Frontier, you have a major problem:

[Straha Yeagar]

I was not familiar with this individual either. But it sounds to me like the guy has been heavily invested into the game for a long time. It takes that kind of investment to write a useful third-party app (never used it personally). And just as anyone who has been investing that much time into something, there is a high risk of Burn Out.

I seriously doubt that this is going to cause any shifts in Frontier's plans. After all, regardless of what he does within the community, it is still down to his personal opinion.

As for Obsidian Ant? I hardly see how this would cause him to rethink his position. His focus has always been on the "News and Happenings, in and Around Elite Dangerous".

The game is always going to have News, and there will always be something happening. Sounds like job security to me.

And for me, invoking the name Obsidian Ant is largely meaningless. All I really know is he is someone who makes videos that I have never seen.

 

[Arindor]

Most people take a break now and then.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

Have to say though discussion around what Genar and others feel really annoying was enlightening to me. I am starting to leaning towards having hard and challenging missions for unlocking these things - than repeating same stuff over again.

It is much more work though and mission system might not be ready yet for this, although there are signs.

I agree, but it won't stop me playing a game I enjoy because I can't get a guardian power plant or weapon.

 

[IndigoWyrd]

Well that's it then.. if the author of some 3rd party tool that I don't use is taking a break, then Elite is doomed.

But there's still a huge difference between taking a break, calling it quits, and burning bridges.

I take breaks regularly - they're necessary to maintain what sanity I still possess. Sometimes they're a couple of days, sometimes a week or two.

And at least once a year, a month long, while I board my ship and sail away to somewhere exotic - usually warm and tropical.

 

[Ralph Vargr]

TL DR, "Game is dead!"...?

I've gotten over +10 rep on this thread already.

Others approve of my bringing this to their attention, even if some do not.

 

[ITZC0ATL]

Indeed, many explorers use Captain's Log and it's a great tool (ED Discovery is another great tool for explorers).

If third-party developers and content creators such as Genar or ObsidianAnt quit, then other people will take their place. They may not do the exact same thing, but Elite will continue and people will still develop content and apps for it.

Think of it, for all the posts you see from someone who has played the game for years and sees the flaws so clearly, how many posts are there of new players who find the Elite galaxy a world of wonder? A lot of the problems that long-term players face have not necessarily been faced by newer players. Enthusiastic content creators and third-party developers will come forward and step up to the mantle if there is a gap for them.

Having said all that, it did just look like Genar needed a break! And Obsidian doesn't need to enjoy Elite to cover it, as long as people play it and his videos get views, then he's still earning and building his channel.

 

[Stealthie]

I alluded to a similar feeling in this thread: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showt...is-it-quot-all-happening-quot-in-ED-right-now

TBH, I wouldn't really want to argue one way or the other.
On the one hand, all the stuff you could previously do is still there (aside from a bunch of missions, eh, FDev?) and there's nothing really forcing you to collect mat's and re-engineer ships.
OTOH, there's just been a big update, in the middle of a big "storyline", and there hasn't been a great deal of new content added, so I can see why people might be disappointed.
Sure, there's the new Guardian stuff but that is, basically, just another mat-collection activity.

I'm totally okay with spending time collecting mat's and modding ships but there has to be a reason to do it.
When the 'goids appeared in the Pleiades, I was quite happy to mod' a bunch of ships for jump-range and fit them out to deal with modules to deal with the corrosion.
That was fine, though, because the Thargoid interdictions, attack sites and surface bases provided a use for all those ships and an ongoing reward for the effort.

Right now, I don't see a lot that makes me want to invest the time and effort into building the ships so I can participate in it.

For me, it's not the end of the world because I am happy to potter around, building different ships just to try out different things but I can sympathise with people who feel like there isn't much to really get involved with.

 

[zombieapocalypse]

Let's just start throwing the names of random ED "celebrities" around and wonder what would happen if they got bored of the game...

 

[MarkAusten]

There is one very useful thing provided by Captain's Log 2, the only bit I use if I am honest, and that is the bearing to destination utility for flying/driving to a specific set of coordinates on a planet's surface. Very useful indeed.

