The New Guilds and Player Owned Stations Discussion Thread.

[Scudmungus]

Havin membership to guilds/gangs/companies/houses/factions/clans/woteva needin player to leave Pilots Federation. Reason? Conflict of Interests!

Den dey able to donate % of earnins into insurance pool - an fram de pool dey pay insurance costs fah members.



Ha! Anyway, simply add option fah creating an managing chat tabs an betta functionality on Friends system, one dat allow us to organize Friends into groups/by type an den alert us wen dem online.

Password on chat tab - aal gud. Social group created. Enjoy.

Anytin else just wastin development money:

- aal reddi gettin voice tools, forums etc 3rd party, fah free. Mon not knowin how or where? Maybi not reddi to run social group online!
- paintjobs/colors gonna require additional moderation an development to keep dem clean an make dem work.
- ownin stations resultin in ats makin trouble, clutter/litter an oderwise needin so much credits dat 'casual' or small gangs/groups/club neva gonna see dem. An again, takin development money.
- game not needin big groups to tackle content. Developin such content placin social barrier fah dem not wantin to join gang/group/corp/guild an again, takin development money.

Understandin tribalism mentality. Recognize we not havin to encourage it, even if it gonna grow anyway. Mould gonna grow in mi bathroom - not meanin mi helpin de stuff grow! An aal dis, dis above an before, if yuh read de papers an do homework, yuh understand dat until a game encourages sociability as a win condition, until a game encourages - drough design - social responsibility an accountability, den addin aal de trappin an hallmarks of a social system be invitin extra aggro an negativity. Mi likin people, considerin mi social an me recognize how anonymity an game design focusin on competition/dominance bringin out de bad in people.

Show mi system dat supports social responsibility an accountability an game design choices that reward such tings an wi gud.

Till den, 'Oder game have it' be no excuse. Lazy tinkin. Do the research. Do yuh homework. Den yuh understandin why.

 

[The Wallet Inspector]

How about this, guy buys a game without guilds, guilds get upset and try to take over the game many people bought ages ago, one people KS on the basis of info from FD which excluded guilds. Sound familiar ?

One people Ks? Can you reword this so it makes sense lol?

 

[Windscreen Smudge]

I have tried to read as much of this thread as my limited attention span and RL distractions will allow. I haven't found (other than the proposition linked back from the other thread), what "guilds" means?
-
Have the pro-guild posters offered suggestions of what they mean or desire from introducing guilds? What guilds will be able to do and not do, what the limits of their size, power, influence, etc might be? What benefits and perks, what assets, what guild communal assets, etc?
-
That sort of thing might soften the argument a lot. Stating "guilds" allows any poster to define the word in either their best or worst experience with guilds in other games.

Been hard to outline anything when the immediate response has been to listen to nothing. I'm already gathering material to start a clean conversation on this in a new thread. This one has played it's tune and we've just been running in circles for hundreds of posts now. If you'll be patient until this evening I'll provide an outline of what would be a beneficial set of guild functions that wouldn't interfere with the day-to-day of solo players.

 

[Robert Maynard]

Same way it was done in UO. Find the members of the PvP community willing to play a protective role and support them.

Edit:UO didn't have time for that model to stabilize though before the expansion threw the whole social structure for a loop. After that you essentially ended up with segregated communities which ultimately killed the game's popularity.

Interestingly, Shroud of the Avatar is another selective multi-player game that adopts a similar three game mode approach to accommodate player choice.

 

[Roybe]

Proof in picture. Look at how many people say they rarely play ED anymore, but spend plenty of time on the forums because the forums are the only meaningful social interaction the community has.

Unless you are playing with a 'guild' or like minded group! Honestly, the time spent setting up what are common guild features in any other game, should be spent playing together within the game.

BTW...if folks are looking for a VOIP option, that also allows nicely for guild chat and more fantastic in chat linking....check out Discord. This VOIP solution is kind of awesome....and is free.

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

And again, it wasn't me who conveniently ignored the "one man, one ship." Frontier took that step first. Or more like they just demolished it entirely every step of the way.

It's not a new generation thing. PvP oriented games are as old as MMOs, if a mixed population does nothing to balance itself out one or the other style of gameplay will dominate. See my reference to Gemstone IV where the PvE players pushed hard against open PvP and won, then continued to hold that position for 25 years.

