That's my point, per usual the truth is somewhere in the middle but to define the middle one needs to know and discuss both ends of the spectrum. I'm not at all hoping/expecting or even advocating for ED to turn into EVE-light, that would be silly. But I AM concerned about how limiting player interaction (in whatever form) will mess up the game's 'replayability'. Too many games messed up because they were too safe, too grindy and lacking interaction.
Elite Babysitter...
- Thread starter JeffRyan
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That's my point, per usual the truth is somewhere in the middle but to define the middle one needs to know and discuss both ends of the spectrum. I'm not at all hoping/expecting or even advocating for ED to turn into EVE-light, that would be silly. But I AM concerned about how limiting player interaction (in whatever form) will mess up the game's 'replayability'. Too many games messed up because they were too safe, too grindy and lacking interaction.
The caveat is with this proposal is that it doesn't allow "hidden" players to affect the visible world with no risk involved. That is the reason for this proposal to begin with.
People have said "Well you really can't affect the world.". Well I say to that are we playing in a sandbox or a themepark? ED is being promoted as a sandbox so I would assume I am correct in my assumptions.
Spot on.
A few points here (not attacking you, merely disagreeing. There is a difference.
).One is that E: D (unlike EVE) is not a client/server game - it's P2P. What this means is, the entire galaxy is on your computer, and all game options, are on the client (game). This includes Ironman / Normal, grouping, solo, online / offline etc are all functions of the client that you (and only you) are running. The "server" is a handshaking & background simulation entity which sometimes pushes things down to you.
Secondly, the "all" group gives you pretty much everything you are asking for, providing you accept the fact that E: D is a fundamentally different type of game with different goals to EVE. It is, as someone put it, a single player game with multiplayer elements & an evolving galaxy.
I think it's premature to assume that the background simulation will throw up things which are "grindy" when none of us have really seen it in action yet. The events are either injected or procedurally generated. The latter is where the real fun will be IMO, and will give you the closest experience to what you're after, as nobody (perhaps not even FD) will know how they will end up.
Robert Maynard
Volunteer Moderator
There is hardly "no risk involved" unless you are inferring that you expect never to be even as much as damaged by an NPC opponent....
All players will affect the world. NPC effects will outweigh player effects simply due to the fact that there are many more of them. Players that you will rarely (if ever) encounter due to timezone differences will affect the world - the in-game universe runs 24/7.
There has been a whole discussion on the term "sandbox" - that's another family size can of worms.
That was me, among others, an it can't be stated enough, because many people still seam to not be able to fully understand it...
...and as for "no risk without PvP": Have the people who think that played the alpha? Well, I have, and every time I did go anywhere in the game, I ran the risk of getting interdicted/attacked by something... you are never really save in ED... even more so then, say, in EVE. Every jump to supercruise can, potentially be your last. I find that quite risky for a game where it might take weeks/months for some people to get the ship/equipment they want... Personally, I can't blame them for wanting to opt out of the possibility to get ambushed by a disgruntled player in his free Sidewinder... at least with NPCs, they can be relatively sure they behave according to the games rules.
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Warbaby, if you are an alpha member you could probably demonstrate the whole story by stating how many times you ran into real people during alpha 4. I mean I watched a ton of videos, and I think it was what.. 1-2 at most? And I'm pretty sure there's more the na 3 digit number of alpha backers.
Were that to be implemented, you'd find even fewer players in your forced All group on server, because a lot of people will prefer the flexibility of server 2. And if you go to server 2 because that will have more people, you are back to square one before your proposed change.
You see other players generally around stations and other POIs. The playerbase is incredibly small though, and even the limited size of alpha 4 is still huge. More so when people are off flying in random directions "because they can".
Additionally, there is no comms or player interdiction yet, so it's no great surprise that alpha 4 appears to be relatively deserted. It's not exactly representative.You see other players generally around stations and other POIs. The playerbase is incredibly small though, and even the limited size of alpha 4 is still huge. More so when people are off flying in random directions "because they can".
