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TBH I don't really get the solo mode in ED. The game is inherently a multi-player experience - solo play seems as contradictory as an RPG being forced to have an unnecessary online mode by a publisher just so they can feature it in the marketing. I know others value this mode but I can't see myself ever using it.
Excellent point. For example Harlan Ellison is a talented author who has been a real pinprick about wanting to get paid for everything - if someone says his name he wants a quarter
. He's brought numerous lawsuits alleging someone stole his idea. He won't even give an interview without being paid. After listening to him rant about it I decided: I will never pay for anything that he will make money from.That's easy. It is depriving (cheating) them of potential targets. I actually had a numpty in a previous thread claim that someone playing solo was "cheating me of my immersion"
Agreed! Just like Elite, Frontier E2, and Frontier FE were.... er...wait...
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ED is not those other games though and Frontier are clearly pitching this new game as a cooperative experience, even if that cooperation is limited to just being in the same galaxy as everyone else rather than actively demanding that you group with others all the time. I do understand that anyone viewing the new game primarily through their experiences with the old ones may not see the reason why it is this way (ED is my first Elite so I don't carry those associations, for better or worse). In which case, well, there is this solo but-not-quite-solo mode where you can pretend other people don't exist!
Well I'm on a shrimp boat right now and the internet really sucks. The company pays over 3k a month for satelite uplink thats rated at 15kbs. When You have three people connected to a 15kbs system I can assure You offline play is a must. So stop with the attitude because some of us can't afford high speed internet considering it would probably cost more than 15k a month. As a matter of fact I know one vessel that doesn't have a cap and their bill runs 800 dollars a day when someone games on the system.
Simple solution, which may already be in the DDF, is to prevent a player from switching to anything other than the all/all group until the bounty is cleared.
Right now you can only choose the method of grouping at the login screen and I think this should remain, I am certainly in favour of solo online as I think this reduces the barrier for people at least getting their feet wet in a multiplayer environment, take that away and Elite may as well have been sold and marketed as a single player game imho because offered the choice I suspect most will choose single player...
Do you have any statistics from any game delivered by a developer where single player or multiplayer is offered as a choice stating which is the most popular?
He has access to stats going back to the original Il2 '46, and yes I suspect ED will be higher (I agree), that wasn't the point actually (the figure of 5%), but you've made the point I was trying to make and os it is certainly of interest. If you go to the forums one could easily get an impression that multiplayer is the most popular, that's another point. Yes, even the percentage of forum posters is going to be small compared to the actual playerbase.
Frontier won't really know how popular each mode is until after release for certain, although I am sure they have a trend in place already. I suspect the single player mode may well end up more popular and really, other than people there is not much different between the modes (other than completely offline).
OK You definitely have a point there. On the front page of the website they use the term "massively multiplayer" at least twice, and don't make much mention of the solo side. But they have made it clear that they are making the game to be played either way. I suppose you could even make a case that solo online is still an MMO since your actions will effect the persistent game world.
It will absolutely not be dead, but it will fluctuate in demand and supply as well as missions and whatever things happening. This is how the original games were, so of course offline solo will have that too.
I don't mind people playing solo mode, even offline.
What I do mind is, if it's possible, if someone plays solo, gets a gazzilion credits then goes and buys the meanest ship in the game, arms it to the teeth and comes to open mode to pvp and brag how awesome he/she is, all the while I've been fighting the good fight in open mode earning my creds and reputation.
There should be a clear distiction between solo and open modes in stats, credits, ships and equipment.
What I do mind is, if it's possible, if someone plays solo, gets a gazzilion credits then goes and buys the meanest ship in the game, arms it to the teeth and comes to open mode to pvp and brag how awesome he/she is, all the while I've been fighting the good fight in open mode earning my creds and reputation.
There should be a clear distiction between solo and open modes in stats, credits, ships and equipment.
The reason you are confused is because you think that the open group will be harder to make creds than solo.
That is incorrect. Creds will be slower to build in solo because some of the most lucrative money making methods in ED will be easier and perhaps only possible when multiple players perform the task.
You don't even need to wait for the next beta or release to see that effect. Go find a buddy and start harvesting cash from NPC anacondas. You'll make a lot of money very quickly compared to trying the same thing alone and certainly more quickly than trading with anything but the Lakon 9.
With more content this will continue to be the case. Want to trade in a dangerous system for max profit? Much easier with a friend or two. Want to perform the dangerous missions for big bucks, you need a friend or two.