My point was that despite other MMO's way of doing things, this game is doing something entirely different in that players have no direct control of in-game assets apart from their ship. That's the only player-owned asset in the game, and anything else is really playing PvE - including influencing Powers or minor factions - all part of the background simulation.

And that's what a lot of players aren't used to.

 

[Robert Maynard]

Been hard to outline anything when the immediate response has been to listen to nothing. I'm already gathering material to start a clean conversation on this in a new thread. This one has played it's tune and we've just been running in circles for hundreds of posts now. If you'll be patient until this evening I'll provide an outline of what would be a beneficial set of guild functions that wouldn't interfere with the day-to-day of solo players.

This is the current Guilds discussion thread - your new thread may well end up merged into this one (or this one will be closed in favour of the new thread) - please wait for confirmation that a merge will not occur before you post your new thread.

 

[The Wallet Inspector]

The expressed concern probably stems from comments like:



I know that you later tried to qualify that statement - but by itself it does not suggest peace and harmony with the introduction of minimal social features.

Again Maynard, you seem to be quoting people out of context in order to back up your spurious position. The argument posited is INDEED a slippery slope fallacy, and it is a given that FD would try their hardest not to mess up a feature. You yourself take the position that it is better not to do any new features at all, since there is a risk they may make the game worse. If you screw ANYTHING up in an online game, it causes problems for players. Once again, we see how a simple discussion involving group recognition has to be mutated beyond all reason, until it is a debate about Gemstone IV and Eve. The "expressed concern" you talk of comes form unreasonable fear. At the core of the argument is this "I don't want it so you can't have it", and then the old chestnut "Well I KNOW the devs don't want it so don't discuss it". If enough people keep voting, and keep discussing it, it will snowball, and we may get a compromise on what we want. It would be nice to see a thread of positive ideas, instead of a ridiculous argument zone.

 

[Scudmungus]

I have tried to read as much of this thread as my limited attention span and RL distractions will allow. I haven't found (other than the proposition linked back from the other thread), what "guilds" means?

Guild gonna mean different ting to each person, since fah much of gamin terminology wi gat no definitive definition. Tings like 'meta' an 'mmo' aal subjective till wi nail dem in a few respected dictionaires an law books. Until wi gat definitive definition fah each term, most forum clutter bout folks arguing fi dem perception be de 'correct' an wonderin why oders not seein dis perception, not recognizin dat said perception, understandin, be subjective. HA! Som mon sayin 'Guild gud' tinkin 'Guild = hat, magic banner and club house' den oder mon freakin out tinking 'Guild = special ships/items, abilities an empowerment'. Den dey fight!

Maybi aal needin to clarify wat dey meanin wen dey state said terms...

Generally, Guild meanin, 'Da ting mi part of in oder game. Ting wid me friends/oder gamers. Ting wat mi part of.'

Mi? Callin dem Social Systems. Mi findin dis terminology clean an wi gat definitive definition fah de words it formed fram.

EDIT:

- Can Elite be betta wid improved social tools? Truth
- Wi needin reward dem social folks fah groupin up? No - groupin up, havin mo bodies aroun alreddi gat inherent advantages.
- Addin social systems fram oder game potentially presentin problems fah Elite players? Truth - Game design not needin or supportin social responsiblity an accountability.

 

[Roybe]

My point was that despite other MMO's way of doing things, this game is doing something entirely different in that players have no direct control of in-game assets apart from their ship. That's the only player-owned asset in the game, and anything else is really playing PvE - including influencing Powers or minor factions - all part of the background simulation.

And that's what a lot of players aren't used to.

And with this design decision people realize the only way to win anything is with grind. The only way to combat the negative affect of grind on a single player is to spread the pain over a larger, concerted, group. Anything that will accomplish bringing people together in larger numbers SHOULD be a major focus of the devs. This does not necessarily mean that 'ownership provides exclusivity'* though. Think of Guild Halls in the original Guild Wars. They were a private instance that, over time, had added functionality (market reps, outfitting reps, etc.). The same could easily be done here...a guild owned outpost on planet 3 in system y...that the group can upgrade to full service over time...and that no one else can visit or use.

