Player character/party should be punished for making themselves walking targets

[Wyrmlord]

In Sid Meier's Pirates!, if you were a low level pirate, no one would put a bounty on you or a bounty on you would be simply too low, so you'd never be engaged by the most well armed or dangerous naval vessels.

If however you were to sack enough fleets and cities, and had a large fleet of rare ships, the bounty on you would be so high that rare Ships of the Line would be sent to sink you immediately. Which was a way of telling the player to build his power slowly, and not start punching over high weight soon into the game.

Similarly, in Baldur's Gate 2, having a piece of the holy silver sword made you a walking target for the githyanki, since you can't put your hands on a powerful item without consequences.

I wonder if this concept could be expanded further? No one should be walking around Markath or Riften in Skyrim in daedric armour without a dozen high level assassins or competing heroes noticing it and coming straight for you to kill you and take your shit. Just stay in a peasant's clothes, so no one knows who you are. Otherwise, get ready to be challenged and attacked in the streets anytime.

 

[laclongquan]

And having newbies come crying to the devs' forum "wwaah the NPC being mean to me...." ?

We are not totally touch the issue of veterans purposely bait them into attack so they can retalitate and kill the bandits without bad consequences.

 

[Norfleet]

If however you were to sack enough fleets and cities, and had a large fleet of rare ships, the bounty on you would be so high that rare Ships of the Line would be sent to sink you immediately. Which was a way of telling the player to build his power slowly, and not start punching over high weight soon into the game.

I don't remember this. I searched for ages to get a SotL, jacking everything in sight. Never found one. Test-drove it by editing instead, decided I liked my canoe better. Frigate-classes were just too clumsy and their hitboxes too large.

I wonder if this concept could be expanded further? No one should be walking around Markath or Riften in Skyrim in daedric armour without a dozen high level assassins or competing heroes noticing it and coming straight for you to kill you and take your shit. Just stay in a peasant's clothes, so no one knows who you are. Otherwise, get ready to be challenged and attacked in the streets anytime.

In the middle of town, and be swarmed in guards going, "Stop! You've broken the law!"? Surely not. Besides, do YOU want to attack a guy with that kind of stuff if you're some scruffy bandit? Maybe if you think he's a noob who didn't earn it, but after he guts all your friends, maybe you reconsider and never try that again. And high level assassins? They already have that stuff. Besides, high level assassins and heroes don't kill people for no reason. Assassins don't do this because unless someone is willing to pay to make you dead, assassins don't do freebies, it's bad for their business. Heroes don't do this because, well, they're heroes, and they don't go around just MURDERING people. They'll just put a bucket over your head and rob you blind.

 

[A horse of course]

Attacking someone in full daedric plate is pretty fucking stupid. A brigand shouldn't look at a guy wearing the head of a Greater Archdemon of the Fuckteenth Circle of UberHell, the scales of an undead Black Hole wyrm, the boots of ceaseless nutkicking and the gloves of worldfucking and think "hmm, I could take that guy".


Unless of course the bandit is himself wearing max-level gear. Yet another way in which Oblivion is superior to most RPGs

Moreover, if you're running around in high-lvl gear then you're probably in the midst of high-level quests, in which case you quite possibly have scripted assassins running after you already.

 

[The Glitterdust Golem]

I think that the latter Bioware games are starting to make a good approach with this. Bandits? Assassins? Demons? What good are those things that you're likely killing by the dozen already. True fear shall be sewn in the chosen one's heart by accosting him with the likes of Bumfuck Barry and Pansexual Pam. Let him know that for every quest he might complete, for every innocent he might save (or kick into the mud and murder the dog of), a companion shall be right there to slither their serpentine hand beneath his trousers and whisper child's poetry into his ear. Throw at him the camaraderie of simpering manchildren and strong, independent womyn - each with an endless list of daddy issues, betrayed pasts or quirky quirks. Beset him at every turn with whining and melodrama and someone somehow having a problem with his saving an orphanage of children.

"Defeat this dragon.." whispered the swampy, warm breath of Dorian into the hero's ear, an effeminate finger tracing circles against the hero's bulge, "..and I shall show you the true meaning of what it is to ride the lightning." With a flourish of one hand, Dorian crackled small sparks in the air. With a hammering thrust of his pelvis forwards, the rolling boom of thunder sounded from somewhere.

