Can we increase fuel costs?

[Mephane]

I am so glad that fuel is now adequately cheap so that a fuel scoop doesn't become near mandatory, and traders don't have to calculate fuel cost vs profit from an extra cargo, and juggle fuel scoop size vs scooping time vs size of the corresponding cargo rack they could have used...

And glad that a ton of hydrogen is a ton of hydrogen, no matter which ship it goes into.

Regarding repair costs: the metagame already is so much centered around never getting your shields down, over-emphasizing the need for SCBs, due to mechanics like power plant sniping; increasing repairs costs strengthens this already bad situation. I distinctly remember how it was with the big repair costs before 1.2. You had basically lost as soon as your shields were down, if you were in an expensive ship. It didn't matter whether you won the fight, your repair cost could easily vastly exceed the rebuy cost of the ship you just beat, or most of the bounties you may have collected in the meantime.

And don't even get me started on NPC kill stealing...

 

[Cobblars]

Fuel costs are fine and where they need to be.

The Fuel Scoops are there for convenience sake more than they are to save you the cost on feeling up. Hence the high price for Fuel Scoops - saves you many minutes during your time in that ship and in game whereby the need to dock quite so often when travelling large distances.

 

[sbdags]

IU jumped from Leesti to Diso yesterday, in a FDL.

It cost me 3CR to refuel!

3CR!

That should be costing me a bit more surely.

 

[Mephane]

IU jumped from Leesti to Diso yesterday, in a FDL.

It cost me 3CR to refuel!

3CR!

That should be costing me a bit more surely.

Fuel is hydrogen, and it is very, very abundant. And if you compare these 3 credits to other prices, for example, a cannon round, which costs (iirc) 20 credits. Surely that round, which consists at least of some sort of durable metal casing, two explosive components (one for propelling it, the other is the warhead that detonates on impact), would cost much more than a small gulp of the stuff that can be found everywhere in space, almost for free.

3 credits for the tiny jump from Lessti to Diso sounds just fine.

 

[Vasious]

Fuel is hydrogen, and it is very, very abundant. And if you compare these 3 credits to other prices, for example, a cannon round, which costs (iirc) 20 credits. Surely that round, which consists at least of some sort of durable metal casing, two explosive components (one for propelling it, the other is the warhead that detonates on impact), would cost much more than a small gulp of the stuff that can be found everywhere in space, almost for free.

3 credits for the tiny jump from Lessti to Diso sounds just fine.

The Galactic average for Hydrogen Fuel is 147CR according the one of the 3rd party trade tools
Assuming no mark up for retail vs whole sale 3 credit is 21 kgs of hydrogen to go over 2.57 light years.
THAT is fuel efficency.

That said current fuel prices are below even Galactic average per ton which doesn't make sense.
They should be Galactic average plus say 15% to represent retail at the star port as opposed to the wholesale commodities market

 

[Muzz UK]

I think the further out from the core systems you get the most expensive parts and fuel should be due to the quality and cost of importing it.

 

[rootsrat]

When 1.2 was released repair costs and fuel costs were made almost non-existent for the benefit of supporting PvP. However, I never understood how fuel factored into this. Fuel costs were one of the more immersive factors of the game. The Jump to the Cobra may provide potential income boons, but can you handle that gas-guzzler, with it's 1,000 Cr jumps? Perhaps the large-ship expenses were far too much, and as I never flew those back then, I cannot speak about them, but as it is now fuel usage is only important to explorers and people who travel 100+ light years on trips. There once was a point to the fuel scoop to the average guy!

While on the subject, I'd like to discuss something coming in 1.3 which could potentially allow us to revert back to pre-1.2 maintenance costs, somewhat. A huge problem with pre-1.2 interdiction was that it cost so much in repairs that using it nullified any profit. In 1.3, now that interdiction can only do up to 10% the damage of an emergency drop, could we see increased repair costs, with a reduction in hull integrity repair costs? Yesterday, flying my Cobra in 1.3 Beta, I fought an Anaconda, and the endeavor left me with only 16% of my hull remaining. When I returned to the station, it cost me but a few thousand credits to repair it all. That's pitiful, it should have cost at least 100,000 credits! It's so easy to throw away ships when we have this, it's so arcadey, and the feeling of danger, of losing your ship and having to make tough decisions!

Frontier, you're great. You honestly listen to our feedback, more so than most game developers do, but you listen to us TOO much. You need to recognize that, although our intentions are honest, we aren't game designers, and are more closely linked to a bunch of giddy teenagers looking at all the cool lazors. So, after hearing my advice, feel free to throw my post into the garbage if you feel so, do the same with a lot of the threads on here, and put some wax in your ears! You have a great game going for you, and the best, safest route that can be taken is for you to shut your ears. Don't repeal good game mechanics for the vocal minority, because the quiet majority may enjoy it!

Here's a little list of stuff I miss:
-NPCs stealing bounties (why would police give you the bounty when they could save the money and get a bonus?)
-Expensive repairs (Excepting interdiction repairs, of course )
-Expensive fuel
-Seeker Missiles affecting shields (was over-nerfed)

You guys are good developers. Good luck!

