A Defense of Gankers (Elite Dangerous) 

I got ganked in my exploration vessel. I was a little bit angry but i remembered the name of the gankers found him and killed him in my combat ship. Then i apologized and we became wingmates

So Griefers randomly attack other players for fun whereas Gankers randomly attack other people for fun. No, wait....reverse that.

Playing in open makes the game feel more alive, I remember playing solo for a while and when I changed to open everything felt more populated, even saw one commander say ajsbdhakdbjd when they entered system. Funniest thing I've ever seen

Running from an FDL in my Type 9 during a community goal, was honestly the most fun I'd ever had in that ship, it was about a half-hour battle of dropping in and out of supercruise, right up till I managed to slam it into the station, finally getting him to pull off, though the best part afterwards when he landed, we struck up a conversation, and I got my own FDL and we set out and killed quite a few type 9s, I've been friends with him ever since, wouldn't change ED for the world.

I once went to a hotspot of trading activity loaded with biowaste and taunted gankers and pirates to come get me. So many ranted about me wasting their time! XD

Usually accept the interdiction, boost, FA off and go silent until i can jump away. That makes it pretty hard for the interdictor.

I’ve been ganked once when I first started, my shields went down instantly as I was still in the starting sidewinder. I said I was new and had 20k bounties to hand in and they let me live!

The problem I think is the no repercussion for killing "innocent" players.. High, med and low security system don't offer any real protection whatsoever. If high protection meant : any wanted players arriving get interdicted and attacked by police non stop and med, low security same principal but lesser cops or lower ranking nps etc. Would solve most of the issue and would also add some immersion and realism to it. Piracy could also give you a wanted status, but not as big of a deal as killing someone (no man hunt by police, but bounty hunters would come after you). Which would encourage stealing cargo more than just killing others. Again, that would add some logic and purpose to the whole thing. The community is already divided, lots of players stick to solo and many joined mobius PVE server (over 5500 players in NA alone). Something need to change to bring back most of the community together and I think safer high and med security system is the way to do it. Low security would be a risk and anarchy/unpopulated system would obviously mean, fire at will, no police. Don't adventure there unless you're an experienced player or with a wing otherwise, you gonna get sealclub. regarding the ban and carebear issue, obviously it's a problem.. You shouldn't ban anyone regardless of what their opinion is (unless they are being toxic and insulting people obviously). If people think the actual state of the game regarding gankers is fine, that's their opinion.

While ganking could be said be 'part of the game' when that ganking crosses the line into griefing it has gone too far. The problem I have is with the notion of deriving pleasure simply through depriving others of theirs. Such an attitude is an indicator of a shallow, selfish individual. By all means play pirate, but when that slips into deliberately disruptive behaviour simply because you can....then you lose my vote.

I had enough of all carebears, gankers and griefers during a decade of Eve Online. So now I exclusively stick to solo mode, ahhhhhh the silence! Personally I'd prefer Elite to be the 1 player game that it was in 1984 when I first fell in love with the concept of a free to roam galaxy of my own, as over the last 5 decades the stand out lesson that I've learned from humanity, is that people = shit

Holy shit ... I love how you define "militant care-bears". Absolutely.

I once tipped a pirate some random cargo because he made my LTD run legendary by taking shots at me right at the end

ED should strive for believability. And if someone is partaking in indiscriminate mass murder, you'd have to imagine there'd be quite a severe penalty for such. But ED doesn't have that. The in game consequences should be much more severe. So fine, gank away, but how about say constant harassment from extreme-engineered federal bounty hunting NPCs that will not stop until you're in custody and assets seized with no rebuy. Thoughts?

I too can avoid interdiction every time except when the game decides I can't. Sometimes you get interdicted so fast that you don't have time to react. But I have solved it. now I always play in "offline" mode..... Saying that gankning adds flavor and looking down on people that don't like ganking is like complaining and looking down on people that move away from a crime ridden area. "Ohh look at the care bears moving to a better area! "Getting gang mugged is a way of life and adds flavor" This is human nature. Good people move away from bad neighborhoods and bad people stay or even move to them. And then when the police comes they yell pigs and all that. PvP and Ganking is not the same. PvP is for gamers and Ganking is for cowards. In PvP two ore more readily opponents meet on level terms. In Ganking one or more attack one, under experienced or under gunned, victim. I don't play this game for the amusement of others, my time is to valuable to spend giving cowards and bullies the illusory satisfaction that they have managed to accomplice something. And let's face it playing this game online or "offline" makes almost no difference except that in "offline" I'm not some other persons amusement. And this is why the Gankers become so sour when game devs give non gankers a game mode in which there are no PvP elements because now they will have to seek their amusement somewhere else. Playing the game normally is not for them they only play the game for one thing and just like a swarm of locusts when the feeding is done they just move on. And just like the villagers afflicted by the real locusts, the players that play the whole game rejoices when they leave and sadly swarm on another poor playerbase in another game. I may be a care bear but at least I'm no coward.

In my former squadron we role played as bad guys. We never ganked and really unless a random cmdr was being a straight asshole to us in our home system if you left us alone wed leave you alone. So our former leader decided to make a pact with a griefer squadron. We were all nervous but it turned out well for us. They would provide us protection if other griefer squadron's attacked us and didn't indiscriminately kill all our players. We trained/spared in pvp with them got build advice and they got regular fights with people outside their squad. We even hosted several pvp tournaments that they attended and everyone had a good time. Then one day someone from a stupid carebear faction doxed our leader and tried to fuck with him irl just because we had an alliance with the griefer squadron. He not only quit the game but gaming alltogether. Unfriend/blocked everyone and despite our best efforts to keep the squadron afloat we eventually succumbed and I personally had to disband the squad we spent almost half a year cultivating. So good work carebear. I hope you are happy with yourself. You are a coward and I will never know your name because if I did me and said ganker squad would descend on your home system. Ruin your BGS and indiscriminately attack and destroy each and every player that crosses into your territory regardless if they are affiliated with you or not. I hope you are proud of yourself you human trash.

