3x Assassin Contract Payoff Feedback

[perseid]

I'm obviously aware of the logic at the time the change was implemented, that people felt it was too easy to pay off assassin contracts for oldmoney factions (I don't know if this was the official reason but it was the state of dialogue at the time of the change). That said- I don't see what the change actually accomplishes in terms of evening the playing field overall. In terms of FactionXFaction political conflict it seems like in both directions the 3x vs settlement leader bounty effect is just a snowball mechanic for the party that already had the advantage. It makes it easier for the larger party to post insurmountable contracts and at the same time the party that's going to have the easiest time paying off a 3x contract is going to be the larger one as well. The implementation as it stands exists to basically reward already being the winner in material terms. I wanted to bring this up because I think Arelith has a real issue with over-rewarding already big dogs that we've only started to OCCASSIONALLY pivot away from such as the change to QB balance that made it so that finally people who weren't in large factions could think about regularly fielding quarterbreakers.

[Anomandaris]

Keep in mind the person having to pay three times the bounty is literally the leader of a settlement. That alone makes the David and Goliath framing here questionable. The incumbent power with access to tax revenues, and the support socially and politically to achieve settlement, leadership is certainly not a non-entity.

Personally, I think settlement leader turnover is a healthy thing to avoid stagnation and gatekeeping of other cohorts, looking to do something different. Given the settlement leader has a lot to offer potential political allies, and other mechanical resources such as exile, this disadvantage in terms of the bounty payoff seems more than fair.

In the case, where the large faction is in power and a smaller one is trying to remove them it at least makes the economic pain of paying off the bounty with their huge reserves of money, slightly more impactful. In my opinion, this is more often in the case, given how old and wealthy some characters or factions are. This would make me argue for a higher ratio to make it even harder to pay off. Or put a timer so that you can’t pay the bounty off for a certain period of time.

Lastly, people will still use the questionable strategies of not logging hiding, etc., especially in areas that are inaccessible such as boats. In my opinion, this should also be changed in both should be accessible to Quarter breakers and not infinitely powerful safe spaces to avoid in character consequences.

[perseid]

Keep in mind the person having to pay three times the bounty is literally the leader of a settlement. That alone makes the David and Goliath framing here questionable. The incumbent power with access to tax revenues, and the support socially and politically to achieve settlement, leadership is certainly not a non-entity.

This is the point I'm making though. It's a solution that doesn't really address the problem. The incumbent power will usually be the best poised to pay off its own bounties and even if displaced they will generally be in the better position to leverage the snowball effect to force yet another election against the challenger.

[Anomandaris]

Keep in mind the person having to pay three times the bounty is literally the leader of a settlement. That alone makes the David and Goliath framing here questionable. The incumbent power with access to tax revenues, and the support socially and politically to achieve settlement, leadership is certainly not a non-entity.

This is the point I'm making though. It's a solution that doesn't really address the problem. The incumbent power will usually be the best poised to pay off its own bounties and even if displaced they will generally be in the better position to leverage the snowball effect to force yet another election against the challenger.

I’m not sure I understand what you mean by snowball mechanic. The incumbent party has to pay three times. This is a great thing as it is far too easy for a settlement leader to pay off a bounty and the opposing party will not be able to keep up with the economic warfare without some sort of disproportionate ratio like this. In my opinion, it’s that simple.

Otherwise, I don’t think there’s any way to make the game “fair” for people that have fewer resources in terms of players coin or otherwise, without making these things resources meaningless, which would be less fun. Like it or not if you have more time, players, and coin, then you will have more social political and mechanical agency. Does this create issues? Absolutely. Are there other mechanics like assassin that at least give people trying to disrupt the status quo a fighting chance to affect some change? Certainly..

Personally, I would like to see it harder to remove an assassin bounty than it is presently. But we may just agree to disagree on that. And I would change all player character owned safe spaces that limit access to opposition via a hard mechanic (boats, certain guild houses etc). This just allows players that happen to control them to avoid conflict entirely, and have a huge advantage in such exchanges.

Public spaces such as is shadovar trade post or dis however, are great for enabling dialogue and conflict without the threat of PVP. I suppose of a character wanted to they could spend the entire duration of the bounty loitering in the trade post (or not logging on) however that does not seem to be in very good faith.

I’m sure there are other options to improve this dynamic, but none come to mind at this time.

[perseid]

Keep in mind the person having to pay three times the bounty is literally the leader of a settlement. That alone makes the David and Goliath framing here questionable. The incumbent power with access to tax revenues, and the support socially and politically to achieve settlement, leadership is certainly not a non-entity.

