Suggestion:20080408 Reduced Starting AP

	Spam!
	This suggestion was voted as spam and closed for voting, with 4 keep, 16 kill, and 21 spam votes.

20080408 Reduced Starting AP

Explodey 16:36, 8 April 2008 (BST)

Suggestion type
AP.

Suggestion scope
New characters.

Suggestion description

1. New characters start with 25AP instead of 50AP.
2. Creation of a new character counts as 25 hits (or possibly more) towards the IP limit.

This is my second attempt to address the problem of players creating throwaway PKer characters.

At the moment it is possible to create a new character (usually a Private) and with the 50 starting AP search for a little extra ammo, find a victim, PK them, then abandon the character. This allows PKing without the associated risk of being bounty-hunted. A little luck is required to find enough ammo and still have sufficient AP to get the kill, but if the PKer is unlucky (e.g. down to 30AP and no extra ammo found, making it impossible to get an immediate kill) they can abandon that character and start again with a new character at a new random location. If I understand correctly this does not break any anti-zerging rules (although the PKer may have 2 or 3 characters, they are never in the same location, do not attack the same target and are not simultaneously active.) I have exploited this loophole myself but I think it would be better for the game if this was made more difficult.

With this change the PKer would be slowed down by a factor of 3-4 because as well as having insufficient AP to get an immediate kill, they must spend some AP to find a safe place to sleep and accumulate the 50+ AP required to kill someone, and having invested this extra time they will probably spend all of the second day searching for ammo rather than take the gamble of trying to search and kill in one day. After that they can start killing as normal but now they have invested more time in the character so the risk of bounty-hunting is more significant.

The change would not really be necessary for scouts, medics, consumers or scientists as they can't get a kill anyway but to keep things simple I'd give them the lower AP as well.

This is just one example of a more general problem - that a player can keep creating characters until one gets lucky - with attacks, searches, DNA-scanning of rotters, starting in a location near a potential victim etc. The extra penalty for creating a new character would reduce all of these possibilities.

Voting Section

Voting Rules

Votes must be numbered, justified, signed, and timestamped. # justification ~~~~ Votes that do not conform to the above may be struck by any user.

The only valid votes are Keep, Kill, Spam or Dupe. If you wish to abstain from voting, do not vote.

Keep Votes

1. Author Keep - I've been on the receiving end of a couple of throwaway PKers as well! --Explodey 16:40, 8 April 2008 (BST)
2. Kill- I like it.-- BKM 16:43, 8 April 2008 (BST)

   Kill, I like it? Lol, don't you mean keep? --Nitro378 ^{T JNL} 18:09, 8 April 2008 (BST

   Maybe he just just doesn't like Explodey, but wants to be decent about it. --Vandurn 22:26, 8 April 2008 (BST) Non author REs struck. --•▬ ▬••▬ • •••• •▬ ▬•▬• ▬•▬ ^{#nerftemplatedsigs} 01:43, 10 April 2008 (BST)

3. Keep - The people "harmed" by it won't be inconvenienced much by a one-time event, and the benefit seems real. --Pgunn 19:06, 8 April 2008 (BST)
4. Keep, but... -give them a warning and advise them to wait. --TerminalFailure 21:18, 8 April 2008 (BST)

Kill Votes

1. Kill- No --UCFSD 17:05, 8 April 2008 (BST)
2. Kill - As Ariedartin. --Pdeq^Talk* 17:19, 8 April 2008 (BST)
3. Kill - I also think that you are overestimating the problem, and this would be harmful to the poor, little newbies. --ZsL 18:44, 8 April 2008 (BST)
4. Kill - While I appreciate the idea, the fact remains that your problem comes in with the abandonment of the character immediately after the PK. Making them spend an extra two days to get to the PK doesn't change the fact that they can immediately dump the character afterwards. --Shigogouhou 20:12, 8 April 2008 (BST)
5. Strong kill - I've actually considered submitting the exact opposite- newbies deserve more AP to get used to the game. The making a new char take IP hits thing is interesting though.--Studoku ^W! 20:16, 8 April 2008 (BST)
6. KILL - Don't like this at all. It hurts newer player, yada yada yada. If you want to be safe from a throw-away PKer, sleep in a heavy (or more) barricaded building. What kind of self-respecting PKer would do this, anyway?--KF 20:37, 8 April 2008 (BST)

