This game needs to impose itself upon the player.

[Leper Messiah]

My argument isn't that it cannot be done, but that it's improper to do so.

The game should not be catering to me as a player, but reacting to the character I'm playing. If I'm playing a mild-mannered Joe Blow type, who minds his own business and never sticks his nose into any dangerous situation, most of the game should be pretty easy, barring the occasional random misfortune.

If I want to play a character who can single-handedly shift the course of galactic history...well, I had better be in the top 0.01% of all players in overall ability and determination, otherwise their is no reason for my character to stand out.

Not everyone can be a main character, or even a local protagonist, in a story with a hundred thousand regulars in the cast, and it shouldn't even pretend to try.



The Elite setting should present itself as reality to the characters that exist within it.

A system to make things equal, despite differences in player ability, would not make for a better game. Certainly not in the case of ED, where much of the core gameplay deliberately avoids abstraction.

I was struggling to understand exactly where you were coming from until I read the reply to picocommander....I sort of see what you mean (I think). It's an interesting premise and take on it I must admit. I get the feeling we play games for VASTLY different reasons though!!

Again, you're talking about ship destruction. I'm talking about the game world imposing itself upon the player, so that we have to live in it, rather than it living around us.

Ok, so are you talking similar to what Morbad says above or something else? "The game should not be catering to me as a player, but reacting to the character I'm playing. If I'm playing a mild-mannered Joe Blow type, who minds his own business and never sticks his nose into any dangerous situation, most of the game should be pretty easy, barring the occasional random misfortune.

If I want to play a character who can single-handedly shift the course of galactic history...well, I had better be in the top 0.01% of all players in overall ability and determination, otherwise their is no reason for my character to stand out.

Not everyone can be a main character, or even a local protagonist, in a story with a hundred thousand regulars in the cast, and it shouldn't even pretend to try."

I'm guessing for both of you you'd want Thargoid to NOT be optional other than players leaving the bubble to get away from the attacks? (I'm trying to understand your viewpoints)

 

[Gully Foyle]

easy rememdy: just scale the difficulty in open. make Open more challenging and more complex than solo. that way the Elite: Harmless CMDRs can have their empty theme park, and Open players can actually feel challenged by the environment.

The best fix for Open is to buff all rewards say 5%
I'd love to see galaxy wide bounties come back again like the beta, but FD would have to make them un-gameable. (IE: buddies kill you for coin)

 

[Dillon Fallon]

Fully in agreement with the OP. The last few times my ship was destroyed were due to me not concetrating my shields were down, not concentrating in a white dwarf jet cone and not concentrating next to a Hydra. I'm getting lazy.

Consider Jackson's Lighthouse. There is a warning in the system description about how dangerous it is. When you know what to do it's safe and that's the problem with a lot of things.

Things I'd like to see- black holes should be a death sentence if you get too close, no chance of escape, you just get to see your hull drop until you explode. Jet cone boosts need to have far more risk and start melting your ship very quickly if you stay too long after getting the boost message. I'd also like to see system security in anarchy systems asking for their cut with high value cargo deliveries. I also agree with everyone who says that smuggling has got to have some way of stations negating the win button that is heat sinks/ silent running. More rewards for risky activities and less for hanging round high sec systems doing nothing but legal missions please.

 

[Riverside]

Potentially there could be an environmental difficulty setting that could be player adjustable (in Solo or a group where all participants agree the setting) and inf/rep/rewards could reflect the challenge. We have a very similar approach with missions.

I don't think it would work in Open because any player could jump into the instance with you at any time.

This would make Solo (where you cannot get help from other players) the more hardcore way to play.

 

[Deleted member 115407]

I'm a casual player and cannot grind quickly for engineering. Those that have ground to godboats, more power to them. Most can't fly and Super Meta Killas hunt those with dockin' comps LOL

There's nothing wrong with that. And I'm not saying that I want NPCs to be one-shot instakill AI gankers. I do think they could put a little more effort into harming the player once an interdiction has completed.

But there have been a lot of non-combat related suggestions here too, things that could really enhance the gameplay by making players carefully consider their decisions about how and where they play the game. Like I've said, it's not all about combat.

Nice to hear from you, Gully. It has been a while I think.

I would not be against a somewhat more dangerous ambient environment. For example, all ships should need a minimum of shielding to avoid hull degradation through normal use, and to stave off radiation. It should be possible to fly without, but hull should degrade at rates depending on where the ship is travelling (through asteroid belts and planetary rings: fast degradation, through deep space: slower degradation). Radiation could build up and would need be purged similarly to heat (or allowed to cool off).