I see no issue in this type of guild housing. It does not affect the game at large since no one else will see it or use it.

*Exclusivity meaning some sort of negative outcome to PvE players over PvP blocking. Obviously, the 'private ownership' IS exclusive to the guild...but has no 'negative' PvP outcomes that can occur from it.

 

[Windscreen Smudge]

Interestingly, Shroud of the Avatar is another selective multi-player game that adopts a similar three game mode approach to accommodate player choice.

Yeah, by the guy who killed his own game by circumventing the players' natural selection of a set of social rules, and only half-enforcing the changes he made.

UO was open PvP, and while people had problems with it at first they started to build a complex social structure to deal with it. Richard then released the first expansion which introduced new areas that were PvE only but didn't change anything about the old world, so you had PvE players concentrating in one area and PvP players in the other. The PvP players could roam freely in the PvE area when they so chose, but the PvE players couldn't do likewise. Resulted in too many problems to list, and the community tore itself apart.

I appreciate what he did for putting MMOs on the map, but he wasn't able to keep up the success and his newest attempt doesn't appear very promising for the same reasons. They've raised 6.8 million, but talk among the old cats has it that if he had aggressively pursued an experience that was like the core game which made UO successful in the first place he could've achieved Star Citizen levels of success in crowdfunding.

Edit: Woops, I guess there were too many parallels to the current state of Elite: Dangerous for people to be comfortable responding to this post.

 

[Tuub t Tute]

it ain't perfect, but it's not absent:

Given those parameters and that other than seeing the sensor readout as "Guild_001" instead of "Archon" or whatever PP pledge info is shown, that doesn't seem gamebreaking. First thought is would the comms channel be Open only, or could there be a request for it to permeate Solo and Group? There might be guild members who don't or can't always play in Open (although possibly guilds might impose that as membership criteria?).
-
The blocking point is likely to either be the back end programming / data entry necessary to allow info into the game which is player generated, as we all know someone will make up a masked rude guild name for a laugh... Then again, some of the CMDR names are a bit fruity when you see the "First Discovered by" tags out in the black!
-
Or that the comms channels are buried so deep in the game code that extracting that module to expand it and add password entry might be deemed to be excessive use of dev time?
-
If there were no changes to the shared BGS, or mode switching, or player owned assets, I would not be hostile towards an implementation of what you have suggested. See, I can be reasonable when given something tangible to appraise!

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

And with this design decision people realize the only way to win anything is with grind. The only way to combat the negative affect of grind on a single player is to spread the pain over a larger, concerted, group. Anything that will accomplish bringing people together in larger numbers SHOULD be a major focus of the devs. This does not necessarily mean that 'ownership provides exclusivity'* though. Think of Guild Halls in the original Guild Wars. They were a private instance that, over time, had added functionality (market reps, outfitting reps, etc.). The same could easily be done here...a guild owned outpost on planet 3 in system y...that the group can upgrade to full service over time...and that no one else can visit or use.

I see no issue in this type of guild housing. It does not affect the game at large since no one else will see it or use it.

*Exclusivity meaning some sort of negative outcome to PvE players over PvP blocking. Obviously, the 'private ownership' IS exclusive to the guild...but has no 'negative' PvP outcomes that can occur from it.

I think similar mechanics have been mentioned before, but one question that raises is; "So if a non-guild member had no access to that station, then that means a guild player could easily escape that non-guild member by magically disappearing in their guild station?"

I may have gotten confused over that though.

 

[Windscreen Smudge]

I think similar mechanics have been mentioned before, but one question that raises is; "So if a non-guild member had no access to that station, then that means a guild player could easily escape that non-guild member by magically disappearing in their guild station?"

I may have gotten confused over that though.

Things like that are why I continue to say that the conversation on guilds should be kept separate from player owned structures. Player owned structures are complicated in themselves and can be focused on in their own right under another topic. Within that topic you would address questions such as "Do guilds get structures?" "How do guild structures interact with the rest of the world" "How do guild structures interact with non-guild players." Etc...

These two topics should have never been bundled together.

 

[PhazonAran]

I think most people would be okay with guilds as long as there is no guild exclusive content.

 

[Windscreen Smudge]

I think most people would be okay with guilds as long as there is no guild exclusive content.

