Clarification on outdoor swarm kiting

[Bikthek]

Lets say I am a level 52 bard and I need to make some plat. The best place I know to earn money fast is swarm kiting giants in Rathe Mountains. I picked up all the spawns I can see and am kiting as usual when I start to get nasty tells that I am going to be reported and that I can't take all the spawns in the area.

I am aware that people can camp a single mob in an outdoor zone but no one seemed to be camping anything in particular. There were a few other people in the zone also hunting giants but I tagged the kills first so no kill stealing happened. No one was trained because the giants are all following me.

So the real question is does taking most of the giant spawns violate the play nice policy? Is this something I could be banned for?

[kitao]

Don’t think you are doing anything “wrong” but kind of a bleh move to swarm hill giants.

People pay good pp/hr for PLs in zones where there are too many mobs.

[loramin]

So the real question is does taking most of the giant spawns violate the play nice policy? Is this something I could be banned for?

Taking "most" does violate it (although you'd likely get a warning or suspension first, not a ban). The relevant section for bard swarming is generally this one:

10. You may not disrupt the normal playability of a zone or area.

Zone/Area Disruption is defined as any activity designed to harm or inconvenience a number of groups rather than a specific player or group of players. This includes, but is not limited to::

-Monopolizing most or all of the kills in an area.

- Deliberately blocking a doorway or narrow area so other players cannot get past.

- Refusing to cooperate with the other parties at a contested spawn site after having been instructed to do so by a P99CSR.

- Making excessive and inappropriate use of public channels of communications (/shout, /ooc, etc.).

- Intentionally causing excessive zone latency (creating excessive corpses, abusing spell effects, etc.).

- Causing intentional experience loss to other players (deliberately impeding fleeing players by blocking their escape route, intentionally training NPCs on other players, etc.).

So in other words, you absolutely can swarm kite Hill Giants ... or anything else ... as long as you don't do so many that you are:

-Monopolizing most or all of the kills in an area.

And like anything in the PnP, "most or all" is deliberately not defined, so everyone (both you, and the other players there) just have to guess as to whether the amount you're taking qualifies as "most" or not ... and then if someone /petitions and a GM shows up, you get to find out if you're right. If you want to be safe I'd count the number of spawns there and never take more than half, so that by definition you aren't taking "most".

[Tilien]

I'd say best practice is to ask what other people are hunting and avoid it. As Loramin mentioned you're not allowed to monopolize "most" kills in an area. If there are only a few other players hunting you can easily work out what they're camping and avoid those areas. I'd recommend doing this AHEAD of time.

The upside is if all players agree then everyone is happy and they can't really complain when you take everything left unclaimed.

The downside is if everyone is hunting giants as well you might end up with an equal share of them instead of obscene money.

[Baler]

swarm kite until you get a tell from a guide to "knock it off"
lol

[Bikthek]

Thank you for the replies. These are very helpful.

[sacman08]

I was waiting for someone to find and post the specific forum thread where they say it's ok except for HG's in Rathe Mountains. For that reason alone I never tried to quad them.

[Baler]

I was waiting for someone to find and post the specific forum thread where they say it's ok except for HG's in Rathe Mountains. For that reason alone I never tried to quad them.

I can find you posts where I've ranted about people quading seafuries :o

I've sure it's just a matter of time before some fresh blood starts going hard on the HG quads and gets a new thread.

[sacman08]

Just wanted to clarify, we are saying a bard, with the fastest run speed in the game, is ok to swarm and take all the HG's in Rathe that he can manage as long as he is FTE.

[loramin]

I was waiting for someone to find and post the specific forum thread where they say it's ok except for HG's in Rathe Mountains. For that reason alone I never tried to quad them.

I can't guarantee that what you're talking about doesn't exist ... but as someone who does my best to watch for staff quotes (so I can add them to the wiki), if a staff member said that I for one didn't see it.

You may instead be thinking of this (https://wiki.project1999.com/Rulings#Hill_Giants_Are_FTE_Unless_You_Camp_One_Sp awn), which does not say that you can only kill one HG at a time! Instead, it indicates that (like all outdoor zones) you can only "own" one spawn point. You can kill as many as you want (modulo the zone disruption issue I already mentioned), but if another player starts taking the respawns of the ones you just killed, you have no special claim on them.

The context there is that if you wanted to sit at the spawn point of one HG and just camp it, you could prevent other players from taking that one spawn. I believe all Galach is saying in that quote is you can only do that to one HG spawn.

[Baler]

Just wanted to clarify, we are saying a bard, with the fastest run speed in the game, is ok to swarm and take all the HG's in Rathe that he can manage as long as he is FTE.

