Broken Systems: NCPD

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I think I don't need to waste too many words on the fact that the NCPD system is broken. They teleport in on you and try to kill you instantly. It's rather stupid.

So here's how I think it should work:

- Level 1 : Cops will start noticing you and turn hostile if you're near them.
- Level 2 : Aside from turning hostile, there will also be extra police presence on the street, extra patrol cars etc.
- Level 3 : Police starts actively looking for you and sets out a bounty on your head. (Wanted Posters, maybe?)
- Level 4 : MaxTac airdrops in to absolutely try to murder you, and the NCPD locks down your current District.

To go a little more into detail: we'll keep the current four levels of alertness/"Wanted", but rather than the current state where running 100 meters will cancel the whole thing, the Wanted level will no longer go down automatically. This means that once there is any number of badges/stars, they'll stay even if there are no cops around.

Obviously we don't want to be pursued by the police forever without any relief, so we'll add a method of relief. Every district (except the badlands and Pacifica - more on that later) should have a police station, one that you can infiltrate to hack into the database and erase your wanted level. An alternate way to get rid of your wanted level is to place a bribe through the local fixer, just visit them, pay a sum (dependent on Wanted level) and you're once again left alone.

Another important detail is that not all districts are the same. There are, for instance, no cops in Pacifica, so levels 1 and 2 simply wouldn't mean anything there. That is fine, Pacifica is the exception and having that exception is a nice breath of fresh air. The badlands are also different, since there we have Militech presence instead of police, but apart from having army trucks and heavier weaponry, they will basically work the same.

For the first two levels, the police won't actively be looking for you, it's just when you get close to them, so gameplay wise it'll more be a feeling of avoiding any police presence you spot. For level 3, it would be very neat if there is actually a bounty on your head and you'll find other mercs coming after you. This will be very different from the MaxTac level in that they are just individuals, who may be well-armed, but aren't exactly decked out in heavily armored professional gear. Aside from the bounty on your head, police will also be more aggressive and when they spot you, they will start chasing you (until you lose them). For the last level, any District can be locked down like Watson is in the beginning. You can theoretically fight your way out, but there'll be a lot of firepower at every border checkpoint, so getting rid of your Wanted level would be a lot wiser.

And last but not least, after the Konpeki Plaza raid, you should automatically get a Wanted level of 1 or 2 (maybe dependent on difficulty?) since you just attacked the biggest company in Night City and they are mightily pissed.
 
The police shouldn't always shoot immediately.
They are supposed to make you give up. "Drop You Weapon!" "Lie down, face down" and so on.
You should be able to give up! And you should be able to bribe the police. For example, double what you would have to pay for the fixer.
If one is arrested, there could be one escape scenario (or several). Or you stay in prison and GAME OVER just as if you were shot by the police (as you are right now).
 

jcchg

Forum regular
V as a merch collaborates with NCPD, similarly to Spider-man. They could have even avoided the police pursuing system, but probably didn't to somehow avoid backlash, which actually came multiplied several times around the faulty system they ended up implementing.
 
I think I don't need to waste too many words on the fact that the NCPD system is broken. They teleport in on you and try to kill you instantly. It's rather stupid.

So here's how I think it should work:

- Level 1 : Cops will start noticing you and turn hostile if you're near them.
- Level 2 : Aside from turning hostile, there will also be extra police presence on the street, extra patrol cars etc.
- Level 3 : Police starts actively looking for you and sets out a bounty on your head. (Wanted Posters, maybe?)
- Level 4 : MaxTac airdrops in to absolutely try to murder you, and the NCPD locks down your current District.

To go a little more into detail: we'll keep the current four levels of alertness/"Wanted", but rather than the current state where running 100 meters will cancel the whole thing, the Wanted level will no longer go down automatically. This means that once there is any number of badges/stars, they'll stay even if there are no cops around.

Obviously we don't want to be pursued by the police forever without any relief, so we'll add a method of relief. Every district (except the badlands and Pacifica - more on that later) should have a police station, one that you can infiltrate to hack into the database and erase your wanted level. An alternate way to get rid of your wanted level is to place a bribe through the local fixer, just visit them, pay a sum (dependent on Wanted level) and you're once again left alone.

Another important detail is that not all districts are the same. There are, for instance, no cops in Pacifica, so levels 1 and 2 simply wouldn't mean anything there. That is fine, Pacifica is the exception and having that exception is a nice breath of fresh air. The badlands are also different, since there we have Militech presence instead of police, but apart from having army trucks and heavier weaponry, they will basically work the same.

