[Obsidian Ant] Elite Dangerous - The Credits Problem: A Case of Feeling Unrewarded?

[Ryan P Bodfirst]

I think there’s another angle to this also - reputation

Some tasks in the game make less credits but affect your reputation a lot more - though it currently doesn’t have enough impact and so isn’t valued.

For example when I first looked at what the salvage contact paid for escapebpods it seemed very low but then I noticed how quickly my rep went up when I delivered stuff to them.

Now what I’d like to see is reputation really making a difference to your experience in the game - which it doesn’t much currently. At the moment minor faction rep gives you access to better paying missions but not a lot else - so it’s not really seen as something that is worth as much as raw credits.

But if it gave access to other things, gave you more trade information, access to new contacts, favours with the materials you actually need, careers, npc wing mates, access better rank npc crew or better protection from the police etc.... then I think it would be seen as having more value and we’d be happy to do lower paying tasks if it had other positive consequences that made a real difference.

Also this approach allows you to keep the credit payment more believable - it wouldn’t really make sense that salvaging escape pods would make as much money as say bulk trading in a conda per hour but makes sense that the faction values it more (it’s a humanitarian act) and gives you more status.

On the opposite side if I’m less friendly with a faction I should see more consequences of this - all in all reputation should really matter and furthermore making friends should mean I’m likely to create enemies along the way.... rather than just being neutral.

As an aside - I can also imagine a situation where I rescue an escape pod and just by chance it happens to be someone important - perhaps I get a personal reward in such cases?

 

[Red Anders]

Did you miss FDev mission team member post? They don't want Colonia missions to be viable as standalone (when you take trip there because someone offered you mission).
They want you to stack them and even them be just a "bonus" on same scale to usual kind of money from exploration you will made while making that trip.
Hence the payout deliberately not scaled in this case.

No I read it but if I recall correctly that was specifically answering someone's comment regarding the data transfer missions to Colonia; FDev said that they didn't envisage people taking those missions as a primary moneymaker but basically wanted them to be an extra for people who were traveling there anyway.

That does actually make sense since data missions require no cargo space so you can (if you wish) stack a full set of 20 of them even in a dedicated exploration build, add no mass to your ship and bank around 20-30m for the journey. Amusingly though, they still don't stack up with long supercruise data transfer in the bubble, I saw data transfer missions to Hutton that were paying 3-3.5m yesterday.

Cargo and passenger missions to Colonia should really be treated differently to data transfer missions though, just from a logic point of view. Data transfer is basically 'Oh you're going there anyway? Take this (insert 3303 version of a USB drive) and give it to my brother will you?'. Cargo and passenger missions are you using a specific ship built for the purpose of delivering a commercial service at market rates and that is what they should be paying.

 

[Lightspeed]

No I read it but if I recall correctly that was specifically answering someone's comment regarding the data transfer missions to Colonia; FDev said that they didn't envisage people taking those missions as a primary moneymaker but basically wanted them to be an extra for people who were traveling there anyway.

That does actually make sense since data missions require no cargo space so you can (if you wish) stack a full set of 20 of them even in a dedicated exploration build, add no mass to your ship and bank around 20-30m for the journey. Amusingly though, they still don't stack up with long supercruise data transfer in the bubble, I saw data transfer missions to Hutton that were paying 3-3.5m yesterday.

Cargo and passenger missions to Colonia should really be treated differently to data transfer missions though, just from a logic point of view. Data transfer is basically 'Oh you're going there anyway? Take this (insert 3303 version of a USB drive) and give it to my brother will you?'. Cargo and passenger missions are you using a specific ship built for the purpose of delivering a commercial service at market rates and that is what they should be paying.

But data missions also add to the risk ... many of them encourage enemy ships to interdict you. If you are in a ship that can handle the consequences, all is good. Another reason I like running cargo missions and data missions together in my viper

 

[Sole Hunter]

A mile wide but an inch deep.

Yeah, sums up the overall reward experience found in Elite Dangerous and the amount of content.

Grind for hundred of hours...end up with billions but you can't do anything with them.

 

[fu9ar]

A mile wide but an inch deep.

Yeah, sums up the overall reward experience found in Elite Dangerous and the amount of content.

Grind for hundred of hours...end up with billions but you can't do anything with them.

It's almost like this game wasn't designed for you to grind as hard as possible, using every exploit you can find, for nothing but the maximum possible cash for hundreds of hours while entirely ignoring all other aspects of the game.

 

[House0fDerp]

It's almost like this game wasn't designed for you to grind as hard as possible, using every exploit you can find, for nothing but the maximum possible cash for hundreds of hours while entirely ignoring all other aspects of the game.

Lack of mechanical depth but rewards based on endless repetition of the same few gameplay loops or random arbitrary requirements but not designed for grinding.

Story checks out.

 

[fu9ar]

Not everyone does ABA trading for a living, bro. Branch out.

Recently, I am doing quite a bit of contract salvage and light hauling.

This game is subtle. Pay real attention to it.

 

[House0fDerp]

Not everyone does ABA trading for a living, bro. Branch out.

Recently, I am doing quite a bit of contract salvage and light hauling.

This game is subtle. Pay real attention to it.

Never suggested anyone or everyone did any one thing. Doesn't change what certain requirenents may be over the course of what the game offers.

And putting steep requirements does encourage seeking the shortest path.

 

[fu9ar]

The fact that you choose to do the same few gameplay loops is a personal problem.

 

[House0fDerp]

The fact that you choose to do the same few gameplay loops is a personal problem.

I can't chose gameplay loops that don't exist. That they don't exist can't be my fault unless I designed the game.

And even of the ones there are, I can't substitute a partucular mechanic for the required one. I can only ignore that barrier at best for a time.

