[POLL] Do you like Powerplay (as it currently is)?

[Sealurk]

I joined a power, tried Powerplay... I have mixed feelings so voted indifferent. I quite like the general concept but feel that the current implementation is deeply flawed to the point that I ended up withdrawing my support. That said, it's very early days for Powerplay and I think it will improve over time.

As with Elite: Dangerous in general, Powerplay in particular needs much, much more variety. You should be able to support your chosen power in a greater number of ways to support your playing style, but with different (and more tangible) benefits so that the powers don't become indistinguishable.

 

[Sandmann]

we need more votes !

We've had 516, that's a pretty good result for a poll around here. A few more answers aren't going to change the results much. The aim of the poll was to find out how many people like the current iteration of PP, so:

53.49% of respondents have reported playing PP so far.
94.77% of respondents had an opinion to share about it, and 5.23% of total voters have abstained/had no opinion/thought they were porcupines/etc.

Of the 276 people who've played it, 78.26% had strong feelings for it one way or another, the remaining 21.74% being ambivalent.
Of the 213 not yet having played it 87.32% had strong feelings about it one way or another, with the remaining 12.68% being ambivalent/unsure.

Of the 276 voters who've reported as having played PP, only 109 report liking it. That's 39.94% of people who've played it who are in favour of it, with the remaining 60.06% either against it or indifferent to it.
Of the 213 voters who've reported as having not played it, only 37 report looking forward to it. That is 17.37% of non-players who look forward to it with the remaining 82.63% either negative or neutral about it.

From the results thus far we can infer that either players who like PP don't come onto forums/don't answer polls/etc (unlikely) or (more likely given other correlated evidence such as the number of threads) PP is not looking terribly well received.

 

[Colonel North]

From the results thus far we can infer that either players who like PP don't come onto forums/don't answer polls/etc (unlikely) or (more likely given other correlated evidence such as the number of threads) PP is not looking terribly well received.

Good summary Sandmann +1

I quite like the look of powerplay but I've not really engaged with it as to be honest I don't 'trust it'. By that I mean it looks to me like it needs a lot of time input from the player (not least just to understand it!) and I don't want to commit that time to be left frustrated if it doesn't 'work' properly.

I put a lot of time into Fed/ Imp rank progression and that is still a mess. I may be judging it unfairly but the rank progression is fairly simple so if that can't be done right then powerplay has to have profound flaws.

 

[Rubellen]

We've had 516, that's a pretty good result for a poll around here. A few more answers aren't going to change the results much. The aim of the poll was to find out how many people like the current iteration of PP, so:

53.49% of respondents have reported playing PP so far.
94.77% of respondents had an opinion to share about it, and 5.23% of total voters have abstained/had no opinion/thought they were porcupines/etc.

Of the 276 people who've played it, 78.26% had strong feelings for it one way or another, the remaining 21.74% being ambivalent.
Of the 213 not yet having played it 87.32% had strong feelings about it one way or another, with the remaining 12.68% being ambivalent/unsure.

Of the 276 voters who've reported as having played PP, only 109 report liking it. That's 39.94% of people who've played it who are in favour of it, with the remaining 60.06% either against it or indifferent to it.
Of the 213 voters who've reported as having not played it, only 37 report looking forward to it. That is 17.37% of non-players who look forward to it with the remaining 82.63% either negative or neutral about it.

From the results thus far we can infer that either players who like PP don't come onto forums/don't answer polls/etc (unlikely) or (more likely given other correlated evidence such as the number of threads) PP is not looking terribly well received.

I think the majority of players that are playing ED for a longer period of time are not interested in PP ... Nice summary Sand +1

 

[Jmanis]

I like it as it currently is for, well, pretty simple reasons.

When I backed this, I didn't really care what this did as long as it was basically a "pretty" version of old Elite. Now, I never played original elite; I got into it through Frontier: Elite 2, and what I did was Imperial Navy stuff. Ground out all the courier missions to get assasination missions, and ground them to get bombing/recon missions. But the one thing that bugged me was that the landscape never changed; no matter how many things I ever did, it made no difference to the political landscape.

With Powerplay I can subscribe to a faction help them expand, and, given the right circumstances, affect change upon the enemy. That's why I like it.

