News 2.3 Dev Update

[DialBforBiscuit]

I really second this. I see how it might be tedious to require that the skipper and his crew meet up at a particular station to embark on a journey (or even bring them back to their own ship later), but just magically "zapping" through the entire galaxy takes it way too far.

If someone wants to make that journey, they'll make it. If they zap on over and cheapen it (which probably wont feel that way to everyone) that's their own fault. The zapping to someone else's ship is a 2 part choice. Both by the helm and the joiner. The consequences of that choice is on them. The game's design shouldn't be shaped just to prevent some random person from being slightly less awestruck by a distant star.

How about we allow players to log off while traveling aboard another palyer's ship, and log back on to the same ship later?

This would be more developer work to achieve the same end result, with very little change in player experience. The main pilot spends his time flying out to a point. Friend pops in. The instant join features just removes the meet up and drop off time. Which means more time is spent on the objective and shared experience, which is where the game is strong. Lets focus more on the positive aspects of game, and less on making life harder for players.

 

[CMDR Zx]

This is looking awesome. Can't wait for the Beta

 

[Paramemetic]

As for the "well I just don't want people to burn out by being able to join people in Sag A* and Beagle Point and Colonia and running out of things to do" line, I would also point out that "running out of things to do" is not what burns people out in Elite, it's the hours and hours and weeks and months of grinding before you can even get to the point where you might have a reasonable chance to spend yet further days and months doing something that is ultimately just "going to another system and checking a box" that burns people out.

Burnout doesn't come from checking the boxes. Burnout comes from all the nonsense repetition before that. You want to fly a Corvette? It's a slightly more maneuverable Anaconda with less firepower. If you want to fly it you can go ahead and strap in for a few months of effort. Flying Corvettes doesn't burn people out. Getting Rear Admiral does. Is gating content behind playing a good idea? Yes. I think the grind is a bit excessive but you should be able to earn better ships and such by playing the game. But people aren't burning out because they are getting a Corvette and a Cutter and then "welp I've flown all the ships I'm burned out now." They are burning out trying to get over all the hurdles.

It's like looking at a guy running a marathon and being like "man crossing the finish line must be exhausting." Crossing the finish line is good and cool and fun! It's the rest of the marathon, and all the training and so on, that is exhausting. Don't confuse the two.



Nobody is going to go "welp I logged into Elite and now I've been to Beagle Point and Sag A* so I guess that's it, game's over" while they have a sidewinder or whatever. The "we don't want people to finish the game too early" argument is completely disingenuous and silly as heck. If they like being a fighter controller or a gunner, then they will play the game any time they can be a fighter controller or a gunner.

You know what will stop people who like crewing from playing the game?

When they can't be a fighter controller or a gunner because their friend with the Cutter flew halfway across the bubble and they don't really feel like doing 20 jumps to meet him.

 

[BurnyBurns]

My problem with the multicrew update is that it is only focused on combat. So basically useless feature for me. With or without telepresence. There were just so many possibilities in multicrew but it seems that FD took the easy way. Can't even describe how frustrated I am.

And what I find really sad is that even Star Citizen in it's super buggy alpha state offers more multicrew possibilities at the moment.

How dare you come in with some actually important and valid concern?! Can't you see we're on our holy crusade to duck up for everybody else how they are allowed to enjoy the game, because our personal immershun RP conditions only allow for one correct way to play the game: our own! Disagree? You filthy CoD kiddy, you! In the end you're going to tell us you're not at least 40 years old and didn't play the original back in 1984.


Have some rep.

 

[Apec Valorian]

I've said this before and I'll say this again. People who choose to do this don't need either of you to protect them from their own decisions. I shouldn't have to point this out to anyone

You're totally missing the point. This is not about what others do -- this is about my experience of the game.

If there is a canonical option to insta-zap myself to a different location, then it changes the value I assign to embarking on a genuine no-zap journey to, say, Sagittarius A*. Because hey, if I just want to see it, I can insta-zap myself there. And that erodes the whole package that motivates me to go there the old-fashioned way.

