I have never been against PK's for CP's, and CP's follow the standard PK criteria for the vast part of it. Point is simply due to how CP works, it is very hard to nail them. The few exceptions there are in the PK policy to me are justified by the fact that the CP faction also has rules governing what they can and cannot do IC'ly - and breaching those rules immediately invalidates any PK's they carried out. You can not demand that CP's take on more risk while also demanding their hands stay tied when retaliation, even if that retaliation is preemptive. Or complain if their response is much heavier.
The only big exception to the PK policy are sewers sweeps, which is a grey zone otherwise. CP's do not get a choice to do those, and thus it kind goes against the first PK criteria (which is required regardless of this being a 'pk by default' scenario or not). They are forced to do this at figurative gunpoint - which isn't a PK for citizens either (e.g. a loyalist gets forced into the sewers at gunpoint and dies in a way that would be an NLR outside the sewers).
If you want to balance rebel vs CP RP for this, the only condition on which I'd ever agree to consider this is if all OOC restrictions on CP's to hunt down rebels get lifted. You can talk about making it a fair fight, but just making it PK's for CP as well makes the fight squarely unfair for CP's. The means sweeps whenever CP's want, patrols in the slums whenever CP's want, undercover operations, etc. are to be allowed. Rebel vs CP right now isn't a symmetrical fight - rebels also get a lot of protection from being rolled over. The main protection is that CP cannot willy nilly do stuff that could get rebels PK'ed. They need a reason to do anything, which squarely puts them in a defensive/reactionary position. Extend that to PK's... imagine PK's auths were one-way: someone can PK you but you cannot PK him unless he tries and fails to PK you - otherwise it is NLR for the 'someone' if you kill him. Would you like to be a sitting duck here?
Thirdly, expect much heavier consequences against the rebels for any CP death. Right now we easily forget about a CP getting NLR'ed. This in no way will be the case if there are PK's (and because NLR and PK from IC point of view are still the same - a CP died - NLR's will get a much heavier response as well, we cannot IC'ly discriminate against NLR). And just to elaborate a bit on what this could entail: heavy lockdowns on the slums, multiple sweeps including OTA sweeps. Why? You just increased the risk a lot for CP, so I feel it is only right that the risk is proportionally increased for rebels as well to avoid CP PK's being too common.
Lastly, there is this entire big mess of ranks. You can argue a lot both ways, thing is the CP is a faction with OOC demands on it. We are upheld to a standard that your average player isn't. One unit makes a mistake - entire faction gets blamed. Hence ranks aren't a pure IC thing, they are also an OOC indication of trust, experience and quality. Revoking OOC things due to IC events has never been a thing (you can't PK someone out of his faction lead role). Deranking on PK is just too big of a risk to cause instability. But on the other hand I understand that PK's without a derank just will have people remake the same character.
Keeping the rank makes no sense. If you think the rank is not 90% of the cp whitelist then ur dreaming.
PK is both an OOC and IC punishment. If I got pked and kept my rank I would honestly not give a damn, call me a bad roleplayer or a rational person.
A PK can never be a form of punishment. They are a narrative tool to keep things going and continue other character's their story in a realistic manner. Problem is with CP's - one dies and another one takes his place, the PK usually has very little impact on the story. I will definitely not allow PK's to be applied as any form of OOC punishment.
Reminds me of OFC-301 who got PKED during an event. Nothing happened, you now have OFC-302 fresh from the Moe Cloning Facility
You cannot remove a lead from their position by PK'ing them. Faction lead is an OOC position, and the position of OfC is tied to that. IC'ly it matters very little anyway - hence why these deaths often do not even meet the PK criteria and the digit change is more of a courtesy to at least give you some bragging rights.
FOR ONCE, I'm on the Webel side. Civil Protection should receive equal risk as of Anti-Citizen anywhere, be it the streets or Slums. Simply put, there'll be a risk for wannabe heroes on the CP side and to remove the 'God Complex' on most low-level CP Functionaries so they'll actually FearRP as you wouldn't want to in the situation IRL. Also, I suggest implementing a temporary revoking of CP Whitelist of a fella that was recently PK'ed for a couple of days as well.
+SUPPORT
I will not ever revoke whitelists (even temporarily) for IC events. A whitelist is an OOC thing, not an IC thing - let us not mix the two even more. You do not get banned from making new citizen characters either when you get PK'ed on a citizen.
This is a good suggestion that eliminates the typical "pls let me sweep omg!!" CP unit and gives the faction a big reality check on what it means to be a civil protection functionary. CPs must feel oppressed in their own way. They should not like dispatch but fear it, after all, it is the same AI that orders them to lock down their location and die if it must be.
A rank reset?
A rank demotion (eg. from i3 to i4)?
The leads will decide, but IMO, punishment is necessary and fair.
No CP is asking to sweep just because they want to. Sweeps only happen because CP has to. Usually it means a rebel crossed a line and did something that the Combine simply cannot ignore. You can argue a lot about where that line should be drawn, but that changes nothing to the discussion here. In the end, we give rebels a hand by not steamrolling over them, while also making sure they don't take the whole arm. Part of this is also for server balance reasons and not because we as a faction want to (imagine rebels attacking loyalists on the plaza because no CP wants to respond and get PK'ed). Nobody is asking rebels OOC'ly to attack CP's, but we are asking OOC'ly for CP's to deal with rebels when they start doing stupid stuff - otherwise I get complaints that my faction isn't functioning properly if we do not respond.
Hey,
quick one that doesn't need much explaining.
Can we consider/look into expanding the Slums/Sewers PK zone to also apply to CPs?
This would achieve the following:
a) Slightly balance out the risk/reward of entering these areas
b) Force CPs to be more careful/mindful when operating in these areas, focusing on the objective instead of loitering, prioritizing wounded cohorts over pwning rebels
c) Reduce the frequency of injections/sweeps for minor inconveniences due to the risk, focusing on necessary operations only
I thoroughly believe this would be helpful for the server balance and a welcome risk to CP forces, adding some extra risk and tension to sweeps and injections.
Thanks xoxo
I am not certain if this is what would be achieved... it is one way you can see it go, but that implies we don't tackle the slums/sewers in a new manner to deal with the added risk. I really would consider just wiping all contraband from the slums to ensure only very few people actually have the weapons to attempt a serious attack in CP - and make sure that those few people are anything but interested in doing so. I do not believe that is what rebels want to happen, but really up to them to decide if they consider Pk'ing CP's is worth lifting all the restrictions.
