DEVS: Why no social features like chat channels, guilds / corps and parties?
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Robert Maynard
Volunteer Moderator
If you wanted to create a private group, from what we know about group switching, yes.
If, however, you wanted to create an Alliance with the other player then I expect that we should be able to do this on an ad-hoc basis (only one alliance membership at a time though) in-game.
That's exactly the point. It's absurd to think that 1,000,000 could "control" over 300,000 systems each. Groups/clans wouldn't be spread out and would control the same space. 100,000 systems? Still absurd. Same with 10,000 systems. The more realistic you get the less likely it is you would be butting heads. I'm not saying that territorial control needs to be a thing, but it would be nice as that would add an extra layer of gameplay to an already watered down experience. With the PU as big as it is, you can feasibly pick a random direction and never be found again. Which is why I don't understand the hostility towards adding in more meaningful social features.
Hmmm, well I find that a little absurd for a game that clearly advertises itself as "massive multiplayer". It won't effect me much, as I am sure once I convince my friends to play that we will form an alliance.
But I can see why others would find that a little ridiculous. I think somebody hit the nail on the head earlier, it seems that FD hasn't found it's identity yet as far as what this game is really supposed to be. In one crowd there seems to be "this is really a single player game" (contrary to the advertising), and in the other camp are people that want to true social sci-fi experience...
Robert Maynard
Volunteer Moderator
Indeed - still absurd to think that a small group of players could even expect to control a whole system 24/7.
Except that players who do group together using the social features, and I would expect that a lot of them would congretage around the core systems for each faction, could become quite anti-social to lone-wolf pilots simply plying their trade. While a random direction could be chosen to avoid such behaviour, I do not see why it should have to be.
Whether or not you can "control" a system 24/7 isn't the issue. The fact that you can do it in the first place is something that adds more gameplay. But this isn't a call for territorial control, but social features. Fleshed out communications/grouping specifically.
There is already other ways around that. Solo play is one. Private groups another. You can also block such players. DB also said that those players would find themselves only able to "see" other griefers as time goes by. So I think that bogeyman isn't as scary as people like to argue.
Been playing Skyrim a lot lately. I don't feel lonely. Of course, Skyrim has a world filled with eye distraction. Space is more empty. I don't really recall playing the older Elite games if I felt lonely. Although I do remember fantasizing about what it would be like if all these NPC's were real people. Back in the early 80's the concept of a vast internet like we are spoiled with today was unknown.
I am not worried. Some of these things will be implemented, the chat and whatever. This will give me time to get a handle on controlling my ship. Get used to some of the interface. The advantage of not having chat is that people won't bother each other with RTFM. I hear the manual is abd as it is. But it too will force people to pay attention and learning by error is better than just taking it from a page.
Still, I hope a great manual will appear. But will it make things easier? One would hope. But if I see the pdf's out there with tutorials and help, these unoffical ones are already almost 200 bloody pages! Of course there is fluff in there...
It will be...nice and peaceful to fly alone for a while, get to some basic level of competence. And then open the door to the wider experience with other people. This will keep me from asking noob questions too much.
Thata rticle you linked, I don't think the guy really gets it. I never considered this to be a full blown MMO. Space is big and silent and lonely and too much coms chatter will make it feel really full.
I think any such chat should be restricted to the core systems. When someone flies out to the middle of nowhere she should expect to be isolated. I see this game more as a Sim rather than an MMO. I don't necessarily need very advanced chat options, as long as the chat window is scalable and I don't have to lean into the monitor to see anything. Some slight color coding of text perhaps. Would not mind having a chat window on my second screen.
This game is about you and your ship and your career. The whole social aspect might undermine that concept. The speed of light is pretty slow, so communications between players that are magically instant is an immersion killer.
Personally I think Skype will be great for me. It is independent of the game and won't crash with it. Have you any idea how handy that is
So it will be interesting to see how this develops.
I am not worried. Some of these things will be implemented, the chat and whatever. This will give me time to get a handle on controlling my ship. Get used to some of the interface. The advantage of not having chat is that people won't bother each other with RTFM. I hear the manual is abd as it is. But it too will force people to pay attention and learning by error is better than just taking it from a page.