To put it in modern gaming lingo, travelling to Sagittarius A* unlocks two achievements for me: "Been There", and "Done That".

With insta-zap available, "Been There" will cease to be an achievement, and I'll have only "Done That" to motivate me to actually embark on an old-school no-zap trip there.

 

[Maitolee]

As for the Puzzles, they may well be on the forums and on Discord - but that is hardly the same as being able to quickly jump in at the Formidine to check out the settlements, and then head to the Alien Ruins to help with a puzzle is it?

The underlying point is that the Elite galaxy is HUGE. And as it continues to grow, and as interesting things are located at ever further distances, eventually huge amounts of content is going to be locked off from people. Instant-join crew allows people to experience this, and because it is only temporary (you go back to your point of origin at the end of the session), Frontier's current solution can alleviate the above problems without compromising the size and scale of the galaxy. If you want to go there for real, then you still have to travel.

Wouldn't it be equally real if you are onboard a ship that is there? With no need to travel.

I've being reading about the puzzles and ruins and Formidine Rift, also about explorers doing days and weeks long travels to reach certain distant region. There is no other game that let you do this. Reading about this is what pushed me to try exploration, and I'm loving it. If I could have gone there instantly teleporting to a friend's ship I would not have even though about it. I would have missed a great part of the game.

Some time ago I played Dark Souls on PS3. There was an exploit that let you improve your character stats easing the battles. I just gave it a try and it changed the game so much for me that it killed the experience, I ended up stopping playing it. I though Frontier was encouraging people to learn exploration by adding outside bubble content (ruins, etc), but now there is no need anymore, look for someone there and pop in his ship. Then people will keep complaining that there are few mechanics in the game.

Answer: Exactly as much as you want it to be. Relish the way there? Go, play your way through the hundreds of loading screen. Don't? Well, don't.

I don't want to spend time on ranking or doing missions to get credits, I just want to log in 10 minutes and have a fully loaded Corvette. You cannot prevent me from playing the way I want.

I think you can't argue that way. There is people saying (myself some pages ago) that there could be a middle point between speeding up friend meeting and instant teleporting anywhere in the galaxy.

 

[Paramemetic]

My problem with the multicrew update is that it is only focused on combat. So basically useless feature for me. With or without telepresence. There were just so many possibilities in multicrew but it seems that FD took the easy way. Can't even describe how frustrated I am.

And what I find really sad is that even Star Citizen in it's super buggy alpha state offers more multicrew possibilities at the moment.

I think I'm going to park my Cutter to Beagle point once I reach it if these announced multicrew features are all that FD has to offer for 2.3.

I don't disagree with you, the multicrew options are very combat heavy. What are some of the ideas you have had for non-combat oriented multicrew?

One of the biggest weaknesses I think for planning this kind of thing for Frontier is that there is really only two ways of interacting with objects in Elite and it is to shoot them or scoop them up. You can either shoot a thing with guns or with scanners, or you can scoop those things up. That is all you can do.

So it is difficult to imagine a multicrew option that is fun for all of the players involved when the main actions for interaction are "shoot a thing or scoop it up." Shooting a thing is combat, scooping it up is only compelling for the pilot. The game as it is right now simply does not have any other options.

It is unfortunate for explorers, for example, I get that. Like, exploration involves jumping around a bunch of places, then shooting planets in supercruise with a scanner. That's what it is. It's fun and neat sometimes for a while but I have no idea how you could divide up the activity of "fly around in supercruise looking at things" to more than one person in a way that is compelling and run for everyone involved.

So I don't think it's really that Frontier is weak on this, but it's that a lot of explorer types (for example) complain about how there isn't much content, and there isn't, but I don't know what would be something that is fun enough for enough people to be worth implementing while the majority of players prefer doing other things, given that the options are "shoot a thing or scoop it up."