For the first two levels, the police won't actively be looking for you, it's just when you get close to them, so gameplay wise it'll more be a feeling of avoiding any police presence you spot. For level 3, it would be very neat if there is actually a bounty on your head and you'll find other mercs coming after you. This will be very different from the MaxTac level in that they are just individuals, who may be well-armed, but aren't exactly decked out in heavily armored professional gear. Aside from the bounty on your head, police will also be more aggressive and when they spot you, they will start chasing you (until you lose them). For the last level, any District can be locked down like Watson is in the beginning. You can theoretically fight your way out, but there'll be a lot of firepower at every border checkpoint, so getting rid of your Wanted level would be a lot wiser.

And last but not least, after the Konpeki Plaza raid, you should automatically get a Wanted level of 1 or 2 (maybe dependent on difficulty?) since you just attacked the biggest company in Night City and they are mightily pissed.
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The police shouldn't always shoot immediately.
They are supposed to make you give up. "Drop You Weapon!" "Lie down, face down" and so on.
You should be able to give up! And you should be able to bribe the police. For example, double what you would have to pay for the fixer.
If one is arrested, there could be one escape scenario (or several). Or you stay in prison and GAME OVER just as if you were shot by the police (as you are right now).
1
Post automatically merged:

V as a merch collaborates with NCPD, similarly to Spider-man. They could have even avoided the police pursuing system, but probably didn't to somehow avoid backlash, which actually came multiplied several times around the faulty system they ended up implementing.
1
Post automatically merged:

V as a merch collaborates with NCPD, similarly to Spider-man. They could have even avoided the police pursuing system, but probably didn't to somehow avoid backlash, which actually came multiplied several times around the faulty system they ended up implementing.
1
Post automatically merged:

V as a merch collaborates with NCPD, similarly to Spider-man. They could have even avoided the police pursuing system, but probably didn't to somehow avoid backlash, which actually came multiplied several times around the faulty system they ended up implementing.
1
 
I think I don't need to waste too many words on the fact that the NCPD system is broken. They teleport in on you and try to kill you instantly. It's rather stupid.

So here's how I think it should work:

- Level 1 : Cops will start noticing you and turn hostile if you're near them.
- Level 2 : Aside from turning hostile, there will also be extra police presence on the street, extra patrol cars etc.
- Level 3 : Police starts actively looking for you and sets out a bounty on your head. (Wanted Posters, maybe?)
- Level 4 : MaxTac airdrops in to absolutely try to murder you, and the NCPD locks down your current District.

To go a little more into detail: we'll keep the current four levels of alertness/"Wanted", but rather than the current state where running 100 meters will cancel the whole thing, the Wanted level will no longer go down automatically. This means that once there is any number of badges/stars, they'll stay even if there are no cops around.

Obviously we don't want to be pursued by the police forever without any relief, so we'll add a method of relief. Every district (except the badlands and Pacifica - more on that later) should have a police station, one that you can infiltrate to hack into the database and erase your wanted level. An alternate way to get rid of your wanted level is to place a bribe through the local fixer, just visit them, pay a sum (dependent on Wanted level) and you're once again left alone.

Another important detail is that not all districts are the same. There are, for instance, no cops in Pacifica, so levels 1 and 2 simply wouldn't mean anything there. That is fine, Pacifica is the exception and having that exception is a nice breath of fresh air. The badlands are also different, since there we have Militech presence instead of police, but apart from having army trucks and heavier weaponry, they will basically work the same.

For the first two levels, the police won't actively be looking for you, it's just when you get close to them, so gameplay wise it'll more be a feeling of avoiding any police presence you spot. For level 3, it would be very neat if there is actually a bounty on your head and you'll find other mercs coming after you. This will be very different from the MaxTac level in that they are just individuals, who may be well-armed, but aren't exactly decked out in heavily armored professional gear. Aside from the bounty on your head, police will also be more aggressive and when they spot you, they will start chasing you (until you lose them). For the last level, any District can be locked down like Watson is in the beginning. You can theoretically fight your way out, but there'll be a lot of firepower at every border checkpoint, so getting rid of your Wanted level would be a lot wiser.