When I'm not playing ED I often play action RPG's. My biggest one for a long long time was the Dark Souls series, where we have had a similar discussion going on since the first entry. Cooperative players who want to play with their friends in peace, vs Invaders who want to provide them the level of challange the series is supposed to be known for, vs Cooperative PvP players who specifically hunt those Invaders. I learned to take ganking and PvP in stride, and never take it personally. And yeah, we had griefers and hackers there too. But you learn to block or ignore those people after the first time, or get away from them by other means. When i got ganked for the first time in Elite, i thought it was awesome and a wholesome experience that brought back the feeling of my first time being invaded in DS years ago. I saw them and was in more or less awe of what i see as their mastery of the game. We even added eachother as friends. Elite is a very easy game and even if the devs added more elements of challange i wouldn't want to see gankers removed.

Running from gankers in my type-7 has been some of the most exciting experiences in ED

Preface: This comment is intended to broaden perspective and outline flaws in some of this video's reasoning. It is not an attack on a playstyle but a different perspective on it. Ganking is a playstyle/environment that is enjoyable for some, on either end, and has its merits. It is not inherently an abuse of this game's features or its players and, as such, is undeserving of the level of authoritative action wielded against it. ( Solo play exists. Don't want to to get ganked? Use it. The moment you choose to open yourself to multiplayer (PvP permitted) content, you submit yourself to its dangers and are no longer blameless in unfortunate encounters.) 1. Intrusive behaviour existing in other arenas is not good reasoning for intrusive behaviour. 2. Intrusive behaviour adding depth to an environment is like getting fired adding depth to your day. "Depth" is not inherently good. 3. Raising a point of practicing maturity after experiencing regression due to others' intrusive behaviour while simultaneously defending intrusive behaviour is hypocritical. 4. Plenty can go wrong without other players facilitating it. 5. "Vapid, stale, and meaningless" are all subjective criticisms from a narrow perspective. Relaxing and enjoyable are equally applicable. 6. Personal ability is subjective. 7. Player encounters can be boiled down to a science just as easily as NPC encounters. The game's assets and mechanics are simple enough that even player encounters can be predictable to an experienced player. 8. Ganker behaviour is anecdotal at best. Many are undeniably toxic. 9. Lack of understanding of something does not mean it doesn't exist. You might ask what is the point of any game in which progress can be made without risk of significant regression. To that, the answer is obviously the fact that fun is subjective. Yes, those games do exist and many people play them. 10. "Are you really earning it if you aren't risking it?" This question outlines the greatest flaw in this perspective; see points 4 and 9. 11. Points 9 and 10 are in response to attacks on a playstyle the video author does not understand, despite their claim that this video is not an attack on said playstyle. 12. "You should be... building... to protect yourself [from other players]." Telling people how they need to approach a video game based purely on subjective desires is poor form. 13. "Being attacked by a player is... memorable and it is always unique." Subjective at best. One could argue that being attacked by a player is just another waste of time, which is also subjective. * It could be argued that every encounter ends one of three ways; jump, win, or lose. ** Jump - Lose time, gain nothing. ** Win - Lose time, maybe gain a couple cheap items that you could have earned faster from NPCs (if you choose to stick around to scoop them and you're lucky). ** Lose - Fail missions, lose cargo/passengers, lose a lot of credits ( to rebuys), lose all the time associated with each of the former, gain nothing. 14. "Militant Care-Bears" and gaming politics: At this point in the video, there is a lot to unpack. There is obviously a lot of lumping and aggrandisement ( and hypocrisy), making this a subject that deserves its own comment. 15. From this point on in the video, it simply devolves into a toxic tirade and not worth reasoning. Disclaimer: Before anyone attempts to suggest I fall into the "militant care-bear" pile purely because I've shared a perspective that differs from the video, you should note that my YT avatar. It "should" denote my interest in piracy and general vandalism ( in fictitious environments) and that I am not personally averse to ganking as a playstyle. I simply find this video to be far too polar and narrow-minded to represent a reasonable defense of ganking. If you've read this far... you should probably hydrate. Maybe call friends or family to let them know you're alive. Stay healthy, CMDR.

i just dont have to time to get ganked so i dont play in open...

Here's what you do. After the rebuy screen, use the comm's panel to find who killed you, and send them a friend request. You'll be surprised with the results. EDIT: Forgot to add - Well said Commander, well said.

I have been playing the game for just over a month and always in open. I have been ganked twice. NEVER pirated. Just ganked. And sorry, with no profit for the ganker but the delight of the salt flowing, they are griefers. Let me explain... I am a new player. The first gank was kind of whatever. I got jumped at Deciat and I was just going back home with cartographics data. So I lost a load of that and had to pay insurance. The second time, I had almost 300 million in LTD onboard. I get to the high sell station and get jumped by a wing of gankers. I almost escaped their interdiction but just couldn't maintain the circle consistently enough. I drop out and instead of my throttle down being treated as a submission by the game, I get a massive cooldown. On top of that, even though I am in a MODESTLY modded Python, I am utterly eviscerated in moments. I tried dropping some cargo to distract them thinking maybe they are just looking to pirate? Nope. They just want the kill. So I die. Not only do I die, I die losing almost 4 hours of play, 200 ly of travel to get there, the insurance cost on my ship and NO ONE gets ANYTHING truly beneficial to the story or the game. No pirated cargo, no profit, no faction being grown in influence. See, I have no issue with PvP if it moves the story, if it adds something tangible to the game. If it is a viable career path as a player (aka piracy). These are not things advanced by ganking. Ganking/griefing is also not punished properly by the in game justice system. These players should truly be treated as pirates. severely limit their access to systems, kick them out of the Pilots Federation, eliminate their access to insurance coverage. Something, anything, scaled to their persistence in their behaviour of course, to either make it high risk behaviour or to completely dissuade a part of that population of players. Why do I say all of this after only one month of play? Because for a game that really is great fun, new players DO find the NPCs and the environment hard! All you people that have been in the game for over 5 years are myopic. You think that everyone that gets into this plays for a few weeks or something and then has a whole fleet of engineered ships. We don't. We are learning a STEEP in game meta. This is a massively complex game with peril at every turn just from the in game environment. I have died several times over to NPCs and me being an idiot noob gotta 'get gud' player. The danger of these griefer/gankers is that it VERY rapidly makes new players either just play the game in solo or give up entirely. And before anyone starts in on me being whiny or salty... I have been playing open world Minecraft for YEARS. That world is FULL of griefing and ganking (around spawns). The community responded by developing mods and plugins for servers that allow for protected regions but with the still real danger of going out of your area. I never played those as the goal for me was always to hide my base as best as I could and see how long I lasted as this type of behaviour was known and well expected in Minecraft from the word go (2B2T, I am looking at you :) ). But why is it different here? It is different here because there is no REAL penalty to these people that do this. Because there is no way to recover as the victim. There is actually nothing BUT cost on you as the victim. Lost time that you may not have a lot of (I don't have endless hours to play a game as I have a real life and family) so when I literally lose 4 hours of time (And that is small compared to some who have been ganked), what do you think that does to my desire to want to stay in open play? When the engineering MASSIVE imbalance makes it utterly impossible for new players to stand any kind of chance? Carebears can go to hell but as a broad community, there is a massive issue at hand. These griefiers... (Yes, they are all griefers and I will never change my mind on that until the game itself has its meta changed to reign them in (Not eliminate though) somehow) These griefers have long fractured this game. I did a LOT of reading and watching after my second ganking. This game's long term growth issues are due to one problem. No solution to griefing/ganking. There is a massive pile of players that are in private and who knows how many in solo. This whole problem really only has the few solutions that exist and have been listed time and time again. But for sarcasm's sake, here is what you and several others are effectively saying... If you come into this game you must play in solo for months or possibly years and grind and grind and GRIND to get all the engineering and then twink out an FDL or a Cutter. Then and only then, get into open play. Guess what the game doesn't tell you in the tutorials? That this is the only viable way you can play this game this late in its existence. Great fun... Yay... An open world game where there are people deliberately gank stomping the high traffic zones of the game. The places you HAVE to go. Places that can be determined with the help of Inara to know and then go in and just watch the world burn in your twinked out ship. Ya, sure, great fun. Fun for the player with several years of time under their belts and likely billions and billions of credits to their name. Oh and I bet you dollars to donuts these same SOBs likely do all their credit grinding in solo... So no. There is no defense of ganking in the game. Not until the game has meta added to adequately deal with them. Even then, this community has clearly been fractured for a LONG time and it is only getting worse. Several people I know along with my son, all started playing this game this spring at the same time as me and I have warned them that open play will likely not be worth it. Personally, I will skip open play for a while now. So good job griefers. You win again. Because if I haven't made it clear enough already, I don't have 'live in my parent's basement' levels of time to recover from getting ganked. I want danger but I want danger that feeds the in game universe, not random sh*t lords that think they are cool killing brand new players in their multi year twinked and engineered ships. Real risky, ooooOOoooooohhhh sooo brave....

