Bounty Buy-out

Bopping past a bounty board recently got me thinking about the number of bounties placed by dead characters and clans that have been standing for months or years in some cases, and can’t ever be removed except by the character who was bountied being permed. And while in many cases the targets of foreverbounties tend to have it coming, I thought it might be neat to have a mechanic whereby outstanding bounties can be cancelled.

The thought I had was that after a certain period of time has passed from the bounty first being posted (2 weeks? a month?) the BOUNTIED party and only the bountied party, can pay 200% of the bounty in order to buy out the contract and cancel the public bounty. Other people can help with fundraising, but they have to go in person to the bounty office and make the deposit.

Maybe as an additional restriction, the bountier has to no longer be around? Not sure on that one.

Anyway. Ideas? Comments? Concerns? Thoughts? Wildly Off-Topic Tangents About How We Totally Need To Revamp BHing?

I would totally support this. It has bugged me that the bounty can’t even be removed with the character/clan being dead and gone for months on end. It should probably be if the bountying clan or person is dead though, unless they’re using it to fake being dead. It stands to reason that a bounty office would accept the fact that since the bountier is dead no real credits would be exchange, but still be corrupt enough to make the bountied pay to have it removed.

The money wouldn’t go to the bountier, it would just go poof as a way to take some of the massive hoards of wealth out of the game world.

Here is my 2 cents on this discussion:
A)Too many players instantly shelf their characters in some manner when a bounty is placed on them. Whether it be logging out and not logging in until the danger has passed, or sitting in uncharted, with disguise, and a freshly renamed ship. That already happens too much as is. Adding this mechanic would mean “LOL I’LL JUST GO HIDE FOR 2 WEEKS THEN I’LL BE BACK!” Enough of that.

B)Bounties drive the game, in a way. Having the ability to remove one from yourself takes some of the danger away. Additionally, there are incentives to only allowing the bountier remove the bounty. A)It means that if the bountied character wants out of their bounty, they have to resolve their issues with the bountier. Do they ever try? Not really. To the shelf they go!

TL;DR – i’m not a fan of this idea for various reasons.

My issue with the bounty system is the fact that once the character who bountied you is DEAD, you can no longer resolve your issue with them, and you can’t bribe the bounty office to remove it.

Then a) Don’t get a bounty on yourself, or b) Understand that their time is finite, much like yours, and deal with the problem at hand. Hiding in deep space or not logging for the amount of time required is not an answer.

The absolute bottom line in this game is IC Actions = IC Consequences. Being able to hide out and wait for your time to buy your way out of a contract makes those actions and consequences less important and takes some excitement out of the game.

• This reply was modified 7 years ago by frumpalumpaguss.

I’m personally not a fan of a buy out option. Public bounties are already pretty scarce as it is. I feel like this would just give an even bigger incentive for people to never log in and try to wait it out.