Reworking the Alarm System and Burglaries

[knppel]

44 minutes ago, Fogry said:

Unrealistic crime rate? 90% of the breakin attempts end up with the people going to jail or a wild chase with the cops making the scene even more unrealistic. IRL most burglaries are left unsolved... 

Yeah you need to also take in account the total amount of properties, domestic or business-related, you can break into.

As I've said the other day irl more places of business or residence come on less burglars than in our ingame community where crime for the sake of it is a major motivation drive for many people.

 

As you throw up numbers: Compare the amount of burglaries irl (3,370 daily) with that ingame and now also put the population in relation to each other to properly define unrealistic.

 

IRL, the US have 331.449.281 citizens according to the 2020 census. Who, as mentioned, commit average 3,370 burglaries a day.

Let's assume single households a moment- technically not correct but you'll see it barely matters:

This means roughly 1 in 100,000 citizens becomes victim of a burglary every day.

 

Chances are effectively rather low, opposed to what your statistic claims. It happens, but (in most areas) not regularly.

 

If we assume we have 2,000 active characters played in LS now, who each have an own residence or business one could break into (as false as the single households, but whatever) and have 2 break in attempts daily, this already makes 1 in 1,000 citizens a burglary victim. Daily.

 

That is why the crime rate is unrealistic and no further incentives needed in this direction.

 

44 minutes ago, Fogry said:

Look at that for a second, think on how many burglaries are happening in game. Not as much, people are afraid of doing them!

If you observed discord general you'd know at least once a week someone cries their break-in request is unanswered since hours.

As in many other cases I have reason to suspect it's down to decision-making here (not that I say admins should blindly approve all requests- see below).

 

Keep in mind for every attempt, no matter if by front door or elsewise, a player first needs admin approval. That might or might not come depending on how many available staff we have ingame at that very point, which tends to be a very dynamic factor.

 

Pushing it on the allegedly overpowered alarm system is an option, sure, but changing alarms won't affect the detail one still needs to take ooc steps (and no matter how good an opportunity might be, has to delay and wait until one has permission to act ic).

 

44 minutes ago, Fogry said:

If you have concerns with that system share them, don't just say - "oh unrealistic crime rates, unrealistic measures - no support" If you have opinion give it out, it will be way more helpful than what you just wrote. 

My concern is that as mentioned I do not think we need to incentive burglaries.

 

The reason is simple- my own character's place was already broken into this year. I don't mind that generally, as mentioned above from this point of view everyone using a domestic residence or place of business also offers a possible rp hook for others to break in, I am fully aware.

 

However, I'd mind a lot if that happened not on occasion, but regularly, as this would simply deter more of my playtime only to take measures to protect whatever property I use, respectively to earn money just to maintain simple counter-measures that might or might not work.

 

I can't speak for other cases but my base theory is if you get caught you did it wrong, not the alarm did it wrong.

If you're not even trying, well, you're not even trying.

 

It is possible in our system to break in a house , search for coke, and eventually run off over the balcony with some jewelry before the cops arrive.

 

I wanna keep sinking my e-money in coke and booze, not alarms, thank you.

The suggested ideas are just absolutely ridiculous- for that money you can already pay G6 to lurk infront the door 24/7 all month in our economy, for those who are not aware.

 

Last but not least I have to stress once more what I mentioned before: This system only has downsides for property users and does not eradicate the requirement of admin permissions for an (attempted) break-in, which is the core hurden , not the alarm.

Edited December 20, 2021 by knppel

[Triple Seven]

37 minutes ago, Fogry said:

Unrealistic crime rate? 90% of the breakin attempts end up with the people going to jail or a wild chase with the cops making the scene even more unrealistic. IRL most burglaries are left unsolved... 

 

 

Look at that for a second, think on how many burglaries are happening in game. Not as much, people are afraid of doing them! And if they do? They butcher the RP in the sake of getting away from cops that are coming in waves like the fucking horde. For a alarm that might be a false one - just like Bospy said... usual IRL practise is to send a single officer to check on the alarm or a "Security" if the "hood" is rich. And it is unrealistic for a house that looks almost ran down or abandoned to have an alarm that will silently inform the cops for 5 minutes before it alarms you. Just not the way it is man.

 

If you have concerns with that system share them, don't just say - "oh unrealistic crime rates, unrealistic measures - no support" If you have opinion give it out, it will be way more helpful than what you just wrote. 