That said, this doesn't mean I think Powerplay is objectively "fantastic" or even "good". I think mechanically there's a lot more that could be done for it as a modern game, and a lot more could be done with content.

tl;dr I like it, but it could still be much better.

 

[hanks01]

Just got my vote in and put myself down as liking. Have had a great time with it so far and it's really encouraged me to move around the galaxy a bit more. Parked up the Type 7 and FDL, hopped into my Vulture and also bought a second Cobra. Use the Cobra for fortifying as well as a bit of cheeky smuggling and some courier missions inbetween. Pop into the Vulture and head into enemy control systems to disrupt their efforts and engage in some interdiction combat, can be pretty thrilling, whether taking on a Commander or interdicting an NPC before realising they have 2 more wing mates itching to join the party. Getting in, causing a ruckus and getting out to supercruise before the authorities try and rain on my parade.

Spent plenty of time pouring over the shifting stats of my power and the nearest opposing ones to see where my efforts will be put to best use. I love turn based strategy games and this feels like a more drawn out version of that, balancing the spinning plates during the week to see your power (hopefully) grow at the end of the week.

There's also a lot more communication between random players within your power, discussing strategy, seeing what activities are going on etc...

I'd like to see either a shift or better representation of the fortification/undermining mechanic as it's still not clear whether they affect each other after both triggers have been met (I believe they should.) Whilst I think other tweaks can be made (many don't seem to affect my current activities but 1 merit per kill should be scaled as others have suggested) I'm actually quite surprised about how much of a backlash there is. I guess that may just come down to genre preference for some but most of the feedback doesn't seem to gel with the experience I've had. Maybe I'm just lucky or perhaps it's down to the faction I've chosen, the activities I've participated in or the way I've approached powerplay.

 

[xDreadnoughtx]

Sorry, but this is just a badly thought out poll.

Totally invalid without....

I have joined a Power, and played PowerPlay. I find elements that are entirely enjoyable but have reservations about others. Has potential. Needs work.

The final option in the original poll is a blackhole for opinions. The indifferent option is a sop in the same way.

So I voted that I enjoy it. (even though there are bits I dislike). Not indifferent. Not poll black hole.

Don't want to play it....don't. That option is available to you.
If it's fundamentally wrong (the bits of PP you don't like) then either FD will tinker or PowerPlay numbers will fall off a cliff.

BUT .....if you are playing PP then continue to post what is wrong until FD understand.

Edit:
What I like....social interaction, more danger, forces a more varied and mixed playstyle if you are in PowerPlay (takes getting used to), a greater sense of identity.

What I don't like....the snap card game like banality of PowerPlay. Faction A ship happy juice from A>B. Faction B ship pictures of sad puppies in response. The lack of ongoing financial rewards (does not need to 6m/hour, but it needs to be better), the background "sim" (stifles laughter) not matching the PowerPlay overlay.

 

[bigtaff]

Could'nt care less about it, sorry FD

 

[CreepyD]

I wonder if it would be better everything was scaled down.

Instead of a 30 min timer for prep actions, what if it was 6 hours?
Raise the price of buying more actions accordingly.
This would make every action count for something.

This would also reduce the hideous grinding and allow more sound decisions.
You would have players taking prep materials to the nearest system just because it's fastest to go back and forth. If they were only making the trip once or twice per day, they might choose more sensibly.

I've not entirely thought this through, but it's an idea.
I love the concept of PP, but I don't find it fun in it's current state, even though this part of the game is something I really want to be a part of.

 

[Acteris]

No I have not joined. Nor will I. Tried it in Beta and looks too much like a grind/repetitive task orientated. I am indifferent to it. "Spoiler Tag" Much better if FD had spent their time improving player interaction parts of the game. Warehouses/Station Offices/Asset totals for ALL your ships and not just the one you are flying in!

Couldn't agree more, I do compliment Frontier on having the best intentions but unfortunately putting another wrapper on a grind philosophy is not my type of fun. I also applaud Frontier for their approach to building the game in a "Agile" way, releasing really good stuff incrementally rather than spending 10 years in development and selling the game as a complete product.