Still, I hope a great manual will appear. But will it make things easier? One would hope. But if I see the pdf's out there with tutorials and help, these unoffical ones are already almost 200 bloody pages! Of course there is fluff in there...
It will be...nice and peaceful to fly alone for a while, get to some basic level of competence. And then open the door to the wider experience with other people. This will keep me from asking noob questions too much.
Thata rticle you linked, I don't think the guy really gets it. I never considered this to be a full blown MMO. Space is big and silent and lonely and too much coms chatter will make it feel really full.
I think any such chat should be restricted to the core systems. When someone flies out to the middle of nowhere she should expect to be isolated. I see this game more as a Sim rather than an MMO. I don't necessarily need very advanced chat options, as long as the chat window is scalable and I don't have to lean into the monitor to see anything. Some slight color coding of text perhaps. Would not mind having a chat window on my second screen.
This game is about you and your ship and your career. The whole social aspect might undermine that concept. The speed of light is pretty slow, so communications between players that are magically instant is an immersion killer.
Personally I think Skype will be great for me. It is independent of the game and won't crash with it. Have you any idea how handy that is
So it will be interesting to see how this develops.
Did you now see the recent newsletter that mentions one of the core pieces of the visions was groups accomplishing goals and tasks? How is that possible without some sort of social features?
If this invite doesn´t suits you, feel free to spare your place for another one........
The only thing we need is an OPTION to "Visit the Little Green Thargoid bar". Every station must have a sleazy pilots' hangout where commanders can get drunk and tell tall stories.
On a more serious note, however "lone-wolf" many of us want to be - a large part of the enjoyment is in the contrast: however much you prefer to be alone, *sometimes* you want company -even if only to recount your adventures to others.
Party chat obviously makes sense, and possibly Alliance chat (if/when Alliances are implemented). What would be clever and immersive would be to make all real-time chat systems in-system only, while adding some sort of scaled delay for comms coming from further away, with reception of "logs" or "messages" arriving in your "in-box" from far away friends or allies hours, days or weeks after being sent.
The only thing I think would be truly terrible idea would be any kind of Global Chat. Never mind immersion and OOC trolls, the last thing we want is for all the mysteries and secrets to be revealed to everyone en masse the moment one player discovers them. An opt-out option would only partially help because the information would filter down to other local chats anyway.
QE
On a more serious note, however "lone-wolf" many of us want to be - a large part of the enjoyment is in the contrast: however much you prefer to be alone, *sometimes* you want company -even if only to recount your adventures to others.
Party chat obviously makes sense, and possibly Alliance chat (if/when Alliances are implemented). What would be clever and immersive would be to make all real-time chat systems in-system only, while adding some sort of scaled delay for comms coming from further away, with reception of "logs" or "messages" arriving in your "in-box" from far away friends or allies hours, days or weeks after being sent.
The only thing I think would be truly terrible idea would be any kind of Global Chat. Never mind immersion and OOC trolls, the last thing we want is for all the mysteries and secrets to be revealed to everyone en masse the moment one player discovers them. An opt-out option would only partially help because the information would filter down to other local chats anyway.
QE
I don't think anyone wants game wide global chat. I actually can't think of any games with such a feature. The largest I've seen is Eve online's constellation chat that no one ever uses. The default there is "local chat" which includes everyone in the solar system and no one else. I'd be happy with a simple instance wide chat here in addition to some persistent private channels (eve online also has these).
I agree 100% with the OP, the game nearly completely lacks social features like chats, and an in-game grouping system (both for ad-hoc groups and permanent "guild-like" groups).
In its current state the ED doesn't even allow the (rudimentary) level of socializing most FPS games do.
I don't necessarily need a general global chat, system-level would be good I think. But private chats should not be limited by geographical means.
A very basic feature that's also missing now is a way to find out who of my friends is logged on.
