I totally agree but the issue is with the playerbase having so many different voices, opinions, playing styles etc. What you want for the game might be completely different to what I want. They cant please us all, they can only listen and then decide on the direction they feel is best. That WILL certainly mean a section of the community will be disappointed to and feel like they have not been listened to.
A writer's thoughts on 'PowerPlay' - Drew Wagar
- Thread starter drew
- Start date
Missed this on the way through - brilliant. In fact, PP could be used to foster this if there was a 'scientific' power of some kind. Great idea.
Cheers,
Drew.
Good article......I've tried PP briefly and then thought, hmmmm not really sure I like this, so going back to my normal piece of space. I think it needs further development on it......at the moment, it's just not that "compelling" in terms of gameplay. I'd rather have had better BB missions and Powers feeding into this, rather than a merits ladder.
It may surprise you that we don't. The official writers are no different from any other player in that regard.
Cheers,
Drew.
Very much this. The manny different voices will never agree. Power Play is cleverly implemented that way. If you don't want it, it dosen't affect you. Same goes for PvP arena (if implemented). It's probably a very low hanging fruit, development vice and it will not affect those that don't want it.
This aproach makes a lot of sence. FD just have to be carefull not to spread their resources to thinly.
A very good write up Drew, i agree with your views, and especially this.
"We need mysterious wrecks, hard to find signals, distress calls, odd bits of space that you can’t navigate or that screw up your instruments, more weird artefacts and clues that when you put them together… ?Give us adventure, Frontier, not politics. That’s the essence of Elite."
I have always wished for exploration to take this route.
Edit: I would like to add, i read a thread about Taylor Vauban
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=81298
This inspired me to venture out exploring myself, in the story, he was on a mission, and his journey was filled with intrigue and danger.
Now i know it is probably not possible for ED to craft missions like this, but something more out there is needed.
During my exploration trip, i found it was just jumping, check system map, jump some more, ect, i ended up turning back through boredom when powerplay arrived.
I even mapped hyperdrive and system map to the nearest joystick buttons as i got so fed up of moving to keyboard for them at every jump, or saying them with Voice attack.
"We need mysterious wrecks, hard to find signals, distress calls, odd bits of space that you can’t navigate or that screw up your instruments, more weird artefacts and clues that when you put them together… ?Give us adventure, Frontier, not politics. That’s the essence of Elite."
I have always wished for exploration to take this route.
Edit: I would like to add, i read a thread about Taylor Vauban
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=81298
This inspired me to venture out exploring myself, in the story, he was on a mission, and his journey was filled with intrigue and danger.
Now i know it is probably not possible for ED to craft missions like this, but something more out there is needed.
During my exploration trip, i found it was just jumping, check system map, jump some more, ect, i ended up turning back through boredom when powerplay arrived.
I even mapped hyperdrive and system map to the nearest joystick buttons as i got so fed up of moving to keyboard for them at every jump, or saying them with Voice attack.
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Most of the time this is true. I am sure there are few people who want space dinosaurs, I've seen suggestions that all ships should be equal power, I've even seen someone who wants a station named after David Hasselhoff.
But this is really is different. I've never seen such a uniformity of displeasure with a feature of a game before. Well I have, once. Did you ever play Oblivion? Did you ever see the "conversation pie" where you had to coerce, joke, charm, and insult someone all at the same time every time you tried to persuade them? Nobody had anything good to say about that and Bethesda never put anything like that in any other game they made.
Powerplay is rather similar. Very few people actually like it and the criticisms are pretty unform across the community.
1. There is no reason to care about these powers. Their ethos and methods aren't really all that different. There is no real soul or passion to the powers. That's covered in the op of this thread so no need to elaborate here.
2. The powers don't seem to care about us either. If you rise up in a power structure you get a few perks, which decay at a constant rate. That decay forces you to carry on working for your power, like you're on a hamster wheel. You can get access to a module and credits. But a rank? A message of thanks? A notice on Galnet thanking the warriors of Winters?
3. The mechanics of it, the "turn based" weekly cycles, the arbitrary goals for merits which encourage people to grind and grind even when systems have been fortified or trying to grab systems that are worthless (basically risk by committee) don't work well and scream "Video game!"
4. Following on from that, the actual mechanics are fundamentally broken. There is absolutely no way for powers to communicate and decide on a strategy, so everyone does their own thing. The committee can't debate their next moves, decide where, as a power, they want to go or what they want to do, and as a result the moves are all wrong. The players of a power either don't care and are grinding for merits or they do care and terribly frustrated.
5. The powers are all against each other. There is no diplomacy, there is no means to form an alliance or even a non-aggression pact. A follower of Hudson is as much an enemy to Winters as a follower of Torval, even though one is still Federation and one is Empire. That breaks lore and immersion terribly.
