Justice System Concept: Community Service

Enodoc

I wanted to pull this out of a comment and give it its own thread for people to comment on. The idea here is Community Service as an alternative to directly paying your bounty or fleeing from the guards.

1. Select the "Community Service" option in the Accost Dialogue Window.
   • Bounty decay is frozen.
   • Infamy status changes to You are on Probation: Guards will not accost you for the duration of your community service order.
   • Probation timer of 2 hours starts.
2. Complete the Community Service quest.
3. Report to the "Probation Officer" NPC in the zone capital to turn in the quest.
   • Standard Gold reward for quest is subtracted from bounty.
   • XP reward from quest is capped at 10%.
4. Community Service is complete.
   • If your bounty is now zero, You are Upstanding.
   • If your bounty is not zero, you get the option to Pay the rest of your bounty, or complete another Community Service quest (or Flee).

• The time given by the Probation order should also be enough for you to do some other stuff in the area as well (Questing/Grinding/Crafting) without being accosted for your bounty.
• If you do not complete your Community Service within the Probation period, your bounty and heat are increased as if you had fled from the guards.
• If you are witnessed committing a crime during the period, your Probation is cancelled and the appropriate amount of bounty and heat are added.
• If you are not witnessed committing a crime, and attempt to return to the Probation Officer while you have stolen goods, you will have violated your Probation order and will have your bounty increased appropriately. You will then have to Pay or Flee.
• If you attempt to return to the Outlaws Refuge with stolen goods, the Fence will not deal with you if you are on Probation. (They will however advise you to ditch your stolen goods before returning to the Probation Officer.)

All the Community Service quests would be available as well for any Upstanding citizen to complete for the standard amount of Gold and XP.

Community Service Quests:

• [x] creature is harassing [y] location. Go and kill [n] of them.
• [x] creatures from [y] delve are growing stronger. Go and clear them out.
• [x] criminal has escaped and is hiding at [y]. Go and apprehend them.
• [x] item has been stolen, and has been taken to [y]. Go and retrieve it.
• [x] citizen has been kidnapped and taken to [y]. Go and rescue them.
• [x] citizen needs an item picked up from [y]. Go and collect it.
• [x] citizen needs an item taken to [y]. Go and deliver it.

TheShadowScout

I'd do those quests when my slightly lawbreaking main was caught stealing (again)...

But then, I always have been a fan of quest driven alternate punishment schemes!

SantieClaws

This one likes the sound of this. Would this one be able to keep her 'lucky finds' if she accepts this option?

Enodoc

wenxue2222b16_ESO wrote: »

This one likes the sound of this. Would this one be able to keep her 'lucky finds' if she accepts this option?

Unfortunately not, as any interaction with the guards would remove stolen items. If you could launder them before being caught though, then absolutely.

Sphinx2318

It was my choice to be a fugitive in the first place when I made the decision to kill/steal/trespass.... Do you really think that after weighing my options and still deciding to go through with my crimes that I would ACTUALLY choose to perform community service????

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

AshySamurai

Nice idea. It will add some diversity to the world. I don't think I will use it, but it's still could be fun for RP.

Ysne58

I think it's a great concept and offers another choice.

I've also seen suggestions for jail time if the criminal can't pay the bounty and doesn't want to flee. Is that something that is also workable?

Wreuntzylla

I have saved the leaders of every faction multiple times, sent a Daedric Prince back to Oblivion and ended countless threats to entire cities. My power is so great that I am called upon to deal with any major threat to any of the alliances.

What community service could ever measure up to that?

In any time, dimension or reality, people would just look the other way and grumble under their breath as I walked away with their goods. The monarchs would simply reimburse them for the loss. The whole system is flawed from its conception.

Enodoc

Sphinx2318 wrote: »

It was my choice to be a fugitive in the first place when I made the decision to kill/steal/trespass.... Do you really think that after weighing my options and still deciding to go through with my crimes that I would ACTUALLY choose to perform community service????

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Then don't? The point is that it adds an extra choice to clear your bounty that doesn't involve you losing any money (and still allows you to clear it if you have nothing to pay the fine with). TES games have had a "free" choice for ages, it's just usually jail time. The problem with jail time in an MMO setting is the persistent world, as you can't just make an arbitrary amount of time pass with a blank screen.