I support these ideas, maybe apart from Seeker Missiles, but that's because I've never used them so I can't comment really. I think that nerfing down the fuel and repair costs was needed, but it's been nerfed WAY too much. Before I'd think twice before attacking a stronger and better equipped opponent because of the danger of my repair cost being higher than the reward. Now it's just peanuts, some small change from the back pocket of my pilot's seat.

Fuel Scoop - yes, again. Like you say, before the nerf it was much needed device for non-explorers too and the decision of whether to mount it or not had a lot of weight due to loosing a slot. It used to be a must-have for explorers and very-nice-to-have for non-explorers. Now it's only the former.

NPC kill steal - bit of mixed feelings here. I remember how difficult it was to make a decent living when bounty hunting due to all the kill steals. It was realistic, yes, but it was also a PITB. Nerfing it was a good idea, but perhaps it was - again - nerfed too much and now it's too easy and player is getting pretty much every single kill. With higher rewards BH finally became profitable profession, but it's just too easy now. I can't remember what the thershold of made damage to the enemy ship is for the kill to be counted towards the player, but I think it's too tolerant.

 

[Mephane]

I think the further out from the core systems you get the most expensive parts and fuel should be due to the quality and cost of importing it.

Fuel is abundant, basically everywhere. Price variations would be minor, the only places it would be expensive are systems consisting only of non-scoopable stars and rocky planets.

 

[Wicz]

There is NOTHING fun about paying huge bills and grinding for hours just to cover repairs. I'm not here to play real life simulator. Repair prices are fine! I hope for cheaper modules one day.

This a million times.

When I require stress, I go to work.

 

[ruffsfunnel]

This a million times.

When I require stress, I go to work.

Gameplay designed for 15 year olds, and average age of ED player is 35-40?

 

[Quineloe]

I never understood the changing of these prices either. You had to decide to buy fuel, scoop, go lighter with smaller fuel tanks, get longer trips, but higher expenses with bigger tanks...

The game economics needed the coin sinks. Now, after a few months, we get a little boost in fuel prices..and a 10% outfitting cost, to bring down the amount of in game coin.

SMH then. Laughing at it now.

Fuel scoops were never intended to eliminate fuel cost.

The need for a coin sink is an unexplained claim by you. Since we can't trade with other players, our money is our own and doesn't affect others. Also, fuel was never that good a cash sink to begin with, since you made more money. Without fuel scooping, at best it would have been a small income decrease.

Here's the thing: People don't want to get taxed to death for doing things in this game that are not profitable. For example protecting traders in a piracy heavy community goal. High fuel, ammo and repair cost made defending traders a rather expensive business in 1.1

I would really like to hear the reasoning within the game limits why a fuel, something that costs 100cr per ton on the commodities market, should suddenly cost thousands per ton because "the ship is expensive".

 

[CMDR RAY-ZOR'SHARP]

Well, I'm certaintly not for increasing fuel costs. Honestly, the cost of fuel in Elite right now is just where it should be. A convenience charge for not having to fuel your ship yourself. Fuel for our ships is super abundant and can be scooped freely from any star of classes F, O, G, K, B, A, M (Yeah, FOG KBAM. I went there!). There is no cost or penalty for scooping your own fuel.

Previous the obscenely high fuel costs were quite ridiculous. They were also scaled by your ships size/value, despite the fact that all the ships used the exact same fuel. This meant two completely different ships fitted with the exact same size fuel bay paid completely different costs for fuel. It was extremely illogical and the change to the current method was highly welcome to many.

To conclude in terms of fuel costs, if they increased it, I would not be affected at all as I fly around with a 6A fuel scoop and I don't ever have to worry about fuel because of that.

On repairs... They can get pretty expensive right now if you take a lot of module damage. Hull/armor is pretty easy and cheap to repair. The modules however can get pretty nasty. The old repair costs were bad though. The way it used to be.. You could wind up paying more than your ships rebuy for a repair on a still flyable ship, which meant in some cases it was cheaper to die, than to live. Given some ships can get rebuys exceeding 10 million credits, this was very very bad gameplay. Maybe repairs could use a slight increase in cost... but I am adverse to this for risk of it getting to close to the previous numbers.

On mines/missiles. Mines are complete garbage and useless and need a drastic overhaul. I at one time desire to run a T9 loaded to the gill with mine launchers and a proper tank... Only to find out that mines aren't even remotely threatening enough to make your pursuer sweat while chasing you down. Missiles, I've only played with them on my Eagle, and the only disappointment I had was a lack of ammunition capacity and their very high cost of use.

I agree, fuel and repairs are just fine as is, the mines ect do need tweeking.

 

[Flavio]

Fuel cost should go up slightly as the fuel has to be refined but if you scoop fuel then since it is both free and unrefined your jump distance drops slightly (unless, in order to help explorers there is a special explorer drive that can be purchased to nullify this effect but is not practical for others to have due to its excessive power drain).