The answer is simple - make anarchies actually be dangerous places and a safe haven for miscreants - just like in the original game , so going into one a cmdr accepts and risks interdiction without support but this is where the highest profit should be earned so its risk vs reward - and make high sec systems extremely difficult to get away with anything - there should be cops that drop almost instantly but with super npc skills flying top of the line ships maybe even ones players cant get like the experimental super ship from the original game the ''constrictor', but with this added safety make the profit potential very low - this way a cmdr has to make a conscious choice: enter an anarchy and risk destruction but make lots of credits or fly safe and barely tick over, also the pirate has also to make a decision - prey on your victims within the safety of an anarchy or expect being doggedly chased by super npc's flying ''constrictors' through all the systems controlled by the faction of where you did the deed - could make for interesting game play - the other thing that needs sorting is the powerplay - it should be open play only and being pledged should be like setting a pvp consent flag - preventing access to private or solo - your right about the squishyness of npc's too they seem to be getting easier and easier - there was a time that they were made a descent challenge - but not for a long time

Right now, new players who are not good at combat play in solo mode, so a dedicated PVE server would NOT split the community any more than it is today. In fact, the lack of a PVE server is the main thing that creates a split in the community of more "laid back" players who would want a PVE server... The people who want PVP plays in open, while the rest plays in solo or private. Even if someone thought it was a problem with PVE servers, it should not be up to them to decide what others choose...

Need to mine for materials or do important tasks: solo mode Want to risk your neck: open play

Dig the perspective! This video is DEFINITELY going to be a discussion point on this weeks podcast. : )

I get the "PvP is part of the experience" angle, but not everyone wants that experience. The existence of Mobius alone proves that there are people who want an open-PvE experience and that there are enough people to sustain it. And that's just one PvE group, let alone the countless solo or smaller private group players the game has. You're allowed to like PvP just as much as other people are allowed not to. A PvE only variant of open play would take all these already existing communities and effectively combine them, and what exactly is so wrong with giving players the choice to play how they want? No one's forcing you to play this theoretical PvE mode and many of the people who do want it simply choose not to play in open as it is anyway. You're not splitting up the community, you're unifying a large portion of it. I absolutely cannot get behind the "you're not playing the game right" kind of attitude you're alluding to by saying you're not really earning anything unless you play with PvP, either. That is, at best, a form of mild gatekeeping, and is not the kind of attitude the game needs.

I am new to elite dangerous! I have always open played and love it. The idea that other players can attack me or gank me is something that adds spice to the game play. It adds danger and excitement. Great video it gave me some understanding that I didn't realize existed. Fly dangerously commanders.

I've always thought that the reason people gank is there's really not much else to do if you're looking for shooting at players. Most already fight other players plenty, but you eventually want to find new people to fight, and ganking high traffic systems (which engineer systems end up being) ends up being an outlet. Solo & PG exacerbate this problem IMO. Because players can just turn on "stealth mode", they can influence powerplay and bgs without threat, making any gameplay element driven conflict pretty much meaningless.

I'll be honest. I used to have strong emotional responses to gankers because not knowing the game and having close to no money in the beginning left me feeling a bit powerless in the face of death. It even made me combat log once. I learned to deal with it, simply escape and never min-max with ships that are vulnerable to attacks. Even so, no matter their reasoning, gankers still cause negative emotional responses in some players who are really emotionally invested in the game (the latter being maybe as a coping mechanism for some irl stuff). For that reason, I every now and then join manhunts for active gankers in a pseudo-ATR style to bring ever-so-slightly more peace of mind for beginners. I don't know what your positive experience with gankers was, but I personally found them to be toxic, no matter the context or what my response was (mostly neutral or positive).

imo gankers are in some ways important to this game. pve can get very dull like you said npc interdiction are stupidly easy to break and the only real difficulty when fighting them is when you are significantly out numbered. jumping into a system and seeing that hollow box on the sensors is exciting. it gets you thinking actually thinking and out of the grindy almost robotic mindset of pve, sizing them up, trying to determine their intentions, considering everything you can lose all before before they line up for an interdiction, and then having to fight them or escaping is a much more enjoyable experience than the almost mindless pve combat.

