I do hope Season 2 helps Piracy - Today's experience just confirms to me it doesn't work very well...

[Banana's_Are_Good_For_You]

Question about that crime system. As it is now traders more often than not and even more often than that log. But lets say I interdicted a ship which for whatever reason is impossible or near impossible to get cargo out of (ECM point defence and all that) and they refuse to coorporate. Will I get a bunch of bad rep because I find a bunch of very difficult costumers?

Logging is not something you can use as a valid argument. You should know what to do when that happens rather than try and smear one role as being the only one's who do it when it is far from the truth of it.
You should know who to go to when that happens so stop with that. It's very uncool.

Happily, regards other things:
Not necessarily, you should make a choice.
Do you try and and take out the things causing you issues first?
Take out the things causing you a problem first and then go about your business.

Regarding bad rep, if you kill you should expect the full weight of the law and feel the repercussions of same.
What would make good gameplay is finding a way to not invoke a full on retaliation against your actions where you don't draw as much attention to yourself, yet you still get your candy.
There would be skill in that.
Sometimes you might just have to select a loadout beyond that which is only designed to kill.

 

[terrycloth]

As to the modes, Star Citizen has no such intentions, like any other MMO, it's a single shared game world for all players, an open PvP game world,

Seriously? Well, I'm glad I never bought into Star Citizen, then, since it's going to be another worthless PVP mudhole.

Why do people keep making open PvP games? It was proven to be a terrible idea back in the 90s.

 

[Comrade Error]

Logging is not something you can use as a valid argument. You should know what to do when that happens rather than try and smear one role as being the only one's who do it when it is far from the truth of it.
You should know who to go to when that happens so stop with that. It's very uncool.

Happily, regards other things:
Not necessarily, you should make a choice.
Do you try and and take out the things causing you issues first?
Take out the things causing you a problem first and then go about your business.

Regarding bad rep, if you kill you should expect the full weight of the law and feel the repercussions of same.
What would make good gameplay is finding a way to not invoke a full on retaliation against your actions where you don't draw as much attention to yourself, yet you still get your candy.
There would be skill in that.
Sometimes you might just have to select a loadout beyond that which is only designed to kill.

Did I say traders are the only ones who log? No. And I'm not too sure because it doesn't seem like reporting them works too well.

Take out what? Do you want me to shoot first ask questions later?

Get the context.

 

[Querty Out]

Maybe there could be a "surrender" button that super charges shields for a while and disables thrusters and FSD; this could be visible to the pirate and allows more time for comms. And an "escape" button that disables the cargo hatch, sensors, life support and speeds up FSD charging; survival is more or less certain but the trader loses some random amount of cargo.

Even if all traders were forced to play in Open, piracy could do with some TLC.

 

[shadragon]

Piracy needs to work... It needs to become a flesh out profession with flesh out mechanics...

Agreed, it is a viable profession in game, but I don't have to follow their direction or play their games. Never been one for bullies or threats. I've never given up a single ton of cargo to a pirate, nor will I ever. I boost away and high-jump to a nearby star. I have chaff, point defence, SCB's and ECCM. Even in my T-7, I can usually get away. Been killed a few times, but I have my rebuy covered. Minor inconvenience overall.

As for combat logging. Combat logging is bad, m-kay. If you need to combat log, you are in the wrong game mode. If you are in Open face the consequences of Open.

 

[Robert Maynard]

Even if all traders were forced to play in Open, piracy could do with some TLC.

How, exactly, would traders be forced into Open?

.... or more specifically, if players are forced into Open play, how would Frontier then force them to trade?

 

[Comrade Error]

How, exactly, would traders be forced into Open?

.... or more specifically, if players are forced into Open play, how would Frontier then force them to trade?

Easy. Make trading the fastest way to make money.

Those greedy (well apparently that word is banned and got no clue what to replace it with) would sell their own mother if the price was big enough.

 

[Robert Maynard]

Easy. Make trading the fastest way to make money.

Those greedy (well apparently that word is banned and got no clue what to replace it with) would sell their own mother if the price was big enough.

.... then it would probably be used by some of those already in Open to feed their PvP habit - more targets right there - and no need to "encourage" players from other modes.

 

[Querty Out]

How, exactly, would traders be forced into Open?

