Ismael_D

Forcing the Cops in this situation to stay a bit longer I agree is shitty, I'd imagine the idea is to avoid situations where anyone is stuck for more than 15 minutes or so, where usual RP generally times out. The only thing I could really think is to require even more Cops to be on for that specific vault, since the rewards are so great. Maybe requiring 8 or 9 online to plant the bomb, but allowing it to continue with as few as 7 online, opening a few options for officers to leave if need be. I definitely understand the concerns of increasing the length of an RP in this situation though, and it's a great point. Would just have to balance around it though. If 40+5 is too much, 30+5 wouldn't be too crazy of a change from the current. If that makes armed Hurons too common, change the spawn rates.

Not sure about Feds, but cutting travel time out for APD means BW waves will begin sooner, means there's say 18 minutes of combat instead of 14 or 15. Pretty substantial percentage.

Why not though? BWs are some of the most fun content in the game for Civs, and I'd imagine Cops love handling them. The only drawback to them is the high-end vehicles, so toning the amount of them spawned back, while opening up the event to more gangs just seems like a win-win to me. Is it a particularly negative experience on Cop? FTFY

The idea is to open BW to more people, but to bear in mind the legitimate concerns about the OPness of the higher-end rewards which was kind of addressed with the handbook change. To encourage more gangs to do the event, rather than just balancing its difficulty around the most capable gangs

BlackWaters and Feds are essentially Civilian-controlled server events. They're a few minutes for all of the top dogs to stop robbing people, to stop running drugs, and to possibly work together. The recent APD handbook update will lead to fewer people attempting BlackWaters. I don't think anyone will disagree that making it harder means less people will try. This is a bad thing, discouraging fun shouldn't be the goal of an update. I understand the issues with BW, and why these changes were made. The rewards can be too strong. You don't want every gang to have an armed Huron flying around, shit will get too crazy too fast. Again, I don't think there's anyone who would disagree with that. These vehicles should be beyond rare, and that APD change works towards that. That's the one positive. So here's what I think would be the best of both worlds - change how the BW loottables are hit. Make it have a gun/equipment loottable, a ground vehicle loottable, and an air vehicle loottable. Make each accessed through blowing through a different door, and obviously only one bomb could be set at a time. (For RP elements, I guess.. The first bomb detonating would ruin the others?) What I'm imagining is like this - you blast your way into a dome, using a bomb with a ~5 minute timer. That's enough for Cops to get there without redeploying. Not necessarily in, but to get their bearings and have troops near where they need to be. Unless they're in Kavala with only a car from there, you'll pick one of three doors - guns/equipment, ground vehicles, or air vehicles. The guns/equipment room could have something like a 7 minute timer, making it easier than a traditional BW, but without the possibility of some of the amazing rewards. Thermals are cool, though. The ground vehicles, say a 10-12 minute timer, and the air vehicles as high as a 40 minute timer, making it so you REALLY need to have it locked down to claim some of the most OP shit in the game Visual aid: Obviously, balance times as needed. I think a large part of the balance would honestly be the time it takes for cops to redeploy from other servers, and getting through the non-lethal waves. Holding off 12 minutes is much easier than 17 Just some very rough thoughts on the situation, but all in all I think these fun events should be encouraged, not discouraged. The aim should be to staunch the flow of OP vehicles, but to also leave alone, or increase the rate at which people have fun.

Opening up with "You're breaking rules, I'm recording this and I'll be submitting it" is never advised, and for that reason I doubt you'll get much sympathy. Play the situation out, find subtle ways to drop hints (IE, if you're recording mention a GoPro as opposed to ShadowPlay) and if you know they're in the wrong, offer them a chance to offer compensation afterwards, if they don't then submit a ticket. As far as the APD being the same as a Civ gang, just they get free guns and don't really have to care if they die -- yes. That's exactly what APD is, and has always been.

I've been killed by/killed with the P07, and it's always been a thing where it's not the cops fault, but something you put in a compensation ticket for if you want fixed. You're not wrong for using your P07 as a non-lethal way of downing, the server is wrong for killing him with the P07. Personally, I wouldn't have sent him anything. P07 isn't lethal, there is no such thing as 'Civ ammo'. The 9mm 30RND mags that you load into a P07 are non-lethal in the P07, but lethal in the Rook/PDW. The same for the Sting, they're not lethal in the sting, but lethal in the Rook/PDW. 100% a server-side glitch. Also to my knowledge, the whole 'comp or ban' thing - once you've been comped, you can't tell them 'give me more or i'll report you'. It's comp or ban. Quite sure accepting comp then submitting a ticket is itself bannable. If it's not, it definitely should be.

