How to solve the problem of farmers and killers in realistic games?

Question

Game development

Given:

• Realism.
  
• Farmers love to grow tomatoes.
  
• Killers love to kill other players.
  
• Farmers don't like being killed.
  

You need to keep as large an audience as possible by providing realistic gameplay. Artificial unrealistic constraints are highly undesirable. For example, beginners should not be touched for the first N units of time - this rule is not intuitive and needs to be studied separately, and with realism, common sense is enough for the game. Or another example: a farmer's life is hidden in one of his tomatoes - from the same series.
Regular case:

1. Farmers populate the world and grow tomatoes. They like that everything is possible. the game is realistic.
   
2. The killers come and start killing. Mostly farmers. They can kill each other too, but it's difficult. And farmers are harmless, as a rule, because. not even interested in the pvp component.
   
3. Farmers are trying to do something, somehow defend themselves, but killers always have more experience. Killers deeply study the gameplay with only one goal - to rob and kill, and it is these aspects that are worked out to the smallest detail. As a result, farmers have no chance.
   
4. Gradually, farmers are exterminated. When one or more killers become pros, it's only a matter of time. And then there is stupid genocide.
   
5. Farmers leave the game. There are no farmers left, and the killers get bored.
   
6. Killers also leave the game.
   
7. As a result, a couple of pro-killers (fans of the game) still remain and do not allow anyone who comes to play.
   

Answer 1

I don't see any particular problem here. Everything has been thought of for you. What are the farmers doing? grow food. Need to make a need for this food. Just introduce a system of motivation and values. That is, the economy. and unification of players. If there are no farmers, food will cost a lot of money, that is, becoming a farmer is more profitable for the player in terms of self-realization. He will dictate his terms and he will be a very willing guest in any association of players. If there are many farmers and few or no robbers. It is more profitable for the player to become them, since there is a lot of fun, they are easy prey. It works in a very balanced way. Rogue clans take care of farmers to ensure self-sufficiency. there is a benefit for everyone + communication and fun, + this adds more fun to the robbers. If you cut out the enemy farmers, the enemy clan will starve to death, an easy win.

Answer 2

If you want to be completely realistic, then no one should be reborn. Then the robbers will kill all the farmers and starve to death themselves.
And if you add the revival of characters, then you should forget about realism and make sure that there is no profit in killing farmers, but there is a risk of getting a lot of trouble.

Answer 3

The police must protect the farmers from the killers, otherwise there is no way to balance (within the framework of realism). Well, or racket - part of the killers protect farmers from other killers for a bribe.

Answer 4

We make a bunch of defense + karma + economy
1. The game tries its best to protect the farmer. Farmers can buy defensive turrets, guards, etc. Killers can hire farmers to produce resources for them (something like clan communities, where everyone plays their role). The area is patrolled by NPC policemen. In the case of the murder of a policeman, a raid begins on the player. We carefully consider the balance, the reward for the arranged bacchanalia, we rejoice.
2. Every action has a reaction. Killed the blacksmith, keep a 10% markup on repairs. Killed a doctor? + 30 minutes to full recovery. Before you kill someone, you need to think if it's worth it. The farmer can order a killer with impunity and announce a reward for his murder.
3. Balance should be built within the framework of an easy and long grind of NPCs (ala Korean RPG / mmorpg) against the killing of farmers.

Answer 5

Article on the topic. https://dtf.ru/games/22604-istoriya-ubiystv-v-ulti...

Answer 6

1. Make as MMO invulnerable areas. For example, in cities, pvp is prohibited.
2. If the first item is not desirable because of the immaturity and the farmers will hang out in the city all the time and be afraid to go out, then it is worth making a temporary restriction on pvp. For example, during the day, make a fine for pvp in the city, thereby they receive damage to health x2 than outside the city x1. At night, the penalty is removed, but guards appear in some random places. They still do x2 damage. With this approach, the interest of the killers will appear, and the residents will be less afraid to go beyond the fence of the city.
3. Give farmers a license to eliminate killers on their territory without fines. Moreover, the license can be sold by the piece.
4. The farmer can hire a weak guard permanently, a medium guard for a while if he wants to be escorted or a thug on a mad hitman. Allow farmers to chip in to protect any type of guard.
I'll think of more.

Answer 7

After all, there are more types https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bartle_taxonomy_of_p...
Take a closer look at the Criticism section
In the general case, the task is not solvable
You need to watch the dynamics (maybe farmers will turn killers faster than they will register)
And react by changing mechanisms
There are also games in which PVP is made optional and no one balances
anything