Dear Devs: Regarding The Law, and Crime

[thedoorlord 0]

Dear Devs,

I strive to be straight-forward with this post, but it will be random as my brain is only capable of millions of ideas all at once. I'll encapsulate a few of them here.

Haven't done too much searching through the forums in-case there's a similar post, nor have I played a beta of this game if there has ever been one.

I'm also new on the forums.

Just here adding a few cents here for anyone to consider, since this game just hit my horizons and I'm considering purchasing a founder-pack!

 

REGARDING LAW AND CRIME:

I'd like to say at this point: it will be a good idea (down the road) to have a system of control over the players who are going to apply for Law positions.

-Give players trials to apply for police, and provide systems to heavily monitor police-player activities/limit the power of the Police.

Why?

Abuse of overpowered abilities such as jailing, arrest, pulling people over while metagaming (watching a twitch stream, or having an alt account, knowing someone is doing a crime and finding them to arrest them with no real evidence), and other pre-trial interactions such as arrests for suggested misdemeanors which never happened, effectively wasting player gameplay time by taking them to HQ. Monitoring the police needs to be a thing.

Corruption should not be allowed in the game's justice system in the slightest, keep big borders between law and crime. With the exception of sharing information regarding meta-gaming *tipping off cartels about cartels etc* metagaming is the most broken mechanic of online games and MMORPG's. Players will exploit players via metagaming, and many fun aspects of law/crime will be instantly evaporated as players do personal investigations, or even police-players creating alts to join crime families, waiting for them to instigate a felony, and logging onto their police account to *conveniently intercept and arrest them, or vice versa; criminals creating police accounts to arrest other crime families, or to wave access to areas by diverting police attention with a random radio call to allow them to complete their crimes. Even allowing players to take bribes via trading should be banned as well. There needs to be a clear light and dark to the game, otherwise the police and law will be based on favoritism and reputation, instead of black and white right and wrong. Where a famous twitch streamer gets passed on by a squad of police because they know who he is, or having outstanding warrants ignored because they are friends with the criminal, etc etc etc etc etc. 

 

To simplify my late-night ideas I've created a list of bullet-points which Identity dev's should consider, or reconsider.

 

o Police Training Camp

-Player must take in-game classes to learn how to represent county authority properly and how to handle crime respectfully and with moderation regarding the law.

-Player must take a shooting test

-Player must memorize at least a few police radio codes and radio conduct.

-Player must be taught of the penalization system regarding corrupt police officers or abusing the power of the badge.

 

o Police Recruit Weekly Reviews

-System in place to monitor how many players are in the force at one time, and players will compete to hold their positions based on their in-game activity, arrests, popularity, and record of active service as an officer.

-This can also work in favor as a promotion system, instead of a over-simplified rpg job progression system which gives players one requirement to progress in a promotion: EXP

*Why a EXP based job progression system is not preferred*

-Anyone can find a way to exploit EXP through game-mechanic abuse or metagaming (farming crime-arrests with a friend using an alt acc for job promos)

o Dupe accounts and Alt accounts are bannable *metagaming and currency farming will kill a sandbox RPG life-sim if nothing is done about it in pre-tense. End of story.

o Admin Police/Military/Warden/Marshall/Judge/Lawyers

-The gentle placement of admin/moderator police or law officials will create a environment where people actually monitor and premeditate their crimes in fear of being rightfully penalized by the well-informed, active admins. Players will want to interact, impress, beat, outsmart their admin overseers in their activity (crime, justice). Admins will also be there as a rolemodel to inspire, teach, and remind players how to be better citizens, police, even to be better criminals.

 

o Do not provide players immediate access to a police cruiser if they join the force.

-Perhaps players will become a town "rent-a-cop" before being provided access to police testing. Keep them from having immediate access to an overpowered mode of transportation and power to halt a player's in-game progress (through the arrest system). If players can simply join the force, you'll see more cops roaming to do personal errands in their cruiser when they get on and avoid conflict with doing their jobs, because they were given instant access to a vehicle; without a need to go to driving school, or learn the road laws, etc. Players parking in the middle of the street, what-have-you. Please appropriate a proper recruitment system/roadmap for players so not EVERYONE joins the force for the free gun, free power, and free car.

 

o Cops get tazers which incapacitate players so they may be taken in easily.

-Unless cops are doing a raid, they do not need lethal firearms, and they shouldn't be given the ability to incapacitate a player costing them a medical bill AND bail for running from a parking ticket etc.

o Cop cruisers are not "modified to be faster than every vehicle EXCEPT *this* cash shop car" etc. 

o Cops can have body armor but aren't invincible or anything OP that changes the reality of mortality

o Cops don't have grenades but have a helmet, shotgun and AR in their trunk which they must literally retrieve.

o Cops must always be with a partner, so players will really judge each other whether they are right or wrong, and can report it to higher authority to get their promo.

