Does anyone actually enjoy engineering?

[Vandaahl]

They are a bit like space dentists to me.

 

[Tarman]

there will always be people who like watching paint dry, dont judge them

I usually only judge people on their punctuation failures in a purely text-based communication format. o7

 

[EmmyV]

To simply provide feedback, no, I do not enjoy it at all. If it was something I could work on personally. Like a captain working on her ship and doing "A few modifications myself", that would be really cool. But going to yet another selectable menu to equip more things to the sound of an electric power drill? Do not enjoy. I still come back every few months to see if they fixed anything though.

 

[B1rdy]

I agree. This game is just not a 'winning game', something that must really hurt most PVPers and old school gamer. The game just wants to be too nice to everyone, so no one can really lose. And since it's a commercial product and can't risk to frustrate too many players, the game acts - from a gameplay perspective - like a faceless prostitute. It basically fails to get both entertaining and true gameplay into the same boat (something that most MMOs don't get right by the way, but it's rarely that obvious).

I don't actually think ED tries "to be too nice to everyone" in all aspects. The learning curve, lack of ingame information (including tutorials for basic activities), the sheer amount of information needed for Engineering (and not provided in-game - maybe intentional to keep players testing more?), the repetition of certain game loops - surely doesn't cater to all player types. However, due the basic design of the game (3 different, but connected modes, 3 very different careers) it needs balance everything around that. Take inderdicitons as an example, they affect every player. Currently it seems they are tuned that way, that (almost) everyone in every ship can win an NPC interdiciton. Your analogy fits there perfectly.

Edit:

A reasonable assessment of my comment - except that the turd sandwich could be a smoked salmon & cream cheese bagel

By approaching engineering as something that provided an 'upgrade' that I'd like to have the option (yes, it is optional) to gather the materials needed in a way that doesn't have me wanting to pull my own teeth with a pair of pliers comes into my play.

I've been playing a little over 6 months and have the 'easy' engineers unlocked as they provide the upgrades I want, I have no 'need' of combat related engineering so can, for the most part, ignore those engineers as irrelevant to my game plan.

It is for the folk who actually do need those combat-related upgrades (PvP, BH, Pirates etc) as it is part of their play style that the need to rapidly acquire high-grade materials in large quantities that the 'grind' is a real thing, combat play requires a heavily engineered ship to compete on even ground with other engineered ships...

My comment wasn't disagreeing with the 'grind' aspect, solely making the point that I can forgo concentrating exclusively on mat gathering, rank progression etc. as not relevant to the way i wish to play - so no grind needed as I'll pick things up along the way.

Thank you for clarifying.

 

[Deadlock-3000]

Tuning your ship is fine. The problem is the whole process grinds to a halt when you're missing one material that can only be obtained one very specific way in a specific system type with a certain population in a certain state and RNJesus refuses to smile upon you hour after hour after hour.

Blaze your own yawn.

 

[Speedcuffs]

New HGE system is garbage.

 

[babelfisch]

New HGE system is garbage.

Certainly needs to be improved, but the old system wasn't any good either.

 

[DukeIronHand]

Didn’t (or need or want) read 26 pages.
Yes I like Engineering.

 

[Rudal]

Didn’t (or need or want) read 26 pages.
Yes I like Engineering.

Basically it's full of Yes and No's.

 

[B1rdy]

Interdictions are currently in a state where someone with a little experience can even shake off an interdiction attempt (from NPCs) if in the FSS screen. Already happened to me, no problem. Now imagine they would make the interdiction mini-game a true challenge that somehow tries to simulate real combat skills. Not hard to see how this would hurt the current FSS mechanic.

I get the FSS being a separate, somewhat disjointed element can be problematic. However, it should not rule out any challenge. Why is there such a huge gap in challenge when comparing NPC interdictions and player interdictions, anyway? Where is the consistency?

 

[Amargosa]

I get the FSS being a separate, somewhat disjointed element can be problematic. However, it should not rule out any challenge. Why is there such a huge gap in challenge when comparing NPC interdictions and player interdictions, anyway? Where is the consistency?

There shouldn't be? Don't both players have to follow a game-controlled moving target?

 

[Speedcuffs]

Basically it's full of Yes and No's.