NGL kinda makes me want to start up a faction dedicated to attacking Militant Carebears and Griefers... Good vid as always

Nope sorry Gankers are the reason a HUGE amount of the player base is hiding away in solo / pirvate groups. I only play Open, but getting ganked is 100% frustrating and NEVER fun.

I'm a relatively new player to Elite, but a veteran in online and MMO games, Eve online as well. For me, I'm all for Open play, as one of the main aspects for me in an MMO is the multiplayer and cooperative experience. For the first months i played only open, and was happy with this. Being ganked, pirated, is all just another part and realistic aspect of the game. two weeks ago however, i switched to solo play. Permanently. The problem is that this game does not allow you to do anything time investment farming wise, and play Open. The risk of a random player suddenly interdicting your Asp explorer with no chance of evading, no roleplay, just blasted out of the sky with no way of hiding, evading, or protecting yourself against a fully kitted pvp ship. This introduces an element of absolute and random risk, into what often is a higly time consuming farming process over many days, giving you little to no tools to protect yourself. Some risk is of course needed to make space exploration anywhere near realistic, but leaving you with no tools in Open play to protect your valuable time investment, being cargo, data, exploration, or whatever, I think is a mistake by Frontier.

Your previous video made me change my opinion on gankers. This reinforces it. Some points on the video. You mentioned that it doesn't make sense to divide Open. I fully agree! There are already ways to do this. It doesn't make sense to further divide it. You said you don't have anything against people that play Solo. As a solo player, I appreciate it. I don't play the game for the multiplayer experience, I play it to explore the galaxy. And until your previous video I was one of the pretentious anti-ganking people, although I didn't really act on it. I truly appreciate these videos for presenting a new perspective and make me rethink and change my position.

Some people just wanna space truck and have random conversations in stations

You almost had me on-side. Then you went full toxic. I get that some people are abusing their power but that still doesn't give you the right to insult people, you claim to be better but all I see is more of the same. They've obviously upset you so take some of your own advice and grow a thicker skin, or figure out a way of avoiding/defeating them. (Throwing out insults on a RU-vid video is not it.) Now to my counterpoints; Some people don't like PvP but still want to interact with the wider community, this is a fact. The game is already split, me and my friends play in private and very rarely if ever go into open. We're not interested in the possibility of PvP at any stage. You may find it boring but we don't, that's how we like to play. You can turn your nose up and call us "carebears" all you like, we don't care. If you want the possibility of being interdicted and griefed because it makes the game interesting that's fine, however, that's not a good enough reason to force social players to suffer PvP/griefing when they don't want to. Perhaps a whole new server mode is a bit of an extreme but there's plenty that Frontier could do to accommodate those who are more PvE/truck simulator focused players, without just forcing them into private/solo. To deny other people a new way to play based purely on your opinion is short-sighted and selfish. And hey, if ever a PvE only mode appeared and PvP open play died, then the community has spoken.

My most memorable experience in E:D to this day is when I got ganked while trading in my type7

I find people that enjoy making people mad bit disturbing to be honest.

I agree that gankers add the sense of danger. Hell even a griefer can be role played into a psychopath. Either way, the name of the game is Elite DANGEROUS lol. You can have fun times, relaxing times, and also "dangerous" times. The PvP encounters add to the game. At the end of the day, remember. It's just a game. One that welcomes you to immerse yourself into its world to become an intrepid space farer set lose upon the great black unknown, and all the risks and dangers that come with it. It's not something to obsess over min-max statistics and kill counts or whatever, it's an ADVENTRUE where you chose your own destiny. An adventure with a vast community of actors making it all work.

Without gankers there couldn't be anti-ganker gameplay. So I'm glad, that they're around.

I remember you mentioning in a previous video on that topic about gankers being a common occurrence in a most MMO's, yet, Elite is somewhat different in that regard. There are no profit, no bonuses for people doing ganks - maybe some cargo, but if you gank an explorer, who spent months out in the black, he looses his data, and all you get is some pure, distilled hate. But. That's why solo exists. I personally go solo when risks are too high and/or I can't deal with a bad mix of gankers and griefers in the area. I was simply foced into solo when I kept getting Orange Sidewinder while trying to get to Farseer Inc., escaping a wing of gankers just a minute before. Pure PvE is boring asf. There is a good reason why PvE servers of MMO's like WoW are in general less popular than PvP. What makes Elite bad in that regard, there is usually no reason to gank, and thus, gankers are getting confused with griefers. "They killed me for nothing and got nothing from it - they must be a griefer!" Sily logic, but sadly, the most common one. All those aggressive carebears needs to know, when they should switch to solo, and then go back to chaos of open. But instead they are trying to force other people see things their way. That's just... Dumb.

With the introduction of carriers, ganking might turn into true piracy, with wings patrolling stars between resource sites and stations. Letters of Marquis could then be issued to commanders to fight the pirates . . . and I'd be okay with that.

Imagine defending toxic behavior that causes people to leave open play, then complaining about the other toxic behavior.

I like the idea of having some kind of player police faction. Maybe something like a subfaction of the federation, empire and alliance. This could be realised by raising a bounty on these cmdrs, and updating their location to everybody who accepted a mission to hunt them everytime they get scanned by some security ship or station or even land on a station.

As a carebear, but not a militant carebear who mined and ratted in NullSec in EVE Online, I share your overall opinion about gankers. Griefers can go get screwed, though. At least gain from my loss, don't just harass me because you feel like it.

I've seen too many friends get IRL threats from these militant carebears; they're a permanent plague in this community

I would be more accepting of gankers and griefers if there was an actual reward system they were working within, rather than just doing it to piss off other people. You can defend them all you want, but griefing and ganking too much just makes open a vacant wasteland

I get a kick out of when people try to gank me. I can usually get away without much trouble and like to throw some taunts when I get away. (I usually travel unarmed.)

I think gankers are part of the game like high level pirates that we have to outwit until we're strong enough to fight them. They're just another form of danger that we have to be cautious about like teleporting into a blackhole or colliding into a space station. Space pirates shouldn't be just xp pinatas, in real life pirates are a force that is feared and dangerous, thus making it more satisfying when you defeat them.

