Discussion: Giving Players a Reason to Interact, not just KOS.

[Window Licker 504]

When respawning infected hit stable, there will defiantly be some "KoSer's" who end up in a bad way, initially at least. I think it will all pan out it's merely the lack of content that is making players bored and wanting to kill someone.

[Mdogg2005 447]

omg another KoS thread.

[D Train 6]

Very few of you understood what this thread is about.
I encourage KOS, its the safest way to deal with other players. KOS is not a problem, nor should it be punished.

 

The problem is that everyone who wants to play "friendly", is currently being punished. A large portion of the playerbase is forced to KOS simply out of self preservation. There's not enough reason not to. However, punishing the KOS crowd in turn, is not the answer.

Enacting any sort of benefit I described would only be available to those who help players from time to time, KOS players included.. It wouldn't punish anyone, it would motivate them to help one or two players instead of killing everyone.
 

Zombies ! More Zombies is always the answer!

 

More dangerous and more numerous zombies are definitely needed in game. But making the game more dangerous for everyone doesn't exactly aid players who are already playing a harder game than the KOS crowd. Some people will always KOS regardless, its their choice to. 

 

There is no possible way to incentivise interaction between players without giving away something you can't just kill them for. ...  A sanity system? ... The OP's suggestion of boosting player stats as a result of player interaction would be incredibly hard to code, take time away from more important things like attempting to fix the ladder bug and are at best an easily exploited system.

How? Bandits often are in groups, which means they have other people to help them bandit and KOS. What's stopping them from interacting with each other to gain these benefits which make no sense from a realism standpoint?

 

These condition based benefits are EXACTLY what you can give players, something that can't be forcefully taken by others. They can be implemented within a day using the current condition system in place. Performing helpful actions to satisfy that condition, with no negatives given by ignoring it, as opposed to starvation or dehydration. Limiting abuse of the system would be simple, limit how many players you can help, or how often you can help, would be a simple fix. And even if players exploit the system with friends, so what? They don't gain anything other players can't gain themselves easily through helping.

 

Following along the lines of what Foolz said, if they make the game stupidly hard to survive as a solo player you could add a reason for interacting.

 

Put a sh*t load of zeds in all the high priority locations.

 

Going to cities, AF's and military bases should require multiple people to help stem the tide of zeds. This could mean people will be more inclined to seek help or assist others. If at that point they, or you, decide to turn on your fellow survivors for the loot, well so be it. At least there was some interaction first!

 

This wouldn't force a playstyle on anyone, you could still hit the smaller towns for a bit of loot then spend your days in the hills hunting if you like. But if you want the good stuff, a bit of co-operation, even if temporary, would be required.

 

You won't get rid of KoS, nor should you. It adds a dynamic to the game whether you agree with it or not.

I would also hate to see anything that defines a player as good or bad. We are all bad already, but just to varying degrees!

 

While I'm not sure if the threat of zombies alone can force players to positively interact, I agree with this post 100%.

 

 

Unless they come up with an EFFECTIVE humanity system like the one below in my signature, the game will be 100% KOS.

 

I disagree, most humanity systems discourage people from KOS. KOS shouldn't be punished, motivating players to help each other, even if only from time to time, is a far more effective path.

 

 

 

 

I will say it again, because no matter how many times I state it, people don't understand.

There is nothing wrong with KOS. There souldn't be a punishment for KOS.

The game is currently punishing players who don't KOS, and THAT is the problem we are looking to fix.

[iBane 381]

You have to been seen to be KOS; period.  

 

People being KOS all the time are making bad choices about where they go, how they move through the game world, and the manner they choose to initiate contact with other "unknown" players.  No amount of special game rewards or perks can or should overcome impatient or reckless player choices.

 

You can initiate contact with players without exposing yourself to being KOS.  You can avoid players you don't know.  You can take steps to minimize the chances you'll be spotted before you spot them.  You can take steps to make sure that when your spotted you're not a sitting duck or easy prey.  

 

This is how you deal with KOS, rather than asking the devs to put in a hand-holding system that gives bad & reckless players protection or advantages that bandits or KOS thugs don't have.  