True, guess we'll see starting tomorrow. I really hope we get randomized starting points, or it'll be Sidewinder traffic jam day next to that Coriolis station xD
I did in an EDIT above... sorry.
...but yea, that's true... NPCs and station collisions probably caused about 90% of player deaths in the alpha up until now... but those few players that actually interacted did also pretty much immediately try to grief each other...
I see these replies and I among many other completely understand the Pay model, architecture and backend of the game and how players and their clients will interact.
The constant EvE references make me chuckle. It makes me picture some knuckle dragging neanderthal(EvE player) talking to Spock(Elite player). Most people here understand none of the EvE mechanics will be here and we are fine with it.
My proposal is the most simplistic request that can be made about this issue. Simply stating it again I want the choice to handshake my client with visible players instead of ghosts.
No offense but attempting to pile gameplay mechanics and theories only obfuscates the simple issues I have brought up.
The constant EvE references make me chuckle. It makes me picture some knuckle dragging neanderthal(EvE player) talking to Spock(Elite player). Most people here understand none of the EvE mechanics will be here and we are fine with it.
My proposal is the most simplistic request that can be made about this issue. Simply stating it again I want the choice to handshake my client with visible players instead of ghosts.
No offense but attempting to pile gameplay mechanics and theories only obfuscates the simple issues I have brought up.
Maybe and maybe not. It'll all depend on how well the instancing works.
I did in an EDIT above... sorry.
...but yea, that's true... NPCs and station collisions probably caused about 90% of player deaths in the alpha up until now... but those few players that actually interacted did also pretty much immediately try to grief each other...
Haha, I really should scroll back more often. Thanks for the answer though, guess we really only see this after we the PB Horde descends upon the unsuspecting I Bootis.
I did in an EDIT above... sorry.
...but yea, that's true... NPCs and station collisions probably caused about 90% of player deaths in the alpha up until now... but those few players that actually interacted did also pretty much immediately try to grief each other...
The majority of violent encounters I had with other players (which is already a minority among total encounters) were all fair game - I had a bounty or they had a bounty, we were on different sides of a two-faction war, that kind of thing.
Yea, I didn't mean all player encounters where griefing, but it did happen... in station ramming, spawn point camping and cargo container spamming, mostly.
ED humanity, comprising a 250 lightyear bubble. The Thargoids (one of two other sentient races known to have evolved, and the only one we've failed to exterminate) have colonised about 1% of the galaxy.
So be it. I if given the option would never play on server 2 due to the fact it just would not be real for me or seem cheaty.
I would play with 5 visible people and thousands of npcs before playing with thousands of visible/invisible players mixed with npcs.
edit - I may never see a single player ever in years of playing but I will never feel the need to call Ghost Hunters.
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You might be interested in Elite: Dangerous Dev Diary 2- How the Galaxy will Evolve Over Time. Here's an expanded example based on something mentioned there:
Let's say Lave's parliament has its opening ceremony today, and dignitaries from nearby systems are invited to attend. Depending on each system's internal status and the reputation statistic they share with Lave, they generate passenger transport, escort and assassination missions for players.
Each mission has a little procedurally-generated uniqueness to it, for example Lieutenant Lester Leesti wants extra protection because his home system is in unrest, and his assassin points out that selecting political leaders based on alliteration is stupid. Players in single-player mode protect or murder delegates with NPCs, while those in the "all" group do battle with each other.
When the opening ceremony takes place, the background simulation totals up all the successful and failed missions, adjusts the scores based on the chance of success in the "all" group vs. private groups, then uses the results to adjust Lave's reputation with all the nearby systems. Next time an event pops up that uses the reputation statistic to determine Lave's reaction (war, famine, trumble infestation, happy hour at Hoopy Casino), everyone that participated in that event will know their actions had a little lasting effect on the universe.