HOWEVER unfortunately latest PP release and its mechanic just reminds me too much of the grind I just spent 3 months doing. I think the immersion formula should avoid repetitive tasks as much as possible, be it flying to crime areas and blasting opposing forces-flying back to base, collecting propaganda data then flying back to base. As a evolutionary thing havent we humans invented computers to do all the mundane repetitive stuff instead?

I do suggest perhaps for Frontier to focus on the formula that gives players immersion but without the grind philosophy. Perhaps focusing efforts on being able to excavate an asteroid to build your own base, space walking / repairing own ship, investigating huge derelict spacecraft finding lurking alien artifacts, landing on bug infested colonies meeting Ripley's cousin or something, (joking), receiving a distress call from a space station and having to rescue its inhabitants or repairing its leaking reactor, having your mates join you in the python or conda to man the laser turrets etc

I suspect the Frontier is perhaps working on some of that stuff already so I'll get off my soap box .......less grind (mind numbing stuff) more mind (evoking imagination, and sense of adventure)....well done chaps for a great game and look forward to more exciting additions!

 

[sutex]

Haven’t joined , only played ED once since PP launch, and after this post twice ( waiting for the update to finish) back too RES hunting, been playing Elder Scrolls Online, LOL , SPACE to MAGES , says a lot , but there's ppl everywhere hehe in ESOL

FIXED for ED
OPEN to be PvE. NPC ships to have a purpose , like going somewhere too somewhere. Other than that ED is just 6 months old , So in another 6 months , has to come up with something , that's better what it is now ,which is alone in space hiding from players in private servers.

 

[Araviel]

We've had 516, that's a pretty good result for a poll around here. A few more answers aren't going to change the results much. The aim of the poll was to find out how many people like the current iteration of PP, so:

53.49% of respondents have reported playing PP so far.
94.77% of respondents had an opinion to share about it, and 5.23% of total voters have abstained/had no opinion/thought they were porcupines/etc.

Of the 276 people who've played it, 78.26% had strong feelings for it one way or another, the remaining 21.74% being ambivalent.
Of the 213 not yet having played it 87.32% had strong feelings about it one way or another, with the remaining 12.68% being ambivalent/unsure.

Of the 276 voters who've reported as having played PP, only 109 report liking it. That's 39.94% of people who've played it who are in favour of it, with the remaining 60.06% either against it or indifferent to it.
Of the 213 voters who've reported as having not played it, only 37 report looking forward to it. That is 17.37% of non-players who look forward to it with the remaining 82.63% either negative or neutral about it.

From the results thus far we can infer that either players who like PP don't come onto forums/don't answer polls/etc (unlikely) or (more likely given other correlated evidence such as the number of threads) PP is not looking terribly well received.

not surprised that you would try and turn around the poll results into something negative given your vocal resistance against PP.
PP was men't as sub level to elite and not something that was men't to be played by everyone, whit that in mind the results looks decent and not like it was a waste of development time.
doubt me then go and make an equal poll about exploration or mining or any other sub career and see how that goes.

 

[Ladazz]

Not joined PP... and not going to. Not like the idea of beeing wanted some place. Me want to be friends with everyone

 

[CTCParadox]

Joined a power (A Lavigny-Duval). Did PP stuff for the first week but honestly I just forgot it after that so I voted indifferent.
Back to just doing conflict zones and bounty missions.

 

[Beetlebum]

The outcome of the poll doesn't say much. There are a lot of people who don't like trading, combat or mining, but I am happy these aspects are still in the game.

Most people aren't interested in politics in real life, why should they in a video game?

The far more interesting question is:

Is the target audience of PP pleased with its implementation? If I want to know, whether the mining mechanics are well implemented, I don't ask the PvP-only player wo doesn't care for mining in general and would rather have it kicked out of the game, so that the devs have more time to enhance his pew pew stuff.

 

[Herik]

The outcome of the poll doesn't say much. There are a lot of people who don't like trading, combat or mining, but I am happy these aspects are still in the game.

Most people aren't interested in politics in real life, why should they in a video game?

The far more interesting question is:

Is the target audience of PP pleased with its implementation? If I want to know, whether the mining mechanics are well implemented, I don't ask the PvP-only player wo doesn't care for mining in general and would rather have it kicked out of the game, so that the devs have more time to enhance his pew pew stuff.