Please understand I'm not trying to go hard at you or anything here and tell you you're playing the game wrong, I think there should be other things we can do - it would certainly make CGs and storylines more interesting if you had more actions than "shoot" or "scoop," but I am at a loss for what could be a fun mechanic that works within the engine which a lot of people would enjoy (by which I mean having a very small niche activity would not be fun: you can't make a crew role "work the nav map" because that involves clicking a thing every half hour or so, which isn't something many people will find fun).

 

[Chrysophylax]

You're totally missing the point.

I didn't miss the point at all. 'I second that' when 'that' is 'being able to jump into somebody's ship even though your far far away might well lead to early burnout for some' doesn't leave much room for interpretation tho. You expressed yourself poorly, it happens.

With insta-zap available, "Been There" will cease to be an achievement, and I'll have only "Done That" to motivate me to actually embark on an old-school no-zap trip there.

This is the sort of thing best kept to oneself instead of being used as an argument for why 'insta-zap' is a bad thing.

 

[jolrag]

Wouldn't it be equally real if you are onboard a ship that is there? With no need to travel.

I've being reading about the puzzles and ruins and Formidine Rift, also about explorers doing days and weeks long travels to reach certain distant region. There is no other game that let you do this. Reading about this is what pushed me to try exploration, and I'm loving it. If I could have gone there instantly teleporting to a friend's ship I would not have even though about it. I would have missed a great part of the game.

Some time ago I played Dark Souls on PS3. There was an exploit that let you improve your character stats easing the battles. I just gave it a try and it changed the game so much for me that it killed the experience, I ended up stopping playing it. I though Frontier was encouraging people to learn exploration by adding outside bubble content (ruins, etc), but now there is no need anymore, look for someone there and pop in his ship. Then people will keep complaining that there are few mechanics in the game.



I don't want to spend time on ranking or doing missions to get credits, I just want to log in 10 minutes and have a fully loaded Corvette. You cannot prevent me from playing the way I want.

I think you can't argue that way. There is people saying (myself some pages ago) that there could be a middle point between speeding up friend meeting and instant teleporting anywhere in the galaxy.

you are right !!! and the way to the "easy play" is unfair for players like you and me who's spend a lot of time to reach our own objectives ... exploring all the features of the game ...and it's the best way to kill the game ... today guys want all without difficult ... why are they playing so ? if a guy go to explore the galaxy he must assume the fact he will fly alone and must return in the human sector to fly with allies ... i have spend a lot of time to upgrade my corvette at full grade 5 ing rank in all modules and weapons ... a lot of missions, a lot of farming ... you have spend a lot of time to explore the galaxy too ... you're respect the game and the telepresence dont respect your game time ... totally unfair ... not coherent ...this is not the fun of elite dangerous ... elite dangerous is a spacesim ... not an arcade game.

 

[Paramemetic]

Wouldn't it be equally real if you are onboard a ship that is there? With no need to travel.

I've being reading about the puzzles and ruins and Formidine Rift, also about explorers doing days and weeks long travels to reach certain distant region. There is no other game that let you do this. Reading about this is what pushed me to try exploration, and I'm loving it. If I could have gone there instantly teleporting to a friend's ship I would not have even though about it. I would have missed a great part of the game.

I have not done any of this, won't do it, don't plan on it. Have an organization with 700 dudes. We have maybe 20 people who have done any of this stuff. I might consider doing some of these things if it didn't mean sacrificing the opportunity cost of doing literally anything else in the game. So I might actually see the ruins or whatever they are if I can multicrew with someone out there. Otherwise, no big loss.

Your priorities for what is fun in the game are your own, and that's really cool and good, but you don't get to decide other people's priorities for the game.

Some time ago I played Dark Souls on PS3. There was an exploit that let you improve your character stats easing the battles. I just gave it a try and it changed the game so much for me that it killed the experience, I ended up stopping playing it. I though Frontier was encouraging people to learn exploration by adding outside bubble content (ruins, etc), but now there is no need anymore, look for someone there and pop in his ship. Then people will keep complaining that there are few mechanics in the game.

