Thank you so much. I don't that it is (much of) an exaggeration to say that you just changed my life.
Thank you, Commander.
o7
Fleet carriers are a epic fail in one word
- Thread starter Vicktore Beskor
- Start date
Thank you so much. I don't that it is (much of) an exaggeration to say that you just changed my life.
Thank you, Commander.
o7
Old Duck will never drop the mic. You're all are stuck with Old Duck forever and ever and ever and ever! (Though I do put the mic in the closet from time to time.)
You're only ever an ignore button away
EDIT - oops, wrong thread!You're only ever an ignore button away
I'm likely years away from being able to sniff in the direction of owning one of these inane behemoths, but concur: Why would a player drop billions of in-game credits on such a monstrosity, just so some other player in-game could get his jollies destroying it while said player was off-line? Who the heck would buy the things in such a case?
Oddly, I'd have suggested the entirely opposite argument on whom might be responsible for us not having fun, Dangerous, things...
But then, I'd not see the need for surrogate expletives either
Ummmm... you do realise that open is not a dedicated PvP mode? Just askin'
Deleted member 182079
D
I'm hopeful that FD will add a filter of sorts in the system map (although there's no filter option at all so not sure how easy that is to add for them), though it's really only an issue for player hotspot systems - in my current system (2bn+ population) there's just one other carrier, this is ~20Ly from Founders World.
The filter in the nav panel was only added recently, as its omission was noted in one of the Betas. Although that also hides your own FC if it's in the same system. But it's useful in busy systems and I'm glad they added it.
To answer your above question, it took me a short while to work this out as the FC marker confused me at first - the FC marker is for your own carrier. To see which systems have FCs present, there's a new option in the Galmap filter section (bottom I think called "Carriers" - where you can select state, economy, etc.). The systems will show as yellow dots if enabled.
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Matter of taste. But now i am curious: can you please give me an example of a game where RL-time based upkeep (very different from ingame-time based upkeep) actually was a positive factor? I above mentioned some examples of games, which for actual reasons did have a RL-time based upkeep. I explained why they had it, but also gave examples of the negative impact.
Next to that, i also gave examples on how ED could have handled things better, without having the negative impact. So, which games would it be, where the mentioned RL-time based upkeep, which keeps ticking down when you are not logged in, actually was positive, without having to pay the price of reduced customer retention and feeling hostile to the returning player?
This one is funny. After i pointed out how FD failed their own design goals, you just add new ones. And you would be right, if upkeep would be the only option to achieve the goal.
But now we can ask two questions.
First: Does it actually meet the design goal you now state? I dare to say that it does not. What we now have does not force you to limit your choice. You merely have to suck a little longer on one of the several fountains of unlimited credits the game by now has. So, grind a little longer, pack everything. No need to choose. Goal not met.
Second: Would there be better alternatives? And i dare to say that yes, there would be. If limiting what the player brings is the goal, you could have predefined outfitting suites. You could have a slot system, perhaps even a weighted one. These are just two examples of what would be possible. While they may seem random, the first represents our SLF options, the second is our current ship outfitting system, which for years reliably made sure that we don't have the 900 ton cargo eagle.
And it's not hard to come up with other options. You don't even need to invent them yourself, there's plenty of games out there, which have a variety of different mechanics to give you options., while still putting limitations on them. Just take a look around, see how they work, what they do well and where they fail and pick the suitable one for the problem at hand.
I have not made examples on how things would be, i have brought up examples of what i have already experienced to happen. I stated in which games i saw it happen, i stated on the circumstances (as far as i knew them) on why it happened. I am sorry if what actually happened seems exagerated to you, but that's not my fault.
On this i dare to re-iterate myself:
Now look at what ED does. No matter if the owner of the FC then looses all 5 billions or if he gets 4 billions back, the message still is: "How dare you return! We took your stuff, now get lost!"
Indeed you can say that by not taking away everything, it's not -as bad- as the examples i experienced in the past. By mere numbers, you are right. If you are a bot, then by all means, stick to your point of view and i am utterly wrong. But most of us players up to now are still human. And humans most commonly, especially when playing a game, react like humans.
Of course i can't tell about you specifically, but i can say that at least according to my personal experience, somebody returning to a game and first of all getting the message that the game took something away from him for being away for too long, the game already is in a very bad position. When somebody enters a game, he usually wants to have fun. And first of all getting the message "you were away for too long, so this is how we punish you" is not exactly the most fun he can have.
People are different. Some shrug it off and play anyway. But most humans will react in a very human way, find that the first thing the game gives them for returning is a punch in the face and decide that it's not worth it. There are other games out there, which are more than happy to have an old player back. (See the example of STO i gave. ) So it's those games which will have the player and his money.
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This, in my mind, is serious exaggerating.
To me, what it might says is:"You were away too long, we were not sure if you were ever coming back. We had to delete your carrier (which you knew might happen), here's what you've paid for it minus the accumulated debt. Rest of your stuff is ok."
Honestly the biggest inconvenience of coming back to find your carrier gone is that all your stuff has been dumped somewhere, and depending on how far out you were at the time, it might be inconvenient or expensive to fetch it.
In your eyes, purely on the numbers: yes. I merely describe how most humans, according to my experience, read such things.
And just like the other things, this would be avoided by merely despawning the thing instead of scraping it.
Never mind, Vicktore, I'm sure no nasty, indestructible, Fleet Carriers carrying a bunch of invaders are likely to arrive in your Home System.