And shoehorns.

 

[Ethaidan]

there will always be people who like watching paint dry, dont judge them

If you're not here to judge people, then why are you here?

 

[[VR] M4st0d0n]

Interdictions are currently in a state where someone with a little experience can even shake off an interdiction attempt (from NPCs) if in the FSS screen. Already happened to me, no problem. Now imagine they would make the interdiction mini-game a true challenge that somehow tries to simulate real combat skills. Not hard to see how this would hurt the current FSS mechanic.

Since when did NPCs needed to win the interdiction minigame to still just spawn at your place when you drop off of SC, anytime anyhow anywhere?

I mean, before making a ridiculous minigame harder, they could at least find a wayfor the mechanism to be at least pertinent.

 

[EternalSorrow]

Engineering is an another grindwall now. I've expected it to be something for a ship specializing, when FDev teased us with them, but we got another progression system with an old max-it-all principle. So my answer - Not, in the current shape.

there will always be people who like watching paint dry, dont judge them

Those people influence the product we get, so I think they're not right at all.

 

[[VR] M4st0d0n]

I don't actually think ED tries "to be too nice to everyone" in all aspects. The learning curve, lack of ingame information (including tutorials for basic activities), the sheer amount of information needed for Engineering (and not provided in-game - maybe intentional to keep players testing more?), the repetition of certain game loops - surely doesn't cater to all player types. However, due the basic design of the game (3 different, but connected modes, 3 very different careers) it needs balance everything around that. Take inderdicitons as an example, they affect every player. Currently it seems they are tuned that way, that (almost) everyone in every ship can win an NPC interdiciton. Your analogy fits there perfectly.

Edit: Thank you for clarifying.

Update effectively broke the old mining tutorial... Now when you shoot at a rock, any rock, you need to be in Analysis mode. If you press the trigger, no laser comes out, no paladium chunck is cut.

But the chick insists for you to hatch the Palladium you were so lucky to get. But there is no chunck.

Triple A quality stuff. In Elite, confusion is a feature.

 

[babelfisch]

Update effectively broke the old mining tutorial... Now when you shoot at a rock, any rock, you need to be in Analysis mode. If you press the trigger, no laser comes out, no paladium chunck is cut.

But the chick insists for you to hatch the Palladium you were so lucky to get. But there is no chunck.

Triple A quality stuff. In Elite, confusion is a feature.

It seems you are easily confused.

 

[Amargosa]

Engineering is an another grindwall now. I've expected it to be something for a ship specializing, when FDev teased us with them, but we got another progression system with an old max-it-all principle. So my answer - Not, in the current shape.



Those people influence the product we get, so I think they're not right at all.

At least it doesn't require a raid group to get maxed, unlike in most other games.

 

[Brrokk]

Engineering is an another grindwall now. I've expected it to be something for a ship specializing, when FDev teased us with them, but we got another progression system with an old max-it-all principle. So my answer - Not, in the current shape.



Those people influence the product we get, so I think they're not right at all.

That's funny, I use it for ship specialising. I find that I don't have to "max it all". I think you're just doing it wrong.

 

[Morbad]

I don't really enjoy the Engineering process or the effect it's had on gameplay. However, I do it to stay competitive and because the material requirements are no longer particularly bothersome as of 3.0.

I did burn myself out back in 2.1 when all BPs cost triple what they do now (plus cargo), materials were acquired in single units, and you had a 10% chance of getting any effect at random. Before 3.0 I had 18+ month long engineering projects that ate tens of thousands of materials that I was never able to finish...that were all completed to satisfaction the day after 3.0 dropped. The new system is essentially grind free for frequent players of diverse interestes, which is a huge improvement, but I still don't like gameplay implications of Engineered modules.

Anyway, I read this whole thread, so here a huge wall of text:

And the process of Mining Raw Mats is time consuming enough that if FD were to get rid of the Mat Sites like the crashed Ships, Engineering would instantly become intolerable for me.

You can pull several dozen, if not into the hundreds, of high-grade raw materials per hour from surface deposits without needing any specific mat site or relogging.

I realise that legacy weapons are the biggest issue and legacy thrusters & FSDs are a secondary concern but the vast majority of my legacy modules are things like collectors, shields, utilities and some core components.