👍👍 good vid

To those that do want a pure PvE experience. I reccomend checking out the Mobius group. They run a private server with tons of players signed on and all aggressive PvP is banned. It's obviously quieter than Open, but there are still plenty of people to run into.

Hey Giest I agree that ganking is 100% apart of the game. Like I know most of us here start at runescape when we were kids and you had to go into the wild to get the best stuff but you had the chance of being ganked. That made it adventurous and much more satisfying when you did succeed! I'm new to elite dangerous but my heart is pumping whenever a NPC tries to gank me. So I know its gonna be awesome when it's a real person !

There is no difference between indiscriminate and senseless killing of an inferior player and grieving. Pirates dont do that. Criminals dont do that. If you want my cargo, sure, maybe threaten me or blow me up to get it. ID GET THAT. What I dont get is doing that for no reason at all except to have fun at someone elses expense.

PVP is awesome. You lose some, you win some. Elite needs it.

I appreciate the chance of getting ganked. I adds a certain thrill to the game. Besides Mobius is already there for people who want to be cautious.

Absolutely spot on about carebears ! Been on the receiving end many times and I’m a ethical ganker

I'm new to ED, but part of what has drawn me to it is the optional pvp. I'm playing solo right now, learning the game and making some credits for fun toys. When I feel like it, I will jump in to open and start playing there. It reminds me more of the old Diablo 2 system, but a little more open. you kinda lump ganking and in game piracy together. I have no problem with piracy in games.... happens. It's the griefers and seal clubbers i have an issue with.

What you described happened to me in Sea of Thieves. I am a very skilled player, with hundreds of hours of experience. I saw a ship with a reapers bounty (so a pretty large sum) and approached. I then demanded they either join my alliance, give me the loot, or I would sink them. In sea of THEIVES, I asked for the loot rather than sinking them. They denied, and tried attacking me, so I destroyed their ship and took the loot. They found me again on the server and tried to get revenge. They were very bad at the game, and I actually had to raise my sail and slow down so they could catch up to me. I then sank them a second time. After which they messaged me. Them: Your parents should have beat your a** more as a child for being such an a**hole Me: I told you to surrender, or I would sink you. You didn’t join, so I sank you. T: Your just a little wiener prick (an insult I have never received before) and to scared to fight someone like a little pu**y M: I fought you twice, let you catch up to me because you were behind me, and sank you twice. This is sea of THEIVES, and I stole your treasure T: Your just a little a**hole, lashing at out people because your daddy stuck it up your butt, and your uncle f***ed you when you were a kid. One day, something’s gonna come for you and karma’s gonna get you M: because I sunk you? You don’t need to be toxic. This is just a game, and I told you I would sink you, and did. Also, I don’t have an uncle, or an aunt. T: *more insults I forgot, and more about how I shoulda been beaten as a child* M: ok dude gg *the next day* T: more insults, some threats, asking who I was, ie. my real name and where I lived M: I’m not telling you any of that, and please stop bothering me T: *something about me being a little b*tch, and how I was probably gonna report him like all the other ret**ded kids these days M: Actually, no I’m not reporting you. Why would I report you for being mad that I killed you. If you continue to bother me though, I will. You have said multiple swear words and will get com banned T: yeah right little b*tch *Another next day* T*More insults and threats* M: I said stop or I’m reporting you T*something about karma and I’m a c*ny M: alright dude, I’m reporting you, and right after, I’m blocking any and all messages from you. *i block and report them* *ANOTHER next day* A profile I don’t know: You stupid little N*gg**, you got me f***ing blocked. I f***ing reported you, b*tch, hows that feel. Me: bro, I told you to stop. Your about to get banned again Them: F***ing try it p**sy Me: Ok *reports and blocks them* *a few days later* Another new profile: alright I’m sorry, can you unban me Me: who is this? T: the guy you sank earlier and banned. It says I’m banned permanently, but I’m sorry, so can you unban me Me: you got permanantly banned? Them: yes, I’m sorry Me: First of all, I don’t decide if you are banned, Microsoft does. I reported the messages you sent. Microsoft saw 20+ swear words in 10+ messages and banned you. Secondly, no I would not unban you if I could. Why should I let other people have to listen to you be a jerk to them, when I know you will just do the same thing to other people who beat you and make you angry? And finally, You are absolutely not sorry at all. You were so mad you used a second account to trash talk me. Now you’re banned and angry you got banned. No, I know you are only apologizing because you got banned. Have a terrible day, you sad lonely person. Them: f*ck you your just a f***int white piece of trash fa**ot who sucks d*** and is a little p***y and *more insults I forgot* Me: first of all, I am not white. Secondly, you are now going to be banned on a third account. Third of all, I am sorry for insulting you, I was angry. However, you are just a sad angry person, and after calling me white trash, you deserve to be insulted. Have a horrible rest of your life, goodbye. Any further messages from any other accounts will be immediately blocked and reported, it is not worth my time to argue with you. *i report there messages* *just before I block them* Them: f*** you stupid ne**o ass Mexican whatever motherf*****r b*tch a** little wh**e And that is the last I’ve heard from them. So yeah, I was trying to have a positive meeting with a new player. They did not comply with a stronger player. They got destroyed. Yes I was ganking, if you can call it that. The only advantage I had was skill, they knew I was there and prepared for a fight. Do I deserve to be called a piece of white trash? Or a N***** or a b***h or any of these other words? For theiving you in sea of THIEVES? No, but this is what happens. Thank you, Sepulcher, for showing this in a clear and positive way. This is exactly my feelings as well, just about a different game I am passionate about. A game even more dedicated to ganking and killing other players. Sea of Theives

I just started ganker/griefer hunting yesterday I guess you would call me a bounty hunter? It's pretty hilarious to get interdicted and then the ganker/Griefer realizes they made a horrible mistake.

The way you describe the militant carebears is beautifully brutal. I love it.

They used to justify it by telling you to "git gud". It is why I never play in open.

I don't think gank is anything other than an onomatopoeia for how you feel when you get ganked. Remember the term 'yoink' was an entirely made up sound that Homer Simpson would make when he grabbed things.

Last time I got ganked in Shinrarta, they had to wait for me to come back from Prison. When I got back, one (there was 3) said "what happened? You blew up". All I said was "Yep". He actually asked, "WAT? No salt". I think I actually made him mad, that I didn't get mad. Great vid, by the way. And I agree, they may be gankers, but they are our gankers. o7 CMDR

Surprisingly, I’ve yet to actually get ganked by another player. I’ve only been playing for a bit less than a month. I find the idea of getting attacked by another player quite fun. I was wondering how effective a Chaff/Shock mine setup would be to counter them, would it be worth it?

