What I would like is to have an academic discussion on the pros and cons. Think of it as a ‘what if’ and tell me what the consequences would be, either positive or negative, from your point of view. Please try to be civil to each other. I know this topic can be controversial, but I’m interested in either factual assessments or subjective opinions. Anyway… Guess we may find out if Ramona thinks I’m a sucker or a masochist.
The idea goes something like this. When a player first open fires on another in a situation that would normally create a criminal timer, the game will randomly decide between setting the player criminal or just suspect. The higher the security of a system, the higher the chance of going criminal is.
The check is made per defender such that if all ships are attacking a single target, only one check will be made, otherwise a large fleet is almost guaranteed to trigger CONCORD early. Once CONCORD is triggered by a defender, everyone who shoots that defender illegally goes criminal, but could still save themselves if they break off the attack before firing another shot. Once CONCORD arrives on grid or the defender leaves the grid, they lose their special CONCORD triggering status.
CONCORD still reacts immediately to criminal activity that happens on grid with them, though CONCORD can be pulled off grid in the usual ways (though the timing will be randomized, which may be a little more annoying).
If the aggressing ship does not initially trigger CONCORD, survives any counter attacks, breaks off their attack before the next random check, and they’ve not gone criminal, then they get to keep their ship. If they continue to press the attack, the check is repeated, either renewing the suspect flag or applying the criminal flag and summoning CONCORD.
Let us assume that the random values, time between random checks, and delay before CONCORD arrives when triggered are set such that, on average, CONCORD response time is the same as the existing response time for a system of a given security status, but that they may show up sooner or later depending on luck.
Let us also assume that, for the purposes of the discussion, the development team has the ability and the will to implement the system if the player base approves of it. We all know this is not true, but I am not interested in what’s practical, just what people would think of it if it were practical.
This is an attempt to address the criticism that ganking does not have risk because the results and mechanics are completely predictable. It is also an attempt to incentivize players to rely on CONCORD less by making them less reliable and give anti-gankers more to do by allowing gankers to potentially save their ships, but still be viable targets if anyone is on grid to shoot at them. I am trying not to penalize or promote any particular play style (Except maybe to make it more feasible to be the police if CONCORD doesn’t come). If you feel it does favor one style over another, let me know which style and why you think it is favored.
Again, if you hate the idea, or see flaws in it, that’s fine and I’d like to hear from you, but please don’t go on a tirade about how stupid and terrible a person I must be for thinking of it.