Ysne58

Enodoc wrote: »

Sphinx2318 wrote: »

It was my choice to be a fugitive in the first place when I made the decision to kill/steal/trespass.... Do you really think that after weighing my options and still deciding to go through with my crimes that I would ACTUALLY choose to perform community service????

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Then don't? The point is that it adds an extra choice to clear your bounty that doesn't involve you losing any money (and still allows you to clear it if you have nothing to pay the fine with). TES games have had a "free" choice for ages, it's just usually jail time. The problem with jail time in an MMO setting is the persistent world, as you can't just make an arbitrary amount of time pass with a blank screen.

That's a great explanation for why jail time probably would not work as well.

eventide03b14a_ESO

Enodoc wrote: »

I wanted to pull this out of a comment and give it its own thread for people to comment on. The idea here is Community Service as an alternative to directly paying your bounty or fleeing from the guards.

1. Select the "Community Service" option in the Accost Dialogue Window.
   • Bounty decay is frozen.
   • Infamy status changes to You are on Probation: Guards will not accost you for the duration of your community service order.
   • Probation timer of 2 hours starts.
2. Complete the Community Service quest.
3. Report to the "Probation Officer" NPC in the zone capital to turn in the quest.
   • Standard Gold reward for quest is subtracted from bounty.
   • XP reward from quest is capped at 10%.
4. Community Service is complete.
   • If your bounty is now zero, You are Upstanding.
   • If your bounty is not zero, you get the option to Pay the rest of your bounty, or complete another Community Service quest (or Flee).

• The time given by the Probation order should also be enough for you to do some other stuff in the area as well (Questing/Grinding/Crafting) without being accosted for your bounty.
• If you do not complete your Community Service within the Probation period, your bounty and heat are increased as if you had fled from the guards.
• If you are witnessed committing a crime during the period, your Probation is cancelled and the appropriate amount of bounty and heat are added.
• If you are not witnessed committing a crime, and attempt to return to the Probation Officer while you have stolen goods, you will have violated your Probation order and will have your bounty increased appropriately. You will then have to Pay or Flee.
• If you attempt to return to the Outlaws Refuge with stolen goods, the Fence will not deal with you if you are on Probation. (They will however advise you to ditch your stolen goods before returning to the Probation Officer.)

All the Community Service quests would be available as well for any Upstanding citizen to complete for the standard amount of Gold and XP.

Community Service Quests:

• [x] creature is harassing [y] location. Go and kill [n] of them.
• [x] creatures from [y] delve are growing stronger. Go and clear them out.
• [x] criminal has escaped and is hiding at [y]. Go and apprehend them.
• [x] item has been stolen, and has been taken to [y]. Go and retrieve it.
• [x] citizen has been kidnapped and taken to [y]. Go and rescue them.
• [x] citizen needs an item picked up from [y]. Go and collect it.
• [x] citizen needs an item taken to [y]. Go and deliver it.

At least it's something. I don't think they put much thought into the justice system as it currently is. It's one of the most disappointing things about the game so far. What I would like to see:

1. Faction/zone based bounty tracking instead of global.
2. The option to avoid bounty by killing all the witnesses.
3. The option to return stolen goods and cancel combat if you accidentally hit a non hostile NPC.
4. Guards that are not invincible.
5. The ability to feed as a vampire that won't register as a crime.

Basically the things we have come to expect in a TES game...

Gidorick

This is a wonderful idea! I must be honest, I didn't come into the thread expecting to like the idea but the system you've devised sounds great! Tons of fun too!

I really like the way you've structured the community service. It would be cool if they could add community service quests to the game from time to time. Heck! They could have "Community Service Quest Packs" in the crown store!

Well done sir!

I hope @ZOS is listening.

Enodoc

I wanted to dig this one up again since I first posted about it before console launch. And also because I wanted to drop in here my design for the Infamy Meter while on Probation. This design goes along with my previous designs for the meter which have different icons for Disreputable, Notorious and Fugitive:

Enodoc wrote: »

Left to right, Disreputable, Notorious, Fugitive.
The grey hand represents the fact that you are a petty criminal. The white masked face represents the fact that you are a known outlaw who is visible to the guards. The red sword, as before, represents kill-on-sight.