This is the point I'm making though. It's a solution that doesn't really address the problem. The incumbent power will usually be the best poised to pay off its own bounties and even if displaced they will generally be in the better position to leverage the snowball effect to force yet another election against the challenger.

I’m not sure I understand what you mean by snowball mechanic. The incumbent party has to pay three times. This is a great thing as it is far too easy for a settlement leader to pay off a bounty and the opposing party will not be able to keep up with the economic warfare without some sort of disproportionate ratio like this. In my opinion, it’s that simple.

Otherwise, I don’t think there’s any way to make the game “fair” for people that have fewer resources in terms of players coin or otherwise, without making these things resources meaningless, which would be less fun. Like it or not if you have more time, players, and coin, then you will have more social political and mechanical agency. Does this create issues? Absolutely. Are there other mechanics like assassin that at least give people trying to disrupt the status quo a fighting chance to affect some change? Certainly..

Personally, I would like to see it harder to remove an assassin bounty than it is presently. But we may just agree to disagree on that. And I would change all player character owned safe spaces that limit access to opposition via a hard mechanic (boats, certain guild houses etc). This just allows players that happen to control them to avoid conflict entirely, and have a huge advantage in such exchanges.

Public spaces such as is shadovar trade post or dis however, are great for enabling dialogue and conflict without the threat of PVP. I suppose of a character wanted to they could spend the entire duration of the bounty loitering in the trade post (or not logging on) however that does not seem to be in very good faith.

I’m sure there are other options to improve this dynamic, but none come to mind at this time.

I’m not sure I understand what you mean by snowball mechanic. The incumbent party has to pay three times. This is a great thing as it is far too easy for a settlement leader to pay off a bounty and the opposing party will not be able to keep up with the economic warfare without some sort of disproportionate ratio like this. In my opinion, it’s that simple.

I don't think it is that simple is the thing. If this were true the bulk of contracts wouldn't still be small six digit contracts launched at the moment of the assassination attempt. If things like adding a multiplier was really helping solve this problem the typical scenario wouldn't prioritize speed so much. And on the other side, what it really does is favor the incumbent. The incumbent is already the most likely to win the next election (or someone in their party is) and to top it off you're also giving the better funded party a 3x multiplier as well in the event that they do both get displaced and somehow lose the election. In all of these scenarios there's the illusion of the smaller party having an advantage but all you've done is create a new system for snowballing sums of money into larger sums of money which is always going to favor the larger party.

Otherwise, I don’t think there’s any way to make the game “fair” for people that have fewer resources in terms of players coin or otherwise, without making these things resources meaningless, which would be less fun. Like it or not if you have more time, players, and coin, then you will have more social political and mechanical agency.

Yes, which is why haphazard solutions are worse than elegant ones in these contexts. Because if you do them wrong you don't actually change anything you just entrench people further. If the point is to enable underdogs then the solution shouldn't immediately become an advantage for the temporarily displaced larger party. All this does is create pointless money wars that ultimately favor the status quo faction of the hypothetical settlement anyway.

Public spaces such as is shadovar trade post or dis however, are great for enabling dialogue and conflict without the threat of PVP. I suppose of a character wanted to they could spend the entire duration of the bounty loitering in the trade post (or not logging on) however that does not seem to be in very good faith.

I don't think this is true. PVP is allowed in Dis off the main area and is allowed in the main areas w/ an assassin contract. Shadovar... I mean I've never seen it tested myself. I know people get talked to for pvping there but I've never once seen an assassination contract reversed because of where it took place so I'm not really sure how either of these zones tie in with the discussion at hand.

[Dreams]

I think it's a cool change. Settlement leaders have ridiculous amounts of gold at their disposal.

It should also always be more expensive to pay off a hit than to pay for one, otherwise what is the role that the guild is playing? Even for a normal hit I'd recommend something like a 1:1.5 or 1:2 rate of the deposit:payoff. It's a bit ridiculous that someone goes to the cost of having a hit place and then it can be paid off. You've still lost the gold. The guild takes another payment from the target. At the very least give the original person a refund?

Perseid, seems like you're usually the voice publicly complaining about things related to current events in game. Maybe it's better to take these to the DM team?

[perseid]

Perseid, seems like you're usually the voice publicly complaining about things related to current events in game. Maybe it's better to take these to the DM team?

