Contraband semirebalance#1862
Conversation
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I agree with everything but the tools and the bomb suit. A bomb suit is a bomb suit and should arguably be at least C2, for both versions. And Syndicate tools are objectively better than the alternatives in every way. We don't need EVEN MORE people bringing them on station. |
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Also the tools are deadlier than their printed counterparts. |
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By like... 4 damage. Noone's beating you to death with it. |
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It seems like the general community also agrees that the tools should stay C3. In fact, the only one arguing for them to be reduced to C2 is the OP. |
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As far as I've seen, closer only to ~three loud voices. I still don't think they should be as illegal as a literal LMG or plastic explosive though. They're not even that much better. (They certainly don't feel it, at least.) |
Once again, C3 isn't a spectrum. Comparing every piece of C3 to the L6 as the deciding factor on whether or not something should be C3 is at best, stupid. |
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I guess I should express I still have a full-planned re-listing of all contraband coming up, as a note. I've got pathfinder today but post that i've gotta work on that and SEC SoP. |
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Please also check that things like the winter coat and other items in the syndiedrobe are marked down appropriately. As far as the tools go, I say put it up to a vote and run from there. |
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Hmmm, after talking with some others, leave the tools as C3. |
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Also woulf like to see the Jug Suit, Raid Suit, L6, China Lake, RPG, And Riot Launcher all stash banned. |
Ask and you SHALL RECEIVE. :D |
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Oh, and the Commander Suit please |
L6 borg module should be fair game though yeah? |
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For what reason? Give me the logic why a borg should have a weapon exclusively meant for war, especially considering that one recharges. |
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Oh, also the ColSec Jugsuit needs to be stash banned too |
Making my day right now. |
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To be fair, the Jug and Raid suits were already banned. It's nice seeing the L6 and other high powered weaponry get banned as well. |
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should L6 be replaced with something or removed from the loot table too? |
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Not replaced at all. If you fimd one during play, by all means have fun with it, but it simply won't save. |
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There is zero reason for mercs to have a squad suppression weapon at the ready for any threat, same with the other gear. |
Because it is only available to be gotten if nukies buy a borg. There's probably like. 3 on the server total and I'm ngl I will be real fucking pissed if something I paid 7m for gets stash banned |
Same could be said for everything else that has been stash banned. |
Let's be honest when is the last time you've seen the L6C module compared to an L6 SAW. The normal L6 is something I believe can be found as just regular loot. The module can't be. There is no way to obtain it outside of admins running nukeops and them buying the borg. We're already extremely limited in what weapons we can use due to the limit of 1 hand. There's no reason for this. I'm already confused why a thread meant to make stuff more accessible got turned into "let's stash ban more shit" |
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Hmmmmm, I can agree until we make more borg modules. Moreover fwiw, armor for borgs is getting a full pass as it's utter trash in it's current state |
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See, that's the thing, you want the shiny, you have to work for the shiny, Regularly. Do a thing once, have it forever, then never interact with the content that got you that shiny. No. Again, there will be multiple alternatives to pick from. L6 does not need to be something people have on the daily. I will not budge on this. |
It also just goes against persistence as an ideal and the natural consequences and stories that come from the fact that abundance-of-arms and irregular regulation, which has kind of -led- to this happening. If it wasn't supposed to be this way, it probably shoulda got nipped way, way, WAY early into the servers identity..but since it didn't, and there are a -lot- of people who like it that way..all that really needs to be corrected is regulation and giving a cleaner defining of "this stuff comes from a strict, galaxy-wide blacklist because its associated with orgs that seek to kill, destroy...If it has the marking to the org, even if it's a knockoff, that's a point to worry about the risk of the holder -being- part of those organizations." Then..We simply pull the list, knock-down power a bit of those items, make them a high-rated "Strictly for XXX-officiated and trusted groups" kind of regulation, and let them keep the identity of things folks like. We just power them down slightly, give them a new and officiated paint-job that depicts these as "Top-of-line" but not tied to criminal organizations, and we still police them regularly as High-grade contraband gear, to where they're not going to be used or seen EXCEPT on expeditions, or red-alerts and higher. |
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I'm just curious why it was allowed to be stashable previously for an extended period of time and what changed to cause it to not want to be stashable now? Hasn't this thing been available for freelancers for a decently long time now? |
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This is a problem that -can- get solved in a way that doesn't break trust, peoples interest and motivations, and bring a new angle to equipment identity and rarity, and be able to be regulated/balanced well. It just needs time, communication and consideration -- and if that gets met..Just enough back-and-forth dialogue to balance things -perfectly- as the directorates ideals are of clear and firm lines for the world and its narrative. I'm confident all this is doable. And still as ever, happy to help in the endeavor WITHOUT crushing the thing the server relies on, and that's its players. |