DAMN VIRUS AND HIS HACKS No but for real, if you lose a vehicle with insurance it's because it got chopped. Other than that, the only thing I've heard of eating vehicles is parking them in the ocean and having them explode. You should be getting them back though if you're just crashing them/exploding them.. That's what insurance is for, mang. (Right now, at least)

Obviously, it's not accurate information. And at that, you're #2 not #1. But 40 hours definitely isn't the record playtime..Unless that's in days?

Yup, I think a lot of people don't quite understand that. I've actually heard people call the blacklisting of the name 'ISIS' a free-speech violation on Altis Life.. That's not really what the topic is about, though. It's not if it's right or wrong to block the name 'ISIS', but moreso a question of what the standards for blocking are. Hitler is bad, obviously - and so is ISIS, but there are other groups that some view as just as inflammatory, while others may not. Like BlackWater/the IRA, to quote the examples given.

I feel it's hypocritical to allow ISIS to exist on the servers, but not any other real extremist group, I.E. Nazi's, etc.. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm a server crybaby and 100% against it.. But if you're going to outlaw one thing for reason A, then the other needs to be outlawed for reason A aswell. If real-life 'evil' names/people are going to be banned, ISIS should be among them. If ISIS isn't going to be a banned name, then nothing Nazi/ETC-related should be either. It's a two-way street. E; For clarification against the Nazis were 7/7 evil and ISIS is 2/7 posts - I'll just be straight up, I do not watch the news. I don't know how bad they actually are/what the news makes them appear, I'm fucking 800% oblivious to the subject. My entire reasoning here is based on the fact that there are people who think the name is offensive, and I know they do some fucked up shit over there. I also think it's a LOT easier to be less offended by Nazis, because they weren't active in any of our generations.. ISIS however, is an active, current thing. So before you go slapping body counts into it, consider that.

Have you ever met/engaged with ISIS: Y/N I believe only once? I found an [iS] guy at the Frog Factory, and he slipped away from sight entirely. I was impressed. Have you ever met/engaged with Nerdz: Y/N Yes. We had a pretty large fight with them, which wound up in them losing 2 HEMTT Boxes each packed with 1,000 of a Moonshine ingredient. They were cool as hell all through the fight though, and absolutely no shit was talked. I've got respect for these guys. Have you ever met/engaged with Burban: Y/N Yes. No good memories. Have you ever met/engaged with KI: Y/N Yes. I am a huge fan of Nacho's war reenactment DVDs. Are you in ISIS: Y/N N Are you in Nerdz: Y/N N Are you in Burban: Y/N N Are you in KI: Y/N N Which do you prefair?: Burban, Nerdz, ISIS or KI: Nerdz Why?: We've only fought once - what they lost in the fight, essentially 1,000 moonshine - would have been enough to make any gang I've ran into so far begin to talk mountains of shit. They were cool through it all though, I think our engagement ended in saluting. Which do you hate the most?: Burban, Nerdz, ISIS or KI: Burban Why?: Just because my small sample size of experiences with Burban will all pretty negative. One of their members who is permanently banned now (for exploiting ofc) was talking a lot of shit, then went on to lose multiple Orcas/fire fights/etc.. and only had 'I don't give a shit I'm rich' to say as a defense. Seeing as he's banned for exploiting now.. It just doesn't leave the best impression. Also because I've never really met ISIS or KI - these are server 2/3 gangs, I play on server 1. -------------------------

I'm contractually obligated to vote for Snake whenever possible.

Shit happens man. On my first day of playing with my friends, we wound up pooling ALL of our money together and bought a HEMTT Transport.. We loaded it up with Diamonds, and set off to the green zone, thinking you just couldn't be killed there. And of course, some asshole rolls in and RDMs us. It's the shittiest, most discouraging feeling.. But it makes the game that much greater when you finally get on your feet. You need something to look back on. Take this shitty situation and build on it IMO

