Modes The Solo vs Open vs Groups Thread [See new thread]

[Spacejanitor]

And what if the answer is *my internet sucks* or any other technical reason they may not be able to play open mode ?
This has been covered, but yea, I'm not dizzy yet lets go round again.

It's a game played over the internet, so I kinda thought that a decent connection would be like... a basic requirement? But good for you that we have solo.

You're the one comparing peoples leisure time activities to an issue of human rights (basic human choice - of who to have a relationship with)
I was still on topic, you just could not defend your own example. But then, when you compare two completely different things with only a slightly vague reference to each other....

Have you seen the movie "Yes men"? In this movie, two anti-corporate activists claims to be members of a multinational corporation, that has done huge environmental damage in India, completely polluting a city which has lead to a crisis in public health. They get into a BBC interview and claim that the company at hand, fill finally take responsibility of this crisis, and will now compensate to those who have gotten sick. Now, when they get caught, and people realize no compensation will be given, the western media don't question the company for actually not doing this because it's the "right thing to do", they actually question the two poor anti-corporate activists about how they plan to make amends to those who thought would get the compensation. Your take on this topic is precisely the same as in this example.

If you still miss it:
Person A: Changing A to B is like changing C to D. The fact that A is A and C is C at present doesn't make this impossible.
Person B: How can you compare B and D, they're two completely different letters, and that, somehow, proves that Person A makes an invalid argument.

 

[OBoile]

No, because in the current open mode there are people who make their progress in solo and go open just for the lolz, or trade in the core systems in solo, because they are too lazy to use ingame mechanics to find their safe spot. Not everyone is like this. But it is possible to do so, and for me it is like legal cheating to some extend. It is okay by me if you guys don't mind that. But why should gamers like me be forced to play a mode we don't like? Give us the options!

Seriously, this is really not a big deal. The advantage gained from going solo is very, very minor.

 

[noldunar]

I haven't read the entire discussion so I am not sure if this was brought up before but I think the option to switch freely between the modes actually increases the chance of people playing in open.

I am a solo and private group player only at the moment. If I had to choose right now if I want to continue playing my character in open or solo/private without the option to switch back ever again I would choose solo/private instantly without even thinking about it for a second. Since it is not possible to have two or three different saves at the moment (which I think should be implemented) I will be lost as a potential open player for good.

Even if I had a second save slot I doubt I would want to start all over again with a different commander to play in open. Why? Because I am a working father with a little daughter, a beautiful wife and a 41+ hour work week. My gaming time is precious and limited. I just don't have the time to go through all of it again (even if it actually was fun) or would want to.

However, I would not rule out the possibility of eventually playing in open. Once or twice I already did it and it was an intense experience paying very close attention to the hollow squares on the radar .

So that was actually exactly what DB stated, that by going this route they open up the possibility of primary solo players to join open eventually just out of curiousity if they feel comfortable to do so.

If I didn't have the option I would be another player lost to open. And so what if I bring my A-kitted Viper I got in solo to open? In this game it is I would say 70% skill and 30% equipment. I have never fought a player in my ED life. I play keyboard only (yes, no mouse). Do you really think I would be a threat to any player in open with PVP experience? No.

So all you would achieve by dividing the player base further and adding another and another matchmaking filter or restricting one mode of play over the other would be an even lower number of players in the all open group.

 

[Draconus]

I think there's definite merits for each mode of play, it provides a lot more freedom for players to play the game their own way.

One of the only gripes I have with how it's currently configured is how the system influence is modified from all modes of play - (according to the OP, this is the case). I think influence change should only be possible from within OPEN (ALL) play. As it is you could have a large group of players playing in PRIVATE and providing support for a certain faction without fear of any recompense from players supporting the rival faction. It is something that ruins the immersion of fighting in a full blown system war, not to mention you are only ever aligned with a faction when inside a conflict zone and are able to switch willy-nilly as if it didn't really matter in the first place. There's a whole host of issues with that scenario but back to topic, it's fair for players to want to play in a galaxy where they are free from the unwelcome attention of "CMDR xxIOwnYouxx" but to allow these players to play against the interest of others from an unseen, unreachable dimension is unfair to the players who take the risk of flying in Open.

I think this is a pretty reasonable assumption. When I enter a system in a state of war I expect it to be a hot zone for PvP action.

I suppose one alternative is that any system that is in a state of war can only be traveled to while in Open play. I'm just throwing that out without really thinking over it much, so tear it apart if you don't agree.

 

[Yaffle]

A reminder - any baiting, sniping, insulting etc in this thread will bypass the usual warning system and go direct to infraction. An infraction is a ban (7 days for the first time).

Thank you.

 

[Dabba]

I think there's definite merits for each mode of play, it provides a lot more freedom for players to play the game their own way.