Good Point Beetlebum, I can't and wont be involved in this political shenanegan, except as necessary to go and play as I like. If it eventually negatively effects my play, I'm gone.

I suspect the 'hardcore Eve players' are intrigued, and of course we have (a lot) of them.

 

[Sandmann]

not surprised that you would try and turn around the poll results into something negative given your vocal resistance against PP.
PP was men't as sub level to elite and not something that was men't to be played by everyone, whit that in mind the results looks decent and not like it was a waste of development time.
doubt me then go and make an equal poll about exploration or mining or any other sub career and see how that goes.

I don't see how you can accuse me of having "turned poll results around". I simply did the math, there's absolutely no interpretation in there, and math doesn't lie. If you like PP that's great, but there's a significant chunk of players who don't. That's not an attack on you, that's just personal opinions which we're ALL entitled to.

I'm pretty sure that when FD spent a bunch of time and a bunch of hype about a major update to their game they intended it to be played and enjoyed by most people. They didn't put in all that work to create something that would only appeal to 25% of players.

So you're saying that because not everyone likes every version of grind, that it's equally fair that a lot of people don't like an additional layer to the game that encompasses every version of grind?

 

[Sandmann]

Is the target audience of PP pleased with its implementation? If I want to know, whether the mining mechanics are well implemented, I don't ask the PvP-only player wo doesn't care for mining in general and would rather have it kicked out of the game, so that the devs have more time to enhance his pew pew stuff.

Given that the operating mechanisms of PP are exactly the same as the ones that have always existed (fight, mine, trade, explore) I'd be hard pressed to understand who you think are the "target audience" of PP, if it's not people who enjoy one of fighting/mining/trading/exploring, as there's simply no other way to participate in it. As to what the poll says, it says that the majority of players who have tried PP either didn't enjoy it or were ambivalent to it. That's pretty damning for such a major release.

I think a misunderstanding you (and possible Araviel) have is that we want it (to use your words) "kicked out of the game" - quite the opposite. We want it improved so that it makes sense and is fun for more people. No-one wants LESS in the game, but we equally aren't going to be interested in mediocrity. Surely even people who enjoy it would want to see it improved?

 

[Beetlebum]

Given that the operating mechanisms of PP are exactly the same as the ones that have always existed (fight, mine, trade, explore) I'd be hard pressed to understand who you think are the "target audience" of PP, if it's not people who enjoy one of fighting/mining/trading/exploring, as there's simply no other way to participate in it. As to what the poll says, it says that the majority of players who have tried PP either didn't enjoy it or were ambivalent to it. That's pretty damning for such a major release.

They would say the same about mining, even if mining had the best mining mechanics imaginable, simply because most people aren't interested in mining off rocks, when they could blow things off instead.
The "target audience"? Well, people who are totally in this board game politics risk stuff. People like me.

 

[Sandmann]

They would say the same about mining, even if mining had the best mining mechanics imaginable, simply because most people aren't interested in mining off rocks, when they could blow things off instead.
The "target audience"? Well, people who are totally in this board game politics risk stuff. People like me.

There's two points here... firstly if you asked the people who enjoy mining if they think it's great and they don't want to see any improvements to it I'm sure they'd all say it's primitive and it needs heaps of improvements - and yet the proponents of PP seem to think it's a perfect game, needs no improvement, and get quite upset at the idea that the majority of ED players don't enjoy it.

Secondly, noone backed ED because they thought it was gonna turn into an RTS. I'm personally a huge RTS fan and I've been playing them since Age of Empires way back when, I've even got a few RTS's on my cellphone. PP however is not only a pretty crappy RTS (let's face it, it's more fantasy football than age of empires), it's not what I backed ED for... I backed it to play Elite! Even if it was a GOOD strategy game it's still not what I (and at least half the player base) want in a space fighting/trading game.

[edit] There's a third point. As an RTS it's not introducing any new game play - it's using the same old fight/trade/mine/explore mechanisms, so you'd expect that ANYONE who enjoys any one of them would enjoy PP. (in fact when FD were "selling" it to us they said many times that there was "something in it for everyone" because it would encompass all the basic trades). Yet half or more of the players DON'T enjoy PP. Surely you're not suggesting that half of the players of ED don't enjoy any of the basic mechanisms of ED?