To me it's quite irritating that no such features have been tested in beta so far, as testing them would require a large number of users. So I have little hope to see much of it added till release. It would really be a shame to see a game that promises so much and is really groundbreaking in immersion to fail to miserably on the social side.
By the way I think the danger of having public chats filling up with too much spam is much lower here than in the usual MMOs. Elite requires much more concentration on the task at hand than other games (e.g. EVE) so the time you have to chat is much more limited.
In its current state the ED doesn't even allow the (rudimentary) level of socializing most FPS games do.
I don't necessarily need a general global chat, system-level would be good I think. But private chats should not be limited by geographical means.
A very basic feature that's also missing now is a way to find out who of my friends is logged on.
To me it's quite irritating that no such features have been tested in beta so far, as testing them would require a large number of users. So I have little hope to see much of it added till release. It would really be a shame to see a game that promises so much and is really groundbreaking in immersion to fail to miserably on the social side.
By the way I think the danger of having public chats filling up with too much spam is much lower here than in the usual MMOs. Elite requires much more concentration on the task at hand than other games (e.g. EVE) so the time you have to chat is much more limited.
Robert Maynard
Volunteer Moderator
Indeed I did - small groups of up to 6 persons will be able to co-ordinate just fine with the newly announced chat feature and combined with the existing alliance mechanic.
I suppose it depends in ones expectations regarding the size of the group of players involved.
You can't tell which of your friends are logged on? Try the friends part of the main screen, it shows you who is online and the system they are in. Have you tried it?
No. Private groups aren't like groups in other games. A private group is basically a private version of the galaxy for you and anyone who is a member of that group. In that group you don't have to play together or even ever see each other. They are also persistent.
As the game stands right now there's no specific group support and ship-to-ship comms is one to one only, though that's due to change in a few hours. Of course, having no formal grouping features doesn't mean you can't play in a group, it just makes it harder. Combat is difficult as you have to rely on a hell of a lot of situational awareness to know friends from enemies, but every other kind of gameplay is doable.
Formal grouping should be coming soon, or soon after release, in the form of wings (which were called alliances previously just to keep things confusing).
The FGE will be using the in-game VOIP for our small groups (I doubt we'll ever be working in bigger teams than four or five), and using a press-to-talk TS channel on top of that to communicate between the groups. The TS channel will be a quiet channel only to be used in emergencies and such, and for messages from the Staff Group when needed.
My view on having full-on guild features remains as it always was. Basically no, or not at least until the game has been out long enough for the features to suggest themselves. Chucking in bog standard guild/corp features will just encourage the same old social gameplay as in every single other game, which won't work because ED's not one of those games and doesn't cater for that kind of social gameplay.
Just as EvE developed over time in response to how it was played, so ED needs the time to develop in the same way.
Except it's been really buggy and can show a bunch of nonsense. Hopefully fixed in the build we're waiting for.
All due respect, but I think you guys have it the wrong way round - the cart before the donkey, so to speak ...
These MMO things are not what an Elite game needs to have at launch.
That's the mental problem right here.
Way it is advertised it is not "Another Elite game". It is not "Elite 4"
It is advertised as:
This creates a very specific set of requirements. If you want to be "greatest multiplayer space adventure" then by definition you must beat the current "multiplayer space adventure" AKA EvE.
In some respects, it has been done (dogfights), and there is lots of space for all to play in , but that's not enough.
That's the problem of customer base, which does not end with diehard previous Elite fandom. For the people that never bothered to look at those games (like anybody born after 1980, and not into retro games), there is no emotional baggage to deal with.
It is either good multiplayer space game made to 2014 standards on it's own, or it is not.
And E|D claim to be "massively multiplayer online" game. Massively is adverb here. That is very specific definition in customer's mind, no matter how you try to lawyer it into submission.
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The first thing i do when i login int WOW switch off the dumb chatter in channel 2 wich is ment for Trade but uesd for everything..
The same with EVE
So thanks i dont need chats if i have Friend who Play ED too i will have other means to comminicate with them
The same with EVE
So thanks i dont need chats if i have Friend who Play ED too i will have other means to comminicate with them
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