So on that note, here's my Probation meter:

The blue bar decays with the timer. When the blue reaches the white, the timer has expired. (This would mean that, for a lower bounty, the timer would appear to decay faster, as the full two hours fills the meter, and one hour would be half-way between full and wherever the white section has reached.) I was undecided whether to keep the bounty value itself as part of the UI, or replace it with the timer (as shown here). The timer could alternatively be attached to the Community Service quest tracker, like other in-game quest timers.

mrskinskull

Enodoc wrote: »

I wanted to pull this out of a comment and give it its own thread for people to comment on. The idea here is Community Service as an alternative to directly paying your bounty or fleeing from the guards.

1. Select the "Community Service" option in the Accost Dialogue Window.
   • Bounty decay is frozen.
   • Infamy status changes to You are on Probation: Guards will not accost you for the duration of your community service order.
   • Probation timer of 2 hours starts.
2. Complete the Community Service quest.
3. Report to the "Probation Officer" NPC in the zone capital to turn in the quest.
   • Standard Gold reward for quest is subtracted from bounty.
   • XP reward from quest is capped at 10%.
4. Community Service is complete.
   • If your bounty is now zero, You are Upstanding.
   • If your bounty is not zero, you get the option to Pay the rest of your bounty, or complete another Community Service quest (or Flee).

• The time given by the Probation order should also be enough for you to do some other stuff in the area as well (Questing/Grinding/Crafting) without being accosted for your bounty.
• If you do not complete your Community Service within the Probation period, your bounty and heat are increased as if you had fled from the guards.
• If you are witnessed committing a crime during the period, your Probation is cancelled and the appropriate amount of bounty and heat are added.
• If you are not witnessed committing a crime, and attempt to return to the Probation Officer while you have stolen goods, you will have violated your Probation order and will have your bounty increased appropriately. You will then have to Pay or Flee.
• If you attempt to return to the Outlaws Refuge with stolen goods, the Fence will not deal with you if you are on Probation. (They will however advise you to ditch your stolen goods before returning to the Probation Officer.)

All the Community Service quests would be available as well for any Upstanding citizen to complete for the standard amount of Gold and XP.

Community Service Quests:

• [x] creature is harassing [y] location. Go and kill [n] of them.
• [x] creatures from [y] delve are growing stronger. Go and clear them out.
• [x] criminal has escaped and is hiding at [y]. Go and apprehend them.
• [x] item has been stolen, and has been taken to [y]. Go and retrieve it.
• [x] citizen has been kidnapped and taken to [y]. Go and rescue them.
• [x] citizen needs an item picked up from [y]. Go and collect it.
• [x] citizen needs an item taken to [y]. Go and deliver it.

This sounds like an awesome idea.

Gidorick

Thanks for bumping this. I simply love this idea. I actually think the community service quests could be more mundane than what you have posted.

How about the need to /sweep for a period of time (20 minutes) in a specific area that changes after a minute or two. So you could go sweep in this area...

Then after 2 minutes the quest area changes and you have to go sweep in the new area.

Boring.

Mundane.

Community service.

Enodoc

Gidorick wrote: »

Thanks for bumping this. I simply love this idea. I actually think the community service quests could be more mundane than what you have posted.

How about the need to /sweep for a period of time (20 minutes) in a specific area that changes after a minute or two. So you could go sweet in this area...

Then after 2 minutes the quest area changes and you have to go sweep in the new area.

Boring.

Mundane.

Community service.

Hmm, mundane tasks is an interesting idea. The questing idea in the OP is based on Community Service from Fable II, but having mundane tasks in the rotation (or maybe as an alternative option) could work as well.

Tandor

I love the whole idea, and the mundane aspect mixed in with the other suggested quests would be great.

I really hope that ZOS read this topic, because at the moment the justice system feels half-finished but the original idea of player enforcers simply won't work. Adding PvP penalties to PvE crimes in PvE areas was never a good idea in my view, and I'm not surprised it's never happened. This idea, on the other hand, is an awesome way of extending the justice system while maintaining the PvE nature of it and without bringing in open world PvP which would simply cause more problems than it would solve.

VilhelmValhalla4

@Enodoc Yeah, this idea had that Fable 2 ring to it, I like it. If they added jail and community service that would be especially great, though I imagine the Three Banners War would present more pressing duties than sweeping a street corner or exterminating rats. Maybe if the player could opt to "volunteer" at a work-camp, gathering materials, making siege equipment, and doing their patriotic duty for their alliance. I do like the idea of hunting down monsters and criminals, a Tamrielic equivalent of the 12 Labors of Hercules...