It all started with me rolling on the floor laughing at momerath's post where he said... "Lord Aroltemort"...

Then I thought Azkaban... (then I started trying to think of something funny like VOkaban, but nothing was all that funny...)

Then I thought...what about a prison (so to speak)...here goes...

What about actual in-game penalties for those that choose to fight the system.
For example:
Let's say Dr. Lecter decides to station-camp a n00b. I know, you are saying that would never happen. But lets pretend. Since Dr. Lecter chose to camp in an Itani station, and pops poor n00bie, the strike force is sent out. (or however that all works...) Well, if Lecter is boomed by the station guards, instead of returning to his home station, he is brought into the station he is at. (this is where the prison bit starts) Dr. Lecter is confined to purchasing a free-bus, and cannot make a wh jump. He is told that he needs to do some BORING tasks in order to fulfill his sentence, such as the prospecting missions, or to wipe out a few hundred collecters in said free-bus.

Now, i'll leave it to anyone who cares what exactly the penalties and the crimes should be, but I think that some sort of penalty system that is in-game would be appropriate. Basically a few in-game hours of stupid tasks, that one wouldn't think is fun, in order to "pay" for his/her previous actions. But it should be something that needs to be completed, so that the player actually has to DO something for that amount of time, instead of say logging on and leaving the room while a timer runs out.

Now, this can be expanded to penalize many things, such as entering Serco space while KOS. A death in serco space would put you in "jail" until you pay your debt to serco...insert boring task here...

These could also be adjusted according to the players levels. A n00b wouldn't get too harsh of a penalty, unless it's a repeat offense, but a "vet" would get the longer, more boring tasks.

I don't mean to make the game boring for those that play evil characters, but if certain actions are set as not right, there should be a penalty.
I think making players pay for those penalties would certainly help convince them that perhaps there actions are not wanted.
I think this is fair, and reasonable. And it's at least a way of dealing with issues and letting the players still play.

(i'm only picking on Dr. Lecter because I can, it's nothing personal)

Ooo Ooo, I just thought of this, maybe we could have a prison station!! O.o
Or a prison sector...that you could only leave when your sentence is up...
And each "visitor" would get a prison badge, so that other players would know they were convicts...
Ooo this could be big!!!

Thoughts? Direct flames elsewhere, I aint nobody's biatch...he he

kernel.panic

I'm not even going to read past your title!

[Edit]

I read past your title and it sounds like a pretty good idea, but 2-3 hours seems a bit much. I'd like a prison sector and then maybe say Shape gets busted for something 10+ BLAK (Yes, they're back. And you'd need a lot of people) rush in and kill all the station gaurds (who are kinda tough, and respawn every 5 minutes?) and if they can kill them all, Shape can flee until more respawn!

I happen to like that idea.

...and I think it's a bad idea.

what would the proposed faction hits be anyway?

I like the "JAIL" idea, it might be "implementable" down the road a bit once some other things are done.

Each large nation has a "prison" station somewhere near the capital. I'm sure that Serco and Itani would have different ideas on what crimes were.

We'd have to have either NPC "Police" bots or perhaps players could sign up to be "Police" just like they can sign up to be Bounty Hunters.

Nation crimes are listed in all stations, and if you break a law, the police come for you/after you. You could surrender, run, or fight. I think if you fight and die your penalty is doubled or something. If you run and are eventually caught, there's some kind of "interest" that is accrued for the crime, which was originally 5 minutes, gained 1% per day, until you were finally caught 10 days later, and now your penalty is 5 min 32 seconds.

If you dock in that nation's stations you are automatically captured by the police and you have to serve your time. I think that this time would pass while offline as well, so the maximum sentence would be like 2 Days for a 50-count n00b and SF killing Spree in Itan, and 2 minutes for popping an NPC bot inside the NFZ.

Crimes would be cumulative. Times add on each other.

And (Here comes the good part) If we ever have destructible stations, we can have "jailbreaks." Say good 'ol tumblemonster is caught "liberating" Xithricite Ore from a trader. For some reason he decides to give up and gets 30 minutes in the clink. Then his buddies Martin, Shape, and Alamar come to bust him outta jail. Say if you do "X" amount of damage to a station then the prisoners can escape.

Of course, all those guys get bounties and arrest warrants are issued, but that's why they live down in grayspace.

I think that'd be really fun.

It'd be neat, but I think it would have to wait until some of the "other" cool things are implemented first. Like economy, crafting, putting in Seldon's new ships, etc.

Of course, corporation factions would have the same thing, except instead of prison and a sentence, it would be "You can buy your freedom by making taking out our rival factions mining party. We don't want to be associated with it, so here's a crappy derelecit we hauled in and gave generic weaponry" and they give you a sector-limited ship to go do your thing.

I think this is a perfect way to make death mean something instead of a minor hit in the pocket.

Yeah, the only thing I don't like about the idea is the "few hours of a boring task" thing. I think forcing a combat pilot to mine for 20 minutes is a good enough punishmet =). Other than that I think it sounds great.

I still like the idea of warping the player to a sector which has a closed loop of the Maze racetrack tubes, and not let them leave for 20 minutes or so.

"Shooting n00bs, eh? You know what that means..."
"NO! Not that! Not The Box again! I'll be good!"

I think this is a great idea. Maybe allow a bail system, where you can pay or bribe your way out of prison. It would make another money sink, and allow you another way out of your sentence.

How would faction work? What if you do your sentence? Do you get a +401 faction increase? Otherwise you get SFed on your way out and end up doing prison time again.

-tm

Oooh! Yeah, in grayspace you can bribe your way out of prison.

In nation space you may just be fined a certain amount for lesser infractions, instead of being put in jail.

I just like the "jailbreak" idea. That'd be fun.

I like it. A little work on the specifics but would add greatly to the RP feel of the universe, and make a pirates life a bit more risky.