It's all very arbitrary, very gamey and very very unorganic. It makes the universe feel more like a game and destroys immersion extremely effectively. It works contrary to the strengths of Elite, and contrary to what most people play the game for. This is basically what people are saying, in different ways, over and over. It's a million ways of saying the same thing, not a million different views of something. The criticisms are not coming from the usual forum malcontents and types who complain at everything, they're coming from people like Drew who have contributed to the Elite canon, long term backers how pledged hundreds at the start and fans who have waited years for this game.
FDev should take notice.
I feel crappy sometimes for criticising it like this. Powerplay is someones creative little baby after all. Someone has put their heart and soul into it and I can see a few people in the office getting really hurt at some of the commentary here. But as an individual game, between 10 players playing risk in space taking the part of each power (undoubtedly this is how it was tested during development) I think it'd be an absolute blast. As a mobile game I'd get this instantly. But it hasn't worked for all the reasons above, and I hope whoever made it can understand that we are only criticising because we want the game overall improved, not because we don't appreciate their efforts.
DB once referred to ED being an empty house, and now they're putting in the furniture.
What I think we have now is a cheap microwave, a kettle and 4 billion slightly different mugs. The painting is done, there are some pictures up and we have an awesome sound system. Uncle Dave just brought round a board game as a housewarming gift to give us something to do while he saves up for the actual furniture.
Thanks a lot Dave, very nice of you, but what we really needed was a fridge and a table and chairs. Perhaps some cutlery so we can start doing stuff in this fantastic house of ours.
I fear that some of my mates are losing patience and are looking for somewhere else to live, and then we won't be able to afford the rent.
What I think we have now is a cheap microwave, a kettle and 4 billion slightly different mugs. The painting is done, there are some pictures up and we have an awesome sound system. Uncle Dave just brought round a board game as a housewarming gift to give us something to do while he saves up for the actual furniture.
Thanks a lot Dave, very nice of you, but what we really needed was a fridge and a table and chairs. Perhaps some cutlery so we can start doing stuff in this fantastic house of ours.
I fear that some of my mates are losing patience and are looking for somewhere else to live, and then we won't be able to afford the rent.
There can be adventure in politics. One scenario I'd love to see is... via exploration you find a new species of plant or animal with novel chemical properties which can fight disease- it's a jackpot discovery and will make anyone who trades in them buckets of money. In opposition, you have the eco-protectionist group (GreenSpace) who believe that all species should be left alone, so it sets up this opposition in ideology which could get very heated. If you're the discoverer of this new species, who do you tell about it? The scientists working to cure disease, or the green group? Both could work against each other via contracts to take out ships representing either group. That kind of thing could be tons of fun.
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My original play was to spend the weekend playing ED just so I could give PP one last chance in it's current iteration. Sadly I simply could not even muster the will to fire up ED let alone get into PP. Instead, this thread has pretty much convinced me that ED is currently not the game for me (and the list of reasons is long) and there is a good chance that it never will be. Consequently I've deleted it and it will (likely) stay deleted until something pretty radical changes at game's very core. I derive more enjoyment talking about the game rather than playing it so I expect that I'll pop in here from time to time.
This isn't a rage quit - I had my fun with ED, especially in the Betas - and I don't expect FD or anyone else to be gripped by misery by reading this comment.
This isn't a rage quit - I had my fun with ED, especially in the Betas - and I don't expect FD or anyone else to be gripped by misery by reading this comment.
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In all cases, Frontier will choose the most profitable option financially
FuzzySpider said:
Actually not the case. Attacking ships belonging to the same major faction loses you merits. As a Hudsonite you are, therefore, more an enemy to non-federal powers than you are to Winters.
This is a detail that is easy to miss - and I did miss it myself until I tried to undermine Aisling by destroying her ships as a follower of Lavigny-Duval. Thankfully I had earned no merits by that point so I didn't really lose anything.
Now, I've thought of a way that they could achieve this *and* bring the community on side...
Open up the asset creation (for non-animated or operational items) to the community. I'm sure that there are a large number who are artistic, talented and technically skilled enough to do the job.
Choosing a standard 3D format and a set of volumetric templates to use for each type of asset should be enough.
The increased administrative work would be more than offset by the additional artistic input, which Frontier wouldn't have to pay for. This would be doubly important when planetary landings appear and the architectural models for buildings have to be provided.
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Of course, the other elephant in the room is that the original mechanics made flying to the centre of the galaxy easy and only 10 hours away...
But that particular horse left the stable a long time ago.
Although I do agree that PP needs further development I do have to say that I like it.
As you said in your article I did not ask for PowerPlay, but I find that PowerPlay is very good at introducing a cool expandable political system that gives an identity to otherwise faceless star systems and perhaps even more importantly it also gives a framework for direct and indirect player interaction.