Kind of my point. If we suddenly chokehold long-built community expectations and norms rather than tailor them in a way that consciously helps balance AND keep expectations in line, all this'll do is roll things further in a direction of the server losing parts of its identity and what drew folk here. |
I'm going to say something I said before with every expectation that people will not like what I say, but if being able to have an L6 is what draws someone to HardLight, I don't think they're here for MRP, nor do I think they're a healthy addition to the server. |
No its not the L6 specifically being allowed or the MRP or anything like that. Its the fact that its supposed to be persistent and the L6 was a persistent rare reward that players have found and stashed previously for a long period of time. Now its just being taken away. |
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Yeah as someone who just kinda showed up semi-recently, I started collecting stuff and I also saw people had a shit ton of fun stuff and was like "Wow, this is cool! These items I rarely saw on Starlight or ever got to use because they were antag-exclusive are fun to use! And you don't get in trouble for them unless you bring them on station!" Like the Bulldog, I got one of those from an expedition and like... I'm too scared to even bring it onto station during red, I just kinda have it for fun at this point. But now there's uh... There's this. Which, currently does not effect me, but seeing as I have a Bulldog that I got from an expedition that is not worn at all (for some reason) it uh... Yeah. It'll eventually probably effect me seeing as the Bulldog is also a pretty good Syndicate weapon. Probably not on the same level the L6 is, but I'm not all that well-versed in weaponry and I like laser weapons more anyway. |
When I hear 'persistence' as a key word, I imagine that it intends that all your efforts, story, struggle and successes will persist. If someone's just wanted to pocket and keep a really rare or unique thing, that..seems fine? If it's a weapon or item that can pose a great danger or threat? You firmly regulate and police it -- and guess what? If they die, if it gets confiscated, it's just -gone-. They lost it -- but they lost it narratively and via their actions and decision-making. If they lost it because they were careless, thought they could whip it out anywhere they please and people be okay with it? Well, it gets confiscated -- and they STILL lost it due to narrative action, not OOC bite-down. A IC punishment CAN exist, AND allow for both things to be true at the same time. Without having to drag into OOC and staff interventions and distrust. Proper SoP, proper rules, proper regulation, proper clarity. I'm doing the SoPs. I'm doing the regulations. I'm giving the clarity. It just needs to be made into rules and able to be accepted. There's plenty of achievable stuff we can do here -without- having to hold the idea at gunpoint. |
And this right here is an excellent example of part of the problem. People attach value to things that aren't really valuable and can be fairly easily replaced, and then they refuse to ever use it because they're too scared of losing it. So people amass massive hoards of vaguely sentimental junk that they then force the server to endure every time they load their ship. How scared do you think people would be to use their fancy antag L6's if they no longer save? |
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My entire goal in all the stuff i've been contributing in here hasn't been for anything other than making the community and staff more coherent, cognizant and tied together as a community, rather than Boss/employee identity. If the community goes, then all this work that was put in goes with it. All the time, story, effort will just get evaporated and lost if we just choose to neglect the fact that This game does not exist without its community. |
Whats valuable to each player is unique to that player and thats part of having a stash is it not? You have an item that this person just said they find REALLY fun and they use with the risk known that they can keep it or lose it. Why do we need every item to be of similar value when the idea of expeditions and stashes as freelancers are to STORE valuable items that you find and want to keep. How excited do you think a person would get over finding a rare gun they can keep vs a gun they know they're gonna lose. It ruins that excitement factor. |
If the debate is the server enduring stability and lag, I don't think you point at specifically ideally sought-out items that draw awe and interest because "Holy FUCK, where'd you GET THAT?? ISN'T THAT ILLEGAL??" I'd point you at things that do cause pain points to that -- Big ships, amassed storage, no limitation on storage per-ship, maybe also Botany (which ate the guillotine a few days ago, and all botanists so far have been REELING at how sudden and slamming the action was). Putting the illegal dirty-goods stuff on the chopping block isn't addressing server load, it's just biting one symptom of a bigger issue that could instead be addressed and probably -should- get addressed. Let fear be the selling point for people being hesitant to pull the big guns out. Let the risk of losing that be the selling point to being SMART about its used. And let the people who're too scared to ever pull them out -- Let that L6 or whatever collect dust and rot away without ever having gotten used for its purpose just decay away. Just police shit better. That's entirely what i've been working on with my SoP work and everything coming post-its discussion. |
I have to point out the "I will not budge on this." is simply....antithetical. It feels like it is an us vs them mentality for the entire server. No discussion, no meeting halfway, which IS needed at times but... it feels like it's getting to be every time. the polls barely exist, the server as a whole had an entire "We will be more open to listening" a while ago and it still feels... like talking to a wall. Just something I noticed. a blank face in a crowd. |
I... What? I don't know what to say to this I... It's a... Okay, the Bulldog in particular is the first C3 weapon I found on an expedition, sure, you could make the argument that I've put too much sentimental value on it as a result. And sure, it's a gun so like yeah I should be using it for fighting shit but I did that once and in character I nearly lost the weapon as a result and also nearly ashed to wizards. But this feels like a really rude comment in general. Like. Anyone can save stuff. Anything is going to have potential sentimental value to someone, not even for OOC reasons, it could be IC reasons! I have an entire satchel that's saved on one of my shuttles that was given to me IC! And yeah I do have a bunch of stuff saved at this point too, but it's split between a bunch of shuttles. I believe specifically three shuttles at this moment. That too is just gonna happen. (Also yeah I have my own opinion on the botany stuff that happened recently, but seeing as nothing has happened since then, I guess I'm just gonna have to live with that...) |