And last but not least, after the Konpeki Plaza raid, you should automatically get a Wanted level of 1 or 2 (maybe dependent on difficulty?) since you just attacked the biggest company in Night City and they are mightily pissed.
The police shouldn't always shoot immediately.
They are supposed to make you give up. "Drop You Weapon!" "Lie down, face down" and so on.
You should be able to give up! And you should be able to bribe the police. For example, double what you would have to pay for the fixer.
If one is arrested, there could be one escape scenario (or several). Or you stay in prison and GAME OVER just as if you were shot by the police (as you are right now).
+1
I like your suggestions
 
YES! THIS! Absolutely agree! Nuance would be great. Whilst it's very convenient for the police to give up after you've run away a few hundred meters, especially if you're trying to power through the story, it's kinda weird and non-immersive for the system to not be very complex.
As for bounty that would be great. Imagine you're just minding your business and suddenly a Maelstrom assassin (or assassins) start hunting you down. Or a netrunner tries to jack into you and subdue you long enough for the police to turn up. That could be a mini-game in and of itself where you have to "counter-hack". If the netrunner is successful there could be a different mini-game (or the same but harder) that will allow you to break free. If you don't manage the police turns up and arrests you.
 
Yeah the teleportation is quite ridiculous. I saw it happen right before my eyes. Lets say I see some rando-civilian under a bridge at night and I cap him. Okay, that would be a crime in anyone's eyes correct? Okay, but no Police are anywhere in sight and I'm using a silenced weapon. Yet, there they are, instantly! Also the endless hordes of cops that keep popping in is even more ridiculous!! Crimes are committed everyday without being solved. Just look no further than some of the worst neighborhoods in the country (meaning mine in the US).
 
Yeah the teleportation is quite ridiculous. I saw it happen right before my eyes. Lets say I see some rando-civilian under a bridge at night and I cap him. Okay, that would be a crime in anyone's eyes correct? Okay, but no Police are anywhere in sight and I'm using a silenced weapon. Yet, there they are, instantly! Also the endless hordes of cops that keep popping in is even more ridiculous!! Crimes are committed everyday without being solved. Just look no further than some of the worst neighborhoods in the country (meaning mine in the US).

Yeah! And have you noticed that once you've killed off a wave or two they just stop and unless you get spotted again you're golden. In a way it makes sense (in a real life sense) that they would stop sending officers to the slaughter since they don't get anywhere but more emphasis on the progression of toughness would be great too.
Example:
- Regular NCPD gets slaughtered
- You hear a radio announcement to retreat as MaxTac gets called in
- They physically retreat and then MaxTac AV-9s land dramatically
- They get slaughtered
- They retreat to their AV-9s and take off but not to leave, only to engage from the safety of the AV-9s as they wait
- Heavily modded special ops like Smasher get called in.

This could translate to Arasaka and Maelstrom too since they dabble in that.
The Voodoo Boys could even try and somehow mess with you and entrap you in their subnet that you have find your way/hack your way out of!

It'd be far more satisfying!
 
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The policing system doesn't even make sense from a canon standpoint. Response times are godawful and they're so strapped for resources that they won't even check in on missing officers for hours on end. Also cops explicitly avoid cyberpsychos unless they're looking to play hero.

Take the system out entirely. If there's not a cop nearby, then no cops show up. Cops can call in MAX-TAC if you injure them and don't kill them immediately or if they see you commit multiple murders, but otherwise will respond to nearby crimes on their own. MAX-TAC flies in after a set amount of time and drops you with tech weapons from the air if you don't evacuate the area instead of the teleport BS. MAX-TAC are the ONLY reinforcements.
 
The police shouldn't always shoot immediately.
They are supposed to make you give up. "Drop You Weapon!" "Lie down, face down" and so on.
You should be able to give up! And you should be able to bribe the police. For example, double what you would have to pay for the fixer.
If one is arrested, there could be one escape scenario (or several). Or you stay in prison and GAME OVER just as if you were shot by the police (as you are right now). In some cases they just should ask you a sum of money to look the other way.
I'd say this should depend of the district, in term of Cyberpunk lore. In some district they shoot first ask questions later. In others they act a little more like how they behaves in GTA.
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- Regular NCPD gets slaughtered
- You hear a radio announcement to retreat as MaxTac gets called in
- They physically retreat and then MaxTac AV-9s land dramatically
- They get slaughtered
- They retreat to their AV-9s and take off but not to leave, only to engage from the safety of the AV-9s as they wait
- Heavily modded special ops like Smasher get called in.
Not Smasher.
MaxTac is full of ex Cyberpsychos, guys like Smasher can't be a credible stepup to them.

The police response system would rather be :
- NCPD / Corporate security forces
- If they are down, bronze and silver Trauma team pick up the fallen
- Riot NCPD / Corporate army
- If they are down, silver and gold Trauma team pick up the fallen
- Final stage is MaxTac / Arasaka or Militech elite units.
- If they are down, platinum Trauma team pick up the fallen

TraumaTeam should pick up victims among the civils, too.

