Elite only rewards players who can spend a ridiculous amount of time playing....

[simonyee]

Focus people focus
1. playing this game what you learn? the steep learning curve? no la it is simple you have gain knowledge to pilot your ship.
2. experience to have handle difficulties
3. Start from the beginning all over again!
4. patience and time
5. see who is the one you want to friend and who is your enemies.

 

[darshie76]

The only players who can advance in the game, (to get better weapons, ships etc) are the ones who can spend the most time playing and that's all there is to it. From shooting it out at RES sites, doing the CGs, trading, it all just comes down to if you have the most time to play, then you advance quicker because you earn more credits. I know this kind of makes sense and, it is the case in a lot of other games, but how about missions that don't involve rewards based around credits? How about we get rewarded with ships or equipment instead?

What about missions that make us use our brains such as treasure hunts, cryptic clues, rescuing damsels (or princes!) in distress and bringing them home safely to be rewarded with some kind of experimental weapons or ships. I've played the powerplay beta and, while doing missions unlocks some 'special' items, it's still all about earning credits at the end of the day. If you want get anywhere in this game you need credits. How about some other options for those who don't spend 12 hours a day playing?

The game is based on wealth; which means that you buy better stuff, move more stuff, sell more stuff, until money does not matter, and until there is nothing else to buy.

This does not affect you thou; if someone reach the apex, and has all the ships with all the weapons, why should this concern you? You will get shot down anyway, no matter how much money you have, or how good is your ship and build, because there will always be someone better than you. with more luck, with a better connection; so why even worry?

Enjoy the game at the pace that you prefer; the game has close to nothing as goal, beside the factions and achievements, so if you put aside the money paradigm, the game really never end, because there is no end.

Bigger ship does not mean better, unless you live for PVP; where the best is the paramount You can be decent at all professions with cheap ships; then once you go up organically in rank, then your ship will change too, based on your new challenges. Don't rush; take it easy...400B systems assure you that you may find a nice place where there are no PK, and enjoy the game in the way that you prefer.

 

[drew]

So, after reading through here, agreeing with some, disagreeing with others. . .I may be missing something, but does someone have an example of ANY MMO where time does NOT equal progress?

No I don't, but I can see how it *can* be done. Elite can be different to what has gone before. Elite broke the mould the first time it came out, it can do it again.

ED could be the game that defeats 'The Grind'.

Make missions that don't reward grind, or credit. Missions that challenge the intellect. Adventure that stirs the soul. Stories that engage art, music, puzzle solving, week or month spanning clues that need to be put together to unlock... something other then credits and rank.

Yes, it will take content, but there are folks around these forums and the wider community who could help FD with this, all they need to do is co-ordinate, approve and insert into the game.

There's an entire galaxy out there and it should be full of bizarre weird stuff that needs investigating. There should be strange navigation hazards, impassible bits of space, strange wrecks, crazy signals that make no sense, dead ends, blind alleys, and the occasional revelation. Think Spaceship graveyards, the sargasso sea of space, the legends of the bemuda triangle, big foot... compelling story that makes you get out there and have a look.

Imagine stumbling on the remains of a ship that was lost 50 years ago in strange circumstances and having to figure out what happened to it. Maybe it's a cover up, maybe it was an accident... Maybe you need to do a bit of research in the Lore, or look some stuff up on Wikipedia as there's an historical precedent...

Or traversing a nebula which rapidly dissolves your hull... got to be something valuable in there surely? How do we find a way in? Maybe you need to co-ordinate with other players

A strange signal that seems to be echoing around several star systems and you have to do some clever co-ordination to figure out where it's coming from. Maybe you have to do a little GCSE maths to figure it out.

Three ships just disappeared in a certain sector of space. The search party went missing too. Why? Dare you go take a look?

You accidently see something and get tagged a fugitive with a massive bounty on your head from the Feds/Imps/Alliance - they're trying to hide something. What are you going to do about it? Maybe you have to make a tricky moral decision between what is right and what is best for you.

That's what Elite should be about - IMHO.

The possibilities are endless. What it needs is some imagination and a depth of content. It doesn't need that much more sophistication from the game engine. It's all do-able - but it depends if this is on the FD roadmap for ED or not. If it's coming - great, but right now the indications are that they are concentrating on a fairly standard MMO environment. Great for grinders, not for the rest of us.

Cheers,

Drew.

 

[Obsidian Ant]

No I don't, but I can see how it *can* be done. Elite can be different to what has gone before. Elite broke the mould the first time it came out, it can do it again.

ED could be the game that defeats 'The Grind'.

Make missions that don't reward grind, or credit. Missions that challenge the intellect. Adventure that stirs the soul. Stories that engage art, music, puzzle solving, week or month spanning clues that need to be put together to unlock... something other then credits and rank.