Not if they're camped, hill giants in rathe are NOT FTE

[loramin]

Just wanted to clarify, we are saying a bard, with the fastest run speed in the game, is ok to swarm and take all the HG's in Rathe that he can manage as long as he is FTE.

No, that is very much NOT what I'm saying. Re-read the post above about zone disruption; it's completely separate from the camp mechanics/FTE stuff.

Any player (Bard or otherwise) can kill as much of any outdoor mob, as long as A) individual spawn points aren't being camped by someone, B) they are the first to engage each mob, and (this is the key one here) C) they aren't disrupting the zone.

Again, the exact details of disruption are a bit nebulous, but to be safe take no more than half the available spawn points, because it's harder to argue you're taking "most" if you're taking half or less.

[Baler]

I've noticed a lot of people confusing what FTE actually means.

FTE mobs can't be camped, whom ever engages it first has FTE on that mob.

If it's not an FTE mob it can be camped, Players can't come along and kill it while other players are actively camping it.

[sacman08]

No, that is very much NOT what I'm saying. Re-read the post above about zone disruption; it's completely separate from the camp mechanics/FTE stuff.

Any player (Bard or otherwise) can kill as much of any outdoor mob, as long as A) individual spawn points aren't being camped by someone, B) they are the first to engage each mob, and (this is the key one here) C) they aren't disrupting the zone.

Again, the exact details of disruption are a bit nebulous, but to be safe take no more than half the available spawn points, because it's harder to argue you're taking "most" if you're taking half or less.

Thanks Loramin. Your middle paragraph here should be on the wiki along with Galach's response (His response seems to suggest only one at a time period).

[loramin]

Thanks Loramin. Your middle paragraph here should be on the wiki along with Galach's response (His response seems to suggest only one at a time period).

Well to be fair to Glach, that quote is taken out of context; it's clearer in context (https://www.project1999.com/forums/showthread.php?p=3072385) (and that's part of why all GM wiki quotes come with a link to the original thread).

As for adding my middle paragraph ... the Camp Rules/Rulings pages are kind of special. I admin-lock them so no one can edit/vandalize them, and so I try to keep them strictly a record of GM quotes. If I started adding my opinion, however well-intentioned, it could look like I was trying to pass it off as the staff's opinion.

Instead I have http://wiki.project1999.com/Camp%20Rules%20FAQ :) And since it's not admin-locked, feel free to add a question with my middle paragraph as the answer ... or any other question for that matter ... if you think it would improve the page!

[sacman08]

I've noticed a lot of people confusing what FTE actually means.

FTE mobs can't be camped, whom ever engages it first has FTE on that mob.

If it's not an FTE mob it can be camped, Players can't come along and kill it while other players are actively camping it.

That's what the question is about HG's in Rathe: Can they be camped or not? Galach's response suggests yes, here we are saying no, FTE. Loramin's response cleared up what I was wondering.

[elwing]

It's an outdoor zone so you can claim 1 spawn point if you want... No one does that as it would be too slow so it's fte fest as it is fte... Meaning bard kiting is okay as long as you don't go up to area disruption... That said a single 60 mag killing almost all giant could aldo be assimilated as zone disruption but good luck with that...

[loramin]

That's what the question is about HG's in Rathe: Can they be camped or not? Galach's response suggests yes, here we are saying no, FTE. Loramin's response cleared up what I was wondering.

I think part of the confusion is that "FTE" gets thrown around in a lot of different ways. People say things like "all outdoor mobs are FTE", but I think that's confusing because no mob is always FTE, except raid mobs: if you have been killing any (non-raid) mob and someone else shows up, it is not FTE.

So it's not "the players say one thing and a GM says another", it's that people are talking about different states: "unclaimed mob" vs. "claimed mob" vs. "unclaimed because people are sharing claims on some other mobs". All mobs are FTE in the first and last states, but not in the middle one (with some minor complications indoors with "camps of mobs").

[Trexller]

in Rathe Mountains, a giant that is walking is fair game.

A player camping a spawn has to engage it before it starts walking.

A GM or Galach said it.

Lore-amin can probably find the text in his photographic forum memory.

So a bard can go round up all the walking hill giants. but still a bleh move... maybe.

[loramin]

Lore-amin can probably find the text in his photographic forum memory.

No photograpic memory, just: https://wiki.project1999.com/Rulings :)

I think you're specifically referring to: https://wiki.project1999.com/Rulings#Hill_Giants_Are_FTE_Unless_You_Camp_One_Sp awn

[Sacer]

Let's put it that way if you were smart you would swarm to 60 on uncontested mobs and make 50k+ plat a day selling PLs in DN, but instead you're going to swarm a very popular cash camp used by casual players and make half the server hate you to grind a few thousand plats.

[Sibelia1]

I'm an idiot.