-In addition to admin monitoring, players will be put in a position where they can report their colleagues for being dirty cops, so criminals are truly demoralized and refrain from making silly cop alts.

o Criminals get a debuff if marked by on-duty police which only may be seen by on-duty police and law officials, and a warrant/APB goes out on radio and to the stations, the courthouse, and to player cell-phones in a "amber alert" style notice, etc

-Players will be instantly recognized by police with a symbol next to their name etc if they have warrants, maybe have a system in a cell phone or in the police cruiser and HQ that shows a list of all APB and warrants so the community is intimately informed about crime, who to avoid, who to trust, and a record of a player's criminal history which will keep people from hiring them, and slumping criminal income, which in turn forces criminals to do more hard crime to obtain their rent.

-Players once caught committing a crime will be forced into a bottle neck where they must go into hiding, and the crimes do not disappear after 5 minutes like in GTA, that player will then be on the run for their entire game-life for running from a crime, and they can then retreat to the criminal underground, explained below. 

o Criminals can be denied housing by landlords, criminals can lose their license to drive, etc.

o Add a small town somewhere in the game where there is a "safezone" for criminals; where they can do no crime, hurt no players, where there are few streets for police to approach the town. This becomes a haven acting sort of like a large "tavern for pirates" where everything is super cliquey and the word of the street reaches the ears of everyone involved in crime so they may give shelter to a man-on-the-run etc. 

-Players can pay for an identity change which costs 150% of their crime-bail costs, which doesn't include property destruction costs, but all the variables in the costs for crimes are rounded up to 50% of the bail so the price is justified. All warrants become nullified once a player changes their identity. A player may do this once a month.

-Casino where players can gamble, solicit escort services and sell drugs (*if these become a mechanic)

-Clustered-and-cramped shopping district where players can buy hot merchandise from less-than-legal salesmen or companies in narrow alleyways that insinuate a dangerous and sketchy vibe.

-Many nightclubs, bars and restaurants where crime families can launder their money (if dirty money becomes a mechanic, or players can purchase this in-game real-estate to provide streams of passive revenue for their syndicate/corporation, which will create a somewhat fixed criminal "Plutocracy hierarchy" and may not be preferred in the long term as this would give players an incredible advantage as real estate in a game like Identity would likely be simply limited to thousands of players and that does not support an entire community, giving people a massive leap ahead of others)

-Players can retreat to this underground (let's say that's the name of this town) to blend in with a crowd after committing a crime, sell their stolen merch, meet criminals, join a gang, and have safe-guarded criminal meetings of business etc. This location will be the town square for criminals and will be a very influential environment, inspiring citizens to learn the trades of criminals, or to avoid this town entirely to stay safe, and keep the underground from reaching the humble citizen town. 

 

----This ends my brief board of suggestions that I've surmised here in this post.

I've owned dozens of roleplay servers on all manner of sandbox rpg games, and one of the main selling points of a game like Identity is the law system. This law system can be manipulated (*interacted with) by any player who applies for Law, Justice, or an office such as Government, so it must be planned VERY intricately, and carefully. These systems must simply give players the tools and overhead to perform their duties, and a system to watch over their activities. The game will die if Justice system is broken or overpowered, or if the crime system is broken or overpowered. Obviously the players will inherently determine the outcome of what becomes OP or what becomes challenging, but it still stands that these professions or systems must be monitored, and the right people for the job must be chosen. In a roleplay oriented game, players should be willing to put a little effort into developing their career through simple interviews, tests, studying, and learning how to be the person they want to be in-game. If a badge and a gun is given to a player by simply clicking the [Join Police] button you can sign your own grave.

The key to success in a roleplaying game is having sufficient social environments for players to play in whilst off-duty (not completing content or character progression.) 

The one thing I've learned in my 14 years of playing MMORPGS is: A player will spend a whole 24 hours straight grinding for a piece of loot, but once they have that shiny sword they will spend a whole 800 hours loitering in the main hub showing it off and talking about their day with their in-game colleagues.

Make the 800 hours of loitering more enjoyable and diversified than the 24 hours of content and your game will survive decades.

 

Thank you to those who read this post, there needn't be any comments here, this is just a sticky note for the developers regarding my expectations for the game.

Also I will likely not reply to any comments on this post. Just planting my seed of advice here.

Instead of worrying if the game will be a success or not because of the simple justice system, I'm publicly posting what can be done to safeguard the future of this wonderful game.

With much love and hopeful regards,

-Agent/Warden/Major/Chief/Crime Boss/Adjutant/Mayor/Officer "Quack"

 

P.S

I've created many sandboxes via modding/map creating in many games, my ideas list for MMORPG's has been slowly compiled over a decade as I've played games, seen what works, what ruins a game, and why. This game is underway so I assume you all have your work in front of you making the world great as we speak. I don't want to gloat or put myself ahead of you all, but if you ever need suggestions I'll always respond to a kind email. You guys are awesome for making this game, as a modern life sim is one of the most challenging sandboxes to monitor and maintain as a commercial and social success for years to come, especially once you introduce player cops and player government. It is wise to leave only so much of the game's entire fate in the hands of the players, even in a virtual sandbox where everything is realistically decided by the players including government and law enforcement. Players are known to make other players quit, easy for a police officer to give someone a bad time!

