In Dune: Awakening players have developed a new method to deal with their opponents in the Deep Desert. However, the developers are not pleased with this and intervene.
What is this new method? In Dune: Awakening, in the endgame PvP area Deep Desert, players have the opportunity to kill other players. Ideally, they should encounter each other in action-packed fights on foot, in the air, or in a vehicle, but players have found a better way to engage in PvP.
Similar to GTA 5 in online mode, players simply park their ornithopters on top of other players to take them out. This crushes the characters and can even lead to death. Those who die drop resources and money, which the attackers can then collect.
In this video on Reddit, you can see how it looks:
The developers intervene
Why is this such a problem? As a player, it is hardly possible to defend against the attacks. If there is no way to shoot rockets at enemy aircraft, for example from a buggy or combat ornithopter, one can only dodge the attacks.
Shooting at the aircraft is exceedingly inefficient and, due to the inability to move much, carries a higher risk of being crushed.
How are the developers reacting? The developers of Dune: Awakening have already responded to the incident on Reddit. They write:
Yes, we are sorry. We have people working to fix the Goomba stomping as quickly as possible.
Joel from Funcom on Reddit
Despite the developers’ statement, the bug fix did not make it into the latest patch 1.1.0.13. So it remains to be seen when the problem will disappear from the servers.
Have you heard about the one riding the sandworm?
Griefing is getting worse
How bad is the problem? Cedric Holmeier is a freelance author at MeinMMO and currently plays a lot of Dune: Awakening. He says:
On my server, griefing has now taken over. Bases are being built into each other, dungeons are being blocked with bases. Players are flying with combat ornithopters through the Deep Desert and just want to farm kills. This is all different from what the developers want and promised. Even in the beta, players have already tried to block or damage my sandbike with their ornithopter. I have also experienced attempts to “park to death” players with the ornithopter.
The problem is that the anti-grief protection is currently insufficient and rather prevents players from being able to defend themselves. This makes it hardly possible to do anything against the griefers. Reports to support are also not really possible due to the lack of nametags in the open world. The problem runs deep in Dune: Awakening and primarily affects players who just want to be left alone while griefers are having a lot of fun.
Even if the developers fix the problem with “Goomba stomping,” as they call it, there are still many other ways to annoy other players. One player even had their relaxed evening ruined: Player in Dune: Awakening complains about a griefer who “ruined his night and made him cry,” gets immediate support