 

[[Diplomacy] Carnegie]

The answer is No.
I've just taken a break from ED (at least until I get home from work), so ObsAnt will have to wait in line.

Maybe I should start another 'Is Obsidian Ant next?' thread.

 

[Maka Gucci]

Genar-Hofoen is suffering from burnout after playing for 1-3000 odd hours. It happens.

Nothing more, nothing less. And what he calleds "busy-work", most others call gameplay.

Still defending the grind? I don't now how you do it mate.

Your response to my question of how you go about unlocking the Guardian Plasma Charger, without grinding was to not unlock them. Because you concede yourself that its not possible to unlock them without relative busy work that the player will have mastered long before completion.

Going to the guardian sites, collecting mats, doing the puzzle and unlocking a blue print shard, is game play. The fact that you need to do this 8 times for 1 of the unlocks, is only game play on the most lazy of terms.

OP, has real points, as do Ant, Yamiks and many others. You have said yourself that HGE farming is grindy, and boring, so why do you continue to defend it?

 

[WR3ND]

I agree, but it won't stop me playing a game I enjoy because I can't get a guardian power plant or weapon.

Oh, I'm sure I could get one. There are just other things I'd rather be doing in the game. Leave the rat race to the rats, as they say. Sounds way harsher than I mean it, but kind of funny none the less.

Cheers.

 

[Mengy]

There is one very useful thing provided by Captain's Log 2, the only bit I use if I am honest, and that is the bearing to destination utility for flying/driving to a specific set of coordinates on a planet's surface. Very useful indeed.

EDDiscovery has this too now, and yes it is awesome. I wish it was a feature of the game.

 

[znôrt]

people get it after a while: the galaxy and the ships are gorgeous, the sound is impressive. the rest is just stupid, childish crap.

to enjoy the good stuff in this is game all you need is a small ship, and a forum account for the lulz.

 

[Ralph Vargr]

To clarify the thread:

Ant isn't the one taking a break, Genar-Hofen is. Ralph is simply wondering aloud "what if Ant is next?"

Absolutely correct. I'm not saying OA is going to quit. It was a comparison, not clickbait.

But, when one of the third-party developers gives up on the game, it is, in my opinion, important.

Gennar may well come back. But, the dedication needed to write Captain's log shows he is more than "just another player".

He, and others who support the game through third party utilities, represent the strength of the game's appeal. When it loses that appeal for a significant player/developer, I think it is important.

 

[CMDR ANCALAGON]

For what its worth, I've right at 1000 hours in the game over 12.5 months of playing, am currently 32k ly from my starting point, have reached elite in exploration amost exclusively via sale of cartographic data (the profits from which are also more than those from any other single activity), and in 12.5 months I have made three expeditions of two to three months each.

In the past few weeks I've discovered (first tag) three planetary nebulea and two active volcanic sites (the last one was 100% visual (no scanners) in an SLF, visted hundreds of systems over 15k ly and driven 1.1Mm in the SRV.

I can honestly say that I've never used a thrid party tool for any aspect of exploration, save Q&A on the forums and the neat poster of current catographic data value (which is something one only needs to reference once or twice)

I know a lot of people do, and that is fine of course, but these tools are neither essential nor counted on by everyone.

Guy gets burned out playing a game he enjoyed for quite awhile. Since the game has no actual end, everyone at some point simply quits playing, and since people rarely quit something they enjoy doing, that means that most people have and will quit when it is no longer enjoyable.

Hard to see where the story is here.

 

[Ralph Vargr]

This thread has nothing to do with OA i'm afraid - title is very misleading

I replied below.

 

[Iskariot]

Frontier, you have a major problem:

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showt...y-Lose-Faith?p=6513864&viewfull=1#post6513864

"As of last Friday I'm taking a break from the game until things get better.

It hit me like a hammer that evening as I loaded up the game....

"When you strip out all the busywork, what's left?"

Busywork to me is, for example, materials & materials collection.

In short - there is now too much "gameplay" revolving around materials. And by "gameplay", I mean, boring tedium. Busywork.