.... or more specifically, if players are forced into Open play, how would Frontier then force them to trade?

By having only an "Open" mode (not going to happen, I know; I was having Maj's post in mind). The point I was trying to make was that, even if there was only "Open", there would still be the same problem: Traders would have very little time to indicate compliance and pirates have very little time before they need to start shooting to hinder escape.

I still believe though that "Open Only" or "Commit to one mode only" would help piracy along quite a bit because there would be more pressure to find solutions to the current problems. The current "solution" for traders is switching to solo mode and while that solution exists traders find little reason to complain.

 

[DanaM]

The current "solution" for traders is switching to solo mode and while that solution exists traders find little reason to complain.

Many players would still find little reason to complain......and a lot of reason to play a different game.

 

[Querty Out]

Many players would still find little reason to complain......and a lot of reason to play a different game.

A hope a balance can be found keeping Open, PVE, and Solo mode players happy. There have been some good suggestions here: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=235327

 

[Kristov]

Kristov you must know some trick to NPC's that I don't 3-5mil an hour is like 400-600 gold, or 250-350 imperial slaves an hour, i've never seen a freighter carrying more than 20 of anything :/, and even then its usually tea

Picking the right targets and using the cargo scanner, that's really all it is. You can hit multiple smaller targets quickly that way, don't get gold and such a lot, but cargo you don't pay for is pure profit, and the more of you get, the more profit you make.

Seriously? Well, I'm glad I never bought into Star Citizen, then, since it's going to be another worthless PVP mudhole.

Why do people keep making open PvP games? It was proven to be a terrible idea back in the 90s.

Actually, no, it wasn't proven a terrible idea, it's been proven to be something that makes a profit time and time again, which is why it's done in so many MMOs. People like to point to UO and try to use that as an example of how PvE over PvP trumped, which amuses me no end because the actual facts show the exact opposite, even today. The PvE/PvP split did initially have a majority of the players go PvE, and it also damn near killed the franchise, all that saved it was the PvP side which was the one that didn't drop in players constantly over time as the PvE did. Even today, the PvP servers are the busy ones, the PvE are the deadlands. Yep, UO sure showed the wisdom of that move...

 

[Boomer Kay]

Actually, no, it wasn't proven a terrible idea, it's been proven to be something that makes a profit time and time again, which is why it's done in so many MMOs. People like to point to UO and try to use that as an example of how PvE over PvP trumped, which amuses me no end because the actual facts show the exact opposite, even today. The PvE/PvP split did initially have a majority of the players go PvE, and it also damn near killed the franchise, all that saved it was the PvP side which was the one that didn't drop in players constantly over time as the PvE did. Even today, the PvP servers are the busy ones, the PvE are the deadlands. Yep, UO sure showed the wisdom of that move...

Well, OU made a sandbox game for a story driven franchise. They also made a FPS (Ultima X) for a RPG community.
None of them fared exceedingly well. A franchise is a franchise, because people expect more of the same, not something entirely different. That's why all major franchises today run successfully and forever. Don't alienate your core user, don't try anything too fancy. One bad title and bye bye Spiderman 4.

As for the terrible idea.. the current crop of MoBas stomps everything into the ground player wise. It's PvP, but it's not open and certainly not asymetric. That is the stupid idea, that apart from some masochist, anyone wants to play the "victim" in his spare time. You can compensate that, of course, but .. ermm .. they learned nothing in the last 20 years.

 

[Derath]

Actually, no, it wasn't proven a terrible idea, it's been proven to be something that makes a profit time and time again, which is why it's done in so many MMOs. People like to point to UO and try to use that as an example of how PvE over PvP trumped, which amuses me no end because the actual facts show the exact opposite, even today. The PvE/PvP split did initially have a majority of the players go PvE, and it also damn near killed the franchise, all that saved it was the PvP side which was the one that didn't drop in players constantly over time as the PvE did. Even today, the PvP servers are the busy ones, the PvE are the deadlands. Yep, UO sure showed the wisdom of that move...

I agree with you here big-time, though I don't think people generally think UO is a case of PvE won it was just that seperate servers won, but PvP servers are still extremely popular in every mmo i've played (which is alot), UO was great, as was DAoC, all my favourite mmo's have that pvp element, and like you say they hold population well because PvP content is dynamic and repeatable, whereas PvE content generally isn't which is why Dota has been played for over a decade on the same map lol.