So you're saying that using an exploit that took away a game made you stop playing the game - and yet a lot of people still play the game, so I guess that's a thing? I haven't played the game so I can't weigh in on this, but I will say that "letting people play their space game together" is a little bit different than Dark Souls for a few reasons. One, Dark Souls is about progressing, so skipping the progress does remove most of the game. Elite is not really about progress, it's about the actual gameplay itself. You play Dark Souls to git gud and so on from my brief dalliance with it. I play Elite because I like the actual mechanical aspects of flying around in a spaceship. Being able to fly around with someone else in their spaceship doesn't "ruin spaceships" for me.

So I mean, the idea that playing Elite is about going places and seeing things is a very narrow view. I don't care particularly where I am flying around in my spaceship provided there are things to do there. Because Elite's interactive options are "shoot" and "scoop," that mostly means the bubble for me. But if I'm with my friends, I would like to play with them, no matter where they are, as long as there are things I can shoot, or scoop. It is also really nice, in my opinion, that I can play with my buddy while he's online, then I can go back to my ship and do what I want to do there. I see zero possible problems with this because if I didn't want to do that, I could just not.

I don't want to spend time on ranking or doing missions to get credits, I just want to log in 10 minutes and have a fully loaded Corvette. You cannot prevent me from playing the way I want.

Oh, this old thing. That's a really neat thing you said. Actually, nobody thinks this is the case, nobody has ever said this at all in the history of this game. Some things do require playing the game to earn them. "Being in a spaceship with your friend as his gunner or his fighter pilot" is not a thing that you should have to grind to unlock. "Being on that same crew when he is far away in space" isn't either. It would make no sense for it to be, because "being at Colonia (as a fighter controller)" or "being at some alien ruins someplace (as a turret gunner)" is not really some kind of tangible reward or some kind of unique, magical experience that is somehow being stolen from someone by someone getting it.

Judging by the number of threads on Reddit and elsewhere about "what is the fastest way to do the same thing over and over so I can fly a Corvette around," I would say that the current method of getting a Corvette isn't particularly fun or cool anyhow. So I mean, yeah, this should be revised and made easier. It shouldn't be "log in and just have whatever ship," but if it was, that would still be fine because if flying Corvettes is your thing, more power to you. Mine mostly collects dust.

I think you can't argue that way. There is people saying (myself some pages ago) that there could be a middle point between speeding up friend meeting and instant teleporting anywhere in the galaxy.

But why bother with all that? Just let people log in and crew for their friends. You already teleport - you log out, your ship vanishes. You log in, your ship reappears. There is zero difference between that and logging in (and appearing) in a friend's ship, then logging out (and disappearing) from that same ship.

Because it's a game.

 

[Morloch]

With a hundred pages, the thread got a bit TLDR.
I'm sure it will have been said though - If there is nothing else to add, this update will be a big bowl of steaming 'meh' for us solo players.

 

[bitstorm]

With a hundred pages, the thread got a bit TLDR.
I'm sure it will have been said though - If there is nothing else to add, this update will be a big bowl of steaming 'meh' for us solo players.

Every few pages. It's just the same 4 pages over and over... including this comment you are reading now.

 

[ColdGlider]

Like, exploration involves jumping around a bunch of places, then shooting planets in supercruise with a scanner. That's what it is. It's fun and neat sometimes for a while but I have no idea how you could divide up the activity of "fly around in supercruise looking at things" to more than one person in a way that is compelling and run for everyone involved.

Funny, just did this exact thing over the weekend. Teamed up for some group system scouting 1,000 LY north of Colonia. We found the system we were looking for, then began a group search for the iron magma volcanism that exists there. Found it.... and began racing around like lunatics. No shooting. No scooping. Plenty of fun.