And run he did.

 

[Cosmo]

Similarly, in Baldur's Gate 2, having a piece of the holy silver sword

NWN 2 you mean...

 

[V_K]

Attacking someone in full daedric plate is pretty fucking stupid. A brigand shouldn't look at a guy wearing the head of a Greater Archdemon of the Fuckteenth Circle of UberHell, the scales of an undead Black Hole wyrm, the boots of ceaseless nutkicking and the gloves of worldfucking and think "hmm, I could take that guy".

That'd be a very fourth-wall-aware brigand.

 

[Roguey]

NWN 2 you mean...

It was BG2. When you return to Athkatla a bunch of 'em show up and demand you either hand over the pieces you have or kill them for it. Kill 'em and you can get that guy to craft you up a +3 vorpal sword.

 

[Cosmo]

Wow, i don't remember that at all. I may have unintentionally skipped it...

 

[ERYFKRAD]

In Sid Meier's Pirates!, if you were a low level pirate, no one would put a bounty on you or a bounty on you would be simply too low, so you'd never be engaged by the most well armed or dangerous naval vessels.

If however you were to sack enough fleets and cities, and had a large fleet of rare ships, the bounty on you would be so high that rare Ships of the Line would be sent to sink you immediately. Which was a way of telling the player to build his power slowly, and not start punching over high weight soon into the game.

Similarly, in Baldur's Gate 2, having a piece of the holy silver sword made you a walking target for the githyanki, since you can't put your hands on a powerful item without consequences.

I wonder if this concept could be expanded further? No one should be walking around Markath or Riften in Skyrim in daedric armour without a dozen high level assassins or competing heroes noticing it and coming straight for you to kill you and take your shit. Just stay in a peasant's clothes, so no one knows who you are. Otherwise, get ready to be challenged and attacked in the streets anytime.

Well, yeah, if the combat in the game actually works and is fun to engage in, and stays lethal throughout.
Otherwise it's just a 5-second irritant especially to a bloke in daedric armour.

 

[Carrion]

Oblivion got it right. At low level you only attracted lowly bandits, whereas when you had built up some reputation, gone up a few levels and got some better equipment, you were attacked by bandits in Daedr... Oh, wait.

In all seriousness, I think something like what's described in the OP would be a pretty logical way of doing what level scaling usually tries to achieve in an open-world game. If you are a level 1 weakling with a rusty iron dagger and some rags, why would anyone even want to attack or rob you? It's not like it's going to be worth it, unless we're talking about some utterly desperate bandits. On the other hand, if you gain the status of a legendary hero and prance around like a peacock in your shiny new armor and magical jewels, you'll be attracting the attention of much more dangerous individuals whereas more low-level bandits probably wouldn't even dare to attack you.

 

[Tigranes]

BG1 did this with assassins, and what you notice when certain difficulty mods expanded on the assassins to make them more difficult and ambush you in non-fixed spots is that they are really challenging and provide you wth a sense of danger as well as progression. When you realise that after hitting the Nashkel mines, any world map travel might find you surrounded by well armed bandits who are powerful enough to actually stand a chance, is significant.

 

[MrMarbles]

BG1 did this with assassins, and what you notice when certain difficulty mods expanded on the assassins to make them more difficult and ambush you in non-fixed spots is that they are really challenging and provide you wth a sense of danger as well as progression. When you realise that after hitting the Nashkel mines, any world map travel might find you surrounded by well armed bandits who are powerful enough to actually stand a chance, is significant.

BG1 also punished you for being a total sociopath ambitious in the beginning and getting a very low reputation (1-2). A party of Flaming Fists would spawn and move towards you on every map (in addition to guards in town maps attacking you). At low levels, and combined with damage from travel ambushes, they could be a handful.

 

[DraQ]

I wonder if this concept could be expanded further? No one should be walking around Markath or Riften in Skyrim in daedric armour without a dozen high level assassins or competing heroes noticing it and coming straight for you to kill you and take your shit. Just stay in a peasant's clothes, so no one knows who you are. Otherwise, get ready to be challenged and attacked in the streets anytime.