Yes, it will take content, but there are folks around these forums and the wider community who could help FD with this, all they need to do is co-ordinate, approve and insert into the game.

There's an entire galaxy out there and it should be full of bizarre weird stuff that needs investigating. There should be strange navigation hazards, impassible bits of space, strange wrecks, crazy signals that make no sense, dead ends, blind alleys, and the occasional revelation. Think Spaceship graveyards, the sargasso sea of space, the legends of the bemuda triangle, big foot... compelling story that makes you get out there and have a look.

Imagine stumbling on the remains of a ship that was lost 50 years ago in strange circumstances and having to figure out what happened to it. Maybe it's a cover up, maybe it was an accident... Maybe you need to do a bit of research in the Lore, or look some stuff up on Wikipedia as there's an historical precedent...

Or traversing a nebula which rapidly dissolves your hull... got to be something valuable in there surely? How do we find a way in? Maybe you need to co-ordinate with other players

A strange signal that seems to be echoing around several star systems and you have to do some clever co-ordination to figure out where it's coming from. Maybe you have to do a little GCSE maths to figure it out.

Three ships just disappeared in a certain sector of space. The search party went missing too. Why? Dare you go take a look?

You accidently see something and get tagged a fugitive with a massive bounty on your head from the Feds/Imps/Alliance - they're trying to hide something. What are you going to do about it? Maybe you have to make a tricky moral decision between what is right and what is best for you.

That's what Elite should be about - IMHO.

The possibilities are endless. What it needs is some imagination and a depth of content. It doesn't need that much more sophistication from the game engine. It's all do-able - but it depends if this is on the FD roadmap for ED or not. If it's coming - great, but right now the indications are that they are concentrating on a fairly standard MMO environment. Great for grinders, not for the rest of us.

Cheers,

Drew.

Of all the games on the market Elite is the one that has the potential to deliver on all of this. The size of its play environment opens up the potential for endless possibilities.

Frontier spoke so many times during development about game mechanics that would create emergent gameplay. I remember David Braben talking about how difficult it would be to get into deep space, that it would require planning and the assistance of other players to travel right across the galaxy. But what we have instead is a simple long road-trip.

I really don't think many of the things you suggest would be all that difficult to implement (although I'm not a programmer, so who knows). And as you say, maybe later down the line those things will come. But right now, from our current perspective, it seems that Frontier have indeed changed direction somewhat and are focussing on time-sink based content. To a degree I can understand that, because it gives the game maximum gameplay time for minimum development time. Once the time-sinks are in place the developer can simply adjust the timers / numbers to increase the amount of playtime. Very, very easy stuff. And no doubt a prime reason so many MMO's are designed the way they are. However after all the early talk from Frontier regarding a living galaxy and emergent gameplay which requires player co-operation and intellect, it is very strange to see Elite heading in this direction.

 

[Kyudos]

ED could be the game that defeats 'The Grind'.

Make missions that don't reward grind, or credit. Missions that challenge the intellect. Adventure that stirs the soul. Stories that engage art, music, puzzle solving, week or month spanning clues that need to be put together to unlock... something other then credits and rank.

FDev can't win this one - have you heard the waaahmbulance sirens in the Beta discussion precisely because PowerPlay missions don't reward Cmdrs with credits?

As soon as something has a numerical value in a game it becomes a de facto progress meter. A lot of players seem to think more credits = winning - so anything that doesn't get them more credits is 'pointless grind' (as opposed to normal grind I guess!). Its the same reason they whine about every occupation by comparing it to the earning potential of trading - if they had their way every job in the universe would pay exactly the same.

Playing solely to amass credits must be damn dull - so I would like to see some more missions done for other reasons, but I'm not holding my breath.

 

[brumster]

Why does it have to be one or the other?

Give those who like monotonous, repetitive grind tasks for monetary reward what they want - leave it as it is today, no problem. Just add on the opportunity for some high risk, high reward advancement for those who have the necessary skill levels. I do NOT mean make it easy; I don't think the OP is either. There's a lot of misreading going on here. I'm with Drew, let's have something that makes me want to boot the game up and go on a journey, that makes the game enjoyable. Some in-game reward as a result would be nice, I guess purely because there is no "end game" in ED it helps provide a reason for doing it... but if it's engaging enough, that can be the reward in itself.

 

[Garybee]

I'm also with the OP on this. People seem very quick to write off his point as 'wanting everything handed to him' but I don't see it that way. Why can't you achieve 'Elite' in exploration by visiting all the nebulae or finding X number of Earth Like Worlds or a combination of similar accomplishments. This could be far more interesting than just amassing money from exploration.