The straw that broke the back was when scootling around a few star systems, in order to look for a suitable Material Trader, and opening the Material Trader UI.

Just look at how many materials there are, for a given material type; there are 3 of those - Raw, Data, Manufactured - and there's, what, 30-odd materials per type? It's completely ridiculous the amount of guff needing collected!

Then I happened to glance at the Tech Brokers. First of all I spotted a human tech broker. Then I looked at the unlock requirements and gave those a blank stare. At another starport there was a Guardian Tech Broker. Opened this UI up and that was my breaking point - the sheer quantity of a number of different Guardian materials needed to unlock just one item of Guardian Tech. I pictured what one would have to do - repetitively - in order to garner Guardian materials/data and at that point I just exited the bloody game.

Had a rant on IRC after that. Basically a bit of a metldown. That was last Friday, and haven't played the game ever since.

Frontier, really, the materials/materials collection thing has simply gone awry. It's simply not enjoyable - in fact it's boring tedium. No one sane is going to enjoy, for example, hunting for a star system which might spawn High Grade Emission Signals, travelling to that star system, and basically just milling around for sometimes hours at a time in the hope that HGE's randomly spawn in sufficient numbers. It's just a terrible experience.

No one sane is going to enjoy travelling to a Guardian site and do the same bloody thing again and again in order to pick up sufficient materials to, for example, unlock Guardian Tech from a broker.

Even driving around in an SRV waiting for RNGesus to spawn a material-giving rock is boring tedium.

So say you completely ignore materials/collection, not worrying about engineering or unlocking tech. What's left?

Missions : limited in archetypes, limited in variation, static.

Exploration : jump, honk, and scan - some busywork involved in not flying into stars and not splatting on the ground and refuelling.

Trading : "Move the thing, to the other thing, for space money"

Powerplay : it's probably nice if you're into shifting progress bars around and are into Board Games In Space

I'm probably just very burned out, and/or have seen everything there is to see. Apart from the new Guardian content - after last Friday's exiting the game, I can't even bring myself to load it up again. There is a feeling of "what is the bloody point" and an almost physical feeling of dread just even thinking about loading the game. I've lost the will to keep coding Captain's Log - haven't looked at the code since last Friday either.

So yeah. I'm taking a break."

It pains me to say it, but in general I cannot disagree with you.
I do not at all mind collecting materials. For me the problem has never been the collecting itself, but the uncertainty whether I would have found some of the more elusive materials after an entire afternoon of gameplay. Very often this was not the case. The second huge problem was formed by the engineers commodities. They have now been removed completely, which I think is sad, because I had hoped FDev would add some gameplay to deal with these commodities instead of completely removing them.

I like the brokers, but the exchange rates are somewhat off in certain cases I feel.
And considering the way the Guardian collecting now works I will never ever have a Guardian weapon, because I am just not going to do that.

Having said that, this is of course a game under development. Changes to several core aspects of the game have already been implemented and more is to come.

I have been advocating for a change in the exploration/honk mechanic for a while now. I hope that is coming and I hope the changes resemble something I proposed .

Trading is getting better I think and there is no way of getting rid of what you call "Move the thing, to the other thing, for space money". That in the end simply is what trading/hauling is. It is unfair to criticize ED for that.

PowerPlay I am not really that interested in in its current form. The merit decay mechanic has completely demotivated me, and whether a Power has a few systems more or less does not concern me at all. I also never played PP for the multiplayer, so that is off the list for me too.
What I hope PowerPlay will do in the future is become a tool for my personal narrative. I want to be an agent of a power and do special missions for him/her, get a good standing, earn merits, earn credits, get goodies etc.
But I refuse to be insulted by the current offensive merrit decay system. It makes me want to turn against my own power and shoot a bullet through his/her head. At a certain point (after being rank 5 for 3 weeks) I truly wished that was an option in the game. I really wanted to kill my Power Lavigny Duval. . I then decided to turn my back on PowerPlay.

 

[Jaffz]

Summary: man decides to stop working on computer programme

 

[Ian Skippy]

Dont make me post the steam charts.