I couldn't agree with this enough. Really, going into Kavala is a lot more intense while geared/with a bounty than going into any red zone.. It's bizarre. You're right about the flight school point. There wouldn't be a crazy amount of high-up officers that would be allowed to train constables for it/would be willing to/have the time to, ontop of both playing the game and already doing ridealongs and so on. So the idea of flight school being a prerequisite to a constable flying can go ahead and be tossed.. But what's the solution? There's, IMO, a big problem with APD when they can't reliably respond to emergency texts from 10+KM away. And again it's not the individual players, most of APD are really good at handling situations/etc.. Terror is dealt with on a regular basis and banished, the same with Fed robberies. But a team of Cadets/Constables just do not have the resources needed to respond to where they're actually needed, outside of Kavala. I'd absolutely love to be in a team on APD that responds to emergency texts (and currently do my best to), instead of one that just babysits other peoples kids. At the end of the day though - how can we make it so all officers can respond to emergencies in a timely manner, without putting a huge burden on higher-up officers? We don't necessarily have to lock down 100% of drug trafficking, but I'd love to be able to help, say, the group of people mining diamonds or running oil on their first day of Altis Life from bandits.

I think there's some misunderstanding here. For one, the groups of bandits you described.. If I'm not mistaking, you're calling for more people to join APD to fight the groups of bandits? That's a fine idea, but APD isn't friendly towards drug runners either. Now, bandits that go around attacking people at say the diamond mine or any other legal areas - fuck them, legal is off-limits (except oil, we're just RPing being America). But bandits that go for players in the red zones, really, they're just doing the same thing APD would do. Really think about it for a minute. When a group of bandits notices a person in a red zone, they'll go in. Either by landing a heli right in the zone, or sneaking up in some kind of vehicle. What would APD do?.. The exact same thing, except for the fact that they'd slap on their sirens, and yell APD. Both groups would then engage all of the players in the illegal zone - the bandits killing them, APD restraining them for further processing. In both situations, the drug runners lose their gear. Both groups would do away with the drugs that the runners had, and be rewarded for it. I guess the main difference is that bandits would steal any big trucks, APD would only steal them if they had over $500K in drugs in them. But APD would end the engagement by throwing the players in jail, unless they paid their bounty. Which is really worse?.. Now, I'm in the gang 'GUCC' - I'm not going to deny it, we're flat out, undeniably, bandits. If we're on and you're in the red zones on server #1, we're coming for your ass. However, we do frequently visit players in the green zone and tell them that if they ever get into some shit, to give us a text. It's bad, but really a group of bandits can react to a situation more effectively than the cops can, most of the time. Why exactly?.. Because #1, we're an air unit. We can go 200+ KM/h in a straight line to where you're being held up.. And we're on the east side of the map, not babysitting trolls in Kavala - we're never really more than 7-12KM (2-4 minutes) from any major zone. I mean really, by the time APD can get everyone organized into a vehicle and begin to respond to a big situation, a minute or so at least has to pass. Then there's travel time... And #2 - we're Civs. We're not bound by the structure of APD. We do not need a Corporal with us to operate a heli, we do not need a Constable with us to leave town. And above all, we're dedicated to helping people if we've stopped them and basically gave them our business card because they were good RPers. We're not worn out and apathetic from a long day of dealing with shit from a bunch of (likely) dupers that have absolutely nothing better to do than endlessly fuck around in Kavala. There's nothing you can do short of making cop helis go 400M km/h to make ground units able to mobilize and handle a situation faster than a group of civs that's already patrolling that side of the map. It's just not possible, it's not expected of APD. But a good start would be for APD patrols to become more common. Hopefully with the changes to the jail in the next patch, APD will be focused on Pyrgos once again.. That'll help some of the problem, as really most of the game is focused on the east side of the map it seems. Give up on Kavala, let the trolls have it (They don't even want it. They're like dogs - if you try to take their toy, they'll pull twice as hard. Act uninterested?.. They'll drop it and walk off.) . APD is needed on the other 95% of the map. Also please don't get the idea that this is an anti-APD post. We're all APD members in my gang, but this is the honest truth as I see it. Sitting in town on the other side the map, a good 5 minutes away from all of the legitimate, non-troll players is not an effective policing method. There is some great police work done when the large issues are in the Kavala area, but typically, they're not. We need APD to branch out. The issues aren't with the APD members themselves, but the restrictions that are placed on them. Maybe allow Constables who are competent pilots to fly/take a pilot's exam?