 

[ruger_shooter]

ED is just a game, it creates an illusion that we can immerse ourselves in with no danger to ourselves or other people. I play ED for pleasure, relaxation, fun and for self devised challenges. When I find something beginning to become boring then I switch to some other aspect of the game or play another game. The important thing for me is that the reward is the actual playing experience; I don't have the time or inclination to spends many hours each day playing so I know I am not progressing at a rate comparable to other players but this does not diminish my enjoyment as I enjoy the time I spend playing. My advice is don't make ED a chore, don't fret over credits, rank or reputation, just sit back fly your ship and enjoy the experience.

 

[EdzUp]

I play at top two-three hours a week, mostly exploring and shooting wanted NPCs and I'm in a Cobra. The only thing that I have a beef with is rank decay that basically makes ranking up pointless for me with any of the major factions as I dont put enough time in to warrant it.

I like the game as 1.2 currently stands and will have a look at 1.3 (well we have to to continue playing dont we) but will reserve judgement on the whole thing till I've played it a while

 

[K-Rose]

I started in January just before my first child was born, since then I've only been able to get on maybe 2 or 3 hours a week at most.

I'm now sitting on a net worth of 13 million and looking to spend that either getting a Courier or building a Mining ASP.

I have no issues with the rate of getting things done in this game, though I do have worries about things such as reputation decline & the competitive Powerplay ranking mechanics.

I play this game to invest in something over the long term, I'm looking forward to all the updates that'll come out, the years of expansions. I'm hoping that over the years the community will become even closer, I can really see the potential in this game. Maybe in a few years when my daughter is older I'll have a few evenings a week free so I can dedicate more time, but that's irrelevant as right now I'm having fun

I do hope that some of the things you've mentioned come along, I have faith that they will, but I don't believe it's the focus of what the game is.

 

[Deleted member 38366]

--- Deleted ---

 

[Magic Man]

The vast majority of games require time spent in order to progress - that's sort of the whole point. Bit of a moot argument really.

 

[CMDR DoubleSkulls]

I'm not rushing at all, I just think that there could be alternative rewards that don't revolve around money.

Like status for kills or exploration?

 

[Cmdr Pli55ken]

You LOSE reputation when you are not actively participating with your faction.

Really? Never noticed that. I'm allied with Feds, Empire and Alliance...and I've not done a single mission for any of them (solely allied due to bounty hunting..maybe trading. I don't know if that gives rep or not...and honestly, I don't care beyond that they don't attack me on sight).
Never dropped to friendly, yet. Strange.

 

[Han Brannigan]

To OP: speak for yourself I have a 40hr per week job a wife and a daughter - I still feel plenty rewarded by Elite ( not that it can't or won't be better ) thank you very much ...

 

[Ydiss]

The vast majority of games require time spent in order to progress - that's sort of the whole point. Bit of a moot argument really.

Indeed. PP doesn't have any progression for casual players, though.

But everything else is OK in this game. Because it's suitable for everyone and everyone can progress with the content. PP isn't built the same way.

DB said they might be looking at changing an element of this though. So we'll see.

 

[Henri]

The vast majority of games require time spent in order to progress - that's sort of the whole point. Bit of a moot argument really.

hahahahahaha so true! except maybe tic tac toe dangerous

 

[Obsidian Ant]

The vast majority of games require time spent in order to progress - that's sort of the whole point. Bit of a moot argument really.

The vast majority maybe - but certainly not all. Not even close to all...

After all, progress doesn't mean "filling coloured bars" in all games..

 

[bobfandango]

Huh???

The only players who can advance in the game, (to get better weapons, ships etc) are the ones who can spend the most time playing and that's all there is to it. [...] How about some other options for those who don't spend 12 hours a day playing?

If you think it takes 12 hours a day, you are doing it very very wrong. If anything, credits and ship advancement come way too easily in this game (that makes sense at the moment given the relative lack of content). I bought the game in December even though I didn't have a machine that could run the game (had only a Mac at the time, and not one suitable even under boot camp). I built a dual boot hackintosh, and bought a hotas at the end of March. So, I've been playing less than 3 months (75 days to be exact). I have a full time job, 2 kids under 5, and another on the way. My play sessions are almost entirely limited to 2 to maybe at most 3 hours at a time after my wife falls asleep, perhaps 4 days a week. Maybe twice a month I will get in an extended play session. Even if I played 2 hours a day every one of those 75 days (which is simply not the case), I would have 150 hours of play time.

In that time, I went: Sidewinder->hauler->cobra->Type 6->Vulture->Type 7->Python... I've spent about half my time trading and the other half bounty hunting in the Vulture and Python.... My Python is fully A-rated now, and I have 2 re-buys worth of credits. This has been pitifully easy with very little grind feel to it....

So, like I said, you must be doing it wrong....