Sick of not knowing!!

Premium synth reloads are dumb. The only time they have much use in PvE is for Hydra because it's a pointless damage sponge with difficulty stacked by more hitpoints and more DPS but not actually doing anything to change the mechanics or improve the AI (ie it's a bad way to stack difficulty, because it becomes a lengthy pointless grind to deal with). Otherwise just learn to use your weapons and balance your ships for the task. Absolutely bizarre that people gulp up this material sink which is just another thing to engage in pointless grind to collect for.

Yeap, pretty much this ^^
If they adjust higher grade interceptors to be less damage sponges, premium ammo could be removed without much impact.
 
Well in that case it is pretty damn evident that the OP should have posted his OP in the PvP sub folder then where all the experts are.

Pretty damn evident that you have no idea about elite as a game and a goldfish memory. You said it yourself two pages ago, that everyone is affected and therefore everyone should discuss it. Now someone changed your mind and you’re trying to patronize the author about what to do with his thread? Do keep up posted about other changes in your perspective!!! 😂
 
I have read all this thread i think..... whilst i am no PvPer i guess you could consider me an interested observer, and afterall it will affect me in my game through PvE.

Morbad makes an interesting point, whilst it makes sense that our ships could detect corrosive damage maybe it doesnt make sense if it could detect a straight out 30% boost to damage, that isnt tied into a chemically detectable side effect.

In some ways perhaps not being able to magically know what peoples gear is would be better (not for PvP but from a verisimilitude kind of way) Perhaps a choice for engineering could then be stealth builds where a ships scan would show a fairly mundane ships build, but it is in reality a wolf in sheeps clothes.

Now, as a carrot to those who like organised PvP.... this is not something i feel certainly David Braben worried about when speccing the game design, however perhaps as a nod to those players, when a ship gets destroyed, so after the fact, and it says you were destroyed by CMDR XYZ, THEN you could look at a detailed schematic of the ship which just beat you....
in a way you could argue this out of game "death" page is not really in game anyway........ so it is ok having a few bits and bobs which are not really part of the game lore anyway.

that way the game stays kind of believable in game, but all the info is available for those who choose to organise "PvP events" within the game.......
 
If you need to use premium synth to meet a PvE challenge either:
A) You would benefit more by building your ship better and/or learning to counter the NPC better.
OR
B) The Devs have contempt for your time by creating difficulty stacking which is countered by grinding to purely increase your damage output and not develop any challenging or engaging gameplay mechanics or skill based function.

There is no way that the player base benefits by premium synth - it is a detrimental addition whatever way you cut it.

Or you're taking on Thargoid ships solo, and want the encounter to end as quickly as possible, because it's really not that much fun and winds up costing you more than the bond is worth.
 
Regarding the imbalance: Ammo synthesis additionally make lasers even less useful, especially with the damage buff of premium ammo.

Edit:
Morbad makes an interesting point, whilst it makes sense that our ships could detect corrosive damage maybe it doesnt make sense if it could detect a straight out 30% boost to damage, that isnt tied into a chemically detectable side effect.
The computer even detects heat from some weapon effects even though they are not visible in the HUD, because their effect is so marginal.
 
Regarding the imbalance: Ammo synthesis additionally make lasers even less useful, especially with the damage buff of premium ammo.

Edit:
The computer even detects heat from some weapon effects even though they are not visible in the HUD, because their effect is so marginal.

I'm just an ignorant peasant, but if you need notfication that you receive increased damage you might need to look at your situational awareness.
 
Morbad makes an interesting point, whilst it makes sense that our ships could detect corrosive damage maybe it doesnt make sense if it could detect a straight out 30% boost to damage, that isnt tied into a chemically detectable side effect.

It's not that it wouldn't be able to detect the damage...our ships can quite precisely detect level of shield and hull remaining, even if it only currently reports them with 1% granularity...but that it shouldn't be able to automatically distinguish from say an unmodified weapon using premium ammo and an OC G3 weapon that is doing the same damage per shot, for example.

I'm just an ignorant peasant, but if you need notfication that you receive increased damage you might need to look at your situational awareness.

The precise level of damage being done really is not often that obvious.

A 30% increase (often less as it only calculates off base damage, if I recall correctly) can often go unnoticed over the course of a fight. There are so many other factors that influence total damage taken over what may be an extremely protracted period.
 

