That's just one example... Elite's credit scale in general is arbitrary and makes no sense/isn't analogous to any real-world economy.
The entire BGS, all missions, all commodities, all values expressed - it's all made up. There's never been a holistic consideration; because this simply doesn't matter, to the developer. There wasn't ever going to be a player economy, so arguably it never
had to matter.
Frontier never intended Elite to be pure simulation; however the popular consensus is that it's
supposed to be a sim. This leads to the natural collision between ideal, and actual. Neither the game, or the developer operate within a consistent rule set. There's no cohesiveness because it's never been required. It
is required in a pure simulation. Elite isn't, ergo the laxidasical approach to consistency.
The game was designed to simulate a universe, but have a traditional mmo approach to mechanics. That "time" is now considered the challenge, and that investment is lauded as the primary goal, is pretty much just the logical conclusion to how Frontier has staged the various elements. It should perhaps present a set of cohesive elements, with a sliding scale of challenge. It doesn't; and so folks have gravitated to "it must take
n time to achieve
y" as the defacto challenge instead.
That frontier want people to spend time in game, doesn't mean that's supposed to be the
core challenge.
Simplistically, like anything, when there is a vacuum of a required component, something with be co-opted to fill the void. In elite?
It's now time. Anything challenging the relative time spent, will therefore cause conflict. The solution, therefore (again simplistically) is introducing scaling mechanics that present consistent, cohesive mechanics, with a scaling curve of difficulty and a set of stepped challenges. This then allows a degree of scale where commanders can progress in experience and capability, with remuneration essentially scaling in sympathy.
This is not a simple task. It's also not a task that I believe the developer yet considers important. In fact; I am concerned they are now shifting entire mechanics to
be time investment; that is, increasingly shifting mechanics to a
time based methodology. Which suggests that's what
they now think
we want. In a weird twist, we've co-opted time as the single challenge, the developer sees this, assumes this is the direction the player base wants, and shifts mechanics to it. Feeding the cycle.
Instead of multiple layers and ways to engage and consistent mechanics, that scale with experience (ie your wealth scales over time as you achieve various goals) it'll all devolve to everything literally being various takes of "
x time doing
y thing". Which, to be fair, depresses me considerably. I really hope not; there is considerable potential within Elite, still.
To think it could literally become just endless timers and eternal waiting, with mechanics that have zero cohesion or sense of merit, gives me the shivers.