Well, stuff like armor and weapons directly translate to combat potential, so smart brigand would probably not want to attack you outright and probably not in the streets without provocation, but underhanded stuff should happen, so should ambushes *if* they have good chance of actually killing you.

OTOH player getting a sizable quantity of gold should paint a big red bullseye on their ass.

Speaking of Skyrim, I kind of liked that reaching sufficient profficiency in any school of magic could make some unkempt looking hedge wizard appear and challenge you to a duel. As much as static (dependent on fixed content like questline completion) reactivity kind of sucked in Skyrim, dynamic reactivity was nothing to scoff at.

Attacking someone in full daedric plate is pretty fucking stupid. A brigand shouldn't look at a guy wearing the head of a Greater Archdemon of the Fuckteenth Circle of UberHell, the scales of an undead Black Hole wyrm, the boots of ceaseless nutkicking and the gloves of worldfucking and think "hmm, I could take that guy".

That'd be a very fourth-wall-aware brigand.

Well, in a fantasy setting, would you try to rob a fucking Sauron if you saw him walking around the streets or wilderness tract?

 

[V_K]

Attacking someone in full daedric plate is pretty fucking stupid. A brigand shouldn't look at a guy wearing the head of a Greater Archdemon of the Fuckteenth Circle of UberHell, the scales of an undead Black Hole wyrm, the boots of ceaseless nutkicking and the gloves of worldfucking and think "hmm, I could take that guy".

That'd be a very fourth-wall-aware brigand.

Well, in a fantasy setting, would you try to rob a fucking Sauron if you saw him walking around the streets or wilderness tract?

But once again - it's the player that knows he's a fucking Sauron, not the brigand. What the brigand sees is a random unknown guy in fancy armor strolling around all alone. Doesn't that just scream easy prey?
Of course, the brigand might have a suspicion that the fancy armor is enchanted (there's probably no way of knowing for sure). But even then realistically it should be one hell of an enchantment for the guy to have the upper hand in a 10 to 1 battle, and the one that powerful should probably have no business walking through the woods alone.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Well, in a fantasy setting, would you try to rob a fucking Sauron if you saw him walking around the streets or wilderness tract?

Yeah sure, if he's worth the xp.

 

[Wyrmlord]

Obviously you should not be attacked by a brigand but by a high level enemy of equal potential.

That is what I liked in BG2, there were other (scripted) party encounters to show you were not the only party on a quest for power.

 

[Ebonsword]

Attacking someone in full daedric plate is pretty fucking stupid. A brigand shouldn't look at a guy wearing the head of a Greater Archdemon of the Fuckteenth Circle of UberHell, the scales of an undead Black Hole wyrm, the boots of ceaseless nutkicking and the gloves of worldfucking and think "hmm, I could take that guy".

That'd be a very fourth-wall-aware brigand.

Well, in a fantasy setting, would you try to rob a fucking Sauron if you saw him walking around the streets or wilderness tract?

But once again - it's the player that knows he's a fucking Sauron, not the brigand. What the brigand sees is a random unknown guy in fancy armor strolling around all alone. Doesn't that just scream easy prey?
Of course, the brigand might have a suspicion that the fancy armor is enchanted (there's probably no way of knowing for sure). But even then realistically it should be one hell of an enchantment for the guy to have the upper hand in a 10 to 1 battle, and the one that powerful should probably have no business walking through the woods alone.

The bandit may not know *exactly* who he's dealing with, but he'd sure know that it's someone he wouldn't want to mess with. In a fantasy setting, someone like Sauron isn't just "a random unknown guy in fancy armor", he'd be radiating waves of pure evil and a mere look from him would would be enough to make an average human wet themselves.

Only a very, very, very stupid bandit would try and rob that kind of personage.

 

[kris]

This should apply when it makes sense. Hey I am just saying the obvious.

It is about setting and the players actions and their fame. While fame might bring them into conflict with good/evil overlords (like assassins and bounty hunters), that fame should also be programmed in as a detterent for some potential encounters. "Oh shit, I didn't see that it was you lord of wyrms! No harm done?" Generally this is in several games as you get enemies with certain factions or scripted encounters as you grown more famous. Didn't one of the fable games have people attack you if you became famous enough?