Deleted member 192138

D
Or you're taking on Thargoid ships solo, and want the encounter to end as quickly as possible, because it's really not that much fun and winds up costing you more than the bond is worth.
There are so many bugs around multiplayer instances and Thargoid combat I really wouldn't recommend taking them on in a wing. If you don't enjoy the gameplay at all I don't get why you'd do it. I enjoy combat, I don't want the difficulty to be stacked based around more DPS=more good, I want the difficulty levels to go up based around more complex or engaging mechanics and better AI to confront. There is a whole separate conversation about the credit rewards for combat being stacked heavily against that style of gameplay being consistently sustainable based on itself. But tbh if you've got a reasonable engineered ship for the task and read up on AXI resources you should be able to solo farm cyclops without too much risk to yourself.
 
There are so many bugs around multiplayer instances and Thargoid combat I really wouldn't recommend taking them on in a wing. If you don't enjoy the gameplay at all I don't get why you'd do it. I enjoy combat, I don't want the difficulty to be stacked based around more DPS=more good, I want the difficulty levels to go up based around more complex or engaging mechanics and better AI to confront. There is a whole separate conversation about the credit rewards for combat being stacked heavily against that style of gameplay being consistently sustainable based on itself. But tbh if you've got a reasonable engineered ship for the task and read up on AXI resources you should be able to solo farm cyclops without too much risk to yourself.

I don't particular enjoy combat, thus I try not to combat all that often, and when I do, I want it over as quickly as possible.


This is how I like my combat.


This is how I make myself laugh a little during combat.


And this is combat taking way too long.
 
Elite Dangerous is meant to be a dark, deadly, dystopian future where might makes right and the law of the jungle IS the law of the land.

Sounds close to anarchy to me. Anarchies, historically speaking, do not survive. This would be more pronounced (not less) in case of thousands of inhabited systems, of which many would rely on others to provide food, medicine, certain technologies indispensable to space flight, etc.

Logic dictates that in certain systems, anybody attacking peaceful traders would immediately be hunted down and killed, no questions asked, no response expected, as to turn a blind eye would imperil the entire populace.

This has nothing to do with law of the jungle, and everything with society protecting itself from disintegration (and death). Unless all systems are self-sufficient* (kinda doubt that), at least those systems importing food (and other vital stuff) would be, quite literally, forced to control the trade lanes, or perish. Those exporting food and goods would also lean towards heavy-handed law enforcement, as otherwise, visiting traders would either perish, and therefore, be unable to trade, or stay away in droves, and also impoverish the system.

*Even self-sufficient systems would have to protect their space lanes. There is simply no room in societies for "murder-hobos;" the only ones who condone such behaviour usually apply narrow frames in which it is allowed (being encouraged, under a certain ideology, to brutally murder your (supposedly) unfaithful wife in public comes to mind). There is no other avenue; it is bad enough in a society with simple weapons, which, at most, can only take out a handful of people. A murder hobo, however, who takes down ships carrying vaccines against some kind of deadly disease, could potentially put millions at risk. There would be absolutely no way any government (not even an "anarchy" (an oxymoron; a government CANNOT be an anarchy, as that means, literally, "no rule")) would permit this. The game's explanation that somebody is being shielded from being reported makes sense, but in any other context, realistically, any such person would be dead meat.

Historically, the most brutal punishments were reserved for those disturbing the peace and threatening merchants. In medieval Germany, for instance, robbers would "put on the wheel," i.e., the bones in their limbs would be crushed with a heavy cart wheel, then their (now flexible) arms and legs would be put through the spokes, with the torso and head resting in the centre, providing, and I quote from a book about that (translating on the fly), "noisy entertainment for the spectators expecting a good show." As I have said, in societies that have taken to the stars, this would, again, be necessary to enforce to the hilt.

I'd agree that some regions (should) conform with that, namely, anarchies, which, however, due to that condition, would be extremely unlikely to prosper, as everybody would fend for themselves and not care about others . . . which, as I have pointed out, is deleterious to civilisation.

Edit: Pirate systems might call themselves anarchies, but to be true anarchies, they would need to be ungoverned, with no clear leader, not even a committee. NO rule, remember? ;) That would make them extremely weak, as nobody would take orders from anybody else, i.e., they would be crushed easily by rival gangs that are actually organised.
 
Last edited:
I recently lost a duel that was fairly close, against someone with an identical loadout to one that I frequently fly (so I know how long it takes to kill certain shield configs etc., I focus on the technical in that way). It's possible that he won fair and square, I'm certainly not invincible, but my instincts are pretty good and I think he might have been using premium railgun ammo. I don't mind that I lost, I'm not a bad loser, in fact, it keeps me improving.

The problem is I just don't know... I can't believe it has been so long since this was introduced and still we don't have a way of knowing if someone is using a 30% (THIRTY PER CENT!!!) advantage.

Naturally I'm expecting some to say 'hurr, durr, you can load premium ammo too', but I wouldn't, for two reasons; 1) I don't want to have an advantage over someone who isn't using premium, and 2) If premium becomes the norm for pvp, it becomes EVEN MORE inaccessible to players who don't have the time to constantly grind materials. With the power creep and grind as well as sheer practice level required to be decent at pvp in this game, I feel this is more than a step too far.