Also, please dear lord, add a driving school.

No one should be parking in the street. Implement a system where players connect their car to a parking space and it turns into a static mesh until activated or stolen. Adequate parking for thousands of players is also definitely needed. Admins should literally have shifts of parking duty where they impound vehicles wrongly parked etc. Drivers license should also be something a player pays a small fee for monthly (in-game currency) and players should have to take a special test to drive diesel/semi's. Imagine the damage people will cause with semi trucks is all I can think about LOL.

Thanks again for reading.

[JamesLuck01 1,531]

2 hours ago, thedoorlord said:

Dupe accounts and Alt accounts are bannable *metagaming and currency farming will kill a sandbox RPG life-sim if nothing is done about it in pre-tense. End of story.

There will always be a problem like this.

except, it is Bannable to have multiple accounts already.

You will be able to have 2 characters on the same account, so having multiple accounts is more useless. (on official servers)

Official servers will have a system which automatically does the police recruitment, but first you have to do tutorials type training. 

Official servers are not heavy and strict on rules e.g. meta-gaming and RDM won't be a thing. Official servers will be more a casual setting.

 

I think you should go read all materials and resources on this game because nearly everything I have read so far is already a thing or has been looked at. RESEARCH!!!!! Please.

No Military in the game. 

A driving school, it is more a tutorial that you have to watch and then you get a license but it could be more detailed than that.

Your very last bit is already something, if players don't park in appropriate spaces then they can be fined / towed away! 

In real life, no one pays monthly for a driving license so that is not going to be a realistic thing to add. (At least in the UK they don't)

 

[AzkabanTV 8]

I can't lie though this does make me wonder a bit about hot action cop style chases vehicle to vehicle, seeing as it's not intended for players to be able to shoot out of their vehicles just because of the absolute trolling wreck that could come from that, and seeing as there WILL be runners, I do wonder at this point what the difference in mechanical strength will be of cop cars, because it would be outright odd to see a Geo Metro take down a cop car just because the cop car totaled itself by ram-barring someone wrong.

[thedoorlord 0]

 

@JamesLuck01

Thank you forum do-gooder for informing me!

I'll see you on the streets ?

[thedoorlord 0]

Thread Solved

[Loops101 0]

On 3/8/2017 at 1:34 PM, JamesLuck01 said:

You will be able to have 2 characters on the same account, so having multiple accounts is more useless. (on official servers)

wait you can only have 2 characters? what do you mean and why? Thanks in advance

[DLimit 167]

One issue that my person possesses with the criminal element of the game:

A criminal should not be incarcerated for an offense unless the Law enforcement officer, detective, or state possesses PROBABLE CAUSE to incarcerate the individual. For example, a human being should not be deemed as a "suspect" for executing a citizen within the woods at 3:30AM in the morning until evidence confirms that the suspect or individual had committed the act through a combination of methods.

First scenario: A suspect executes a female within the middle of the woods at 3:30AM on Monday. The suspect departs from the location while dropping a tissue on to the ground approximately half a mile from the deceased body. On Wednesday, a jogger or hiker witnesses the deceased body in order to report the offense to Law enforcement officers. The Law enforcement officers secure the scene while investigating the cause of death, date, and time while searching for evidence to confirm the identity of the suspect. Afterwards, canine units are summoned in order to scavenge for evidence until the Law enforcement officer discovers a tissue that is required to be examined by forensic scientists. After the evidence is examined, Law enforcement officers confirm that the tissue that consists of mucus was either A) a former felon known as _______ or B) Unknown suspect. Thus, Law enforcement officers resort to conducting road-blocks in order to swab the gums of an individual. Eventually, the DNA shall be the confirmed suspect, resulting in his arrest on Saturday.

Second scenario: A suspect executes a female along the roadside and drags her body to a river on Monday. After three days, one of the character's peers, family members, employee, or employer contacts Law enforcement officers regarding a "missing person". The suspect is NOT charged with the offense considering that the female might have merely "ran away" rather than being deceased. Thus, after a week, a trucker locates the body of a female that is hidden within the bushes of the road during his "piss break", resulting in the confirmation that the female has been executed. Once again, Law enforcement officers are expected to continue to process of investigating the incident prior to determining whether the suspect had committed the crime....

Third scenario: A suspect stabs a male in the middle of the street at 4:00PM. Several citizens had witnessed the criminal act. Thus, the description of the suspect's physical appearance is disclosed to Law enforcement officers. Law enforcement officers utilize the description in order to incarcerate the individual.

Etc...

A suspect should not be classified as a "criminal" that has committed a "criminal offense" if his person were to execute an individual within the middle of the woods, identical to Grand Theft Auto.

*Stabs man in woods*.... *WANTED*.