NPC Gangs
Unbalanced 'terf'

As it stands at the moment. Being NPC's there is no real effect on a gang member when they're killed or on the gang as a whole. I think this should change. NPC's aren't affected by DCD nor do i think they should be, but to add some realism after death I think there should be a random respawn time.

Something like 4-24 hours.

The recent gang war in the mix got me thinking about this because I saw one NPC dead on the street twice during what was a relatively short turf war. Meaning they respawned and rejoined the fray.

I think this could add depth and a lot of realism. Turf wars between gangs could actually have an impact. Because as it stands now. You kill all of a gang, a short while later they're all standing on the street again proclaiming their turf. This isn't a perfect system it just adds consequences.

It also opens avenues for players who have rivals in a gang to be able to have some kind of effect. Because as it stands right now, they merely insta-respawn with pockets full of Chyen to replace their lost gear.

As for the random respawn time for named NPCs (hence not mobs whose names always differ and could always be rookie Judges and Agents, newfish gangers etc) it is proposed I think as a countermeasure as npcs do not suffer the same death disadvantages as a player. No chance for DCD, no cost for cloning, unlimited funds to purchase new gear and weapons. A player who just died needs time to recover -apart from the time needed to clone and get back to his/her base-. A NPC does not. That's what the random respawn would serve, in my view: this gap between death and recovery.

I think that there may be aspects and details that would need further consideration to make such an idea applicable, but the general spirit finds me in agreement.

A PC has to pay for a new clone, find out what happened cure DCD (if applicable) and recover gear. NPC's (Not just gang members) do not.

I think it could be applied as a blanket to most NPC's. Someone kills Rychek, he isn't going to go straight back to serving drinks. If a storekeep gets murdered they should also have a respawn timer.

It's a balancing. It isn't removing a gangs/NPC's usefulness. It's making consequences for IC actions. Get all your NPC pals killed. You're on your own. Kill all of a rival gang? Take over their turf.

I said it isn't a perfect system. It was an idea I had. And I would like some opinions on it.

Ganger Momento's deaths would reset a need for gear, drugs, etc...also costing them an npc-specific bank based on a "weekly salary". If there bank reached below a threshold, they become impoverished, no longer buy drugs and would be slightly weaker for time.

Storekeeper Momento's deaths would damage the "weekly salary" of the gang controlling the turf they inhabited. It would also shutdown the store for period of time hurting potential profits to the stores owner if any. Immi jobs would flow to alternative shops.

To offset murdering oldbies of doom, you would need some very very bad @hate consequences. Bounties, Terra, WJF, autoturrets in shops, and even then there would still be a lot of potential for abuse.

The transitioning of turf also will require a lot of rp. SD doesn't just reward he who kills the most NPC's. Perming NPC's should definitely be a plot worthy affair as well.

I like the idea of NPC consequences that effect the game-world though.

1) Nobody said they respawn with their gear. NPC’s have access to the Chyen needed to replace their gear instantly. And this wouldn’t change.

2) And it would be a system that forces you to protect NPC lives as much as you do PC lives. Because if your shopkeep gets dead, you make no money. It isn’t about what is better/worse/whatever in regards to NPC’s it’s simply an idea about a respawn timer.

3) I don’t see your point at all in regards to older characters. That has nothing to do with a respawn timer.

The point here isn’t to weaken anybody. It’s to stop NPC’s killed respawning 5 seconds later. Nobody said anything about perming or otherwise making their lives difficult. I’m not suggesting a turf based system. I was using that as an example. Because at the moment, when the Snakes kill all the Arteries. 5 minutes later. The street is filled with the exact same NPC’s that died. Sometimes even before the attack is over. It’s to simulate time taken to recover, hit the bank, get a clone and then hitch the next Lev back to the mix.

Sometimes Balance takes over Realism.

On the one hand, I do understand how the quick and free respawn of NPCs screws with the otherwise carefully balanced game world.

But on the other, I struggle to justify nerfing gang NPCs on the basis of it being unfair or unrealistic that they can get immediately back into the fray. The key point here is that these are big gangs, so just because there are say six targets of a certain gang out and about, even if you kill all of them, you haven't even scratched the surface of their ranks. No one person should be able to, either. Now if you're in a turf war and engaging in something actually RP significant (besides killing all the gangers who @hate you so you have free access in a given region, which is pure and unadulterated metagaming. It's a rare thing, but I have witnessed multiple players do this.), then please get the staff involved so they can affect such a change on the game world.

I think it'd be better for staff to accommodate the exceptions where such a conflict would deserve IC notice/change, than to make it standard that one or a few PCs can easily influence or affect street gangs that have absolutely ridiculous numbers.

"Earning cap? PC's have found a way around that for a long time now. One PC can resupply a whole gang and make tons of money as long as he knows how."

That sounds like cheating to me.

There's only one reason a ganger needs re-kitting:

Theft, almost always accompanied by murder.

Used to be, this income source would have been a solo mission and generate absolutely no RP directly.

Today, since the cap, PC's organize and make chy for themselves and for each other. I've roleplayed with at least five characters I definitely would not have, at the time and possibly not ever, because of the conflict generated by the gangers' reluctance to repeatedly deal with the same PC more than about once a week, depending on the items.

Let's clarify whether what Panda described above is cheating or not. My opinion is that it absolutely drives the kind of "players roleplaying and making money off each other" goal which Johnny described when announcing the cap.

But now we've got an admin on record as saying "this sounds like cheating and people are likely to be punished for it if it is".

So is it? Slither? Now that the details are clear? If this isn't the way we're "supposed" to play, I'll take my licks.

Ganger X dies, five minutes later Ganger is back with different equipment/none at all. Sure, the two may look similar, but can you really tell? You were too focused on surviving your encounter to notice that the first ganger had different colored eyes.

Anyway, that's how I justify it to myself. Also, it makes sense considering how many people in the mix have to turn to crime that they are easily replaced.

Speaking as someone who's been playing this game for 10+ years on and off with the same character, the fatigue system has largely dampened down a heavily UEd characters ability to do this, in addition, there are numerous serious IC consequences (coded and otherwise which I won't go into) if you simply start laying the smack down on any singular group en-masse. More to the point however, it simply doesn't really add anything to RP individually or as a whole for an oldbie to do this and except in very specific circumstances makes no RP sense either way.

Now, I also understand the idea that these members represent more than just themselves in the gang or organization. However, We are supposed to treat these NPC's as other players, but this mechanic goes directly against this type of RP. If I slay Randy, and Randy pops back up in 5 minutes, saying the same things Randy always says, I find it hard to imagine him as someone else. And again, we are told time and again since chargen that we should imagine them as players just like us. So why would they not take the same amount of time, generally speaking, to work through the process of cloning. Now I am wondering how hard it would be, to create some more NPC's that randomly pop out in place of someone who has recently died. I do not think we would need a TON of them, and as usual, you could lean on the current player base to help with descriptions.