Which is why I've been pointing out that ED already has plenty for Guilds to do in-game and coming up, and Frontier will not need to cater to them.

 

[Lex Looter]

Yeah, by the guy who killed his own game by circumventing the players' natural selection of a set of social rules, and only half-enforcing the changes he made.

UO was open PvP, and while people had problems with it at first they started to build a complex social structure to deal with it. Richard then released the first expansion which introduced new areas that were PvE only but didn't change anything about the old world, so you had PvE players concentrating in one area and PvP players in the other. The PvP players could roam freely in the PvE area when they so chose, but the PvE players couldn't do likewise. Resulted in too many problems to list, and the community tore itself apart.

I appreciate what he did for putting MMOs on the map, but he wasn't able to keep up the success and his newest attempt doesn't appear very promising for the same reasons. They've raised 6.8 million, but talk among the old cats has it that if he had aggressively pursued an experience that was like the core game which made UO successful in the first place he could've achieved Star Citizen levels of success in crowdfunding.

Edit: Woops, I guess there were too many parallels to the current state of Elite: Dangerous for people to be comfortable responding to this post.

You forgot the part about how they were forced to make those changes because UO was so plagued by griefers that people started to abandon the game in droves and it was on the verge of becoming inviable as a consumer product.

It's cool that you used the most iconic example of how a certain kind of people would rather destroy their own toys instead of letting other people have fun too.

 

[Roybe]

I think similar mechanics have been mentioned before, but one question that raises is; "So if a non-guild member had no access to that station, then that means a guild player could easily escape that non-guild member by magically disappearing in their guild station?"

I may have gotten confused over that though.

Wow...a player can magically disappear so many ways in this game...it would be quicker to high jump than run to a planet. Or just drop connection when a player appears in a system.

 

[Windscreen Smudge]

You forgot the part about how they were forced to make those changes because UO was so plagued by griefers that people started to abandon the game in droves and it was on the verge of becoming an inviable consumer product.

It's cool that you used the most iconic example of how a certain kind of people would rather destroy their own toys instead of letting other people have fun too.

That's false. UO was growing like gangbusters right up to the release of the expansion. They couldn't add servers fast enough, as soon as one popped up on the list it was crowded and houses started going up within days.


There were people leaving, but there were far fewer people leaving than joining, and the people staying were in the middle of creating a balance they could live with. Murdering PKers existed, but so did the Enforcers and Champions, entire guilds of them. That part of the game was still evolving when it got hit between the eyes with the hatchet that was Renaissance.

UO's population bloomed to 100,000 players in it's initial year from 97-98. From 98-2000 it doubled to 200,000 players. From 2000-2003 the growth was stifled to 250,000 players where it peaked and declined from thereon. Renaissance was released in 2000.

Granted there were plenty of other factors such as Everquest and WoW, but UO had a lot going for it that those games didn't, and should have thrived well after their inception.

 

[Lex Looter]

That's false.

No, it's not. I was there, I saw the whole thing while it was happening.

UO was growing like gangbusters right up to the release of the expansion. They couldn't add servers fast enough, as soon as one popped up on the list it was crowded and houses started going up within days.


There were people leaving, but there were far fewer people leaving than joining, and the people staying were in the middle of creating a balance they could live with. Murdering PKers existed, but so did the Enforcers and Champions, entire guilds of them. That part of the game was still evolving when it got hit between the eyes with the hatchet that was Renaissance.

UO's population bloomed to 100,000 players in it's initial year from 97-98. From 98-2000 it doubled to 200,000 players. From 2000-2003 the growth was stifled to 250,000 players where it peaked and declined from thereon. Renaissance was released in 2000.

Granted there were plenty of other factors such as Everquest and WoW, but UO had a lot going for it that those games didn't, and should have thrived well after their inception.

Those numbers certainly suit your argument nicely, too bad they have absolutely no grounding whatsoever on reality.

You can find a more accurate timeline here (with verifiable figures, if you google-fu is up to it)

http://uo.stratics.com/uoherald/newsletterarchive/2003sept/sept2003nl.html

You can also look up "Gordon Walton" (former executive producer at Origin and responsible for the introduction of Trammel) to learn how griefers were driving 70+% of the new players away from the game within their first 60 days, to never come back.

Or don't, if you're easily upset by actual facts.