ED gameplay it's all about -> logoff/logon

[huehnerfaust]

Dear commanders,

why are we not getting hundreds of missions, on a single load of the bulletin board?

I always wondered why for example, a system with a population of billions generated so few missions? Seems unlogical to me. I need about 10 - 15 relogs to fill my mission log with enough massacre missions. Not intendet by your design? Than change it, but stop acting around as if your mission design is great, it is not.

I think the fix is almost to easy, just generate 10 or 100 times the missions as of now? Change your drops rates for efc to reflect the change and your "designers" should not worry that we may find one each and every day.


regards

 

[[VR] Marrs]

Dear commanders,

why are we not getting hundreds of missions, on a single load of the bulletin board?

I always wondered why for example, a system with a population of billions generated so few missions? Seems unlogical to me. I need about 10 - 15 relogs to fill my mission log with enough massacre missions. Not intendet by your design? Than change it, but stop acting around as if your mission design is great, it is not.

I think the fix is almost to easy, just generate 10 or 100 times the missions as of now? Change your drops rates for efc to reflect the change and your "designers" should not worry that we may find one each and every day.


regards

Exactly.

 

[Esvandiary]

I have been wondering about this, maybe you have the answer. Are there technical reasons that the mission boards aren't persistent across the modes, or is this done for gameplay reasons to vary the available missions?

I believe this is a technical limitation due to the need for the game to scale - I think the "mission generation servers" are all separate entities that aren't aware of what the others are doing/have done, and an individual client doesn't get to choose which one it connects to.

So, you can end up with a different mission server each time, which can end up giving you different missions.

Making them talk to each other would likely defeat the point of having that architecture - being able to easily start/stop them to match demand without scaling issues.

 

[Vorxian]

It's just chicken and egg.

It's there, so one person will justify it by swinging it as 'not fair' if someone else is doing it. Hence they do it.

Likely that the people complaining will be the ones either against it, but feel they're letting slip an 'opportunity' but are against it in some internal struggle. Or ones that have done it will complain to close the door on anyone else doing it.

It's there, it's part of the game play. Singling an individual out is a bit of an upper-cut. FDEV have a board, and committee and groups to collaborate on making decisions like these at time of concept. Maybe they can fix bulletin boards as easy as pushing a button, maybe they need to re-write the fundamental source code for 6 months to make it happen.

I'm sure these things look easy, but are quite the opposite. Maybe they could just create an offline mode where folks can cheat-engine themselves 200,000,000,000 credits and be done with it.

 

[Ian Skippy]

I think the fix is almost to easy, just generate 10 or 100 times the missions as of now? Change your drops rates for efc to reflect the change and your "designers" should not worry that we may find one each and every day.
regards

Maybe if something is 'too easy' it could be because you haven't given it proper thought. If you make mission stacking easy, profits increase, which messes up whatever balance FD is going for. So they'd have to reduce the income per missions, which means that from that point on everyone would HAVE to stack missions to keep status quo, which increases the difficulty. How about:

Generate, in addition to the current board, always one of each general mission type (comba, trade, explore, mine, smuggle). These pay less than the 'random' ones, but will be always there. Unlimited number of missions can be accepted, but only one of each type (massacre, carry blabla from X to Y etc).

Gameplay improves, you can always do what you want, there will always be an income for you. And those who refuse to play unless they earn at least a gazillion credits per hour by exploiting 'parallel' missions (get paid 10x for killing one ship): too bad for you.

 

[Ben_BigBen]

I have noticed a longer period waiting for the mission screen recently, one can't help thinking that its a result of all this logging on and off hitting the transaction server

Having said that a mission board that updates while you're looking at it would be great; a bit like an auction, new items appearing, old items disappearing with rewards changing until someone thinks it's worth their while to take the job.

 

[huehnerfaust]

Maybe if something is 'too easy' it could be because you haven't given it proper thought.

Tell me, what is the difference between now and having 100 mission to choose from? All that would change is the log off... Can you think it trough?

You could blame me for over simplification, but not for thinking it trough.

I like your approach of the general mission type style. For example the massacre mission could just be: Kill 'n' ships. The more you kill the higher the payout.

The designer gave us the tools to reroll the mission board. They mastered the persistence of 400 billions star system, but can not generate more then ten to twenty mission on a average bulletin board? come on?


regards

 

[jasonbarron]

I did that for my Corvette, all MC's but with HICAP mags and special effects. It took a few trips to Tod and actually I left a beam laser with a thermal effect on. I can stay in combat for a long time. I have to take a break long before I am dry. You will enjoy your apex predator, believe me.

I got my goal accomplished for three of the guns but ran out of time for the fourth, though even with it set up inadequately it still really is an apex predator (nice description btw). I took it to a High Intensity CZ and it melted enemies like butter on a hot grill...me too unfortunately. The first enemy I faced was an Elite Cutter with a couple Vipers lending support and I was running at 204% heat within a few seconds of unloading on him.

All of my guns and most of my modules were malfunctioning and I lost a load of 8 Articulation Motors due to a popped cargo hatch...all without getting hit by any incoming fire. Gonna have to rethink my build a little, I guess.

Was it worth the slog, though? Oh hell yes

 

[NMS]

If you want to have a good progress in this universe you just have to logoff and logon again and repeat till you got it.

This gameplay is so ridiculous...

It doesn't matter what you need just logoff/logon and repeat.