 

I'm not a KOS thug or bandit, but last time I checked bandits and thugs still spawned into the world with nothing and had to get themselves geared up from nothing.  They managed to stay alive long enough to put themselves in a position to grief you, so why don't you figure out how to do the same.    

Edited March 6, 2014 by iBane

[tommes 331]

KoS is easy to avoid. Don't login to a server!

For friendly interactions stay here in the forums!

[D Train 6]

You have to been seen to be KOS; period.  

 

People being KOS all the time are making bad choices about where they go, how they move through the game world, and the manner they choose to initiate contact with other "unknown" players.  No amount of special game rewards or perks can or should overcome impatient or reckless player choices.

 

You can initiate contact with players without exposing yourself to being KOS.  You can avoid players you don't know.  You can take steps to minimize the chances you'll be spotted before you spot them.  You can take steps to make sure that when your spotted you're not a sitting duck or easy prey.  

 

This is how you deal with KOS, rather than asking the devs to put in a hand-holding system that gives bad & reckless players protection or advantages that bandits or KOS thugs don't have.  

 

I'm not a KOS thug or bandit, but last time I checked bandits and thugs still spawned into the world with nothing and had to get themselves geared up from nothing.  They managed to stay alive long enough to put themselves in a position to grief you, so why don't you figure out how to do the same.    

 

Employing caution and stealth tactics is not a solution, as most people worth a grain of salt will act accordingly. Including your enemies. 

 

No one wants others to have an advantage they can't attain themselves, it would be unfair. The system I suggest would provide a benefit to ANY player who provides aid to others, if only once in a while, regardless of how many players they kill. Friendlys and Bandits alike would be open to receive a benefit. And the benefit could be anything, not just what I've suggested.

 

As long as the system gives players another reason to interact with each other.

[iBane 381]

 

Employing caution and stealth tactics is not a solution, as most people worth a grain of salt will act accordingly. Including your enemies. 

 

No one wants others to have an advantage they can't attain themselves, it would be unfair. The system I suggest would provide a benefit to ANY player who provides aid to others, if only once in a while, regardless of how many players they kill. Friendlys and Bandits alike would be open to receive a benefit. And the benefit could be anything, not just what I've suggested.

 

As long as the system gives players another reason to interact with each other.

 

 

Why should "the system" incentivize one type of play over another?  

[D Train 6]

Why should "the system" incentivize one type of play over another?  

 

As I see it right now, players who KOS already enjoy the following two key benefits:

• Increased Safety, players cant kill you if you've already killed them first. You'll never have to worry about the intentions of your newly met companions.
• Extra Loot, other players are just walking piles of supplies and ammunition for the taking. No need to travel and scavenge for supplies, let them come to you. And if there aren't any players alive to loot your surroundings, more loot for you.

If you decide to help others. you may gain an ally. Even if only during a short time playing together. But you would be splitting loot you come across between each other. You can also argue that playing with random players you come across would increase your safety, and I agree. But there's always a chance for you new friend to turn on you. And thats a risk MOST people aren't comfortable taking, so they resort to KOS strictly for self preservation.

 

Implementing a system that rewards positive interactions between players, even if only once in a while, would do nothing but help the community.

[iBane 381]

As I see it right now, players who KOS already enjoy the following two key benefits:

• Increased Safety, players cant kill you if you've already killed them first. You'll never have to worry about the intentions of your newly met companions.
• Extra Loot, other players are just walking piles of supplies and ammunition for the taking. No need to travel and scavenge for supplies, let them come to you. And if there aren't any players alive to loot your surroundings, more loot for you.

If you decide to help others. you may gain an ally. Even if only during a short time playing together. But you would be splitting loot you come across between each other. You can also argue that playing with random players you come across would increase your safety, and I agree. But there's always a chance for you new friend to turn on you. And thats a risk MOST people aren't comfortable taking, so they resort to KOS strictly for self preservation.

 

Implementing a system that rewards positive interactions between players, even if only once in a while, would do nothing but help the community.