This is compounded by the fact that we now have raw material supersites a little way out of the bubble, giving those with time to farm, a huge advantage and basically endless premium refills.

Personally I would prefer that premium ammo is only effective against NPCs and gives no bonus against players, but I would settle for at minimum, a notification that I am being hit with premium so that I can decide if I want to stand and fight at this HORRENDOUS disadvantage.

Anyone else had enough of this? Maybe it's time to be a bit more vocal about it...
Well, the name of the game is Grind... well, it's actually Elite Dangerous, but it might as well be called Grind
 
Sounds close to anarchy to me. Anarchies, historically speaking, do not survive. This would be more pronounced (not less) in case of thousands of inhabited systems, of which many would rely on others to provide food, medicine, certain technologies indispensable to space flight, etc.

Logic dictates that in certain systems, anybody attacking peaceful traders would immediately be hunted down and killed, no questions asked, no response expected, as to turn a blind eye would imperil the entire populace.

This has nothing to do with law of the jungle, and everything with society protecting itself from disintegration (and death). Unless all systems are self-sufficient* (kinda doubt that), at least those systems importing food (and other vital stuff) would be, quite literally, forced to control the trade lanes, or perish. Those exporting food and goods would also lean towards heavy-handed law enforcement, as otherwise, visiting traders would either perish, and therefore, be unable to trade, or stay away in droves, and also impoverish the system.

*Even self-sufficient systems would have to protect their space lanes. There is simply no room in societies for "murder-hobos;" the only ones who condone such behaviour usually apply narrow frames in which it is allowed (being encouraged, under a certain ideology, to brutally murder your (supposedly) unfaithful wife in public comes to mind). There is no other avenue; it is bad enough in a society with simple weapons, which, at most, can only take out a handful of people. A murder hobo, however, who takes down ships carrying vaccines against some kind of deadly disease, could potentially put millions at risk. There would be absolutely no way any government (not even an "anarchy" (an oxymoron; a government CANNOT be an anarchy, as that means, literally, "no rule")) would permit this. The game's explanation that somebody is being shielded from being reported makes sense, but in any other context, realistically, any such person would be dead meat.

Historically, the most brutal punishments were reserved for those disturbing the peace and threatening merchants. In medieval Germany, for instance, robbers would "put on the wheel," i.e., the bones in their limbs would be crushed with a heavy cart wheel, then their (now flexible) arms and legs would be put through the spokes, with the torso and head resting in the centre, providing, and I quote from a book about that (translating on the fly), "noisy entertainment for the spectators expecting a good show." As I have said, in societies that have taken to the stars, this would, again, be necessary to enforce to the hilt.

I'd agree that some regions (should) conform with that, namely, anarchies, which, however, due to that condition, would be extremely unlikely to prosper, as everybody would fend for themselves and not care about others . . . which, as I have pointed out, is deleterious to civilisation.

Edit: Pirate systems might call themselves anarchies, but to be true anarchies, they would need to be ungoverned, with no clear leader, not even a committee. NO rule, remember? ;) That would make them extremely weak, as nobody would take orders from anybody else, i.e., they would be crushed easily by rival gangs that are actually organised.

You're overthinking it.. it's designed to be a lawless place so lawless things can go on. It's not meant to be super-realistic.
 
You're overthinking it.. it's designed to be a lawless place so lawless things can go on. It's not meant to be super-realistic.

Shrugs I know, I'm being pedantic, but those who want the universe to be so terribly dangerous really should keep the consequences in mind. In addition, it is difficult to imagine there would be so many (mass) murderers running around in space, game or no game.
 
They probably should have used the proven successful method of separate pvp and pve servers. Games like Ark do this and it is very nice being able to encounter another player and not worry whether you need to kill them or run.
 
I didn't read whole thread, but for OP I can say that maybe core "problem" is that ED imo isn't made with focus on competitive fighting and there are only some "unspoken" PvP rules whichs acceptation purely depends on each player.
You bring up an excellent point. If I was FD and familiar with what is being said in the forums and reddit etc., I would be extremely cautious about applying a change like the OP is requesting because for all we know, next week the PvP community will decide the premium ammo is the new meta and everyone uses it. Then of course the requests to change everything will start again.
 
IMO, if you release a multiplayer game with PvP you are also required to balance it properly.
A concept most developers seem to understand.

WoW, League, Starcraft, Warframe, Ark, ATLAS, Conan, 7D2D...
I'm always surprised that 20-30% of each update/patch for some of these games are just about game balance.
 
Back
Top Bottom