- need the right missions for special engineers commodities -> logoff/logon
- need missions for fast ranking up empire/federation -> logoff/logon
- need missions for making fast money -> logoff/logon
- need valuable NPCs for good bounty -> logoff/logon
- need a lot of mats for RNGineering like chemical manipulators, fly into a seeking weapons point and what else as -> logoff/logon
- need UA mats for palin, fly to a tip off mission and surprise surprise -> logoff/logon

I don't know what sandy is thinking about his dumb mechanics but it kills a lot of immersion! He should change this to a normal and good gameplay and increase the chance to get all of the stuff in a good progress without -> login off and login on...

It's time to wake up FD!

It is simply ridiculous to occurrence of it in the game. And yet there are people who defend this failure.

 

[sutex]

Instant money .... or a star that gives you credits... both are as fantastic as the economy of money in ED.... , but its a 10 year and six day plan , +- a few minutes .

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

Play the game.. dont game the game. Loggin off on is not cool

Actually i would say, as long as the game allows it log on, log off as much as you want.. just dont do it then complain its rubbish and you have to do it i think its rubbish so i dont do it. Others this its perfectly fine game play and choose to do it. One or the other guys

 

[Tataboj]

Instant money .... or a star that gives you credits... both are as fantastic as the economy of money in ED.... , but its a 10 year and six day plan , +- a few minutes .

But... economy in Elite is quite complex.

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

But these long range missions are ridiculous. Sothis, Robigo, maia.

I could go on in detail. but we all know the deal. Why are the multi million dollar missions accessible to lower/beginner ranks. If you already are in late game then these missions make a bit more sense. But they should be blocked for people in early to mid game. It makes money worthless when you can earn 30 million in a short session.

Totqlly agree with you here it is FARto easy to get the massive paying missiins in ED and the long range missiins make an insane amount of money in very easy to get ships ... or at least they did. I have not looked at them fir ages due to how much they earned... but FD only bouht these in with the massive payouts AFTER loads of players complained... so it was just FD trying to listen to the community.

 

[CaptainKremmen]

Is this like a monkey pressing a REWARD button?

 

[Ian Skippy]

Is this like a monkey pressing a REWARD button?

Yes, with the difference being the monkey gets an actual real-life peanut.

 

[jasonbarron]

Yes, with the difference being the monkey gets an actual real-life peanut.

What, you don't like virtual peanuts?

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

What, you don't like virtual peanuts?

Virtual peanuts are virtually peanuts.

 

[DaveB]

If you want to have a good progress in this universe you just have to logoff and logon again and repeat till you got it.

This gameplay is so ridiculous...

It doesn't matter what you need just logoff/logon and repeat.

- need the right missions for special engineers commodities -> logoff/logon
- need missions for fast ranking up empire/federation -> logoff/logon
- need missions for making fast money -> logoff/logon
- need valuable NPCs for good bounty -> logoff/logon
- need a lot of mats for RNGineering like chemical manipulators, fly into a seeking weapons point and what else as -> logoff/logon
- need UA mats for palin, fly to a tip off mission and surprise surprise -> logoff/logon

I don't know what sandy is thinking about his dumb mechanics but it kills a lot of immersion! He should change this to a normal and good gameplay and increase the chance to get all of the stuff in a good progress without -> login off and login on...

It's time to wake up FD!

I have a job and a family. With RNGineers you need to mod your ship against those cheating NPCs. I need it now and not in one or two years...

That's not how Elite is supposed to work. It's supposed to take time. If you have fewer hours to play (as I do) it will take you longer realtime but no more play time or effort than it takes anyone else. Instant gratification is not supposed to be a thing in Elite, and every time somebody finds a way to achieve it, FD have moved to nerf it. I think the only reason they haven't done that with the logoff/logon meta is that they are laughing their socks off at the people who deliberately spoil their own game experience that way, like they've nerfed it for themselves so FD can take their own sweet time fixing that one in the code.

 

[=71st=RuSh]

I have a job and a family. With RNGineers you need to mod your ship against those cheating NPCs. I need it now and not in one or two years...

I can only play two hours after work daily! and this is the only way to make progress with the RNGineers materials and they need. And by the way, I have ARMA 3, Witcher 3, Atlantic Fleet, Aliens, DCS world and others that are jealous because I have put them aside

 

[Kalimero]

Alright!
This thread has been going in circles a bit.
There are two different perceptions of progress and satisfaction on display here that are subjective and subconscious enough that just pitting them head on against each other isn't going to work.
If neither side is going to empathise this is going to continue to feel like the textual equivalent of a staring contest.

Progess in Elite tends to be a bit more abstract and long term than in other games, which can lead to some frustration, when comparing it to other gaming experiences one might have had. This is not a hard concept to grasp and I think everyone should at least be able to understand that Elite is somewhat special in this respect, even if you yourself have no problems with it whatsoever.

So is it valid criticism to point this seeming lack of progress out?
No, not at this level. It is almost always immediately perceived as stating that Elite should be different game, which it simple isn't. This is a discussion that apparently is just not going to work.
So let's please move away from this!

Are there things that might suit Elite and improve it for players that feel frustrated with it without changing it's inherit nature? Yes.
Is there still a worthwhile conversation to be had here? Yes.
Reward customisation has come up. Whether it should be customisable rewards or just regular special offer mission is debatable, but as I said in my earlier post, FD has been trying to increase mission variety and enrich interaction with NPCs. This has the potential to do exactly that and also combat the original problem of feeling the need to relog.

So is this something anyone from either side of the discussion might see any use in?