Solos and Runners can't come as fast as NCPD would need. They could act as bountyhunters though.
By the moment the player kill a police officer, there should be a bounty.

Ok, "this escalated quickly" : climbing that ladder is easy to figure, but now, how do you propose to un-escalate this ? How are you suppose to "infiltrate a police station" when you have the nastiest elements of Maxtac looking for you in the physical and the virtual world ?
 
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but now, how do you propose to un-escalate this ? How are you suppose to "infiltrate a police station" when you have the nastiest elements of Maxtac looking for you in the physical and the virtual world ?

It's only mentioned in passing and the game doesn't actually show it due to either a dev oversight or for aesthetic reasons, but V has augments that dazzle cams. Their face can't be recorded. Anyone looking at your face pretty much just sees a giant glare spot unless they've got flesh eyes. Means anyone looking for you would just be working off biometrics and maybe facial sketches.
 
@eradmis In the pen & paper CP, cybereyes are maybe for 10%-20% of the population (datajacks are like 60%).
In the videogame, you can hack anyone's vision...

Anyway that doesn't tell how you evade the police, when it's supposed to use "current irl tech" (China or UK are one exemple...) to identify your curent car, and see through the whole city cams where is the only guy in the district that have a blurred face, a shotgun and blood on its clothes ?

The thing V had is street-rated. It can fool NCPD but not MaxTac or Militech/Arasaka.
 
@eradmis In the pen & paper CP, cybereyes are maybe for 10%-20% of the population (datajacks are like 60%).
In the videogame, you can hack anyone's vision...

Anyway that doesn't tell how you evade the police, when it's supposed to use "current irl tech" (China or UK are one exemple...) to identify your curent car, and see through the whole city cams where is the only guy in the district that have a blurred face, a shotgun and blood on its clothes ?

The thing V had is street-rated. It can fool NCPD but not MaxTac or Militech/Arasaka.
Cameras aren't everywhere or even most places. It's repeatedly mentioned that virtually everyone is armed. You see people using facial blurring tech all the time. And I doubt bloody clothes are that uncommon either. Car you've got a point on, but I'm not aware of any game with that level of granular detail. Also, unless you roll up to a police station in either a stolen vehicle or a vehicle you rolled away from a mass murder in, you're fine.
 
The police system definitely need that kind of change but before thinking about making it more resilient and active, CDPR need to make sure it triggers properly when you actually do a crime and is interesting to handle (please notice that I said "more interesting" and not "easier". It's very important that the Police is extremely challenging, especially on higher star level, to discourage players from doing random crime for no reason whatsoever but the fact that they spawn on you makes them extremely linear and uninteresting to face).

The system still doesn't work properly to this date, even after the patch that makes civilian tankier and I occasionally get reported for comitting a crime while just casually walking in the street (it happens rarely but it does happen sometimes).
If what triggers a crime is not more properly handled, the idea of making the Police looking for you more aggressively, locking down discricts and looking for you actively, for example, isn't very exciting (kind of the same problem as RDR2.....but far worst. Crimes in RDR2 are too easy to do but they're still crime, you know why you're searched, you just didn't mean to do what you're accused for doing. Here we're talking about being searched for litterally no reason).

I'm not saying they shouldn't improve that aspect of the game (it's the opposite, in fact) but they have to fix the system as a whole and make sure everything works properly and as intended.

For example, it should be a distance at which you can aim at a civilian without being reported as "doing something illegal". In the current state of the game, this message still pops up during combats because you happened to hover your reticle over a civilian that was at the other side of the street (and cowering in place instead of running away because, yeah, Civilian's behavior isn't helping either and obviously need fixing too...In fact, fixing it would have a surprisingly good effect on the general issue players are facing with the Police in this game).

The police shouldn't always shoot immediately.
They are supposed to make you give up. "Drop You Weapon!" "Lie down, face down" and so on.
You should be able to give up! And you should be able to bribe the police. For example, double what you would have to pay for the fixer.
If one is arrested, there could be one escape scenario (or several). Or you stay in prison and GAME OVER just as if you were shot by the police (as you are right now).
Without necessarily asking for that much depts in the system, I definitely agree with the general idea.
I always found that dumb when Police officers start shooting at you just for standing next to them for too long, for example (not specific to CP, btw, there's so many games that have this "feature").

I understand why developpers do this. It's to make Police more realistic because they can lose their patience if you test them but the reaction is completely out of proportion and feel even less realistic than if they didn't reacted to that kind of behavior at all, at least imo.
 
I think I don't need to waste too many words on the fact that the NCPD system is broken. They teleport in on you and try to kill you instantly. It's rather stupid.