Solo mode will just make it harder to get at all the content and progress. People need to get over their feeling that this is a pvp shooter - ED is not that game.
Toad.
I disagree. What you posted can work both ways. In solo a lucritive route will stay for longer since only one player is harvesting it. An assasination mission will be easier to do since in open in your "island" the target might be eliminated by another hunter so you need to keep searching. In solo either there will be no group missions or you can hire npcs. In open and solo you can get away from npc pirates rather easily, but in open a pc pirate cannot be fooled with a couple of boosts.
Sure both types of modes have their pros and cons, but for me, I'd rather they are distinctly seperated.
Well my answer to those points is :
Solo-trading - solo online is still affected by the greater ED universe. The solo player will be affected by the dynamic trading environment just like open group players. The question then becomes, will PvP piracy have much of an impact on trading? I think PvP piracy will have less than 1% effect on trade and most of the trade impact will be due to dynamic economy (as it has been in beta 1) and NPC piracy. NPC piracy is mitigated by playing with friends/allies. Hence my conclusion that solo-online trading will not be as lucrative as playing online with support from others.
Missions - FD's plan for missions is that they will be a sliding scale. First missions might be doable solo but as you progress, the difficulty ramps up. It's not the case that someone steals your mission and completes it - its that a mission path/story you choose to follow will be difficult to complete without help. This is basically how diablo 3 works and its a rather nice system. Play alone, you might win but you won't win as big as playing in a stronger group.
In terms of boosting from combat - well this is beta 1 and that particular issue is well understood and also considered to be placeholder for this beta. I don't give that issue a second's thought right now.
Toad.
I was not reffering to pvp especialy, but more to the whole multiplayer aspect of the game. Even if pc piracy affects only 1% of trade, which I doubt it, pc trading will have a much larger impact. In my previous post I mentioned the speed in which a specific profitable route "dies out" after it's been harvested to death by players. In solo this will take much longer as the only competition is npc traders. Sure in open mode there are more chances for a "new" route to be opened, but how does this happen? Mostly by player interactions, and player interactions are messy and difficult.
So I come back to pvp, you can't assume that a battle against a pc is the same against an npc. Pcs have a brain, what ever that means, but npcs just follow a script. Even if they nerf boosting or whatever else, after many battles with npcs eventualy paterns arise that a pc can idetify and counter, can't say it works the same way with pcs.
I understand that in the full game the whole galaxy is going to be a very big place and finding other players is going to be a challenge on it's own, but major trade routs will always be a juicy target, and where there is profit there will be players and where there will be players there will be fights.
This for me is the big difference of solo and open and why I think open is harder to play that solo.
So I come back to pvp, you can't assume that a battle against a pc is the same against an npc. Pcs have a brain, what ever that means, but npcs just follow a script. Even if they nerf boosting or whatever else, after many battles with npcs eventualy paterns arise that a pc can idetify and counter, can't say it works the same way with pcs.
I understand that in the full game the whole galaxy is going to be a very big place and finding other players is going to be a challenge on it's own, but major trade routs will always be a juicy target, and where there is profit there will be players and where there will be players there will be fights.
This for me is the big difference of solo and open and why I think open is harder to play that solo.
No, it doesn't matter if you are in Solo, Private or All you are all playing in the same galaxy, as has been explained repeatedly.
As a primarily single player who is not really into PVP, I can understand peoples concerns. My experience so far of the Beta, its no bothered me as I have rarely seen a lot of players. This may change further upon release.
But I generally think this game is not going to attract as many idiots as other Multiplayer/MMO as it got quite a steep learning curve and how many of the kids or idiots are going to have a decent Joystick setup. They may get to frustrated earlier on in the game.
At the moment I will carry on with online, but may change further along the line, I have fairly decent connection so I am always online. I also think Star Citizen will attract the more casual gamers with the main user base being Americans. Like many other have said I have been waiting 15 years for this to be made.
But I generally think this game is not going to attract as many idiots as other Multiplayer/MMO as it got quite a steep learning curve and how many of the kids or idiots are going to have a decent Joystick setup. They may get to frustrated earlier on in the game.
At the moment I will carry on with online, but may change further along the line, I have fairly decent connection so I am always online. I also think Star Citizen will attract the more casual gamers with the main user base being Americans. Like many other have said I have been waiting 15 years for this to be made.
Agreed; the gaming modes would have to be "detached" from each other. So if you want to play solo offline, you'd have to run a local gamesave too, thus not gaining in the online universe.