 

[Sylveria]

IMO another point of contention here in balancing "reward", is going to always be "Who gets to decide the value?"

Everyone has a different perspective on what's valuable or worth- some are content with little, others are content with much more. (and some are never content)

Much like RL.

Bottom line? I don't think there will ever be an "agreement" from everyone on this. Not even by the "majority" (whomever that may be) because there will always be someone who is discontented with the reward and sees "little" value, and those who see "too much" value. Even if FD had a poll from all players- and balanced on the majority's decision, you will still have threads popping up much as they do now.

 

[EdzUp]

Bring back ship maintenance then the players with billions and fleets will have something to use the credits for

Also insurance is down to how well maintained your ship is

 

[Conflictx]

Bring back ship maintenance then the players with billions and fleets will have something to use the credits for

Problem with this is it would probably affect the player base without billions more than players with. I'm one of the billionaires and as it is now don't care about repair costs from booping my anaconda too hard into a high G world or whatever costs that I make and I assume being a high billionaire (5bil+) is still a small percentage of players.
If newer players who saved up for that Anaconda/Corvette/Cutter all of a sudden had to pay their rebuy costs in repairs/whatever in a couple of days you'd see the forums flare up in anger soon after, and I doubt reduced income from trying to upkeep their Python or whatever expensive mid tier ship trying to get to one of the bigger ships would help either.

 

[Dakron Nova]

Just two points on this for me,

1. This is one of the view videos where I disagress with the Ant, I dont think payouts are two bad especially if you rank up with a few factions.

2. However, unless you move to some kind of player driven economy then you are never going to be able to balance this out IMO, and I mean a proper economy from mining resources to building ships and stations. With perhaps planet type and system type bonus for stations location to add some value into exploration.

 

[Brrokk]

Last night: two skimmer missions for over 5M each. There was a similar mission for 8M but I was out of play time. Payouts are fine, but you have to get allied.

 

[EdzUp]

what about berthing fees so the more ships you have the more you pay, always coming out at a certain time just to keep your ships in dock etc.

 

[sidereal6]

What alot of folks (just judging some vocal Forum opinions) want is "Instant Access" to everything

Maybe FDev should provide something like CQC except that you can fly any ship and equip it any way you want to. Just let people get the itch to fly a vette out of their system, then they can go back to the open world "career mode"

 

[Stealthie]

what about berthing fees so the more ships you have the more you pay, always coming out at a certain time just to keep your ships in dock etc.

That sounds like a great idea in theory (and I keep hearing people suggest it) but nobody seems to consider the practicalities of it.

You don't play the game for 3 months, come back and find you've got a giant bill for docking fees, possibly emptying your bank account or forcing you to sell ships that you've put a lot of effort into.
Not exactly going to encourage people to get back into the game, is it?

Course, if they could levy the fees in accordance with how long you were on-line, playing, it might work.
But then again, in that situation it's only ever going to be peanuts and, besides, it might end up being a nuisance if you have to spend time flying around paying bills at different places.

 

[Sylveria]

You know, berthing and such would actually be a tremendous money sink for the game- scaled upward for the current amount of assets being held at the station, too.

Done right, it could give incentive to playing the game for everyone. Introduce a new rent fee paid daily, scale it by the amount of assets being held... and voila! Now all the billionaires have their money sink and others have a reason to keep earning money in game to upkeep their ships, modules, and so forth.

Alternatively, you can just park in space or on a planet in a single ship if you're wanting to avoid rental fees... lol

 

[CMDR-AD]

Some of my thoughts on "rewards" and a sense of progress in Elite.

Back when I started playing in v1.2, my income was limited by my ship and the missions board not allowing me to accept missions above my current rank. This kept meant I ran the missions that paid amounts that were actually significant, in terms of being my being able to buy modules for my current ship.

With rank locks removed from missions, I can accept Elite missions that pay 30X to 50X or more than missions of my current rank. Accepting just ONE of those higher ranked missions will buy a whole new better ship, nevermind wasting time upgrading a module on this cheaper ship I'm selling now as fast as possible. And some Passenger missions will pay 200X or more than a base "Novice" mission.

So not only do the lower ranked, lower paying missions thus become useless, but so do all the ships,modules, and progression time they are designed to support.

And that break in the sense of progress is a fundamental failure, IMO.

A CMDR starting out gets the hang of raking in these very high paying missions and very, very quickly leaps past the small pad into the medium. And that's where I suspect gameplay feels like it becomes a drag, with "not enough credits"... Because while the current missions will fast-track a CMDR past plenty of ships in just a couple of play sessions, the current rates of payout are NOT high enough to sustain that rapid ascension into the top tier of ships.

There is no early sense of growth and progress, anymore. Getting into a Cobra in 1 hour, and perhaps selling it the next hour. And then suddenly, I'm actually going to have to play this game to get anywhere?

The slower curve CMDRs should have been following all along, suddenly appears as a wall before them. What fast-money exploits can I use to get past this wall and get back to that early, blazing fast progress?

I realize it may just be me, but I enjoyed the early play phases back in those days. They kept me busy learning to actually play Elite. Getting and keeping me invested in my play. Somehow it seems like rebalancing Elite around finding ways to skip all those elements tends to reinforce the very kinds of problems that the developers would likely hope to minimize or avoid.

And in no way do I intend this post to sound like I want to see all CMDR grind for years to get anywhere. I could write a huge topic on what I think about the costs of top-tier ships and modules being too widely separated from the lower tiers, and how bringing this scale down dramatically could be a good thing. Making those top ships cost more to maintain (continued play) than to simply acquire (at lower prices).

My point overall, is that the sense of being "rewarded" or making progress is something that should be happening fairly uniformly for both new and veteran CMDRs. To set and maintain a sense of paced progress that feels consistent, early to late. So far as I can see, this isn't currently happening.