One of the only gripes I have with how it's currently configured is how the system influence is modified from all modes of play - (according to the OP, this is the case). I think influence change should only be possible from within OPEN (ALL) play. As it is you could have a large group of players playing in PRIVATE and providing support for a certain faction without fear of any recompense from players supporting the rival faction. It is something that ruins the immersion of fighting in a full blown system war, not to mention you are only ever aligned with a faction when inside a conflict zone and are able to switch willy-nilly as if it didn't really matter in the first place. There's a whole host of issues with that scenario but back to topic, it's fair for players to want to play in a galaxy where they are free from the unwelcome attention of "CMDR xxIOwnYouxx" but to allow these players to play against the interest of others from an unseen, unreachable dimension is unfair to the players who take the risk of flying in Open.

I think this is a pretty reasonable assumption. When I enter a system in a state of war I expect it to be a hot zone for PvP action.

I suppose one alternative is that any system that is in a state of war can only be traveled to while in Open play. I'm just throwing that out without really thinking over it much, so tear it apart if you don't agree.

I get all that but because of the way that instancing and blocking works even if they took influence out of Solo there would still be plenty of people able to act against your blockade that you wouldn't be able to see. If its hurting your "immersion" just think of them as covert operatives. I wouldn't have any expectation that they are going to gate off influence change from Solo or Private Group players.

I haven't read the entire discussion so I am not sure if this was brought up before but I think the option to switch freely between the modes actually increases the chance of people playing in open. <snip> So all you would achieve by dividing the player base further and adding another matchmaking filter or restricting one mode of play over the other would be an even lower number of players in the all open group.

Ive brought this up many, many times. Its a case of be careful what you wish for, and you are right that locking people out of Open that have played Solo or Private would only exacerbate the issue of not enough people in Open, it certainly wouldn't alleviate it.

 

[CMDR Sheehy]

It's a game played over the internet, so I kinda thought that a decent connection would be like... a basic requirement? But good for you that we have solo.

Yes, good for me or I would be excluded from the game altogether. Thanks FDev.

Have you seen the movie "Yes men"? In this movie, two anti-corporate activists claims to be members of a multinational corporation, that has done huge environmental damage in India, completely polluting a city which has lead to a crisis in public health. They get into a BBC interview and claim that the company at hand, fill finally take responsibility of this crisis, and will now compensate to those who have gotten sick. Now, when they get caught, and people realize no compensation will be given, the western media don't question the company for actually not doing this because it's the "right thing to do", they actually question the two poor anti-corporate activists about how they plan to make amends to those who thought would get the compensation. Your take on this topic is precisely the same as in this example.

If you still miss it:
Person A: Changing A to B is like changing C to D. The fact that A is A and C is C at present doesn't make this impossible.
Person B: How can you compare B and D, they're two completely different letters, and that, somehow, proves that Person A makes an invalid argument.

No. Haven't seen the movie.

But here's the discussion.

Person C: A + B + C = D.
Person A: A + B + C is all fine. However, C should not exist. B is fine so long as you can't do A + B. Who cares about C? Not me. D... Meh! A is supreme, B + C are just <insert insult here>
Person C: ?
Person A: Seriously, don't you understand me? You're just ruining my A experience.
Person C: But... it's D... not just A on it's own. Don't you want me around? Pop in from time to time to say hi?
Person A: No. Go away and do what you like. You're just a cheater. Get off my cloud.
Person C: <shakes head> Glad D's here to stay. Maybe I won't pop by after all.
Person A: Where is everybody?
Person C: Over here!

 

[Dabba]

Seems quite futile contributing anything to the discussion, seems to be 30 pages of "a fine conversation between a collection of cultured gentlemen lobbying against the same thing", ED is what it is i guess, it's cool, will vote with my wallet on upcoming expansions. I enjoy the games, but some things aren't balanced, and can only see further request from those who only play singleplayer to make somthing even harder then it already is so they may or may not venture into open. Hopefully wings will naturally balance this out, although smuggling needs to be improved, piracy/privateering, and i honestly believe those trading in open should reap some form of benefit, should it be lower insurance or multipliers to there income, all ideas are up in the air.

This guy is on the right page with his thinking. You can't force people into doing something they don't want, you can give them good reasons to decide they want to try it. I don't like the idea of income multipliers, as that will only get you people in Open that feel forced there by a mechanic, and people will just block their P2P ports and set up a hotkey to pull the plug, and then play Open like its Solo. What you can do is take some of the risk and cost off the shoulders of the traders in Open, because currently all the risk and all the cost is on the traders in their expensive ships with tons of cargo, and almost none of the risk or cost is on the pirates and killers with their cheap ships, weak security, and laughable bounties for murder.

