Revert Hot zone Changes

[Bigbc]

So with the recent hot zone changes the hot zones have become very hit and miss, there used to be one around 10am and 12/1pm but now sometimes where there's no demand even after 2pm until later on in the day this hinders the crim community as this would be our main source of money and for groups like PSK we don't have a Gus to ask if there's any demand we have to rely on going out and testing the WL spots every 15-30 minutes IE today from 9:20 - 12:10 i went around to find the hot zone with the all the drugs ( apart from fentanyl ) and still there was no higher demand on the streets.

 

[m4rcus8051]

I agree with some parts but also get why the staff has changed them. 90% of the crims knew what time they occured at and most of them staying up to stupid times (including myself) to min max it with the new changes with random hotzones make it more realistic-ish,,, but i agree with the fragger Zeus revert them!

 

[Neve]

+1, im not exactly too sure why these changed, from what i understand hotzones used to be roughly maybe like 30-40 mins after every storm, and then an hour or two after that for the following zones, which in my opinion has never been overpowered (and thats coming from someone that doesn't sell and is a cook instead). i've heard with the recent changes there's only around 1 hotzone per storm now which honestly doesn't make too much sense, but if this is actually correct or not I'm not 100% on. Not sure if this change was made to push gangs to sell drugs more out of hotzone, with the new fent drug being the meta for how much it sells for, but still yeah it just doesn't entirely make sense.

i understand if devs/staff want to divert more crims to do different crim activities, but if thats the case then when something is nerfed, other crim activities need a bit of a boost, because we all know things like robbing shops and pharmacys aren't generally worth it.

 

[Bobinz]

A couple of things I want to touch on:

- Hotzones shouldn’t be expected at a specific timeframe, that doesn’t make much sense.
- A very (and I mean very) big portion of drug selling was happening only during hotzones, to the point where it became "sell during hotzone or don’t sell at all." That was not the intention behind the design. Hotzones should feel like a rush, a push, or a bonus - not the default way to sell.
Drug resell prices were even adjusted based on hotzone values instead of normal prices, which really highlights the min-max mindset.
- There are additional changes in the pipeline that will influence this as well, hopefully in a positive way.

 

[Barry C]

i understand if devs/staff want to divert more crims to do different crim activities, but if thats the case then when something is nerfed, other crim activities need a bit of a boost, because we all know things like robbing shops and pharmacys aren't generally worth it.

For me, its not just a case of this.

You also need a certain amount of police around to do these activities meaning you can only do them anywhere from 6pm - 10pm.

We were unable to do a Bobcat ourselves last night at 9pm so even then it changes quite regularly due to activity.

 

[Bobinz]

You also need a certain amount of police around to do these activities meaning you can only do them anywhere from 6pm - 10pm.

Yet we still see players doing solo robberies. No team, no hostages, nothing.
Sometimes not even scouts outside to watch for incoming police or other threats.


While this is a separate topic, it does remind me of those robberies where the moment the police arrive, the robbers just run out, hop on a bike, and drive off. Avoiding (or try to) all possible roleplay

 

[Barry C]

Yet we still see players doing solo robberies. No team, no hostages, nothing.
Sometimes not even scouts outside to watch for incoming police or other threats.


While this is a separate topic, it does remind me of those robberies where the moment the police arrive, the robbers just run out, hop on a bike, and drive off. Avoiding (or try to) all possible roleplay

I mean if you can get away with a solo robbery why wouldn't you? When you do them, you run a very high risk of being robbed or arrested.

I understand what you mean with the robbers just running out but at the same time surely thats a bigger chance for roleplay because you start a chase which could end with a lot of fun. In my personal experiences if you don't you get tazed/tackled or forced into a gunfight, and thats not me blaming people but is simply what happens.

Its the same with the drug hotzones, its a 50% chance where you could have someone refusing to roleplay and just tackling you for a quick and easy stop and search or you could have someone that is willing to talk and roleplay it out (not meaning the crim or police win in every scenario)

 

[West1]

Yet we still see players doing solo robberies. No team, no hostages, nothing.
Sometimes not even scouts outside to watch for incoming police or other threats.


While this is a separate topic, it does remind me of those robberies where the moment the police arrive, the robbers just run out, hop on a bike, and drive off. Avoiding (or try to) all possible roleplay

As Barry said a few people do attempt this but this statement brings up 2 main points from me.

First why punish or paint a bad image on the community for the actions of a few?

And 2 what else are crims meant to do cause your lucky to get 1 hot zone a restart now and there has been nothing added in over 2 years for crims so you honestly think its realistic to expect criminals to be doing bins?

 

[Maverick Delta]

First why punish or paint a bad image on the community for the actions of a few?

