Ideas to fix Spawn Killing

There is a difference between spawncamping someone without the intend of sinking them and doing it to secure the sink. The first is indeed toxic and propably against the Code of Conduct, however the latter is actually a very viable strat. In SoT if someone boards you, with the exception of deckshots, you either have misplayed or got outskilled by a better opponent. Nothing wrong with either of those cases, but that doesn't mean that the game needs any significant changes. If anything with the addition of traps, i could argue that it is in fact a nerf to the opponent boarder since you can either put them on ladders to prevent boards, or in certain spots in your ship to fight around, thus getting the upper hand. The only thing that could be done, is for the game to spawn you with a 1 sec immunity, because sometimes due to ping you spawn right in front of the enemy and get instakilled before you can react.

As always.

You lost control of your ship. Can no spawn to even fight back. Thus, scuttle to leave the battle or server and move on.

@killerk70 said in Ideas to fix Spawn Killing:

@BurnBacon
Unfortunately your idea that someone should scuttle because their opponent is harassing them is rather pro-bully and not at all an attempt at a solution to Spawn Killing. If you have anything helpful to add that isn't meant to cause unrest or derail the conversation, I would love to hear it.

To be fair, this is a good solution, however there was some context left out.

If you are actually being harassed and the enemy is not trying to secure a sink in these situations, which will be fairly obvious in a respawn or two, then you should take the appropriate steps to gather some evidence real quick (record a respawn or two).

Next, you should scuttle your ship (your choice if you want to scuttle and server merge or if you want to take your chance staying on the same server this crew is on right now). Now that you have your evidence the most important thing is not keeping yourself in this kind of situation - in particular if it is having a negative impact on you. There is no sense prolonging your suffering because your mental well being is more important than a game.

Now you have evidence and have removed yourself from the toxic situation. You are free to either finish off your play session if you're still in a good enough mental spot to continue, or you can drop out of the game and go and submit your report to Rare about the toxic behavior so that action can be taken. If you continued your session, then you finish playing and go and file your report so that action can be taken.

I only bring this up so that it is clear that, despite the lack of full context provided, the solution overall is not an incorrect one or one that is pro bullying. It is an important tool and part of the process that allows people to remain relatively safe in an online space with other people. People dismiss it often for all sorts of reasons when it is brought up ranging from simply the lack of context all the way up to having ego get in the way and keeping them from ever wanting to scuttle because it is taking an L. But, the reality is the bigger L you can take here is by letting yourself stay in a toxic situation when you have all the power in the world to end it when you see fit and to gather the evidence you need in order to file a report.

That's all, just wanted to add that context.

Only spawn camping without the intention to sink goes against rules as that's griefing. Doing it to secure the sink is just part of the game, and somewhat forced due to the actual game design. If you watch some high level play the tank and recoverability of the best players on a sloop is such that they won't be sunk without securing kills.

I can't help but note the irony of your gamertag vs your complete aversion to pvp. Whenever I come across anyone on the seas with some variant like killer, slayer, death etc I do tend to assume easy sink 😅

They already added 2 different ways to scuttle, it is ok to just lose an encounter.

Spawn killing can be categorized in 2 different buckets

1). Done with an intent to sink/steal

2). Done for sport and no intent to sink/steal

The first one does not need a solution. At all. If you don't like it, scuttle. There doesn't need to be mechanics in place to make defense even easier than it already is.

The second one can be solved by capturing evidence and reporting. That is a known no-no. The trick is gathering proof. For that, I do believe there should an enhancement to the "report player" function in the game. Something that will live capture gameplay footage for evidence purposes only. It could then be submitted up for review. The means by which players (especially console players) have to report a player to Rare with evidence is tedious and not something that many will do.

@killerk70 the pirate code is a 'spirit of the rules' type document. It's too generic to assume the exact application of enforcement without any context. Rare have discussed what they consider griefing in their podcasts and showcase updates, even previously admitting that the design is somewhat at fault in terms of forcing the requirement because ships are so easy to keep afloat once the crew is reasonably competent.