 

[Boomer Kay]

I agree with you here big-time, though I don't think people generally think UO is a case of PvE won it was just that seperate servers won, but PvP servers are still extremely popular in every mmo i've played (which is alot), UO was great, as was DAoC, all my favourite mmo's have that pvp element, and like you say they hold population well because PvP content is dynamic and repeatable, whereas PvE content generally isn't which is why Dota has been played for over a decade on the same map lol.

By players that haven't noticed that being at the same ELO for 10 years means you have learned nothing. You're matched with equally ranked players so it doesn't get too frustrating.
In PvE games you're matched against an environment that at one point tells you, you're not good enough to progress. They add new content of different difficulties, or they die out. Higher maintenance and you don't have your initial dev team work on it forever.
That will be one of the big challenges of ed. And the more tools they add to the box, the better.

But I'm just doing armchair game design here, that's always rather easy. At least I try to take different points of view into consideration.

 

[Kristov]

Player vs Player is a big seller, always has been since it's inception, for online games, and that's the sticking point, online games. Single player games still outsell them as they always have, but that's offline gaming, not online. This isn't news, this is how it has worked always, online games with PvP do better than online games without it, while single player offline games blow everything else out of the water on the sales charts. FD made a design choice to allow multiple options with online play, it was a risk, it's still a risk, it could be the thing that kills Elite before the 10 years are up, because it's a single player game at it's heart but being online and multiplayer is integral to it's functioning.

As for getting more people to play in Open, you can't do that without removing the options for Solo and Group, simple as that. People who play in Solo do so for a couple of reasons, one is to play a single player game, so you can't entice them into Open, another is to avoid other players for various reasons and you can't entice them into Open either. Group, well, some of those might be enticed into Open, but many won't be, they want to avoid other players for various reasons. A big part of those 'various reasons' is PvP in any form, they simply refuse to be part of that, even though it's part of the games intended design. You can see it in the forums for other MMOs with PvP, it's not an Elite exclusive by any means.

And FD isn't going to remove the options, so...as I said, it was a risk to do what they do with the modes, it may kill the game, time will tell.

 

[Boomer Kay]

There are some pretty hardcore RPers in this game. Some of them stream- in private groups. They feel their immersion completely broken when they have to deal with all the non-rp around events.

I always found hardcore RP rather weird, but I like to watch it. Does that make me weird?

I think the modes are pretty awesome the way they are. Players will have to stop always looking at the other modes and feel like a red headed stepchild. If they buff income, influence.. whatever in open, I could care less. If they remove rank requirements on clippers so you can get a decent trader at that price point for open instead of the T7 deathtrap and on the FAS so you can have some PvP fun without grinding rank, I could care less.
Just 2 things
- be open what open is on the login screen, don't let a player go there expecting unicorns and roses because it's an elite franchise game and that was always about trade.
- enforce the few rules that exist

 

[Banana's_Are_Good_For_You]

Easy. Make trading the fastest way to make money.

Those greedy (well apparently that word is banned and got no clue what to replace it with) would sell their own mother if the price was big enough.

But, all you'll do is let them make bigger profits in Solo.
Not a solution.
And yeah, saw what you did there earlier.

 

[Querty Out]

...
As for getting more people to play in Open, you can't do that without removing the options for Solo and Group, simple as that. ...

Good post. While I agree with much of it I don't think that it is that simple. Modifications that lower risks in Open will undoubtedly have some group or solo players spend more time in Open. You don't have to turn group/solo players into exclusive Open players to see an increase in the Open population. Balancing crime and punishment while making piracy viable at the same time is tricky business though.

 

[Kristov]

Good post. While I agree with much of it I don't think that it is that simple. Modifications that lower risks in Open will undoubtedly have some group or solo players spend more time in Open. You don't have to turn group/solo players into exclusive Open players to see an increase in the Open population. Balancing crime and punishment while making piracy viable at the same time is tricky business though.

That won't make any difference to most of the folks in Solo and Group, it really won't, they won't go to Open. The only way to make that happen is to remove the options, and that isn't going to happen.