Imperial Criminality-How to lower it outside of Cities

[Emperor Marcus]

Kay.... So I might have killed several Imperial Tax Collectors in a row cause I'm like a dragon and I like sitting on my horde of pretty shiny coins. As a result of this Any large city I go to they try to immpediantly arrest me.

Previous to this I would always pay the fine at the city... How do you do that once your banned from the city effectively? Just wait waisting supplies? For how long? Or is there somewhere else a criminal like me who wants to make a profit can go to bribe the right officals.

[You know my name.]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Andkat:

Burning the corpses wouldn't do anything given that it's established in the course of the game that it works fine on even charred bones that are months dead. This isn't an outlandish rationalization, this is a core feature of the setting that becomes a point of consideration in several major questlines. Application of very powerful necromancy is required to render such consultations impossible. Imperial soldiers are also very likely to have Akshullite contracts of binding that would allow location of their corpses even if one attempts to conceal them.

Then do whatever, as i stated idc how they do it and thats fine, let me as the player be able to find out my criminality, you can think of however it can get done idc.

[Kittenbait]

Query -

I (cough) killed some tax collectors in the Bronze Desert. I paid my fines in Kabur to lower criminality. However, I went back through the gates to the main area and I'm locked out of all the cities, arrested on sight. Does paying off the fines in Bronze Desert not affect criminality in the main area?

[Wlerin]

Paying fines only slightly lowers criminality. Killing tax collectors increases it by a lot. You probably need to pay more fines.

[greegarak]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Wlerin:

....
You probably need to pay more fines.

Without acces to city, this is undoable.

[urartu]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Kittenbait:

Query -

I (cough) killed some tax collectors in the Bronze Desert. I paid my fines in Kabur to lower criminality. However, I went back through the gates to the main area and I'm locked out of all the cities, arrested on sight. Does paying off the fines in Bronze Desert not affect criminality in the main area?

In Onyx Station there is a Dark Elf (whom you learn about via a rumor) which can help with criminality as well, try him out.

[Tadayn]

Raewanar at the dereclit temple in Onyx outpost and the quiet man in Fort Refugis both offer to lower some of your criminality for money. The quiet man offer seems to be one time only. Raewanar seems to offer it every 30 days. Someone else also mentioned we could also pay someone in Augurus Work camp to lower criminality.

[greegarak]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Tadayn:

...quiet man in Fort Refugis both offer to lower some of your criminality for money. The quiet man offer seems to be one time only. Raewanar seems to offer it every 30 days. Someone else also mentioned we could also pay someone in Augurus Work camp to lower criminality.

Thanks.
Augros work camp used to be only option(which I broke by evacuating Hafri).

[Kittenbait]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από greegarak:

Thanks.
Augros work camp used to be only option(which I broke by evacuating Hafri).

Yeah, Augoros is bust for me for that reason. Guess it's Raewanar then.

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Wlerin:

Paying fines only slightly lowers criminality. Killing tax collectors increases it by a lot. You probably need to pay more fines.

Cheers - that might explain it. Hadn't played for a while - assumed my criminality wasn't that high when I killed the tax collectors, but maybe I remembered wrongly.

[urartu]

This game is not about surviving desolate wasteland and dangerous adventures or even turning profit.

It has one large moral lesson: Do not mess with the taxmen.

[greegarak]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από urartu:

This game...
It has one large moral lesson: Do not mess with the taxmen.

Taxmen with white karwags, tainted oghres, necromancers, halfed naked witches. These company just don't deserve to be trust.
Vagrus know better where money be putted(supplies).

[Zoopshab]

From reading the discussion and playing the game, it seems to me the criminality design is pretty well thought out.

Rather than criticize what you already have, I would take a different approach and borrow something I recall was said in an interview with Swen Vincke about Baldur's Gate 3. Basically he said they learned from the Divinity series that if they if they put a feature in a game, they need to really, really double down on supporting that feature.

So, the issue with criminality is if a player wants to go full criminal wasteland raider, they auto-lose the game because they lock themselves out of the major cities.

The answer is NOT to add somewhere in the game a spot outside of a major city the player can buy reductions to criminality to eventually grind their rep up and so them they can get back into a city. BORING!

Instead the solution is to go all-in on a viable gameplay pathway for a player to go full bandit, wanted by the law and cannot visit the major cities.

