Baiting and Totems: Alternative animal spawn mechanic

[Sevenless]

To paraphrase something jorb said a while ago "If players feel the need to bot, it's a bad mechanic".

This is the results of about 10 minutes of effort on my part. Bots login and when they see an angler, they stay online and mention they've found something in discord. Every X hours I pop down and kill what the bots have found, then haul it to the surface. That's not something a botless player can do easily since the time/annoyance of logging characters in manually to check is much higher (I have done this in the past, it's maddening). What creatures get botted? Bear, Moose, Mammoths, Anglers, Orcas are all prime targets to bot. Bear/moose only if you have a crazy quality node, mammoths/anglers for food even if you have mediocre nodes, and orcas anytime for food. Bear/Moose/Anglers/mammoths can be found via simple login bots, and orcas are extremely rare so you need a bot to actively move around to look for them. That said: Orca bots I have seen, and one is/was available in a public client (Nurgling 1)

So if players simply have to wait around for a message, then go check a node (that they scouted out manually for quality first), how could we make this concept accessible to everyone without rocking the boat?

Totems:
A totem would be species specific and crafted from a dead animal.
It would bind to the player who crafted it (same way branding irons remember their creator), and its quality would be equal to the animal in question.

Hunting bait:
Baits would be species specific and a crafted item that's made from (insert bait material for species) + a totem.
Baits when placed in the world have a proximity limit to other baits of about 1x visual range of the player (mimicking the density bots can achieve before they overlap).
Players can only make baits from a totem they crafted (requiring players to invest in the totem softcap for high quality bait)

Mechanic:
After X amount of time a players totem will change model in the inventory indicating that a bait has attracted a creature. When the player goes to check the bait (only the owner of a bait should be able to check it, but baits can be destroyed by other players) it spawns a creature just off visual render and gives the player a directional ping. The quality of the animal is the quality of the bait or the node area that it spawned on, whichever is lowest.

Limiting spawnrate:
The number of baits a player can set is limited, possibly scaling with a skill (lore?). This if not overly restrictive + the time per species being tuned allows decent control over animal spawnrate.

[Ø]

This would be abused by botters. I dig the idea, but it's an even easier way for people with bots, alts, and the like to gain a massive amount of a particular animal. This would disrupt trade and balance, assuming there is any balance (I don't say this as a slight, but as a noob I do not know.)

Unless there is something that I'm missing from this idea, what stops a single player from using alts to make multiple totems and baits for a single node?

Is there a new game mechanic that hinders partied players from attacking this spawned creature?
Is the creature able to be spawned and killed by a separate player without the use of a party?
What about villages and their villagers? Are they all able to attack the creature once the owner of the totem and bait has spawned it?
Is the Survival of the totem owner taken into account or does Survival get bypassed while making the totem and bait? I assume Survival is the last hardcap in the chain of Survival > Totem > Node...

Am I misunderstanding the limits?

Baits when placed in the world have a proximity limit to other baits of about 1x visual range of the player (mimicking the density bots can achieve before they overlap).

Does this mean that a single player can only place one within the visual range or does this mean all players can only place one within the visual range?
Player 1 baits at x,y of 0,0 and player 2 baits at 0,1 is ok or does player 2 have to bait at the visual range that I don't know, but I'll use the example 32 for 0,32?...

[Sevenless]

This would be abused by botters. I dig the idea, but it's an even easier way for people with bots, alts, and the like to gain a massive amount of a particular animal. This would disrupt trade and balance, assuming there is any balance (I don't say this as a slight, but as a noob I do not know.) Unless there is something that I'm missing from this idea, what stops a single player from using alts to make multiple totems and baits for a single node?

Baits take time, and prevent other baits from being placed at that location. Totems requiring you to hunt an animal yourself to make bait from means alts for high Q animals require very significant investment. It doesn't matter how many characters you have, a node can fit X bait traps at a time (due to there being a limit of how many baits fit on the peak). Scale the time accordingly.