And 2 what else are crims meant to do cause your lucky to get 1 hot zone a restart now and there has been nothing added in over 2 years for crims so you honestly think its realistic to expect criminals to be doing bins?

100% There is nothing to do as a cim anymore and its known to be one of the biggest issues causing people to get bored and leave the server.

And I know “more is to come…” but honestly, there is barely anything to do right now yet the main thing people did has now been removed pending a future update coming when? A week, a month, a year who knows? But police are still getting regular updates…

Why not keep the hot zones the same until the future additions are ready.

 

[Bobinz]

We can go back and forth forever about what criminals can or can’t do, we’ve been doing that for God knows how long. If you want to discuss that topic, feel free to open another thread, because this one is specifically about hotzones and their changes.

Like I’ve said, more changes are coming. It’s up to you whether you want to wait or not, but neither I nor any other dev can guarantee when they’ll hit live. Believe it or not, we spend more time balancing new features and making sure they can’t be exploited (even though players always try) than on the feature itself. And keep in mind, we’re just like you. You take time off the server to play other games or do other things, and so do we.

We genuinely try to do what’s best for the server as a whole, Nothing is made to benefit only certain groups. If some changes don’t make sense, we can absolutely talk about them - like we’re doing right now, so lets avoid the "nothing for crims to do.. this and that" rants. Have a suggestion? post it in here: https://www.roleplay.co.uk/forums/gtarp.982/post-thread

That said, everyone is welcome to share their thoughts about hotzones and the recent changes. Opinions aren’t right or wrong. Discussion can lead to management or devs reconsidering things - rants won’t.

I’ve explained why I made the changes: it made no sense for hotzones to become the default way of selling drugs. They were always intended to be a bonus.

Don't have access to gus and therefor can't find the hotzone?
There are many ways to go about it. Going from turf to turf with a stack of each drug in your pockets has, in my opinion, the least amount of roleplay, it feels like cheating the system.. avoid all the costs and all the roleplay. Instead, try building connections with gangs who do have access and get that information from them. Ask, negotiate, pay, or even torture , at least that would involved others into roleplay.

There’s been a plan for a long time to allow drug selling anywhere in the city. But if we deploy that, I can’t help but think we would get a feedback thread asking us to revert it because players wouldn’t be able to find the hotzone themselves anymore.

 

[KiloC]

I'm not here to complain or throw my toys out of the pram, simply offer my perspective on the changes. I'm a cook so I'm not affected on the level other people here are.

If I'm not mistaken, and feel free to correct me of course, hotzones were introduced to remove the previous meta of drugs which was sell the only one that made the most money at the time with the least amount of effort to make which was coke so that there was a reason for all of the new drugs to be frequently made and sold.

With infrequent hotzones and the addition of fentanyl which requires a resource that can only consistently be acquired through being whitelisted and using gus, I feel like there are two issues that come with it. The first one is that it feels like another setback for unwhitelisted gangs which are trying to create something new on the server and secondly that it's essentially reverting the hard work that was put in by the devs for the drug update.

Instead of every drug being readily available and focused on by gangs, I feel there's going to be a decline to the way things were but the drugs that will mostly be sold are fentanyl and high-grade meth which both require being in a whitelisted group to consistently make.

With the amount of money you make being tied to police activity outside of hotzones, you're also essentially forced to sell between 6-10 to reap the benefits of the drugs that you've bought.

I don't think hotzones were perfect but I personally think different changes would be more enjoyable for the community instead of making them a rarity.

I'm happy to discuss it either way, whether people agree or disagree with my perspective.

 

[Maverick Delta]

If I'm not mistaken, and feel free to correct me of course, hotzones were introduced to remove the previous meta of drugs which was sell the only one that made the most money at the time with the least amount of effort to make which was coke so that there was a reason for all of the new drugs to be frequently made and sold.

Gus runs provided 1000 uncut coke which was the only sellable drug once cut

 

[brett_bernstein]

all that's being bought consistently is fent and high grade meth at the moment, before this hotzone change, a variety of drugs were being sold at all times which in my opinion is healthier for the server rather than falling back into people only buying the META drugs. i see this change as a step backwards as it stands. obviously i dont know what changes are in the pipeline so things might improve with hotzones, but as it stands rn, the majority of people feel like the changes to hotzones were not needed and unwanted.

 

[Maverick Delta]

i see this change as a step backwards as it stands. obviously i dont know what changes are in the pipeline so things might improve with hotzones, but as it stands rn, the majority of people feel like the changes to hotzones were not needed and unwanted

This is a good point. Lack of hot zones and 1 drug that everyone is selling has pushed up back to square 1 where we was a year and a half ago