 

These are "benefits" the players create for themselves by killing other players.  The system isn't giving them an extra benefit because they killed another player.  However, I can make the argument that there are at least three disadvantages to KOS or bandit behavior.  You typically need to be in busy or dangerous areas, discharging firearms attracts attention to your location making it difficult to loot your prey, and most combat interactions end up ruining or damaging significant portions of the "extra loot" they are after.  

 

Should players of the bandit/KOS mentality be complaining that the system is unfairly stacked against them because of these trade-offs???

Edited March 6, 2014 by iBane

[finnpalm 312]

From my point of view the reason so many people KoS is:

 

Currently zombies aren't that big of a threat. This in turn allows players to fairly safely scavenge for supplies and therefor easily survive, making survival also become a lesser threat.

 

If zombies are created to be a bigger threat it will be harder to scavenge for supplies and surviving will be a bit trickier because you need to think and work harder to get a can of beans. And once you get that can you need to work harder to find something to open it with and even if you open it, finding a safe place to eat the beans will be trickier. In short, more numerous and aggressive zombies allow for an exponential scaling of the difficulty of the game. It's currently too easy.

 

The fact that the game is a bit too easy leads to players getting bored, and looking for action elsewhere, namely in PvP. Which raises the number of players who utilize the KoS tactic. When someone who kill on sight say that they like playing that way it's often not because it's the only way they would potentially enjoy playing this game, but rather the only appealing way to play the game in it's current state. If or when the game changes the number of KoS-players will change along with it. It will never go away completely because those who actually just like to shoot other players will figure out a way to do it no matter if the game changes. And that's all fine.

 

However, the current amount of players who kill on sight leads to it being very difficult to get into friendly interaction, and since players who would potentially enter a friendly situation are so wary of this, it eventually leads to resignation and "falling in line", resulting in freshspawns attacking everything they see with their fists and other strange behaviour.

 

-----------------------

 

How to fix it:

 

Well, I'm not going to pretend I have a definite answer or a fix up my sleeve, like some magician. But I would like to present my thoughts on the matter.

 

More zombies.

More aggressive zombies.

More common loot (clothes, simple melee weapons, bandages or rags), and less rare loot (guns, military loot, ammunition).

Rewards based on how long one manages to stay alive.

 

One could also add (although this might make the exponential difficulty curve a lot steeper):

 

Less food.

More environmental hazards (other than the planned ones, like cardiac arrest, weather, diseases).

 

Let me dwell on in what way these things would change the game:

 

Apart from zombies which I covered above, more common loot would mean that you can faster get a simple melee weapon to defend yourself from zombies, clothes to shield you from the weather and bandages to stop bleeding. These are essential.

 

Rewards for staying alive will help lower the amount of players with a deathwish which in turn will make fewer people get into a gunfight at the drop of a hat. More, and aggressive zombies will also help this to some extent since zombies are attracted to sound and movement.

 

Less food and more environmental hazards will make the game even more difficult than it would potentially be with the prior additions detailed above, which will in turn make players more busy trying to stay alive just, and leaves less time to seek action, because there'll be enough action just staying fed and warm as is suitable for a survival simulator.

 

All of the above will make it more rewarding to interact and maybe trade with other players. Not more rewarding than killing them and taking all their stuff instead of trading for a select few items, but more rewarding than it is now which will balance the two approaches better. Currently there is little gain in trying to trade with, give help to or trying to get help from other players because you can easily just scavenge the supplies needed on your own. But if guns were less common or ammo scarce people would more often take the friendly approach since it's so hard to try and assault someone with a crowbar and to interact in a friendly manner and potentially trade would be easier in such a case.

 

--------------------------------

 

These are my thoughts on what changes to the game will affect player behaviour in what way. Luckily, most of those changes are on their way, and I have high hopes for this game. I love the idea of a hardcore survival simulator in a full PvP sandbox world and really hope they can pull this off.

[D Train 6]

These are "benefits" the players create for themselves by killing other players.  The system isn't giving them an extra benefit because they killed another player.  However, I can make the argument that there are at least three disadvantages to KOS or bandit behavior.  You typically need to be in busy or dangerous areas, discharging firearms attracts attention to your location making it difficult to loot your prey, and most combat interactions end up ruining or damaging significant portions of the "extra loot" they are after.  