This seemed unnecessary? We've had at least three or four recent settlement leader scenarios involving assassins including multiple in Cordor in recent memory. I think it might be good to disengage from your own investment in current events in game if theyre dominating your view of what's talked about on the forums.

[-XXX-]

I don't think the rate is relevant here at all. The mere ability to pay off contracts entirely defeats the point of the assassin guild.
There's nothing interesting or constructive about characters one-upping each other in an uninteractive game of who has more money to waste, especially once we consider that the reward for successful assassination is questionable - while it might serve as a tool for ousting individual characters out of office, it doesn't really affect the ruling faction all that much.

[Dreams]

This seemed unnecessary? We've had at least three or four recent settlement leader scenarios involving assassins including multiple in Cordor in recent memory. I think it might be good to disengage from your own investment in current events in game if theyre dominating your view of what's talked about on the forums.

Just a pattern I noticed!

I'm not really invested in this topic beyond having played a few assassins in the past and knowing the ins and outs of how these things play out.

[silverpheonix]

Frankly the mechanics of the Guild of Assassins is a joke that encourages as little RP as possible between assassin and target. It doesn't feel like the spirit of the application is being enforced. If you read the wiki page, it makes Assassins look like this thrilling, drawn out cat and mouse RP. But the current "meta" doesn't align with that. And I'm NOT saying there aren't good Assassins that currently follow those rules and themes in style. If I were to make a "protest" application, it'd be as follows:

"I won't RP with my target. It just gives them a reason to realize something is off, check, and pay off their contract. If they do that I don't get paid. I am going to RP with the people that set the contract, get in place a few minutes before, and wait for the wisp that tells me the contract is in place. Then it's pvp time."

The Guild has serious flaws that need fixing, including how seemingly every organization has their own pocket assassin that tells their people which notable figures have contracts and for how much. Contract information should not leave the Guild. If you want to know if you have a contract, go out and speak to the designated Guild representative NPC.

These issues have been beaten to death numerous times without getting fixed.

I've placed contracts, I've thought about trying to act on contracts my character knew were in place because those people dying fit my character's desires/feelings. They have their place. It just feels often the only effective ones are the ones that:

1) Get placed and acted on immediately with no time for counterplay
2) Multi-million contracts that force the recipient to make a judgment call whether it's worth the resources to pay it off vs. Spending a month (or more) in hiding being able to do very little.

There's definitely something to be said about forcing someone to ground and out of the picture. There's good and bad with the system, I just wish the bad would actually get something done about it.

[Aeryeris]

I don't find the x3 pay-off cost for settlement leaders to be problematic personally.

I do however think that assassin contracts should not be immediately collectible and pay-off-able.
The perceived need to execute an assassination before the target can figure out they're a target and pay off the guild is not a dynamic that incentivizes interesting assassination roleplay.

A grace period for the target, and a longer cooldown before the contract can be paid off might help resolve this problem.

[Shadowy Reality]

I don't find the x3 pay-off cost for settlement leaders to be problematic personally.

I do however think that assassin contracts should not be immediately collectible and pay-off-able.
The perceived need to execute an assassination before the target can figure out they're a target and pay off the guild is not a dynamic that incentivizes interesting assassination roleplay.

A grace period for the target, and a longer cooldown before the contract can be paid off might help resolve this problem.

This a lot. Everyone would have a much better time if Assassins actually had time to do their work. Seek their target, try to put some plan in action, whatever it may be.

The way things are, assassins are incentivized to go for the kill as fast as possible, before the contract is paid off, or another assassin beats them to it.

If DMs and Admins want more roleplay and less dicerolling they need to give time for that to happen. I have played an Assassin before and I never managed to even get close to a hit. The board was empty most of the time, and whenever a name showed up I would have no time to figure out who my mark was before it vanished again.

The Guild has serious flaws that need fixing, including how seemingly every organization has their own pocket assassin that tells their people which notable figures have contracts and for how much. Contract information should not leave the Guild. If you want to know if you have a contract, go out and speak to the designated Guild representative NPC.

I saw this happen a couple of times, with a very casual attitude of 'let me just pop in there and let me see if there's a contract on you'. This needs to be taken way more seriously. Whoever does this should be stripped of the PrC, made an example by Guild and never be allowed to play an Assassin again.

[AskRyze]

The way things are, assassins are incentivized to go for the kill as fast as possible, before the contract is paid off, or another assassin beats them to it.

...

