Just an observation...
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It seems that many people seem to think that ED is a multiplayer game with single player added on
In fact if you look at the history of Elite the opposite is true...Elite has, to the best of my knowledge, always been a single player game this is the first time they have added the ability to play with others in a social way. I believe the social aspect is very important to FD and Braben, much more than the pvp, hence why the modes are interlinked and interchangeable, it is the way it was intended from the very start in my opinion.
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I have experienced some pretty frustrating gaming in my many years and nearly all due to open pvp. I stopped playing AoC because of players who treated open pvp as an excuse to get there jollies at the expense of others and when, doing what the same pvpers suggested, I brought friends they logged out...absolutely pointless playing.
I played Lineage 2 and watched my guild get deleveled and pushed off a server by another guild. The guild were from the USA and the aggressor was from the USSR go go no agenda gaming...Humans ya gotta love em
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Bottom line is that I bought elite in the hope of being able to play to suit my mood, to play my way and not have a gaming style/ethos forced upon me. I play online to be social but that, over the years, sadly has not been the case in open pvp.
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I fully intended to play release in open but think now I will just join a pve private group instead so enriching the open play galaxy....In the long run it is clearly going to be a preferable experience