 

Should players of the bandit/KOS mentality be complaining that the system is unfairly stacked against them because of these trade-offs???

 

I agree, the trade off for damaging the loot is very high at the moment.

 

But once equipment damage is optimized, and less objects become damaged during firefights, that argument would become less valid. Your entire jacket and vest and everything in them wont become ruined just from one bullet to the chest.

[Martmital 436]

How can easy mode be satisfying?

 

Imo killing on sight is for weak. Is way too easy to just camped it out and spray people down. 

 

Real challenge is to get close and make the guy surrender and if he doesn't well, let the game begin. 

 

Camping and killing on sight are not the same thing bro...

 

Seriously though, you take away KoS and you take away one of the main things in this game... suspense!

 

Running round trading beans and bandages don't sound like much fun.

Edited March 6, 2014 by Martmital

[iBane 381]

I agree, the trade off for damaging the loot is very high at the moment.

 

But once equipment damage is optimized, and less objects become damaged during firefights, that argument would become less valid. Your entire jacket and vest and everything in them wont become ruined just from one bullet to the chest.

 

Says who, where?  So in the end, you're asking for a weird hero/nice-guy reward system to overcome an "fairness" imbalance that doesn't exist yet, but might sometime in the future?  Hmmm.  I think it's time you:

 

Edited March 6, 2014 by iBane

[KarmaCoin 72]

How can you programmatically determine if a player interaction is good or bad though?

[Meekalew 44]

I will think once the zombie AI is properly fixed, KoS will be reduced... even on Experimental now, firing a gun brings a relatively small horde of zombies running to the location of the shooter.

 

Once this is refined, firing a gun will be risky business in towns/cities; and you will have to judge whether or not robbing or killing this person in front of you will be worth the risk. Snipers will have a hard time hiding in the woods, the first shot they fire will bring zombies running to them, and they won't be able to quietly sneak away from their position; they will have to up and run, making spotting them much easier. Also, bandits will have to determine whether the amount of ammo they will need to gun down a zombie horde as a result of gunfire will be worth it. There'll be more loss to banditry and killing on sight than there would be gain in most cases. If you're going to wind up using 2-3 clips of ammo gunning down zombies after firing a single bullet to kill someone... it'll make ammo a rare commodity and worth preserving. Bandits will have to spend more time server hopping and less time being bandits.

[Meekalew 44]

How can you programmatically determine if a player interaction is good or bad though?

 

+/- Karma.

 

If you shoot or hit an unarmed player, you lose a karma point.

 

If you shoot an armed player who has negative karma you gain a karma point.

 

If you shoot an armed player who has positive karma you lose a karma point.

 

The system would even work out its own flaws; for instance, if a player with negative karma kills another player with negative karma; they might gain positive karma, but they're still lowering the risk of threats.

 

Karma wouldn't even need to be a statistic you could see or be aware of... but could affect your character in subtle ways.

 

At least, if I were programming positive/negative interaction that is how I would start doing it. :)

[wild_man 4442]

simple act of killing player I don't know and never meet before is most satisfy single action in dayz :)

 

best is shoot with pistol or rifle whatever it feel very nice and satisfy with reload animation and sound of the bang and see player drop is always making many guys smile

 

NOTHING STOP THIS BEING PLEASURE :P

 

and here is problem for guys who try to find answer for 'problem' which is not problem

 

thousands of guys have talk about this for YEARS since early days of mod and NOBODY FIND SOLUTION :huh:

 

because is no solution :|

 

Because for many guys with healthy competitive nature and love of pvP KILLING IS PINNACLE OF PLEASURE IN THIS GAME :thumbsup:  ;)

 

you can put some mechanic to encourage guys to cooperate because they need for survive

 

but when this need finish guess what happen???