Well, not today anyway
But, that said, thank you for sharing your opinion.
Well, not today anyway
But, that said, thank you for sharing your opinion.
If participation is optional and people are presented with clear and just rules upfront they rarely react in such dramatic way.
that's not bad idea, actually.
Carriers did "take away" the considerable dev time and resources spent to design, implement, and test them, so they're not exactly without cost to the game.
That's what one might think or want to think. But my experience is different. I mean, i gave examples where stuff happened. You were not required to have a house and store things there in the mentioned games, either. And the people were aware of the upkeep, some kept things fine there for years, till random stuff happened, which kept them away from the game for too long.
The observed reaction never was like "oh, i knew the rules, it's fine, i am so glad i can start over". Not once. Instead it always resulted in the player migrating to another game. Usually after contacting customer support, a lot of cursing and sometimes with taking the guild along.
Quite true. And they are made for a limited part of the playerbase. I still am astonished that there was zero, nada, nilch, for the regular player. During the beta i still was hoping that they'd have at least some small goodies prepared and would just not show them off, so they'd be the nice surprise at launch. After nothing happening for so long for the average player, any small goodie would've made a huge difference.
Instead there was nothing. Which again, translates badly. I mean i mentioned it above: i very much expect my friends, when gaming on this weekend, ask me about the new ED patch and what's up there. And i will have to tell them that there is nothing, not even a tiny quality of live upgrade, included in it, which would be for them. The complete absence of anything for the average player implicitly carries the message that FD doesn't care for them.
Also, having to say that there's absolutely nothing of interest for them doesn't really support my cause of spending another evening with them in ED. While there's plenty of other games out there, which put lots of effort into catering for more casual players.
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Yes, I understand those feelings, but that's all because you might feel that you've lost too much to bother repeating game loops again to get back to the point where you were. It's like loosing a save in a game where you've made considerable progress - usually people don't feel like doing it again and they move on.
I get that, but I think Elite is not that case, because you don't loose that much. You barely loose anything. Some credits.
implying they were tested
"Look, at that sweet fleet carrier.. Ugh, look at him go. Probably spent hours working for it.. Loser."
// Fires at the FC //
"WHAT? THEY ARE INDESTRUCTIBLE TOO?! But my vengeance and hurt feelings! ~~"
// proceeds to loudly complain on the forums //
Joking aside, as many Commanders have already pointed out, it's an all positives no negatives free addition to the game for people who can afford it.
I don't own a Fleet Carrier yet, but I'm definitely looking forward to buying one soon enough.
If those carriers were destructible, then that would've definitely been a world of pain.
I'm glad ELITE is not EVE
// Fires at the FC //
"WHAT? THEY ARE INDESTRUCTIBLE TOO?! But my vengeance and hurt feelings! ~~"
// proceeds to loudly complain on the forums //
Joking aside, as many Commanders have already pointed out, it's an all positives no negatives free addition to the game for people who can afford it.
I don't own a Fleet Carrier yet, but I'm definitely looking forward to buying one soon enough.
If those carriers were destructible, then that would've definitely been a world of pain.
I'm glad ELITE is not EVE
I agree about the filter, really hoping for that. Have to disagree about it just being hot spots, though - I'm up at Colonia, there were seven in a line last night, then I went to several other large station systems and the lowest I found was two and an average of four. Between that already being unrealistic and changing the feel of systems for the worse, the names were also often immersion breaking and stupid, took me out of the space moment, and sometimes unpleasant. I won't repeat the unpleasant, but 'monkeybottom' and 'fleety mcfleetface' did nothing for my enjoyment, indeed they detracted from it. It's the first thing they have done which has set my experience back and set me thinking that maybe my Elite time is up. That system map filter you mention is essential, to me, or I'll have to look elsewhere (which would make me really sad - I'm a 1980s Elite player with a lot of time in ED, I could afford a carrier just don't want one. So I'm every bit as committed to the game as anyone else, my views are relevant. Gameplay which ruins the experience of some is worthy of note and attention. A filter would sort it, I absolutely don't begrudge others having fast travel posts etc. I just don't want to have to have it ruin the previously-authentic feel of the universe).
I guess we just have to agree to disagree then. As said, you look at the numbers, i look at how i've experienced people to react. Several times. The losses in other games in many cases also were not impossible to recover. But it's the message that mattered: "you are back, here is your punishment." And that just competes badly to many other games, see the STO example i gave, which actually spent a lot of effort to reward and support the returning player, to make him immediately feel welcome again.
All the stuff implemented to make returning players more welcome have costs behind them. They are some important investment and those games wouldn't have done that, if they would not be convinced that being welcoming to returning players and thus making him feel at home again would be worth the effort.
In contrast, FD went for a punishing mechanic. Which as described above, could have been avoided. Put operating costs on the thing based on in-game activities. Despawn it if the player has not logged in for a week. Restore it to its old position (or when the slot is taken, to the next free slot nearby) when the player returns. If the ship was moved, give the player the message that the carrier had to move during his absence. Any player will understand that.
All damage mitigated or avoided, while achieving the intended goals and even doing that better than the current implementation.
Anyway, all of this was also duscussed in the bata forums. FD had access to all of this already early in pase 1. (Before that, nobody of us knew which terrible route they decided for, so we couldn't give feedback. ) They decided to ignore it. It's just sometimes sad to see what they do, knowing that any game director with a bit of experience in online games of the last 20 years, would have easily avoided these pitfalls.