All of the ones that exceed what's currently achievable in any way are problematic.

As an activity in itself, then no, not as such. To me that's like asking "do you enjoy the outfitting screen" - it serves a necessary purpose and I'm happy it's there, but it's not what I play the game for.

I enjoy outfitting. Not building the parts I equip in outfitting.

Can understand why many hate the process though, a lot of cmdrs decide they want a certain module engineered, then focus solely on that and complain about grinding.

At this point, the results are more annoying than the process. The inflation is dramatic and it's had a negative effect on many aspects of the game.

I enjoy PvP where skill, not spreadsheets, wins the day.

Everything is a skill.

I prefer games where as broad an array of skills as practical applies to PvP and where strategic planning and foresight matter.

However, I despise arbitrary progression systems, especially in games with low levels of abstraction. I won't play most modern tactical FPS shooters because they feature unlocks and ranks...I still appreciated being able to outwit and prevail against technically superior players in older games in the genre, however. Most games that come down to aim, reflexes, or memorizing power-up locations do very little for me. I was quite good at Quake and UT, but driving an explosive filled jeep I stole into an enemy spawn point in BF1942 was a vastly more satisfying way to rack up kills and help my team than simply out shooting the other side. Spending half an hour trying to get a tank on a destroyer...that was even better.

Not losing (high-waking), is very different from actually winning

Depends on what your goals are.

Might be kinda nice if the PvP "community" got together and made a gentlemen's agreement to ignore engineering though.

That would require there to be a unified community. There isn't one, and could never be one, for such a broad topic.

Do you really love the process or rather the result?

Largely indifferent to the process, mostly despise the result, and all the more so because it's mandatory to remain competitive, directly or indirectly.

How about mats in HGEs, which are more inconsistently than ever before? How about DWEs? Both are the epitome of tediousness for me.

I get most of my top grade materials from missions and metallic meteorites that I'd probably be doing or have stumbled across even if Engineering didn't exist.

Most players do need a meta uber engineered ship for pve to stand a chance against higher ranked npcs. It's only the top 5-10% players at most in games who find pve easy.

The top 1% of NPCs should beat the top 1% of CMDRs half the time in a fair fight.

This is pretty much what I hear from all the newcommers I have brought into the game.

Well, they don't know how much better some aspects worked before Engineering.

For example, my BattleConda has passenger cabins, not because I use it for passenger missions, but because I built it to mimic an actual ship (ex-Navy IRL), which means crew quarters.

Passenger cabins aren't crew quarters, they are passenger cabins. I'd presume the ship's hull and life support module covers any reasonable number of basic crew accommodation.

Without the third party tools ED would already be a dead game - can you honestly imagine trying to do any reasonable amount of engineering (of EITHER version) without them?

I've done the bulk of my Engineering post 3.0 with minimal references to 3rd party tools.

Of course by the time 3.0 dropped I had largely memorized everything and had already done several thousand mods.

So why give players engineered modules that have such power that 10 second kills are possible

I had way more ~10 second kills before Engineers than after. Catch someone who wasn't paying attention with a quad fixed beam Viper in 1.0 and they were gone by the time you drained your WEP cap.

They usually nerf stuff real fast that is considered exploiting, don't they.

Hardly.

The power level of the engineers is cheating.

That's not how cheating is defined.

I have huge problems with the inflation, but it's objectively false to call something that both functions, and is being used, as intended, cheating.

Try to do it FAOff.

200km over a 4g planet.

All I ask for now is that they get rid of raw material requirements that force you to do SRV planet rock hunting and data material wake scanning. These are garbage activities that nobody likes. Why force people to do them?

I have upwards of 18000km in the SRV on live and about 25000km total. I like driving the SRV quite a bit.

I don't do much wake scanning. Most of my Datamine Wake Exceptions come from encoded signal sources or trade.

Engineering was added to try and mend the cookie-cutter results of having no real player-driven crafting system.

I hate video game crafting systems and I had fairly unique (and successful) loadouts before Engineering.

It's one thing in supercruise, but in normal space a ship the size and mass of a Navy destroyer should not be whipping around like it's a radio-controlled airplane.

If they still have thrust to weight ratios of ten-to-one, they should.