But now we can fly near black holes and neutron stars, well near stars in general, with no real issues. And DW2 has built a station at Sag A*! That must be the worlds biggest microwave oven - nothing should be able to live in there. But space is just a pretty backdrop really.

And I miss the more volatile economics of past, and even the more expensive fuel. There was a lot of crying about the hardships of finding viable trade routes back in the days, though, as well as over how short a time they lasted before demand was met.

S

That sounds wonderful

 

[Gully Foyle]

Nerf everything

You missed the psycho NPCS from Hell in 2.5

SARAH come back and crank 'em up!

 

[Deleted member 115407]

I'm guessing for both of you you'd want Thargoid to NOT be optional other than players leaving the bubble to get away from the attacks? (I'm trying to understand your viewpoints)

Operating in or around Thargoid invaded space should be dangerous. So dangerous that players not equipped for it should want to actively avoid it. It should be 100% dangerous at the epicenter, and gradually decrease in danger as you get Ly out... say drop-off to 0% at 15 Ly

As it is now, you can just waltz in all "toodle doo"... no consequences whatsoever.

 

[Gully Foyle]

It's hard to understate difficulty when the mitigations are the defaults.

One has to go out of their way, and force their CMDR to make highly questionable decisions, for there to be any appreciable risk.



It's a multiplayer game that depends on everyone playing by the same rules.

Per-player difficulty is poor game design where all players are sharing the same setting and can interact with each other, even if that interaction is abstracted.

Spot on Cmdr. Repped

 

[RamirezKurita]

I'll try again...I'm ONLY using sport because it's the only place where there is a system to make things fair, I'm not comparing the "game" itself to a "sport". Making the game be hard for one player can make it too hard for another...that is not fair. Elite is a GAME not reality.

And that's why the game needs to have more clearly differentiated difficulties for different activities, rather than everything being basically equal. There's a huge amount of variety in different system states danger classifications, yet in practice they are basically all the same.

An unskilled trader would want to stick to economically stable and high security regions, trading in reliable but low profit goods. Meanwhile, a more skilled trader would be happy enough trading high-value but risky goods in areas that have a wildly fluctuating economy. Combat pilots wishing to trade could instead opt for trading in lawless regions, where they can expect heavy resistance from local pirates every trip they make.

Similarly, bounty farming can be much more differentiated by the different security rating in RESs. Or mercenary pilots could choose their CZ intensity wisely rather than them all basically being the same.

 

[Pville_Piper]

I've spent a fair amount of time in outbreak systems and never once caught space herpes.

Safe sex with a Remlock… Isn't modern technology wonnerful?

 

[Leper Messiah]

sysmon to be fair the station isn't in the same system as Sag a is it...it's 2ly away. I have no idea if that would still be close enough for the radiation to kill though.

 

[Gully Foyle]

I thought you were on to something, until I got to "theme park".

Atomos planets will have raptors riding in coasters. Your Legs will have hair like Kinectimals.
You heard it here fiorst, ya dats da ticket

Z0

 

[Leper Messiah]

Operating in or around Thargoid invaded space should be dangerous. So dangerous that players not equipped for it should want to actively avoid it. It should be 100% dangerous at the epicenter, and gradually decrease in danger as you get Ly out... say drop-off to 0% at 15 Ly

As it is now, you can just waltz in all "toodle doo"... no consequences whatsoever.

Right, I think I'm understanding then, so I was right the only way for players to avoid the Thargoids would be to leave the bubble, not the current totally optional system. Otherwise they run the risk of being in the wrong place at the wrong time in an attacked system? I do see that point and I find it interesting and will cogitate on that. Although first thoughts are FD should have a system to allow players peaceful interaction with the Thargoids that would be remembered and influence how the thargoids interact with the player in future encounters.

I'm also thinking that level of dynamic reaction to a gamer is really hard to program?

 

[Ralph Vargr]

I just enjoy flying a spaceship. I don't need or want the game to be constantly dangerous. I would like perhaps anarchy systems to be more dangerous as well, make it worth routing around them if in a trade ship for example, and of course, good profits if you can make it to the station in one.

NPCs can be dangerous enough when i want them to be. All i need to do is go to a Haz Res or CZ in a smaller ship. Unfortunately, FD added too much in the way of engineering and modules that make ships far too stong (in my opinion), and this has reduced the risk by a lot. There is a limit to how good MoM can make the NPCs so making defenses on ships too strong reduces the risk to players. Its also resulted in PvP fights largely becoming 20 minute long boring fights with people popping SCBs (as long as their opponent doesn't have that engineering thingy for rails) and it taking forever for people to either die or retreat.