This is a difficulty design only in that most of the quests & content are in the major cities, and it just makes everything more complicated where you have to interconnect all the criss-crossing quests and earlier content to make sure it jives.

Some ideas:

1. Perhaps a mechanism where your main Character and the Companions can disguise and sneak into a city, so they can at least visit and click on quest options (less complication) with a risk that you can get seen/caught leading to a big battle with the law as soon as you leave the city and get back to your caravan bandit "posse" (spies follow you). Another cool even could be you get a "narc" in your workers somehow.

2. Where do you resupply on workers, soldiers, slaves, supplies and money? Inability to access the cities quickly leads to resource depletion and starvation. Ideally raids refill your money, manpower and rations. But what is money good for if you can't trade it? How did pirates spend their money? Mostly at Tortuga and other hives of villainy. Otherwise, they hope no one was able to identify their faces when they retired from banditry and went to major cities (your crew wears scarves on their faces right?). Event idea: An event where some terrified local saw your face without the scarf once, they recognize you as the one who attacked their caravan when they were a child.

Unfortunately, there is no Tortuga equivalent; if there was the empire would destroy it. But there could be "intermediaries" where you have arrangements with certain factions that go into town for you. And not just the loaders/carpenters. Everyone is "bad" to a degree in this game. Im sure under the table the great houses or event he temples clandestinely might hire bandits to attack the other factions in secret.

[Zoopshab]

Smuggling and black market goods are also not as well supported as I think they should be. Once you get caught 2 or 3 times with contraband, wouldn't the guards know to always check you, no matter how many times you pay fines?

I imagine if you want to be a contraband smuggler pretty quickly you should become known as "that dubious guy" and the checks to hide hidden goods get more complicated an involved, but gameplay wise that just builds into interesting decisions that enrich that playstyle.

[Matey]

Yeahhh I'm hitting this one too, in an extra annoying way no less.
I got used to just paying fines whenever I hit major cities to keep my crime down, but because of the decision to give no information to me about what level criminality i have... well I didn't know how serious it was... which became a problem when...

I went to the bronze desert and ran around there for about a year of in game time. And since I decided to side with the Hardul, I attacked an imperial legion I came across in order to show I was siding with them... except that it wasn't a chimera legion legion but a legion legion legion... so anyways, I get hunted by bounty hunters constantly, even attacked by other legions here and there. I paid a guy in onyx to lower things up north which I don't know if helped or not. I eventually made my way back to the main area where... I still get hunted by bounty hunters non-stop. I checked on my outpost and then swung by Augoros for a quest I had, and I found the option there about paying to lower crime... which I did. He said it would take 2 weeks but here I am about 6 months later still getting hunted and still not allowed in towns.

I do plan to go visit Augoros again because I thought he said I could visit him again if needed... but its a really annoying system that I had no idea what my criminality was at. Rarely had any idea when it was going up (other than the tax collectors) and I am thinking I piled up crime in DLC land where I couldn't lower it... I didn't do frequent trips back to main land because my comitas set up is 95 horses and no beasts so I can move fast, which is annoying to get going when the portal makes me get rid of all of it... and with no place to park them in bronze desert I didnt want to have to rebuild my comitas every time i go back there, so itll probably be awhile before i return and hammer out the rest of things there.

So yeah in summary. I think the DLC screwed me on criminality and not telling people when they are committing crimes, nor how severe those crimes are, nor how high on the crime list you are, is all really silly. I read the explanation for realism but it doesn't make sense. I know how my companions feel about me. I know when they i piss them off. I keep their favourite drugs and items on hand so I can appease them as needed. If I had known I was going to run into that kind of trouble with crime I would have made a point of going and paying fees to bring it back down. Also the fact augoros didnt work for me was also annoying as you apparently intended that as a one time way to get out of my predicament. So here I am 100 hours in and probably kneecapped? unless augoros will let me keep throwing money at him, which would be nice but still doesnt really sort out the core issue in my opinion.

I do really like the game and all but there are some really pointlessly cruel mechanics to punish players for not knowing things. That would be fine if this was a 10-20 hour per playthrough game, but if you want me to play 100 hour campaigns it would be nice to respect that time commitment a bit more. It isn't a roguelike where you expect everyone to fail more runs than they win.

Anyways criminality as implemented sucks. Rant Over.

[Matey]

update: i can indeed keep giving Augoros more money every month. no idea how long itll take to ever show results which loops back into the main problem here. but I guess presumably I will eventually not be a criminal again some day...