Agreed. Rep++
I'd say it differently, though: Elite has no goals, except for those you set for yourself.
Unfortunately, a lot of people seem to pick goals that only end in frustration: I need an Anaconda to have fun; without realizing that it's a hollow goal. If you can't have fun in, say, a Cobra, it's unlikely you'll have fun in a 'conda.
The problem here, though, is the game essentially tells you, that you need a large ship to increase the amount of fun. People don't all race for an Anaconda because they
need it. It's because the developers decided that a lot of content happens to be effective via large ship acquisition and use.
It's really not possible to claim everyone going for anaconda is absolving themselves of fun. It's because the game is
entirely dedicated in driving people in that direction. And because, well, the Anaconda is pretty much the best at just about every pursuit possible. The old barge just is the gift that keeps on giving.
The "you don't
need it" argument only works, if the game actually reflects that. It doesn't. Anaconda is the go to ship, because frontier refused to correct it at the same time they happily trashed the python, and have then purposefully go on to ram that mistake home, by repeatedly adding compromised ships, leaving the elephant smoking a phat blunt in the middle of the lounge grinning ear-to-ear and getting mighty hungry in the process. It's the perfect target for the first big ship. It's the do-everything ride.
You can have fun in a Cobra. Or eagle. But the game rewards having fun in larger ships. Because that's what frontier want. The developer has invented a credit and time sink game, larger ships equates to more credit sink (look at the larger modules and huge credit costs; it screams credit-sink, same with ship transport; massive credit sink.. the list goes on and on..). This is then thrown against the wall by commanders who see credits as the devil and if you have a large ship you are a bad person
tm. So we have a developer that has invented the notion of up-daring to large ships, so that there's a bigger time and credit sink for the player base; and a portion of the community hell bent on not having that happen.
The game has many goals; the problem is that when people try to shoot for them, they are told this is wrong because we're all supposed to "have fun". To say the community has schizophrenic tendencies, is not the least bit inaccurate. It's less about end goals, it's more that the end goals ostensibly mean endless repetition. In a large ship? Larger repetition. And it's the latter that tends to have a fairly universal impact.
Everyone will have, almost certainly, different goals in game; what is universal though, is the degree in which repetition will feature. And it features just a whole lot. There's a lot the developer has done to make the game really darn enjoyable. But there is just a whole lot going on funnelling commanders into larger ships. And confusing signals from the developer (and commanders) that says you don't need large ships to have fun, yet the game is specifically programmed to make a mockery of that stance.
And when you
do get funnelled into that, there's the sudden realisation that the costs are obscene to do this, yet there's more fun to be had, so the endless credit sink machine kicks into higher gear. More credits, more ship, more modules. None of this is accidental, friend. Any more than the randomness of engineering. It's a rather snazzy, yet entirely obvious time/ credit/ materials sink game.
At some point, someone has to accept this is actually the situation, so it can, maybe, finally, be balanced a bit. So gunning it at warp factor 12 to anaconda, just isn't the entire purpose for a very large percentage of players (it would be naive at this juncture to not think Frontier have very clearly decided to keep Anaconda as it is, as a motivational force; I'm sure they'd claim none of that, of course!). Otherwise, it'll keep happening.
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Lots of cool points and counterpoints raised by folks. And all rather civil. Cheers, commanders! Is a nice change. o7