As Obsidian Ant said: PP adds quite a bit of new dimensions to the game; it brings the Galaxy to life, it puts characters in context to the galaxy, it gives players who want that direction in what to do.
I feel the ED universe needed this in one way or another and PowerPlay delivers it.
For me PP has completely changed the way I perceive the Elite universe. It has given it more meaning, whether I join a faction or not, whether I partake in PP or not.
I am not politically active in real life, but political machinations and political strife are coloring the background of my life nevertheless. PP does the same in the Elite universe. It fills in an empty canvas that needs color. I am happy PP was introduced, even though it needs some tweaks.
As I said PowerPlay needs tweaks and improvements, but it is a great and powerful foundation to build upon.
I would definitely not like to play Elite Dangerous without the PowerPlay component anymore.
I do not disagree with you that the ED universe needs more adventure.
I myself have been asking for mysterious ship wrecks, space anomalies and pirate bases in asteroids from the start. But PowerPlay does not at all preclude all that. I am convinced this stuff will be added eventually and I want it all
. But FD can't do it all at once. This project is huge.One of my personal gripes is that I want to see more diversity.
I want important Imperial stations to be radically different from Federal designs. I want to see large prison installations that look the part. I want to see dramatic military fortresses, huge capital ship yard installations, asteroid bases, auxiliary space installations, deep space refueling installations, solar forges (FD already has concept art), and a few truly unique installations in unique core systems.
I want to see more npc activity: small tugs and repair vehicles around stations, etc.
I also long to see more diverse npc military ships like destroyers, frigates, battle cruisers, military tankers etc. etc. The X-Wing and Tie-fighter games did this very well. There were lots of ships in these Star Wars games the player could never hope to pilot and it helped to give the universe credibility and immersion.
I think the game needs this kind of diversity very badly, but I also understand FD is not a huge developer like Rockstar or UBI. I will have to be patient for all this to materialize.
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At the scale of the galaxy. And this is a rejoicing for the years to come
One of the things that gets me about Elite and 'lack of atmosphere' is the silence in space. OK, explorers should get used to the quiet, but in high population systems, shouldn't comms. channels be buzzing? I'd gladly pay more money for someone to script a few thousand NPC phrases, hire a recording studio and add actual audible comms. to the game - look at the 'We bring Friends' multiplayer video, and how much the comms. add to that.
I agree. These comms do not even need to be really understandable all the time. It could be just a buzz in the background.
And there should be a contrast with the silence of uninhabited systems.
If FD want the game to be successful, they need to listen to the player base.
In my opinion the problem is they are listening too much. Rather than build the game they set out to build they are building what they think we want. I'm not sure that games design by committee is a great idea. we'll end up with a Ford Edsel
Which is a shame, given that the game arose from an allegedly 'shared vision'. There are many 'little' things that could be added, that would potentially improve 'immersion', but may not make financial sense (e.g. adding ship naming, or a pilots logbook tab for systems visited and dates etc. - both seem trivial, but would in the first instance add to moderation costs, and in the second instance add to backend storage requirements if not local to the client).
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I also crave more detail in systems - e.g. discovery scanners requiring some input from the player to interpret results form heat maps or spectrograms - rather than just 'wait...wait..wait...<ping>...you're done!'. However, I can see that would then lead to people saying 'bah! explorers already earn too little, by adding complexity you're eating into my credits-per-hour', so I'm playing something else'. Even a scrolling list in the output window would be nice (e.g. have the descriptive text for a planet appear as scrolling output as the scan goes on - a la the reboot/repair module sequence).
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This is a good point that has been raised before. It's these little additions that add atmosphere to a game and make it feel alive and vibrant. Games don't always need large additions of content for this kind of stuff, sometimes a handful of minor additions can add so much more immersion to a world.
Background comms chatter is one of them. The silence we get when tens of thousands of LYs away would be a stark contrast to the myriad of overlapping ambient background comms we have when in the heart of colonised space.
The other point raised earlier in the thread is just as valid, about how pirate outposts are no different to all the other outposts we see, except for a skull logo. If FD added proper variations and fleshed out the game world more with minor additions here and there it would go a long way in making the gameworld feel less rigid and clinical. For example I would love to see industrial outposts be shrouded in a haze of dust and bits of discarded scrap and give them that dirty industrial feel.
1.4 could really be a lot of minor content like that. Relatively simple additions in themselves but as a whole add so much more to the world around us. At the moment human space is just one sprawling blob of the same old infrastructure, system after system... Whether it's federation space, empire space, industrial space, of high tech space. That may well be the realistic approach but it does little to give us the feeling we're part of a vast world full of variation and uniqueness.
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