I am under the assumption that there is either some clear goal or purpose to these attempted brute-force reshapings of the community, or we're just simply reaction-responding to getting bit and tripping over our own feet and making rash judgement calls in response to it. The community I arrived to was a place of persistence, a pretty healthy community full of faces that enjoy roleplaying and the freedom (sometimes CRAZY unique freedom) the server gave compared to others, and that I was promised -- "This place has good leadership. We have people who do care. It's just sometimes they aren't the best at communicating. But they want to grow the place into something great, its just a lot of work." I've only been here a few months and I love a lotta folk here. And i've already seen a lot of familiar faces leave lately due to crackdowns on stuff and I just..Don't know why. I've also seen some amazing work by the community AND its staff and know that the goal's still attainable! |
Agree fully and sincerely. We are struggling with communicating, we're struggling with taking care of the things that matter and keep this place going. And the flexibility is slowly disappearing in place of..I don't know what to call some of these things, other than "shoving issues under a rug, nailing it down and hoping it gets forgotten while people trip over it 24/7". |
Personally, I felt like I wasn't heard listened to or informed on anything, then that same sensation just kept repeating. I am riding the edge like a lot of my friends now but holy fuck do I love it here and want nothing more than it to succeed. It's unique, beautiful, and endlessly enjoyable. but it's also being stripped away merge by merge at times. I cling to what I love, and hope it remains as long as possible while feeling like an axe is looming overhead every day. or someone makes a similar enough server that I can flee to. |
I'm actively sitting here, in a -ticket- of all places, advocating my ability to help with a bunch of these things, assuring all my words and actions are front-facing and visible to all. And that is PURELY because I love this place and the work that's put into it -- And I want to contribute in a way I know i'm strongly capable, and that's community growth, communication, and stability. I came here seeking a better community and promise it was one. it's been kept, I want to help that promise stay that way by doing what I can for it, and being vocal enough to try to point things out that could destabilize or break those promises. Also, it REALLY isn't fun feeling extreme anxiety looming over you like an axe. I've lived that long enough to know that it is misery and a slow, painful bleedout. |
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Its just kinda clear cut situation of someone higher-up not liking something so they want it removed, whether it affects balance or not and won't listen. If people earn something they should be able to keep it, an L6 is not that big of an issue of things, especially for freelancers who regularly deal with mass amount of enemies. Outside of how ridiculous it is to flatly say 'im not budging' because you're a higher up, theres the issue of 'sentimentality'. Of course people are going to get attached to things, they'll get attached to cool weapons and stuff they like and would rather not lose. It'd also like to just plainly point out how fuckin ridiculous it is that you guys are trying to so diligently police PvE majority content lol. Freelancers can't be antags and nor can they be targeted, So its not like you'll ever have the issue unless they get called in and theres more troublesome issues than a L6 which is more likely to friendly fire than deal with something correctly. |
Yeah. I received nothing but love, kindness, and open arms from the community as a whole since I have joined. I have made friends, real connections, and had a lot of fun. there is nothing like it. anywhere. But the management scares me because unless there's a hard course correction, which begets immense change from either the management, community, or BOTH sides, we're going to fizzle out, and everything will have been for nothing. I hope we survive, but I see smoke. |
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alright so, I've only just seen this thread, I'll look over it, I don't think anything has anything to do with those "higher up" making blanket choices, especially given this pr to my knowledge hasn't even been seen by admins (obviously by the looks of things in the comments) |
Wasn't Hammered literally the one who asked for a listed statement of things to get blocked from being stashed? I think that kinda counts. |
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squints looking up haaaammerred |
There is a pr for it too under livy. #1868 |
As discussed and requested by the directorate. |
Yeah just pointing him to it. I nearly missed it being mentioned here too. |
I have offered my abilities and availability up to ya'll to help with things. It does still sit in the ticket with the SoPs and all other work i've been contributing to with staff. That won't be changing, i'll always be present and offering my help if its ever wanted. But I have enough confidence to know it'd help alleviate a lot of pressure points in the community. |
mood as fuck to all of yall.... |
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this too will require more discussion before a merge |
16 participants
About the PR
A lot of items are C3 that probably shouldn't be C3. Presumably this is because Frontier has the classic "it's not NT coloured so it's bad" reasoning. Fortunately HL is not allergic to things that are in colours other than blue.
Therefore, this PR makes the following changes to contraband levels (with balance justifications):
Why / Balance
Generally, C3 should be reserved for things that are actually fairly dangerous/illegal (e.g. L6 SAW, blood-red hardsuit, C-4); and not blanket applied to things that have minor or even no stat changes "because they're Syndicate".
Technical details
Some HL prototypes were moved out of upstream folders and into HL-specific folders.
How to test
Media
Breaking changes
Changelog
🆑 Illumos