 

MORE MURDER!!! :rolleyes:

[finnpalm 312]

simple act of killing player I don't know and never meet before is most satisfy single action in dayz :)

 

best is shoot with pistol or rifle whatever it feel very nice and satisfy with reload animation and sound of the bang and see player drop is always making many guys smile

 

NOTHING STOP THIS BEING PLEASURE :P

 

and here is problem for guys who try to find answer for 'problem' which is not problem

 

thousands of guys have talk about this for YEARS since early days of mod and NOBODY FIND SOLUTION :huh:

 

because is no solution :|

 

Because for many guys with healthy competitive nature and love of pvP KILLING IS PINNACLE OF PLEASURE IN THIS GAME :thumbsup:  ;)

 

you can put some mechanic to encourage guys to cooperate because they need for survive

 

but when this need finish guess what happen???

 

MORE MURDER!!! :rolleyes:

 

The problem isn't that people are shooting each other in DayZ SA. The problem is that so many are doing it. I (and many others) would simply prefer to see a better balance between the two.

[wild_man 4442]

...The problem is that so many are doing it. I (and many others) would simply prefer to see a better balance between the two.

 

 

I know :|

 

reason so many doing is because most guys enjoy ;)

 

and they playing game for fun to enjoy

 

only way to reduce KoS is play more intelligent way and don't make easy for us :D

 

believe me majority of murder I doing is too much easy

 

problem is not KoS player because this is majority of player base :rolleyes:

 

problem is guys who making easy target

 

why is I only dying from player maybe 8 or 9 time in 140 + hour of play and kill more than 30 guys?

 

is because I play with maximum care and stealth way :thumbsup:  :ph34r:

Edited March 6, 2014 by KoS

[finnpalm 312]

only way to reduce KoS is..

 

I disagree that is the only way. I've already posted my ideas in this thread so I won't do it again.

Edited March 6, 2014 by Strawman

[D Train 6]

From my point of view the reason so many people KoS is:

 

Currently zombies aren't that big of a threat. This in turn allows players to fairly safely scavenge for supplies and therefor easily survive, making survival also become a lesser threat.

 

If zombies are created to be a bigger threat it will be harder to scavenge for supplies and surviving will be a bit trickier because you need to think and work harder to get a can of beans. And once you get that can you need to work harder to find something to open it with and even if you open it, finding a safe place to eat the beans will be trickier. In short, more numerous and aggressive zombies allow for an exponential scaling of the difficulty of the game. It's currently too easy.

 

The fact that the game is a bit too easy leads to players getting bored, and looking for action elsewhere, namely in PvP. Which raises the number of players who utilize the KoS tactic. When someone who kill on sight say that they like playing that way it's often not because it's the only way they would potentially enjoy playing this game, but rather the only appealing way to play the game in it's current state. If or when the game changes the number of KoS-players will change along with it. It will never go away completely because those who actually just like to shoot other players will figure out a way to do it no matter if the game changes. And that's all fine.

 

However, the current amount of players who kill on sight leads to it being very difficult to get into friendly interaction, and since players who would potentially enter a friendly situation are so wary of this, it eventually leads to resignation and "falling in line", resulting in freshspawns attacking everything they see with their fists and other strange behaviour.

 

-----------------------

 

How to fix it:

 

Well, I'm not going to pretend I have a definite answer or a fix up my sleeve, like some magician. But I would like to present my thoughts on the matter.

 

More zombies.

More aggressive zombies.

More common loot (clothes, simple melee weapons, bandages or rags), and less rare loot (guns, military loot, ammunition).

Rewards based on how long one manages to stay alive.

 

One could also add (although this might make the exponential difficulty curve a lot steeper):

 

Less food.

More environmental hazards (other than the planned ones, like cardiac arrest, weather, diseases).

 

Let me dwell on in what way these things would change the game:

 

Apart from zombies which I covered above, more common loot would mean that you can faster get a simple melee weapon to defend yourself from zombies, clothes to shield you from the weather and bandages to stop bleeding. These are essential.

 

Rewards for staying alive will help lower the amount of players with a deathwish which in turn will make fewer people get into a gunfight at the drop of a hat. More, and aggressive zombies will also help this to some extent since zombies are attracted to sound and movement.