Beyond which: players botting are already distorting the market. We just pretend they aren't because it's not a specific game mechanic that's bluntly in our face. Realistically speaking, the point of this system is to let those high end players replace their bots with an ingame mechanic that's accessible to anyone with the quality/stats to take advantage of it (and is easier for the devs to tune, if they decide to rebalance things). Most villages who aren't botting super high Q are also not statted or developed enough to use this system either. Case in point: Nearly every orca killed is found by bots. My village has kileld about 20, we found maybe 5 without bots. And that's because everyone quit after 20 orcas which only took a week or two, otherwise the ratio would be even worse.

Is the creature able to be spawned and killed by a separate player without the use of a party?

Only the character who created the trap can spawn it, other than that it's a normal animal.

Is there a new game mechanic that hinders partied players from attacking this spawned creature?
What about villages and their villagers? Are they all able to attack the creature once the owner of the totem and bait has spawned it?

Doesn't matter how they die, this is about how they're spawned. I'm not trying to overhaul the combat system for animal hunting.

Is the Survival of the totem owner taken into account or does Survival get bypassed while making the totem and bait? I assume Survival is the last hardcap in the chain of Survival > Totem > Node... Am I misunderstanding the limits?

In my head totem is made from dead animal and uses its quality. If we state that the animal must be hunted alone, the totem's Q is the quality of the animal after the hunter's survival softcap. Beyond that it's totem quality or node quality, whatever's lowest.

Simplified: The highest Q bear you've killed (and turned into a totem) is the highest quality you can get by baiting. But you can't bait a bear higher than the node quality of the spot you put the bait on.

Does this mean that a single player can only place one within the visual range or does this mean all players can only place one within the visual range?

To prevent alt abuse, the block is on any baits being placed. This + the hunter skilling lore so they can place multiple baits should reduce the need for alts.

[Ø]

Thanks for the clarification.

Let's say a player decides to pclaim or vclaim a node for baiting. Are non-approved players able to lay bait or destroy bait without criminal acts?

[wolf1000wolf]

Why keep the node system at all?

[Robben_DuMarsch]

Local pool all animals except for junk ones (bats, badgers, foxes, etc).
Make QL random.

[springyb]

Anytime someone makes a post about replacing a simple mechanic with yet another overly complicated alternative, object controlled objects get delayed another month.

[Hesufo]

This is the results of about 10 minutes of effort on my part. Bots login and when they see an angler, they stay online and mention they've found something in discord. Every X hours I pop down and kill what the bots have found

You could just fix that by having mobs always disappear after ~5 minutes of spawning, whether or not they're in sight of a player or even aggroed. And maybe make that timer extendable only if you drop its HP to a certain threshold.

[MachineLegend]

In terms of game design ideals, I don't think recreating the gameplay loop that botting enables should be the design goal of a system as integral as hunting. Although I am sympathetic to arguments that quality node hunting/bot pinging could be changed, I think the solution to solving this problem is to make hunting a more engaging, interesting and fun process. Not to make it more passive.

[Sevenless]

In terms of game design ideals, I don't think recreating the gameplay loop that botting enables should be the design goal of a system as integral as hunting. Although I am sympathetic to arguments that quality node hunting/bot pinging could be changed, I think the solution to solving this problem is to make hunting a more engaging, interesting and fun process. Not to make it more passive.

Normally I'd agree, however I think this suggestion feels "huntery". And really it's only pacifying lategame hunting, when everyone is low energy and ready to semi-afk the long game. All of the active spam hunting/searching for nodes (which most hunters seem to not mind/enjoy) is entirely intact.

Anytime someone makes a post about replacing a simple mechanic with yet another overly complicated alternative, object controlled objects get delayed another month.

>.> Good. OCO is extremely hard to code, but gameplay wise will barely change gameplay.

Thanks for the clarification.

Let's say a player decides to pclaim or vclaim a node for baiting. Are non-approved players able to lay bait or destroy bait without criminal acts?

Making it vandalism to place/destroy without permission and a passable object should be fine. Consistent with how claims work overall.