I saw this happen a couple of times, with a very casual attitude of 'let me just pop in there and let me see if there's a contract on you'. This needs to be taken way more seriously. Whoever does this should be stripped of the PrC, made an example by Guild and never be allowed to play an Assassin again.

I think these things are the same thing.

Every settlement has their own pocket assassin - we've established this.

They coordinate a hit for the first available moment. Submit the contract and execute it at a designated time, both within the least amount of notice possible. I'm pretty sure the point is that you don't want the target to react to the hit by paying it off or playing on skaljard for a week, so if your assassination attempt is to work then you have to strike immediately.

[Anomandaris]

I don't find the x3 pay-off cost for settlement leaders to be problematic personally.

I do however think that assassin contracts should not be immediately collectible and pay-off-able.
The perceived need to execute an assassination before the target can figure out they're a target and pay off the guild is not a dynamic that incentivizes interesting assassination roleplay.

A grace period for the target, and a longer cooldown before the contract can be paid off might help resolve this problem.

This a lot. Everyone would have a much better time if Assassins actually had time to do their work. Seek their target, try to put some plan in action, whatever it may be.

The way things are, assassins are incentivized to go for the kill as fast as possible, before the contract is paid off, or another assassin beats them to it.

If DMs and Admins want more roleplay and less dicerolling they need to give time for that to happen. I have played an Assassin before and I never managed to even get close to a hit. The board was empty most of the time, and whenever a name showed up I would have no time to figure out who my mark was before it vanished again.

The Guild has serious flaws that need fixing, including how seemingly every organization has their own pocket assassin that tells their people which notable figures have contracts and for how much. Contract information should not leave the Guild. If you want to know if you have a contract, go out and speak to the designated Guild representative NPC.

I saw this happen a couple of times, with a very casual attitude of 'let me just pop in there and let me see if there's a contract on you'. This needs to be taken way more seriously. Whoever does this should be stripped of the PrC, made an example by Guild and never be allowed to play an Assassin again.

This is a problem and "incentivizes/requires" less than ideal gameplay of having one place a bounty right before a hit when you have eyes on target. The answer to this is simple. Provide a period of X days where the target is not able to tell they have a bounty, and cannot pay it off either. And set a firm rule that a guild member absolutely CANNOT inform a target of their bounty or risk losing your PrC token (at least within the X-day window).

We should not place a delay on when one can collect on a bounty however. Elections are relatively short, and as soon as the bounty is placed, an assassin will need to be able to start hunting the target. However, if they can't immediately identify the bounty and pay it off, people won't feel the need to place it "right before" they hit the target. This would be a far healthier dynamic.

We also should adjust and balance special player owned quarters like boats, Erudite Arcanum, etc, that cannot ever be broken into. Why are these specific properties special compared to others? They are just exploited as perma hiding places to avoid interaction and IC consequences. For boats, perhaps make them boardable while at dock by other boats (as when they're at sea), or create some other way for a quarterbreaker/infiltrator to get in there.

[aplethoraof]

Settlement leaders DO have more than enough means to pay off a bounty. If a settlement leader cannot pay off their bounty, one of three things is happening:
(1) They aren't raising their own capital (a skill issue), or aren't willing to dive into city coffers (a matter of RP taste, which is your decision as a player).

(2) They don't have enough friends to raise capital (if they are a leader and don't have enough friends who want to see them in power, that's indicative of things). They got elected by a majority, which means if characters are still interested in them as a leader than there will be a vested interest in doing away with the bounty. If a voter base is not willing to help pay for a bounty, it likely means the candidate isn't "that great" (not great enough to keep around anyway).

(3) A large amount of capital wants to see them ousted (again, indicative of things). If enough people are pooling such a huge sum that with #1 and #2 paying is untenable, maybe that's a sign of FOIG.

This is a matter best resolved with RP, imo. 3X is more than fair, considering all the tools any capable settlement leader has at their disposal.

Bounty placers are not always settlement-tier income, more often they are people relying on shops or smaller amounts of income to get by. 1:1 would be FAR too disproportionate, to the point of making Settlement Leaders nigh immune.

TL;DR - The settlement leader has the tools needed to be at advantage. A voter base, their own coinage, the city's coinage.
If they are not, they need to think about why they are not and form a strategy.
If they are being overwhelmingly targeted- it's the same as if multiple locations pariah an individual but on a state level. Maybe there is a reason why.

---

Re; Assassin Timing

I agree, I think there should absolutely be a grace period between contacts being deployed and when they can be paid. That just makes sense for generating RP around the hit.