While agree in principle about a group equipped/possessing valuable things should be a target, that should be more about being robbed (having a high perception skill to avoid). Most criminals are quite cowardly and would take on easy targets, not a full group of armed adventures on steroids. (I guess Jrpg characters then should always be in danger since they look like whussies)

The OP example of the silver sword is a good example, you possess something a powerful group want dearly. The other example of the deadric armor ain't, as most bandits would avoid a heavily armored target and while the armor holds value they prefer gold.

 

[DragoFireheart]

Fallout: New Vegas already does this.

 

[DraQ]

Attacking someone in full daedric plate is pretty fucking stupid. A brigand shouldn't look at a guy wearing the head of a Greater Archdemon of the Fuckteenth Circle of UberHell, the scales of an undead Black Hole wyrm, the boots of ceaseless nutkicking and the gloves of worldfucking and think "hmm, I could take that guy".

That'd be a very fourth-wall-aware brigand.

Well, in a fantasy setting, would you try to rob a fucking Sauron if you saw him walking around the streets or wilderness tract?

But once again - it's the player that knows he's a fucking Sauron, not the brigand. What the brigand sees is a random unknown guy in fancy armor strolling around all alone. Doesn't that just scream easy prey?
Of course, the brigand might have a suspicion that the fancy armor is enchanted (there's probably no way of knowing for sure). But even then realistically it should be one hell of an enchantment for the guy to have the upper hand in a 10 to 1 battle, and the one that powerful should probably have no business walking through the woods alone.

The bandit may not know *exactly* who he's dealing with, but he'd sure know that it's someone he wouldn't want to mess with. In a fantasy setting, someone like Sauron isn't just "a random unknown guy in fancy armor", he'd be radiating waves of pure evil and a mere look from him would would be enough to make an average human wet themselves.

Only a very, very, very stupid bandit would try and rob that kind of personage.

This.

Depending on where on the epic VS realistic spectrum the game falls, said personage either is someone for whom your idea of apocalyptic, world shattering event leaving everyone you have ever knew dead and every place you've ever heard about scorched ash-land would roughly correspond to their idea of tuesday, or merely someone wearing something several fold more durable and protective than notoriously tank-like full plate.

In short, unless you have a very good plan for killing them before they even draw a weapon - no, find yourself an easier prey.

 

[Viata]

The rare item could be well explored in those games. Secret item that makes a number of enemies attack you, which leaves to a side-quest related to this "secret item" if you ask the right people about why people are attacking you/wants secret item. Most side-quest gives you item that make you strong(be it weapon or anything to increase status) or new party member. Why not have a secret, well hidden item that unlock a new side-quest?
As for people attacking you, I guess the opposite would be better. Usually, in fantasy, the weak-looking character or party are attacked by thieves. If you do a solo run, you'll always be attacked (unless, of course, you are looking like Sauron) and if you are doing a party run, the attacks will be decreasing as you level up/do main quest/get better equipments.

 

[DragoFireheart]

Usually, in fantasy, the weak-looking character or party are attacked by thieves. If you do a solo run, you'll always be attacked (unless, of course, you are looking like Sauron) and if you are doing a party run, the attacks will be decreasing as you level up/do main quest/get better equipments.

This can go either way: a weak party is more likely to be targeted by thieves, but a more publicly known party can be targeted by powerful groups that would not care about the weak party.

 

[Gregz]

If you really want this kind of gameplay, try PvP MUDs.

There's nothing like spending 3 months accumulating the best gear you can only to get ambushed, ganked, and stripped bare.

It's quite an experience. I imagine it's similar to how getting gang-raped feels.

 

[laclongquan]

Another solution is that a method of attack that is annoying to player

imagine you walking down the tract. Three mages from hidden places cast Grease, web, and Hold Person on you. 4 archers start peppering you full of arrows from far away. You certainly can take them, but they are surrounding you, meaning you are going to go from one direct to another to kill them one by one, meanwhile still getting arrows on your ass. What the fuck!

The key is maximum range to attack, with status-affected spells, because direct damage spells can be shrugged off.