Oh hey, it's you

Exactly, this is what people don't seem to understand. Recording isn't something you throw around to prevent rulebreaking, but it's a way to resolve it after the fact. I think there is a time to tell people ingame that you're recording, but it's exceedingly rare. (I've had cops for example that have needed me to DC/reconnect due to this or that glitch and have reminded me of rules regarding it/that they're recording.. That I can understand, because it's not RP-related, but game issues that can be easily abused.) RP-wise, I mean.. I've had hostages tell me they're recording. Hostages. Like, if you're a hostage, you're in absolutely no position to try and bully your captor(s) with that kind of thing. It's also the last thing that you'd want them to know - all they have to do is search your body to find whatever camera, after they've executed you. Or, as you do, move you to another location. It's just absolutely terrible RP. In this kind of situation, the primary focus should be to preserve your life, not to let your captor(s) know that you'll have them prosecuted if they botch your execution.. I mean really.. I don't know about banning for it, but maybe it should change the rules of that specific situation. IE, hostages can be executed after being robbed due to failing the RP. Perhaps cops would have to give a reduced ticket/pardon, and civs could be sent straight to jail without a chance to pay their ticket? Something that is enough to give people incentive not to breach RP, but nothing that is just simply too much. It also helps compensate the affected party.

Exact kind of Ironman attitude I'm talking about. The issue is that players with your mindset don't play the situation as if it were real life - I'm pretty much 100% sure that if you were in your vehicle IRL and four guys ran up to it with large rifles, you'd probably not try to run. It's fine if you want to drive away from people giving you orders, but don't be surprised/don't complain when they open up on you. Like I said, it goes both ways. There are tons of shitty 'rebel' gangs that pulled off half-assed robberies, they're just as wrong as the people that try to flee. At the end of the day, the point of the game is to RP, NOT to just endlessly collect money. Green-Zone/Legal robberies/engagements aren't (Oil/HEMTT aside) about earning money, but they're about the experience. Technically, we could all hold hands and pick peaches together and never ever fight. We'd all have some kind of money, there would be no reason to buy anything for self defence.. We'd have Tempest Devices at the peach fields filling HEMTT upon HEMTT and raking in the big bucks. But what the fuck is the point of that?.. Somebody needs to be the bad guy. If there were no bad guys, the game would be unbelievably dull. Know though, the intention is NEVER to make anyone so miserable that they end up leaving the server. That's why we do our best to avoid people that don't give off signs of being well off - basic DMV cars in legal zones are off limits. Unless they're shitty RPers/try to run.. Side note: If you're a civ doing legal things and you're being held up by shitty bandits, feel free to give myself (Ismael) or X. a text. We're pretty much always playing together with our group, we'd be glad to help out. We play exclusively on server #1.

Really, it goes both ways here. My gang and I have been in some of the exact situations you described in just the last few days, and typically, every time it goes bad, it's because of bad RP on the side of people getting robbed. Either 'Okay I surrender I'm coming out', then they take shots at you - or just blatantly ignoring orders, and trying to escape. Also the classic 'barrel down the center of the processing plant road, hope they can't get my tires before I'm free' tactic is a pretty frequent one. I mean honestly, we had a situation just a couple of hours ago - we saw a littlebird in legal processing, we made it pretty clear between us that we were just going to go fuck with the guy and have a chat, possibly leave with a kidney.. Coming in, we texted him and told him not to get in the bird, not to try and spool it up. We've got 5 guys in a circle within 20 meters of it yelling at him on direct chat, and hey, he hops in and goes for the takeoff. Not one text, not one word said on direct chat. It's like some of these people play with no monitor/no speakers. Hell, I remember one the other day that you personally responded to, Karl. We had the same exact shit with an Oil truck - 'Okay, I'm coming out now I surrender' and then he tries to take shots at us with a Rook. Obviously not all rebel groups are the same, but the Gucc boys, honestly, in green zones aren't there for profit. Just some RP.. Unless you have a HEMTT, then chances are you're pretty well set anyways and can take the loss. And if you're not, well, that's just bad planning. There's this weird kind of 'Iron man' mentality that seems to strike people in these situations. Cops too, really.. It'll be, say 1v5, and they'll think for some reason that they can just walk through the bullets and be fine. Not only do Rebels need to RP better (and avoid RDMing, rebel license is not a RDM license.. some people don't seem to understand that) but the 'innocents' and APD need to always do their best too. Also know that just by engaging in conversation, it, at least for me, makes it much harder to shoot someone. When you've heard someone speak it makes them human, and it's way more difficult to shoot a human than a block of pixels booking it away from you against orders.

<3 We'll miss you mang