Every now and then, I saw people mention other players attempting to steal the chests from them while they were in the middle of clearing a camp—most successfully doing so, and I recently became a victim of this act. Unless you're on Syndesia, your only option to deter someone from stealing the chest you're spending your effort, time, and resources to obtain is to break one of Fractured's rules by luring NPCs onto the thief.
This shouldn't have to be done to prevent that from happening. While I don't want to completely eliminate the possibility of other players being able to steal chests from each other, even though they should be courteous enough to leave that player be and find their own camp, there should be healthier ways to do achieve this like how players can just attack and kill each other on Syndesia.
For example, there could be a contest that starts as soon as a camp-spawned NPC is attacked:
(Alternatively, to starting as soon as a single player attacks a camp-spawned NPC, it could simply register the player then officially start the contest when another player comes along and attacks a camp-spawned NPC.)
This could give another player a fair chance to contest the camp's chest instead of trying to challenge a player that's already one or more kills into clearing the camp; although, this could be unfair to the first player.
The player that kills the most camp-spawned NPCs earns the right to unlock and pillage a chest.
The kill counts should be based on damage dealt to prevent a contestant from last-hitting another contestant's target for the purpose of stealing their kill count.
If the contest ends in a draw...
...another NPC could be spawned by the camp to break the tie.
Damage dealt would matter most here.
...every player that formed a tie with each other could gain access to the chest—first click; first served.
...if possible, the chest could split its rewards and itself into smaller chests for each contestant that formed the tie.
Players in a party are considered as a single contestant.
This means that their damage dealt (when securing a kill) and their kill counts could be counted as their party leader's damage dealt (when securing a kill) and kill counts.
This could be elaborated upon if we're able to name our parties in Fractured's future.
There could be boundaries (radii) around camps that mark the playing area for the contests.
If a contestant strays beyond the boundary, they could be warned that they must return lest they risk disqualification.
The boundaries could be generously extended for the sake of giving contestants room to kite and not accidentally aggro more than they can handle.
The statistics for this contest could appear above the chests, or somewhere on the contestants' U.I., that remains until the contest is over or until the contestants leave the playing areas' boundaries.
This mechanic should not affect those who utilize stealth to unlock and pillage camps' chests unless they or someone else attacks a camp-spawned NPC.
This mechanic would be completely optional for Syndesia since, as explained earlier, players on that planet can simply attack and kill each other for the camps and their rewards; however, this mechanic would provide a more sporting way to challenge someone for a camp without devolving to violence against each other.
Another alternative to this entire suggestion is to simply create impassable boundries around camps' chests, of the same themes as the camps, that falls away when those camps are cleared.
However, this could still cause a problem with thieves idling or hiding nearby with the intention of waiting until the player clears the camp to dart in and steal its chest.