I totally agree that ganking needs to be part of the gameplay. I got ganked a few times so far, and each time I noted the name of the other player with the intention of some day enacting revenge upon them in-game. This has been a vital factor to my motivation to level up my CMDR, upgrade my ships and training my combat abilities. It's like the plot of a revenge movie. Without the possibility of that happening, a lot of the literal "frontier" appeal of the game would be lost.

eve online is a game where, literally everywhere, is pvp. Even the so called “High security space” which has a ton of police in it that takes action whenever someone gets attacked by another player. But it doesn’t stop them for doing so. I’ve been in eve online for a while, and gotta say, I don’t mind the pvp, I don’t mind getting my ship destroyed, my expensive modules destroyed. In fact I even look for fights that’s unfair for me. Sure, it does cost me in game currency to upkeep all the activities but it’s a risk that I wanted to take. I’m new to ED, and the only thing I have done here is solo mining. I don’t mind the travel time. In fact, I won’t mind if someone finds me and blap my ship. I actually crave for that player interaction. The feelings you go through and learning more from it, and then doing it for yourself. We live and learn, and I do believe elite dangerous tells us to fly dangerous, where in eve they tell us to fly safe. I’ve been enjoying ED so far the way it is. For me, there is only one rule in ED. Respect the fuel rats and never shoot them. And I don’t want to add more x)

Great video!!! New player here. I’ve resolved that if I ever get ganked, I’ll sort of role play it or take it in stride. That’s what a galaxy scale sim like ED should be.

I play to get away from people.

I agree completely and you said it well. Gankers are the spice of multiplayer games like Elite Dangerous, and like any spice they can be a bit too spicey sometimes. Griefers are people who do more than just kill you in the game, they do whatever they can to make you miserable for no reason at all. In fact, I think "militant carebears" as you described them are the ultimate griefers. They don't just gank you, or send you nasty messages, or harass you on social media, they're trying to hijack the development and moderation of Elite Dangerous and turn it into their own personalized version of the game.

What I appreciate about ED isthat I can choose to play in a different mode if that is how I want to play. I am still learning the game - been playing a few days and I can choose which part to focus on and take some risks away.

Considering there's a SOLO OPTION, it's insane this is even an issue.

Tactics are one thing. When I'm not wanted, and 4 of you jump in on me, YOU'RE the assholes. I mean, you won't get any salt from me. I have plenty of credits, and I already know I'm a garbage PVPer. -This speaks to the "earning it" point he makes. 3+ of you splatting my shitty ass is nothing to be proud of, and if you ask me, speaks more to your inability than mine. Kill me, fine. I play exclusively open and live at Jameson for a reason. However, the only thing you'll gain from smashing me between yourself and your 14 friends is the small pile of mats that my ship drops as I'm very rarely wanted, and my salt only consists of (not always) privately laughing at you. Pirating? Fine. Murder? Sure. Winging up with more than one other person to take out one unwanted, non-agressive target, you're no different from griefers and trolls. Don't like it? Come kill me over it. But do it one on one or risk proving how bad you actually are. Cmndr Ms. Piggy. PC. Again, I live at Jameson.

Hear hear!!! Spot on! I'll take gankers and griefers over carebears any day. Well said, CMDR! o7

Exactly I’m a newish player and part of the enjoyment of trading for me is the risk of another player catching me in my big cargo hauler

Very well said. I’ve been playing off and on for a couple years now and it’s for the exact reasons you stated that I always play in open but am not in any forums or discords. The risk is part of the game. There are human players and they’re going to do what they want to do, play the way they want to play. It’s all part of an open game. But forums where you get told what you’re supposed to believe or think or risk being banned or ostracized is not worth the effort to me. I play because I enjoy the experience. I don’t really need someone else to tell me which parts I’m supposed to like or accept

As a new player I have found that ganks subtract from the game simply because they are next to impossible to learn from. It relies completely on the generosity of the ganker to explain what they did and how they did it.

Mmmm... I don't get it. At the end, you really started sounding like you were justifying griefing because of "militant care-bears" I agree with some of the comments here- that there are no repurcussions to ganking. You outfit your shiny PVP ship, equip an interdictor, chase down something smaller than a Federal Assault Ship, and laugh as you blow up some other player's own vessel. The game is a grind, yeah, and so all the more reason to help other players through it, right? You don't want to be sent several million credits backwards, so why send anyone else down? If you encounter a player who maturely accepts their ship being blown up under dubious circumstances, good for you. But if you don't, they're perfectly justified in thinking of you as a soulless asshole hunting less-experienced, less-equipped, less-prepared players, and costing those players anything from straight rebuy to billions of credits in bounties, mining spoils, or exploration data. If this is a space simulation game, and you should take in stride the good WITH the bad, then gankers, griefers, trolls, and the like, should be ready to meet the system authority bearing down on their ass for unlawful interdiction of another vehicle, unlawful assault of another vehicle, and unlawful destruction of another vehicle. Not only should bad-mannered players be charged with 2-3x the rebuy of another player's now-charred vessel- it's not theirs to break- but they should accumulate other such charges for unsportsmanlike or unlawful conduct. If Elite Dangerous really is a space simulation game, and you really want gankers to be taken as part of the game, then they need to meet similar repurcussions to murder that they would in real life. Really!

There is a huge difference between a ganker/pirate and the worthless griefers.

very well made and absolutly true, the "problem" isn;t really the ganking itself, it's that there is no consequence of doing it, as tiny change inn the way the game deals with it would fix that. NPC's are not exactly a issue, so having a bounty on your head after ganking someone isn't really a problem, if the bounty would be in relation the difference in rank and based on the gankers wallet, then the loop would be closed, meaning if someone shoots someone well below the experience level, the fine and bounty should be much much larger, and based of the wealth the player has, just like IRL. that would add some real danger to the ganker as well and they would stop randomly shooting new players, as this would have some serious consequences for them.

When I first got the game, I was running assasination with my eagle, when a corvette interdicted me, and made me tell him what local faction I was doing it for. I didnt even fully understand the normal factions, told him so, and he blew me up instantly. Best early memory of this game

I remember trying to help like you. But eventually you may grow tired of the harassment over a video game mechanic. Subscribed though. Been low key enjoying your content. This video is 100% on point. God damn Fdev Forums. Wait until you engage with some of their moderators that hold the same point of view as the militant carebear.