Drastically lower insurance costs for ships in Open without hardpoints equipped and put cargo insurance in, increase the response time and fighting strength of system security in high security lawful systems, drastically increase the penalties for murdering a clean player in a lawful system. These are the sort of changes that need to be made to fix the problem. Trying to crowbar people into a box they don't want to be in absolutely never works.

 

[Joe Spivey]

I think there's definite merits for each mode of play, it provides a lot more freedom for players to play the game their own way.

One of the only gripes I have with how it's currently configured is how the system influence is modified from all modes of play - (according to the OP, this is the case). I think influence change should only be possible from within OPEN (ALL) play. As it is you could have a large group of players playing in PRIVATE and providing support for a certain faction without fear of any recompense from players supporting the rival faction. It is something that ruins the immersion of fighting in a full blown system war, not to mention you are only ever aligned with a faction when inside a conflict zone and are able to switch willy-nilly as if it didn't really matter in the first place. There's a whole host of issues with that scenario but back to topic, it's fair for players to want to play in a galaxy where they are free from the unwelcome attention of "CMDR xxIOwnYouxx" but to allow these players to play against the interest of others from an unseen, unreachable dimension is unfair to the players who take the risk of flying in Open.

I think this is a pretty reasonable assumption. When I enter a system in a state of war I expect it to be a hot zone for PvP action.

I suppose one alternative is that any system that is in a state of war can only be traveled to while in Open play. I'm just throwing that out without really thinking over it much, so tear it apart if you don't agree.

Something else you should consider here. The complaint is that players in Solo can affect the background simulation (ie supporting a rival faction) without any consequences because they are not in Open, yes? But what would the consequences be if they were in open? Killing them won't do anything because, well, what happens if you kill someone? they come back 2 mins later. So what are these consequences you talk of? The only way this whole supporting opposite factions works is by sheer numbers. It doesn't matter if the supporters are in Solo, Group or Open. The thing to remember is that EVERYBODY is playing against the background simulation, not against each other. To win you need to have an effect on the NPCs running the show. Players killing players is never going to have any effect.

 

[CMDR Sheehy]

Something else you should consider here. The complaint is that players in Solo can affect the background simulation (ie supporting a rival faction) without any consequences because they are not in Open, yes? But what would the consequences be if they were in open? Killing them won't do anything because, well, what happens if you kill someone? they come back 2 mins later. So what are these consequences you talk of? The only way this whole supporting opposite factions works is by sheer numbers. It doesn't matter if the supporters are in Solo, Group or Open. The thing to remember is that EVERYBODY is playing against the background simulation, not against each other. To win you need to have an effect on the NPCs running the show. Players killing players is never going to have any effect.

This...

Reorte Democrats need help pushing out the Purple People inhabiting Almagro Port. Come over and join me in expanding the Alliance and getting rid of these disgusting Independant Slave Owners...

Doesn't matter if it's Solo Open or otherwise. Freedom needs you!!!

 

[Sigon]

Keep in mind that instancing is essential to make PvP and seeing other players around at all possible. If everyone were to be lumped in one instance, it would quickly become unplayable for anyone except the ones with the fastest internet connections (fiber) because everyone else would be lagged out.
If for example 30 people are hanging around a station in Lave, 10 european, 10 australian, 10 from north america, it is highly likely that, to keep the game playable for everyone, there would be three instances of 10 players (assuming the regional division has the best pingtimes towards one another) instead of one instance with 30. So even if you try to block a station, the way instancing works, you will never be able to do it. If someone has a massive ping compared to your group, the player will be put in a different instance.

If matchmaking weren't to do that, people would be suffering from lag and we would see the forum flooded with players complaining how they were killed while their connection was lagging. I hope we all agree we don't want that.

Keep in mind that sending all the information about your ships maneuvers, the events you trigger (shooting, chaff, deploying hardpoints, etc...) is relatively massive. An event like in Eve is only possible because people give simple commands and the servers at Eve resolve that. Here, every motion of your space ship is handled by your input, not the result of the calculation of a central server. (Hence, it is a simulator and skill behind the mouse or with a joystick has direct influence instead of a 'skill' which is a variable that gets calculated while resolving the commands on a central server).

This is why, as a software engineer, am very curious how they are solving even the minor issues mentioned here with Wings and I think that they will be able to do that shows very good network design. However, there are limitations. Two player need one connection between them, three players three, four players six and this grows exponentially. Massive events will not be possible in the near future with the current networking hardware that the average computer has.

 

[Draconus]

I get all that but because of the way that instancing and blocking works even if they took influence out of Solo there would still be plenty of people able to act against your blockade that you wouldn't be able to see. If its hurting your "immersion" just think of them as covert operatives. I wouldn't have any expectation that they are going to gate off influence change from Solo or Private Group players.