   The characters most likely to be the victims are new and do not have Free Running, Construction or Body Building so that is not an option for them. And not everyone cades above VSB+2 anyway because the AP advantage (vs. the zeds attacking the cades) is diminished at that level. --Explodey 10:16, 9 April 2008 (BST)

7. KILL - Game breaking stuff there mr cash. --Carnexhat 21:20, 8 April 2008 (BST)
8. Special K(ill) - Being a newbie is hard enough as it is, so cutting their AP in half as a way to say Hey you maybe new, but there's just so much damn cheating in this game through Multi Abuse, we're slashing your starting AP in half to stop them, yay. Now go find a safehouse 26 blocks away! Acoustic Pie 22:01, 8 April 2008 (BST)
9. Kill - Hey, I happen to like multi-abuse, thanks. Yeah no seriously, this is a douche move that frankly just looks like you were ganked by a zerg and you want to get back at them for it. There is a problem, but we sure as hell can't deal with it by pulling the carpet from under newbies. I'm killing them enough as it is. I'd go for the second one though. Counting as ip hits. That is fair and reasonable. --Vandurn 22:23, 8 April 2008 (BST)
10. Kill - All they have to do is wait a little bit longer. -doc crook 00:44, 9 April 2008 (BST)
11. Kill - As another voter said- all staying safe from a level 1 PKer takes is heavier or stronger barricades. I've also never seen evidence that this is a common tactic; not ONE of my survivors has EVER been killed by a level 1 survivor. The game wouldn't be much fun if you get short changed on your very first day, so getting less than 50 AP seems bad.
    As for the 25 IP hit cost for character creation- that's not a bad idea, as it DOES encourage people to stick with an alt, and discourages mass-alt-spawning. Syringe manufacture costs 20 IP hits to limit a similar sort of abuse. Proxies or other IP changing tools can get around that, but it's still there, and makes people happy. Just make sure people know about it ahead of time, so they don't expect to play 2 characters, then make a third and play them with enough IP hits to take 50 actions.  Swiers 04:06, 9 April 2008 (BST)
12. Strong Kill - Basic Firearms training isn't all that special. A low-level PKer must go through a lot to get that kill anyhow, and the chances of spawning in the area enough of times just aren't going to let it happen much. All this would do is hurt newbies, and it would have no efffect on the bad-guys.--Kolechovski 05:02, 9 April 2008 (BST)
13. Kill - Unneeded. The tactic in itself is too ridiculous to employ, unless one were the most desperate of pkers, and as stated above, barricades themselves would protect potential "victims" from such persons. --Private Mark 05:32, 9 April 2008 (BST)
14. NuclearKill -Don't punish new players. --Airborne88^T|Z.Quiz|PSS 01:42, 10 April 2008 (BST)
15. Kill - Wow, it sure is a good idea to make characters not able to do much when they first start out so they quit the game. --The Gecko PKer 02:41, 10 April 2008 (BST)
16. Kill - What "The Gecko PKer" said.--Jamie Cantwel3 07:45, 10 April 2008 (BST)