Gankers whinging about the crack down by F-Dev is like RDR2's Dutch and Arthur moaning about the Pinkerton's always hunting them down, they just don't get it, "what are we doing wrong, I'm entitled to kill for myself, it's a free country" they cry, Gankers are cut from the same mold. Just as Outlaws were hunted down in the wild west so should Gankers.

I have feel good story about gankers. I was ganked a few times by a cmdr from the 7th Legion on Xbox, we messaged a few times "gg" and all. I never ran but turned to fight, and lost everytime. We got to talking and he offered to hold a PvP session with some our squad. Great bunch of guys that are now on the friends list and showed us some things and what loadouts produce the best results. Doesn't get better than that in ED.

I got ganked by a Imp Cutter while I was lagged, moving survivors from Li Qing Jao. Fair play, because of my pledge to the Prismatic Bubblehead and I always expect to be attacked in Open, but damn... My now very-dead evacuees got fried against his shields as he boost-rammed me the third time. I ran some purely pro-bono Federation missions that same day to try to make amends to the families of his victims. Econo cabins need to come with better passenger-preservation features. Sounds like a great opportunity for Remlok. What saddened me even more tho is that the ganker left the area around the evacuation frigate before I could return the favor in my prisonshankmobile.

Earning in ED. When you have something like 1 hour tops to play per day because real life, so what might take one person a day to get, might take another player months in real time, getting blown out of the game for no reason is not merely an inconvenience. Consequences of that is the player being short on gaming time is forced to stay at square one for the entire game. That is not an option. That is not why those people bought the game. Consequently it's either solo, priate or quitting the game entirely, That's real money wasted, that's real time wasted. For what?

I hate gankers. Honestly, if I get ganked I usually come back and grief my gankers by any means necessary. Gankers are trash they prey on new players and waste other people's time. I find out who they are and make their life hell, waste their time, and then make them pay. I am very much okay with gankers getting ostracized by the community.

My old squadron CODE had members threatened, doxxed, and stalked IRL because certain individuals did not like the way we were playing the game. If you get so angry over a video game that you try to harm someone IRL, then you are the one with a problem. Im glad you are willing to call things like you see them, subscribed. See you in the black CMDR o7

I have never minded ganking/griefing/whatever. Although I truly believe the in-game punishments for those kind of crimes in the bubble should be more severe. Instead of a tiny fine, it should be proportionate to the amount of damage caused. Something in the realm of 15 to 25 percent. Blow up a 10 million credit ship? Get a 2.5 million credit fine in the bubble. Outside the bubble, everything goes.

Yesterday i was splitting low temp diamonds with my multicrew member (jettisoning and limpets) in the system we were gonna sell em at During part two of the drop off Two commanders dropped in on my friends signal I immediately started boosting away As i still had 200 LTDs in my cargo As i jumped my friend had just been obliterated within seconds Once i clearer after my jump i switched to a private session and my friend joined after paying the rebuy I was fine with it, i felt fear and I wanted to live and i made it out The gankers invited us to a party and poked at us (I guess expecting a negative response) and i went with it Although i was called a logger (even though i had escaped the situation and was never in combat since they were distracted with my friend) which I disagree with It was for sure a thrilling experience They saw our lightly armed miners and wanted some fun. (Though I wasn't going to stick around for round 2)

I'm a ps4 player. I'm part of an antigank team. I agry when you say ganking is part of the game. Fighting against them is fun, hard, and we had some very epic fight. Some of the gankers are just playing a kind of rp brutal, but they are sympatic on the message. But the issue we have with some of them is trash talk, insults, homophobic insults... So i think it's normal, on that last case, to report them. There are limits.

I think part of my problem, personally, is that when I'm in the middle of a grind, just trying to progress in the game in whatever efficient manner I can at the time, all I want is for it to be over already. It's not fun, it's just tedious, and I'm just trying to get to the fun parts. Having that not fun tedious grind interrupted and even worse potentially lose progress on it isn't something I would ever voluntarily put myself at the risk of having happen. That puts me in a weird place where my combat desires are only satisfied by open gameplay where I can get stomped by someone further along in the grind but my ability to even pretend like I can get to that point of the grind is only ever available in solo or private sessions with my friends, so boring tedious but at least safe grinds.

201 "cmdrs" should stay in "solo"

Any of these people whining about ganking ever play Dark Souls? Getting invaded by some crazy psycho with a 6 foot sword is half the fun. I have never had my heart rate increase as much in any game than while running from a crazy invader in the early days of playing Dark Souls. They actually made ganking a game mechanic and its awesome.

To be honest ganking in High Security system shouldn't even be possible. in Anarchy YES, in Low Security YES but quickly. So people would have to make a trade, security VS time.