Yes, the instancing could be a little less brutal, it can be hard to get in the same instance as friends at times. That's not quite comparable to an entire private groups worth of players. The kind of scenario I was thinking of wasn't a blockade where traders are targeted, but a system at war where players are fighting on different sides in conflict zones. Anyway, I don't want to raise to your bait of me supposedly hurting, I just wanted to voice my thoughts on the whole dynamic of Open/Private/Solo.

 

[r3per]

=

Entitlement Diagnosis: Knows the game will be released with the different modes without bonuses for playing certain modes. Buys game. Complains about no "bonuses" for playing in a certain mode.

=

I bought the game because of the different modes, and because playing the game how I wanted would provide me with neither a benefit nor detriment. Competition for Elite is only for All Player Group - I am perfectly fine with that - I actually agree with it. You folks that want a "benefit" for PvP? There it is. Some of the posts presented in the forums are why a lot of us will never consider clicking the Open Play button.

 

[Dabba]

Yes, the instancing could be a little less brutal, it can be hard to get in the same instance as friends at times. That's not quite comparable to an entire private groups worth of players. The kind of scenario I was thinking of wasn't a blockade where traders are targeted, but a system at war where players are fighting on different sides in conflict zones. Anyway, I don't want to raise to your bait of me supposedly hurting, I just wanted to voice my thoughts on the whole dynamic of Open/Private/Solo.

For what its worth I wasn't baiting anything, I was simply responding to your comment about it ruining immersion, and trying to help give you a way to protect your immersion. Baiting would imply that you hadn't already brought it up.

It is something that ruins the immersion of fighting in a full blown system war.

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

=

Entitlement Diagnosis: Knows the game will be released with the different modes without bonuses for playing certain modes. Buys game. Complains about no "bonuses" for playing in a certain mode.

=

I bought the game because of the different modes, and because playing the game how I wanted would provide me with neither a benefit nor detriment. Competition for Elite is only for All Player Group - I am perfectly fine with that - I actually agree with it. You folks that want a "benefit" for PvP? There it is.

Whilst I am in full agreement with you the worrying thing can be this sort of thing can work.

A chicken farm near my parents house had been open for (many) years (true enough when the wind was in the wrong direction it smelled bad). Someone sold some land near the farm and houses were built. People moved in, complained and after a drawn out argument the farm ended up shutting down due to complaints & agro because of the smell and noise.

PS yes I know I love a random story

 

[Robert Maynard]

Two player need one connection between them, three players three, four players six and this grows exponentially. Massive events will not be possible in the near future with the current networking hardware that the average computer has.

As the server is the adjudicator for particular transactions, each player is also connected to a server, so it's N(N+1)/2 connections - with a theoretical 32-player in an instance this would require a total of 528 bi-directional connections.

 

[r3per]

Whilst I am in full agreement with you the worrying thing can be this sort of thing can work.

A chicken farm near my parents house had been open for (many) years (true enough when the wind was in the wrong direction it smelled bad). Someone sold some land near the farm and houses were built. People moved in, complained and after a drawn out argument the farm ended up shutting down due to complaints & agro because of the smell and noise.

What a sad world this is becoming. Good thing for us, smells can't be transmitted through the Internet and we all have mute capability. AND - players have no "legal" right to make demands to change the product.

 

[Dabba]

What a sad world this is becoming. Good thing for us, smells can't be transmitted through the Internet and we all have mute capability.

Yeah Ive been to one of those giant LAN events... yikes. Smells transmitted through the internet would definitely be a deal breaker.

 

[OBoile]

Hi Anthonysheeshc, thanks for your reply.

My question is, What if the PVP is not about griefing but just a regular pirating exercise which is one of the core aspects of the game? Does this justify the actions of players to go single player mode and avoid the risks? What is the purpose why people choose single player mode then later on, once they bought the most expensive decked out ships, go on open play?

In my view this is plainly " gaining unfair advantage" over those who only play in Open Play mode and creates a "MAJOR" Imbalance to the game.

There are ways to penalise griefers (ex. banning the player, create a ignore function, etc.) but creating a feature that allows players to use (or Exploit) to negate any dangerous encounter with a player or used to gain advantage over others who solely play Open Play defeats some of the core mechanics of the game.

The question players needs to ask the developers is, does this feature (allowing switching mode between singple play and open play) is really the fix to greefers or does it create further imbalance?

Im not sure what other players think but if you will ask me, this is definitely a huge design flaw which the devs need to rethink and reconsider.

The problem with your position is that you think going to solo mode is a significant advantage. It isn't. Furthermore, even if it was, the galaxy is large. You're not likely to encounter these "cheaters" very often. The effect on you would still be minimal.

 

[Attis]

When I bounty hunt/pirate I play OPEN mode.

I play SOLO when I trade, I strip my trading ship of all weapons and shields (extra cargo) install D type equipment and A type FSS (all for extra range). I have no fear of NPC pirates.