Stations will refuse you docking if you are hostile to the faction - or at least they used to. Not sure if you can now request anonymous access if hostile, that would be a change for the worse if so.

I agree with some of your points, but i don't want the game to impose itself on me. I'd like the optional choice of danger. I mean, when i'm drinking then the last thing i need is dangerous NPCs popping up all over the place! I'm enough of a danger to myself.

Perhaps FD need to create a separate version of the game for people like me. Elite: Drunk as a skunk.

Elite: Drunk.

That *would* sell....

 

[Flimley]

Let’s rename it Elite Splendid

Flimley

 

[Leper Messiah]

And that's why the game needs to have more clearly differentiated difficulties for different activities, rather than everything being basically equal. There's a huge amount of variety in different system states danger classifications, yet in practice they are basically all the same.

An unskilled trader would want to stick to economically stable and high security regions, trading in reliable but low profit goods. Meanwhile, a more skilled trader would be happy enough trading high-value but risky goods in areas that have a wildly fluctuating economy. Combat pilots wishing to trade could instead opt for trading in lawless regions, where they can expect heavy resistance from local pirates every trip they make.

Similarly, bounty farming can be much more differentiated by the different security rating in RESs. Or mercenary pilots could choose their CZ intensity wisely rather than them all basically being the same.

Ok I'm seeing the sense in these suggestions rather than an overt difficulty setting, as long as the game coding is done well enough to allow those playing as "Fred Blogs, mundane transport INC" to have an easy life. It should be logical and obvious where the dangers are. Not random stuff.

 

[Dillon Fallon]

Operating in or around Thargoid invaded space should be dangerous. So dangerous that players not equipped for it should want to actively avoid it. It should be 100% dangerous at the epicenter, and gradually decrease in danger as you get Ly out... say drop-off to 0% at 15 Ly

As it is now, you can just waltz in all "toodle doo"... no consequences whatsoever.

I remember when in the 1984 version of Elite when thargoids were an absolute nightmare for a new player. When one hyperdicted you (and this could happen anywhere) it was kill it or it killed you. Then when you get the hang of one, here's two hyperdicting you, then we throw in some thargons as well. Good times.

 

[Iskariot]

Yup, been saying the same thing for ages.

I had a screenshot that sums up the game perfectly. But I lost it. Lol

But here's the gist of it:

"You're not welcome here, enemy!"
*Requests docking permission*
"Docking permission granted"

Ah, here it is. It's old.


Lol

That really should be addressed.

I can understand that they would let you dock because of certain unwritten rules among the spacers.
But the ruling faction should only allow you to refuel and not let you use other functions in the station.
Perhaps when you leave the station one of the minor opposition factions might then contact your ship directly and offer you a mission.

 

[Jakester13]

Everything in this game is too forgiving.

You can escape any NPC simply by boost-boost-jumping away.
NPC Combat is a joke.
Pirated NPCs will literally just sit there and let you pirate them.
Markets are so stable that it's virtually impossible to lose money when trading.
Factions will pay you to find worthless space rocks far-far away that no faction should ever care about.
You can be wanted, with a hold full of the most ludicrous contraband, and you can slip into port just be going silent for a moment (and the traffic controller is like "meh".)
Authority ships are reactive only (they should be all over bounties like stink on...).
Stations are totally passive unless you provoke them.
Thargoids are caged inside USSs, and pose no threat unless you choose to engage them.
Factions hold no grudge(You can descend on a faction like Ghengis Khan, then run a few missions for them and they're like "meh").
Same with superpowers - there is no risk-reward factor when working with/for superpowers (i.e. You can be top rank in both, and they're both like "meh".)
Powerplay is just bad and needs to be completely redesigned.

What did I miss?
In what other ways do you feel that this game fails to impose itself upon you?
How would you like to see this game impose itself upon you to make PvE gameplay more interesting?

Vin

Mainly I agree.

Once past new player stage, the only genuine threat are other folk in Open. Sure there's risky things to do, but you have to choose to go do them.

o7

 

[Lightspeed]

I've just escaped from a Thargoid CZ, with hull corroding in the 20's, out of repair limpets, and desperately trying to make it as fast as possible to the closest station without getting into a loop. Approaching at high speed, hoping for docking permission and landing fast with the hull almost out was ............. exciting ! [woah]

The game still provides its moments at times !