So here's how I think it should work:

- Level 1 : Cops will start noticing you and turn hostile if you're near them.
- Level 2 : Aside from turning hostile, there will also be extra police presence on the street, extra patrol cars etc.
- Level 3 : Police starts actively looking for you and sets out a bounty on your head. (Wanted Posters, maybe?)
- Level 4 : MaxTac airdrops in to absolutely try to murder you, and the NCPD locks down your current District.

To go a little more into detail: we'll keep the current four levels of alertness/"Wanted", but rather than the current state where running 100 meters will cancel the whole thing, the Wanted level will no longer go down automatically. This means that once there is any number of badges/stars, they'll stay even if there are no cops around.

Obviously we don't want to be pursued by the police forever without any relief, so we'll add a method of relief. Every district (except the badlands and Pacifica - more on that later) should have a police station, one that you can infiltrate to hack into the database and erase your wanted level. An alternate way to get rid of your wanted level is to place a bribe through the local fixer, just visit them, pay a sum (dependent on Wanted level) and you're once again left alone.

Another important detail is that not all districts are the same. There are, for instance, no cops in Pacifica, so levels 1 and 2 simply wouldn't mean anything there. That is fine, Pacifica is the exception and having that exception is a nice breath of fresh air. The badlands are also different, since there we have Militech presence instead of police, but apart from having army trucks and heavier weaponry, they will basically work the same.

For the first two levels, the police won't actively be looking for you, it's just when you get close to them, so gameplay wise it'll more be a feeling of avoiding any police presence you spot. For level 3, it would be very neat if there is actually a bounty on your head and you'll find other mercs coming after you. This will be very different from the MaxTac level in that they are just individuals, who may be well-armed, but aren't exactly decked out in heavily armored professional gear. Aside from the bounty on your head, police will also be more aggressive and when they spot you, they will start chasing you (until you lose them). For the last level, any District can be locked down like Watson is in the beginning. You can theoretically fight your way out, but there'll be a lot of firepower at every border checkpoint, so getting rid of your Wanted level would be a lot wiser.

And last but not least, after the Konpeki Plaza raid, you should automatically get a Wanted level of 1 or 2 (maybe dependent on difficulty?) since you just attacked the biggest company in Night City and they are mightily pissed.

Yeah, the NCPD would be better with this.
Good job !
 
YES
Hacking into police station would be awesome.

What would be cool is having a reputation system with police. If you get to intervene to stop illegal activities in a district, police could be more friendly to you and not necessarily start chasing you if you commit illegal activities. As police is supposed to be somewhat overwhelmed by crime in Night City they could just say "ok this is V, they helped us many times before so as long as they don't do too much trouble we are ok."
 
I'm not sure because players would reload. Like those times you really wanted to sneak and got caught.

It's still a videogame, where loading a save (on SSD) takes more or less 5 secs.
Reload and wait 5 sec and continue your stuff OR live with the consequence, having to go to the police for the 5th time for like 10-20-30 minutes ?
 
I'm not sure because players would reload. Like those times you really wanted to sneak and got caught.

It's still a videogame, where loading a save (on SSD) takes more or less 5 secs.
Reload and wait 5 sec and continue your stuff OR live with the consequence, having to go to the police for the 5th time for like 10-20-30 minutes ?
so, as it appears to me. it's all better than having police immediately spawn behind the player. Hell, the way it is right now, it would be even better to just completely disable the police system. sad but true. Without the police system, CP2077 would be better off

The current system is like a GM who doesn't feel like it anymore. the GM simply drops an anvil out of the blue on the naughty player. Then he packs his things and goes home in a huff
 
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The current system is like a GM who doesn't feel like it anymore. the GM simply drops an anvil out of the blue on the naughty player. Then he packs his things and goes home in a huff
tbh, instead of an anvil, I used the Titanic once, so I couldn't miss my TPK :) :) :)
(and yes, that was a high-fantasy setting but who cared at that point)

I was saying that because there should be something ideal. I liked the bounty system in RDR2, for instance but the problem in CP is your too high-level to be chased effectivly : you can always stand your ground and play the game as a tower-defense :/
 
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- Level 1 : Cops will start noticing you and turn hostile if you're near them.
- Level 2 : Aside from turning hostile, there will also be extra police presence on the street, extra patrol cars etc.
- Level 3 : Police starts actively looking for you and sets out a bounty on your head. (Wanted Posters, maybe?)
- Level 4 : MaxTac airdrops in to absolutely try to murder you, and the NCPD locks down your current District.

Yes it should be like this, there also the big star? in that case?
 
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