Repeated the process a few days ago. Four people group searching for water geysers. Found a great site, and had a lot of fun racing around in SLFs and SRVs. I've mapped three new SRV courses in a week's time and am loving (most) every minute of it (POI bugs notwithstanding). And again: no shooting, no scooping.

Know what would have made it better? If I could have told my wingmate Jonuss (who blows up EVERYTHING) "No, don't go back to the station for more SRVs. Jump in my ship and deploy one of mine. I have plenty."

 

[Morloch]

Every few pages. It's just the same 4 pages over and over... including this comment.

haha - cool... glad I don't need to read it all...
Will hang fire and see if there is any more content.

 

[CMDR Quar Damek]

Wall of text.

As an explorer I would firstly remove that stupid 30km range limit from SLFs. Now my telepresence-friends could join me while searching for geysers for example. We could cover much larger area. So basically use brute force as there are no equipment or scanners to help us anyway. Secondly I would give my telepresence-friends a possibility to use my SRVs.

And if FD would implement some kind of scanners to help locate interesting surface features I would like to see my telepresence-friend use these more sophisticated scanners to locate these areas. And I'd also give my telepresence-friends access to galaxy map for routing and choosing interesting stellar bodies for target. And possibly even an access to modules panel for repairs or such. We could go on forever almost. And most of these things don't even need alot of features to implement. Then there are things other CMDRs have said like SRV rescue.

As for space legs which I don't see happening, here is a video which has carried my hope with this game a long time now.
[video=youtube;8yd-m9AR7mY]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8yd-m9AR7mY[/video]

 

[bitstorm]

As for space leges which I don't see happening, here is a video which has carried my hope with this game a long time now.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8yd-m9AR7mY

Amazing how many of the Frontier team say they are most looking forward to walking round.

I wonder if that's still the case.

And Braben saying the best thing is seeing a distant world...

 

[Winterwalker]

As an explorer I would firstly remove that stupid 30km range limit from SLFs. Now my telepresence-friends could join me while searching for geysers for example. We could cover much larger area. So basically use brute force as there are no equipment or scanners to help us anyway. Secondly I would give my telepresence-friends a possibility to use my SRVs.

And if FD would implement some kind of scanners to help locate interesting surface features I would like to see my telepresence-friend use these more sophisticated scanners to locate these areas. And I'd also give my telepresence-friends access to galaxy map for routing and choosing interesting stellar bodies for target. And possibly even an access to modules panel for repairs or such. We could go on forever almost. And most of these things don't even need alot of features to implement. Then there are things other CMDRs have said like SRV rescue.

As for space leges which I don't see happening, here is a video which has carried my hope with this game a long time now.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8yd-m9AR7mY

Nice ideas. Grats on 100 pages too .. the Elite Pilots Federation is exercised as ever! [up] o7

 

[Paramemetic]

You're totally missing the point. This is not about what others do -- this is about my experience of the game.

If there is a canonical option to insta-zap myself to a different location, then it changes the value I assign to embarking on a genuine no-zap journey to, say, Sagittarius A*. Because hey, if I just want to see it, I can insta-zap myself there. And that erodes the whole package that motivates me to go there the old-fashioned way.

No, if you think that going there on your own is an achievement, go there on your own, and don't insta-zap. Being there doesn't impress you? Okay, don't respect people who insta-zapped there. Be all "yeah well I flew out there myself."

I've never been to Sag-A* and don't want to go, for me, "I went to Sag-A*" means that you either value that kind of gameplay experience, or you wasted a lot of your time for no reason. If people could zap out there, my opinion would not change at all. But in either case, zapping out there would require knowing someone who was out there at exactly that time, and I mean, why would I bother doing that anyhow??

To put it in modern gaming lingo, travelling to Sagittarius A* unlocks two achievements for me: "Been There", and "Done That".

With insta-zap available, "Been There" will cease to be an achievement, and I'll have only "Done That" to motivate me to actually embark on an old-school no-zap trip there.