Spam/Dupe Votes

1. Spam - Very game-breaking and harmful to newbies. Established PKers don't use zergs because it's simply not fun to do so. You're probably talking about griefers, which are too minor an issue to warrant such handicapping of new players. Also, don't you think that throwaway-PKers with the slightest bit of determination would just end up waiting a day or so before starting to use their zerg army? This will have very negligible benefit and heavy drawbacks. Spam and chopped. ~Ariedartin • Talk • A KS J abt all 16:58, 8 April 2008 (BST)
2. Spam - As Ariedartin. I think you're overestimating the problem. --Nitro378 ^{T JNL} 17:14, 8 April 2008 (BST)
3. Strongest Spam Possible - Are you serious? Leave AP the hell alone, and don't make any more suggestions either.  Billy Club Thorton  T!  RR  18:01, 8 April 2008 (BST)
4. Spam - Ariedartin is unfortunately right on this --~~~~ [talk] 18:44, 8 April 2008 (BST)
5. Spam - There are PKers that actually abuse that loophole!? Where!? Tell me so I can punch him in the face--/~Rakuen~\^Talk I Still Love Grim 18:56, 8 April 2008 (BST)
6. Spam - While we're at it let's just kill the game. --Riseabove 19:26, 8 April 2008 (BST)
7. Spam - Storm in a teacup, dude. It's not that big a problem, and this isn't really going to fix it. Plus, it's not like a Private can aim worth a damn -- n00b PKers suck to play. --Diano 20:14, 8 April 2008 (BST)
8. Spam - don't touch my AP. ever. -- Jack ^{S13 T! PC} 20:34, 8 April 2008 (BST)
9. Strong Spam & Kill - I understand your frustration but this is the wrong way of addressing the problem. For instance, consider newbies who you are hurting because they now lack the AP to find shelter due to spawning in a Red Burb or finding only VHB/EHB buildings. Even if there were as many people creating throw-away PKers as you claim this would do little to stop them as they'd just have to wait before going for their kill. In fact, death in UD is currently more an annoyance then harmful and despite many Burbs being Red it's still very possible to find a revive if you look.--Zardoz 20:39, 8 April 2008 (BST)
10. Reluctantly voting Spam :( - I can't believe I'm actually voting spam on this but, while I do see what you're trying to attempt to do, I don't think it will have the effect you want. PKers tend to not be very useful when they're level 1 throwaways. Zombies are far more useful in that respect, but at level 1 they already have a 25 AP limit for movements because of no Lurching Gait skill. Plus it will -really- hurt new non PKer survivor players, especially when they get dumped in an area where everything is overcaded. God I really hate voting spam, it seems so rude to do so and I got nothin' bot respect for you Explodey. --Tselita 20:55, 8 April 2008 (BST)
11. Suggestions Dos and Do Nots states not to mess with AP. --•▬ ▬••▬ • •••• •▬ ▬•▬• ▬•▬ ^{#nerftemplatedsigs} 20:59, 8 April 2008 (BST)

    I don't think this counts as messing with AP as all it changes is the stats of a new character. It might apply to my previous suggestion though. --Explodey 21:12, 8 April 2008 (BST)

    Alright. Then let's put it this way: New zombies are new characters also. They may start with 50AP, but they don't start with Lurching Gait, therefore, they can take enough moves as a survivor would take in 25AP. By lowering the starting AP, you are hindering new zombies from doing anything on their first day, therefore, if they start with 25AP, their first day will usually average to 12 moves a day, rather than 25 moves a day. --•▬ ▬••▬ • •••• •▬ ▬•▬• ▬•▬ ^{#nerftemplatedsigs} 21:20, 8 April 2008 (BST)

12. Spam - Sorry, but there's no way to salvage this suggestion, it'd be game breaking, in the very literal sense of driving away new players. Firstly, don't punish new players for being new is something of a golden rule! Trust me, they get a hard enougth time as it is. Secondly, PKers are part of the game, though mostly on the survivor side (for some reason zombies killing zombies has either never realy caught on or hasn't ever received the levels of controversy of their survivor counterparts). They're pretty much recognised as the unnoficial "third side". It's a fact of life realy, wheter you like it or not, it's a justifiable and legitimate type of game play and they should not be punished more than they are.--Seventythree^Talk 22:41, 8 April 2008 (BST)
13. Spam Pizza - Do you want new players or not? --FXI 23:53, 8 April 2008 (BST)
14. Spam - Sorry - I also hate zergs/alt abusers... but this suggestion is terrible for newbies-- 
    •  Nevin McAvoy 
    •  (talk) 
    01:35, 9 April 2008 (BST)!
15. Spam - The game, in its current state, probably needs more PKing. - Grant (talk) 02:21, 9 April 2008 (BST)
16. Spam – Messes with AP and harmful to new players. Also, attempts to "solve" something that I fail to be convinced exists as a real problem. ᚱᛁᚹᛖᚾᚨᚾᛏ 05:44, 9 April 2008 (BST)
17. Humorous - LMAO. A throw away PK characters? At level 1? -- John Rubin^{T! ZG}
18. Spam Just hurts newbies and I think you grossly overestimate the speed at which a level one can kill ANYTHING.--Pesatyel 07:53, 9 April 2008 (BST)
19. Spam - Solution: Use less AP.--Karek^maps?! 12:38, 9 April 2008 (BST)
20. Spam - As most of the spams and kills. Never touch AP!. EVER! -- The Lethal Trio ^{[Tlk|NTCS|RRF] U! E!} 16:43, 9 April 2008 (BST)
21. Spam - All this does is hurt newbies. --Jasonjason 22:49, 9 April 2008 (BST)