Would I make Elite gank-free? No, but crime and punishment would be brutal, and if the bounties continued to stack up, almost as unforgiving as Eve Online. And that is the problem, gankers and griefers see zero punishment for their douchebaggery. That is what everyone who elects to leave Open for Solo or Mobius has asked for, which Fdev appears too spineless and/or incompetent to give us: a TRUE karma system that punishes mindless griefing and habitual ganking. If the Feds and Imperials actually enforced the concepts of "high security" by sending more than just a handful of ships any reasonably engineered PVP ship could kill with the same casual ease as a trading or exploration vessel, we would see less hostility. System security forces with the strength (albeit not the godlike invulnerability) of the CONCORD would give all but the most violent or glory-seeking gankers pause outside of Anarchy systems. However much I despise groups like SDC, they continuously prove a point that Fdev has refused to accept: the crime and punishment system is a sham, a disgrace, and an insult. They could do better. They SHOULD do better. No one wants to be interdicted by a wing of 4 grade 5 engineered ships, armed with FSD reboot and drag missiles to prevent high waking, and blown away simply for the mistake of existing in the same instance as their attackers. No declared intentions, no demands, just a flurry of missiles and plasma followed by rail rounds through your power plant once your shield is popped. Traders at least have it lucky in that the worst thing they'll suffer is maybe a fine for some failed missions, but explorers? They lose EVERYTHING, because there is no rebuy on exploration data. That's why the Distant Gankers were hated so deeply, they were capable of ruining dozens, if not hundreds of systems worth of data, including First Discoveries in some cases. There's no roleplay or "immergent gameplay" in that, just someone's hours or even days of time blown away for the sake of some pathetic subhuman's need to cause another person suffering. That kind of sociopathic behavior is why Solo, Mobius, and the block function all exist. A proper justice system would go a long way towards curtailing it enough that people would feel reasonably safe in Open again. It wouldn't stop the truly evil players who consider ANY attention a validation of their existence, but it would make them pay for their soulless need to drag other people down into misery with them. With any luck, it might convince some of them to find some other game to plague, which I'd call a net win for all of us. And a revamp of CQC into something that makes more sense would probably also help satisfy the people who gank purely out of boredom. Much as I dislike them, I can't really blame them - it's gotta be lonely at the top. Now, on the other side of the coin, I agree with you entirely on the militant carebear issue. PVP has a place in Elite. Piracy has a place in Elite. Even indiscriminate killing, technically, has a place in Elite - it just isn't properly punished the way it should be in the eyes of most, with the fist of an angry god. But every time the gankers put on their troll fedoras and say "lol juz git gud, useless scrub", they are fueling the militant carebear population with justification and, for lack of a better term, political ammunition to use against them. Their own callousness towards those they consider inferior players, those uninterested in trying to fight a foe that, for all they know, could simply just combat log and hide in Solo the moment they're faced with a fair fight, is what feeds their enemies. And this is a discredit to the true pirates, the Powerplay agents, and the BGS runners, who all have legitimate reasons to fight and kill other players. I also don't agree with the notion that PVP players should be attacked and ostracized. The moment you take an in-game dispute into real life with doxxing, swatting, and other such threats to life and liberty, is the moment you forever lose the moral high ground. No one should be a pariah for wanting an honorable duel or to serve their faction. No one should be banned from an Expedition - the only remaining form of engaging mass-multiplayer content left in the game with the Thargoids dormant - just for seeking advice on how to defend themselves. Griefers may be toxic trash, but any game can cull their numbers with the right rule system. The militant carebears of Elite, from what I've seen, are just as subhuman, just as pathetic, and just as in need of a banhammer to the skull, in this CMDR's humble opinion. TLDR: People would hate gankers less if they suffered proper punishment. The reason people hate ganking is because they stand to lose hours or even days of effort for no reason at all. Militant carebears are indeed just as much human garbage as griefers.

14:32 “dont tread on us” based libertarian spatula

I agree the banning from forums and such for people who don't even gank or do gank but are just talking about it is dumb. That said, gankers are cowards. Plain and simple. Because there is no real consequence for it. So I have little sympathy for actual gankers in most regards who set out to ruin someone's day and hard work just to ruin someone's day and hard work. So them not being welcome in a forum or club or discord is their own fault. Start your own and if it isn't highly populated then maybe that should tell you something. I don't think pvp should be taken out but if getting kicked from a forum or group filled with people who just want to have fun positive interactions with the game and other players (most people) pisses you off then maybe stop being a cowardly asshole and stop effing with people who haven't done anything to you. Live and let live is a popular concept for a reason. You're not "more mature" for just brushing it off. If someone in the real world who has something they invested hours, days, or weeks into destroyed by some jerk for shits and giggles and they want that jerk removed, they are not being immature. I only make real world comparisons because they were made in the video. And if people who get ganked should just "get over it" like all of the so called "mature" players because ganking makes elite more real, then when gankers (actual gankers) get booted from a forum or especially a group created specifically for exploration and expeditions, then that is not violating free speech. That's people who want to have fun telling people who want to ruin that fun to eff off. Just like in the real world. They can speak freely about tactics on how best to catch weaker ships off guard elsewhere. And yeah I get it; it's petty. It's not something I would do because gankers don't bother me, because I pop them when they try. But again, I have no sympathy for them. Ganking does make elite more real. But in the real world when someone is being an asshole at the party they usually get kicked out. So gankers should just get over it. Right now the only pirating that isn't a problem are pirates like in the Bringing the Dangerous series in my opinion. Until there are actual in game consequences that put actual risk into popping people for no reason then gankers will remain cowardly assholes. And no I'm not some salty player who got ganked too many times. And I'm not one of these forum mods or admins who have kicked or asked for or supported anyone being kicked. I've been playing on and off since the release of the game and only been ganked once years ago. I just have a severe dislike for cowards and that is inarguably what most gankers are. Weak cowards too afraid of a fair fight. Finally, defending these cowards is pointless if the defense is predicated on realism. Whether you eff with someone in game or in real life; if you eff with enough people within a group that group is going to ostracize you. That's how the real world works and complaining about it while at the same time saying the people you eff with are "weak" for complaining and then doing something petty to you for revenge (like banning)... well... the phrase hypocrite comes to mind.

Don't get me wrong, i play Solo cuz gankers get on my last nerve, BUT I don't get overtly hostile because someone shot me down when I do go into open. Its part of the game. You win some, you lose some. If you want to avoid them that badly set up a group. Me and my friends did, we do wing missions and play together so we have that support structure, and it keeps us away from gankers and griefers. I don't get all the hate over someone's play style. Its an open world game, it's meant to simulate real life interactions. You got criminals and scum irl so it makes sense some people would find that type of play attractive. Take your L and move on.

If I get ganked in a Conflict Zone, HazRez or just on a normal mission, that's fine. It adds to the immersion of the Elite universe, and I like it. I play in private or solo when I'm doing anything important, but I can understand the urge to combat log if you've spent a few months exploring or have been out in the fields for several hours.

Just had a funny encounter with a Ganker less then two days ago: I was landing my Krait MK2 at a station and not paying attention to my radar. I got rammed by a Federal Corvette twice. I ended up bouncing around the inside of the station like a pinball, but still survived. I had full pips to systems with grade A shields. The individual joined voice-chat. I responded with while laughing my head off "Oh your the C*** who just rammed me!" He laughed and said to me that he meant to shoot me, but I still had "Report Crimes" on and his son just jumped on him while he was playing. We both laughed and winged up. We took multiple kill pirate missions and I made over 80 Mil in game money. I am still a new player. 80 Mil is a lot to me at this point..... This was the third Gank attempt ageist me this week alone.. I got a laugh and two new friends out of this, so stay optimistic and just be willing to have a good laugh (Evan if it's at your expense). A laugh goes a long way, remember it's just a game.