The repair cost is about right but I would like to see the deterioration of efficiency of a unit if it has to be repaired often so that a replacement would have to be bought instead of just being repaired (maybe over its lifetime this would happen if a unit was repaired equating to 500% damage i.e. If you damage it so that you repair it when it gets to 75% working then you can get it repaired 20 times and after that it wont be repairable and just decrease in efficiency until it gets to zero or a new one is bought.

 

[rootsrat]

Fuel cost should go up slightly as the fuel has to be refined but if you scoop fuel then since it is both free and unrefined your jump distance drops slightly (unless, in order to help explorers there is a special explorer drive that can be purchased to nullify this effect but is not practical for others to have due to its excessive power drain).

The repair cost is about right but I would like to see the deterioration of efficiency of a unit if it has to be repaired often so that a replacement would have to be bought instead of just being repaired (maybe over its lifetime this would happen if a unit was repaired equating to 500% damage i.e. If you damage it so that you repair it when it gets to 75% working then you can get it repaired 20 times and after that it wont be repairable and just decrease in efficiency until it gets to zero or a new one is bought.

Fuel quality (purchased vs scooped) was part of Design Discussion, which serves as a rough guide to what is planned to be implemented in the game. Looking forward to that! Not sure what priority it is on the devs' list though.

 

[Magic Man]

Disagree with fuel costs needing to rise to previous levels. Just tie the price to market cost of hydrogen and be done.

That is what is should be logically, based on the local price for fuel plus a small percentage for duties.

Repair costs however, need to rise. They are far too cheap as it stands. Big ships should be expensive to maintain and repair.

Agree.

 

[CMDR Hagglebeard]

Fuel scoops were never intended to eliminate fuel cost.

The need for a coin sink is an unexplained claim by you. Since we can't trade with other players, our money is our own and doesn't affect others. Also, fuel was never that good a cash sink to begin with, since you made more money. Without fuel scooping, at best it would have been a small income decrease.

Here's the thing: People don't want to get taxed to death for doing things in this game that are not profitable. For example protecting traders in a piracy heavy community goal. High fuel, ammo and repair cost made defending traders a rather expensive business in 1.1

I would really like to hear the reasoning within the game limits why a fuel, something that costs 100cr per ton on the commodities market, should suddenly cost thousands per ton because "the ship is expensive".

Well, I certainly don't believe that you should be a huge amount of money for plain old hydrogen, but I do want it to matter. I think something is wrong when, every time I land at a station, I click refuel/repair so mechanically that I forget that I pressed them at all. Coming from MB himself, "playability trumps realism", and although Pre-1.2 fuel was insane at higher tiers, it was nerfed into oblivion. Perhaps a stat in the shipyard to tell us about a particular ship's fuel efficiency? The Cobra would be a gas-guzzler, at 1,000 cr/jump, for example, whereas the extremely efficient ASP would be just that, very efficient.

I'm glad this thread hasn't derailed yet!

 

[Katkon]

Many (most, perhaps) of the newer players don't want anything in game that hampers speed of credit, rank or title progression. They want I all, and they want it now. If you'd suggested the "instant win" button instead (one that unlocks all ships, all modules and infinite credits) many of those same players would press it and feel an enormous sense of accomplishment in the process. That's my opinion of what I see on the forum these days, which is quite different from the forum a year+ ago. And so, without reading all the responses, I would imagine that many of those who respond would be against higher fuel cost.

 

[Vasious]

Fuel scoops were never intended to eliminate fuel cost.

The need for a coin sink is an unexplained claim by you. Since we can't trade with other players, our money is our own and doesn't affect others. Also, fuel was never that good a cash sink to begin with, since you made more money. Without fuel scooping, at best it would have been a small income decrease.

Here's the thing: People don't want to get taxed to death for doing things in this game that are not profitable. For example protecting traders in a piracy heavy community goal. High fuel, ammo and repair cost made defending traders a rather expensive business in 1.1

I would really like to hear the reasoning within the game limits why a fuel, something that costs 100cr per ton on the commodities market, should suddenly cost thousands per ton because "the ship is expensive".

Test it out
you'll find that regardless of the market price in the station of hydrogen fuel, which would be the wholesale price
we are paying about 45-50 Credits per ton of fuel retail
Specifically when the Commodities market price can range from about 97 CR a ton in High Supply to 145 CR a ton in Low supply.

In both scenarios you still pay the very low price to refill
Why is it ~50% cheaper at the pumps than it is the Bulk haul it?

That doesn't even make sense.

 

[dsagent]

Um no.....fuel and repair costs are fine as it is.

As someone who actually does a lot of friendly PvP and sometimes fights anacondas in an eagle things are fine the way it is now.

This game is very expensive as it is. I don't need another grindfest MMO.

 

[LetoAtreides2]

Um no.....fuel and repair costs are fine as it is.

As someone who actually does a lot of friendly PvP and sometimes fights anacondas in an eagle things are fine the way it is now.

This game is very expensive as it is. I don't need another grindfest MMO.

Agreed. Increasing these costs would only increase the grind, which this game already suffers heavily enough from.

Is this another veiled "little ships vs. big ships" argument? A lot of people in this thread somehow seem to want to see more unnecessary penalties for players who like to fly big ships. For what reason?