 

Think I just gave the concerns and opinion you asked for, but apparently the opinion is not helpful? I think it'd be fine for LEO factions to say: on a property alarm, one unit goes to check on the status and reports back. Based on that backup follows. And obviously when there's units in the area, they'd just drive there too, just like they would in real life. I don't mind a rework of alarms, I think it's one of many things that could receive a boost, not necessarily the most important, but that's up to development choices. What  I do mind is the attitude of: "a county house with a high-tech alarm is unrealistic." when the crime rate more than warrants it having one. The perspective is entirely different from an IC standpoint, that's my point here. I think @slumpmade a valuable point. If there's going to be property tax (hopefully based on playtime of a character per month so it's the same for everyone no matter how much or little they play) and it's not too hefty, alarm services could have contract payments around that same system. The only real question I asked before, is whether or not the proposed suggestion detailed by @Bospyactually means hourly paychecks, as with the prices listed that's a bad idea in my opinion.

[knppel]

11 minutes ago, Triple Seven said:

I think it'd be fine for LEO factions to say: on a property alarm, one unit goes to check on the status and reports back. Based on that backup follows

I cannot speak on LEO protocol for handling of proper alarms but I can tell you in my case it ran exactly like this.

 

Which is also why I say no change is needed, I *have* the full chain of alarm installed ic already, with first G6 being alerted who calls the cops as there's an alarm on a domestic residence they control.

 

If anything, it needs an incentive for players to go through ic security companies opposed to again rely on staff (this is one change that would also help burglars for the better. unironically).

 

Keep in mind this double-responsibility makes the decision-finding for any handling staff member double tricky with burglary requests:

First you gotta decide to (and if to) let them go at their target, and simultaneously you have to decide how fast and in which intensity you alert the cops.

 

Comparing also to the "concerned citizen"-controversy from spring, this is one major issue indeed (just one that won't be fixed by fiddling with the alarms!).

 

it didn't happen in my case where no full tactical team descended on the apartment, but a reasonable response of a cruiser who then asked me if anything was stolen etc.

But on a meta-level, I can imagine (again, correct me with protocols if I assume wrongly please) that based on the simple fact property alarms are 100% correct, and responders might often meet armed resistance, alarms often warrant hefty responses currently. they're a safe shot, after all.

 

To discourage this the best solution would be what @zaXer.mentioned above: False alarms.

With constant alarms to be handled that are in fact not warranting High Threat Responses, these will become less likely (without to punish people who have alarms at their property on a level that's hardly ic).

Edited December 20, 2021 by knppel

[knppel]

1 minute ago, SWAE said:

Prices you mentioned above literally cost more then the property itself, with that being said I do rather lose 20-50k worth of items rather then spend two million in a security system which might trigger once in a few months, perhaps we suggest a price that doesn't really go that high?

Let's not get started with the part of ingame economy but yeah for the that money you can already have a friendly G6 officer at your door ic 24/7 all month who says hello when you come online and can shoot others, unlike a silly alarm 🤭

[Alice in Wonderland]

Why would  I wanna pay that much money for an alarm that only works SOME of the time?

[zaXer.]

1 hour ago, DarkAndDreary said:

Why would  I wanna pay that much money for an alarm that only works SOME of the time?

who said it works SOME of the time...? 

[Memozzy]

2 hours ago, zaXer. said:

who said it works SOME of the time...? 

Level 1 Alarm ($40,000) - 40% reliability, if tripped does not inform police until after 5 minutes have elapsed, alarm goes off at same time as police are informed.

Level 2 Alarm ($80,000) - 50% reliability, if tripped does not inform police until after 4 minutes have elapsed, alarm goes off at same time as police are informed.

Level 3 Alarm ($160,000) - 60% reliability, if tripped does not inform police until after 3 minutes has elapsed, alarm goes off at same time as police are informed.
etc etc, thats the inpression i got too. This is a one sided solution that is simply horrible. 

[992]

3 hours ago, zaXer. said:

who said it works SOME of the time...? 

It literally says that in the main suggestion lol

 

In any case, prices are ridiculous. Id have to sell my property to afford a semi-decent alarm. Doesn’t sound very productive. 

Edited December 20, 2021 by - Alfie -

[mj2002]

16 hours ago, Bospy said:

False Positives

 

Occasionally, IFM may trigger false positives. In real life, alarm systems are not 100% reliable - much the same way that current fires work, we will trip alarms to keep law enforcement on their feet and react realistically to alarm systems. At the moment, any house alarm brings an entire combat force. If we trip many false positives, a more realistic number of officers will respond. Usually, only one officer is sent to a house alarm in real life.

 

The command to trip a false-positive alarm shall be /falsepositivealarm.

 

It would be better if any entry without disabling the alarm in a certain period of time creates a 'false' positive. Forget to disable it? The security company responds right away. Forget to set the alarm? Too bad for you. Then you get real false positives. No need to make this dependent on administrators.

[Bospy]

Main post has been updated to get rid of any confusion