I pretty much spelled this out, if you choose to ignore it because I made an observation about your name that's fine. Try and disprove me. Record someone spawn camping you to force a sink, submit it under a player report and see what action is taken...
Pvp is an inherent part of the game design, and that includes both naval and close quarters combat. It's on you to force the engagement to suit your preferred style. And for context, I'm much better at naval than close quarters.

@jolaton said in Ideas to fix Spawn Killing:

Ahoy @KillerK70 !

Any player out to solely ruin another players day by camping them is not welcome on the seas. Harassment of players to ruin their gameplay breaks our Community Code of Conduct:

*Harass, bully, intimidate, threaten or encourage others to do harm. None of these behaviours will be tolerated. Any activity you engage in that is solely designed to target and upset another player or crew constitutes bullying.

The problem with the verbiage is that people take this to an extreme and believe that any proactive engagement in PvP constitutes as harassment/bullying and is intended to "upset another player or crew"

The verbiage is too loose, IMO...and there's no real definition of what IS ok on the PvP front as far as I know.

It just allows for the more sensitive pirates on the seas to claim CoC violations for any PvP.

@killerk70 i absolutely understand the sentiment here. I do get why the community has such a strong "scuttle if spawncamped" mentality and I personally believe that spawncamping is worlds better since the blunderbus rework, but maybe we need to reevaluate why this happens so often and why it's an issue in the first place.

@killerk70 it would help reduce boarding meta, I don't think it would make sinking feel any better. Over time most changes have actually made winning by naval harder. Reduced knockback, curse ball availability and effect nerfs, reduced blunderbomb splash, sloop masts taking more hits etc. Who knows it may be changed at some point but wait and see what shake up to meta the new grapple gun and traps have.

@killerk70 one of the suggestions my friends and i recently came up with was one that was assumed as in the game for a while among uninformed individuals. Namely: Planks don't fully repair the ship

If a ship gets a tier three hole and you repair it with a plank, if that location is damaged again it remains at tier 3

We have seen the addition of a lot of different supplies so far but no addition repair resources. So what if we added tar/pitch as a throwable and you could use it in one of three ways.

1 - when used next to a repaired hole it will fully repair the location

2 - when thrown at an enemy or ally it will root them for a moment and also increase any fire damage on them

3 - when combined with feathers you get a feather bomb and can cosmetically tar and feather friends and foes alike [this does no damage and is just for the fun of it]

I think the "permanent" damage would go about long way towards increasing the power of naval and would make it riskier to send boarders as the fight drags on longer and longer. Additionally in duo sloop battles it will make it harder to keep the ship afloat indefinitely as you may be able to bucket and repair but the quality of the repairs will be worse. Finally, this also would be a massive buff to scattershot which would then have a place in finishing a ship off as it reopens all of the larger unrepaired holes.

@captain-fob4141 I like the idea of adding pitch/tar, but admittedly I would prefer it just as a repair item and not a throwable. I'd love to see repair resources actually get something new added in.

As I see it we would have Tar which would work like a Plank, but you'd pull out a Tar Coated Brush and have to hold for a similar amount of time as patching whatever Tier the hole is under the Plank.

This would allow for Planks to be a quicker patch overall, but with the risk of the same Tier hole opening back up. Tar could allow for a full repair, but harder to do in the middle of battle.

This would then allow people to make repairs to full with the Tar, but they can keep cosmetic damage as some like this. Otherwise you can head to an Outpost and use the Shipwright Repair and have the holes and cosmetic damage removed.

It would give everything it's own little niche overall.

Not that I fully dislike the idea of another Throwable, but then it isn't really a Repair Resource even if it plays a role in Repair, it would be yet another Throwable. Though, we could always just add in both as well.

@redeyesith that's fair, i am 100% on board with it just being a repair item with no other utility. I think it would go a long way toward helping with the boarding-naval meta balance. The 2nd and 3rd uses are more just extra ideas we were brainstorming and I'm not so sold on them as to die on that hill.

But absolutely, being able to keep the cosmetic damage, OR being able to get a repair at the shipwright would be fantastic. I imagine there could be a rework to the plank crate to include some tar or otherwise so that there is a way to procure a modest ammount. Additionally, hourglass would fully repair the holes when they dive like the ships are currently fully repaired.

Its Easy to fix It,Just use the halo respawn system.