 

Less food and more environmental hazards will make the game even more difficult than it would potentially be with the prior additions detailed above, which will in turn make players more busy trying to stay alive just, and leaves less time to seek action, because there'll be enough action just staying fed and warm as is suitable for a survival simulator.

 

All of the above will make it more rewarding to interact and maybe trade with other players. Not more rewarding than killing them and taking all their stuff instead of trading for a select few items, but more rewarding than it is now which will balance the two approaches better. Currently there is little gain in trying to trade with, give help to or trying to get help from other players because you can easily just scavenge the supplies needed on your own. But if guns were less common or ammo scarce people would more often take the friendly approach since it's so hard to try and assault someone with a crowbar and to interact in a friendly manner and potentially trade would be easier in such a case.

 

--------------------------------

 

These are my thoughts on what changes to the game will affect player behaviour in what way. Luckily, most of those changes are on their way, and I have high hopes for this game. I love the idea of a hardcore survival simulator in a full PvP sandbox world and really hope they can pull this off.

 

I agree with everything except rewarding a player based on time alive as that would only hinder positive player interaction. Assuming the reward is lost in death.

 

So in the end, you're asking for a weird hero/nice-guy reward system to overcome an "fairness" imbalance that doesn't exist yet, but might sometime in the future?

 

The imbalance already exists, as outlined many times in my previous posts, and it will only become greater equipment degrades from damage instead of becoming instantly ruined. In turn, allowing more usable loot to be scavenged off a victims corpse.

 

 

The problem isn't that people are shooting each other in DayZ SA. The problem is that so many are doing it. I (and many others) would simply prefer to see a better balance between the two.

 

Exactly.

 

+/- Karma.

 

If you shoot or hit an unarmed player, you lose a karma point.

 

If you shoot an armed player who has negative karma you gain a karma point.

 

If you shoot an armed player who has positive karma you lose a karma point.

 

The system would even work out its own flaws; for instance, if a player with negative karma kills another player with negative karma; they might gain positive karma, but they're still lowering the risk of threats.

 

Karma wouldn't even need to be a statistic you could see or be aware of... but could affect your character in subtle ways.

 

At least, if I were programming positive/negative interaction that is how I would start doing it.  :)

 

Why should we punish players for playing the way they choose?

 

How can you programmatically determine if a player interaction is good or bad though?

 

You don't have to. Actions like healing a wounded player or force feeding a starving player would be positive. Performing a certain amount of those positive actions, some worth more than others, would eventually satisfy the condition to grant whatever benefit given. In time that condition will degrade, eventually losing the benefit, unless an upkeep of those positive actions are performed. You can limited and adjusted by player, time, or value.

Edited March 6, 2014 by D Train

[hotcakes 348]

...You already get a bonus for buddying up.

[tommes 331]

In the future you will be able to craft a devastating book howitzer. It will be literally deadly. Pun intended. The book is mightier than the sword! I personally hope for makeshift booky traps...booby traps from books. Expanding your mind to the next wall...

[JonayofSweden 12]

I agree with you that there should be some insentive for people to be good but I don't think any kind of buff is subtle enough. People will just be like "Oh dude can I give you some bandages I don't have the hero buff" and they will go on to shoot new players.

I don't think people who kill you on sight, then when you ask them why they reply "because you're gay" Is going to stop that behaviour. A really subtle approach would be to apply to their greed, for example, one way is already how loot is ruined (not really meanngfull now because even if they have good loot, not dying in a dangerous situation, or just trigger happiness or the easiness to get loot is more prevelent) but I think things like increase the radious of gun fire sounds, to a more realistic level so that people don't want to shoot unless they have to because other people with guns are gonna come for them, because we all know once someone fires people are drawn to that location. More ways to get away or sneak, add away where you can walk silently (however slow that walk would be) so that you can hide better.

Some things in that direction. It will never stop KOS people but it would help. or if you could shove people down or whatever so you don't have to kill them if they get very close quickly.
 

[Mullraugh 1151]

yep and when you finaly manage into town and find some loot you will be bad option to split loot with you so why dont simply kill you ?

 

Thanks for the colour. I didn't need my eyes anyway.