If someone else being able to insta-zap out there somehow diminishes your own valuation of going out there the conventional way, I would argue that it is your convictions that aren't that strong. You clearly think that "having been to Sag-A* in online video game Elite: Dangerous" is something that differentiates you from others, and I get that - I just made Combat Elite the other day, and I feel pretty good about that even though all it really shows is that I have spent an entirely stupid amount of time shooting spaceships.

But all you need to do to keep your achievement is change it from "Been There, Done That" to "Been There (As Helmsman), Done That." Done. No problem.

Because this doesn't let you fly your ship out there. It lets you be a gunner or a fighter pilot out there. And that's really not the same as the experience of making the journey.

But if Elite has taught me nothing else, it's that it must be about the journey, not the destination. Because the destinations in Elite are really pretty much all the same. I don't think anybody's accomplishments are diminished by other people doing it.



I mean Sir Edmund Hillary's conquest of Everest isn't diminished by all the people who climb it every year, even when they do it in record time and so on. And "being on top of Everest" is not the same as "climbing Everest." Imagining that teleportation to the top of Everest were possible, the ability for people to teleport there wouldn't make climbing it less impressive. It would just mean more people have been up there.

If you require a zero sum game for something to be meaningful, I have really bad news for you about Elite: Dangerous, a game where inflation happens all the time because there is no control on the amount of money and no ability for players to exchange that money.

 

[Maitolee]

Instant transport is a yes. All this yab about flying to stations for meet ups and stuff means nothing to the few of us that only get a couple hours max a day to play. Not everyone's friends play at the same time or rate either. So its actually really hard and time consuming to link up with people. There's no logical reason a game we pay and support should turn around and bite us in the rear for having real world responsibilities or obligations. Especially if it turns the game into a waiting simulator for the sake of 'immersion'. Waiting is boring. Whether is waiting in a station or waiting in a ship its not fun. Sure its immersive, but I get plenty of realism on waiting in stores, and offices as is. Elite is a game, it does not need to be real life. And I've yet to hear a logical explanation of how an 'immersive' system is going to get me back to my ship once my buddy logs out? If him logging out doesn't zap me back then what? I'm stuck in space? Unable to play? That would be misery.

Well then don't do trade missions because waiting is boring. Better click con "send commodities" without having to actually fly there. What is the point of having an entire galaxy if you don't want to move around because of traveling time? If you can insta pop anywhere it means distance has no sense. This breaks the game I've being playing since now.

BUT I agree multiplayer would be better if we can speed up meeting times. This is my comment some pages ago:

Solutions to "how to":
-easy way, within the same station;
-outside station: deploy yourself in a SLF and dock inside your friend's ship. Same with SRV if on planet surface. Order your mothership npc pilot to follow you so you can wing or later dock back and follow your path (without another magic back teleport).

Solutions to "too far away each other":
-instant: you could control one of your friend's already npc crew. Still a bit of magic but has more sense. Downside: no personal grind/rank. Hint: also for instant pewpew fun we still have CQC, which could see added multicrew.
-not so instant: begin with friend's npc control and order a station to bring one of your ships. Once it arrives your friend docks at that station and you can switch to actual own CMDR/avatar multicrew. A bit of a dirt trick because technically now it's only ship sending but would be acceptable IMO. Winside: personal grind/rank and own avatar (from new cmdr creator), and could add your ship to the wing (npc piloted).
-obviously also actual manual flight to meeting point: maximum immersion hysteria.

 

[Apec Valorian]

If someone wants to make that journey, they'll make it. If they zap on over and cheapen it (which probably wont feel that way to everyone) that's their own fault. The zapping to someone else's ship is a 2 part choice. Both by the helm and the joiner. The consequences of that choice is on them. The game's design shouldn't be shaped just to prevent some random person from being slightly less awestruck by a distant star.

I don't have to zap over to cheapen it. Just the mere possibility that I oculd zap over already does cheapen the journey for me. Maybe I'm weird in that respect, but that's how it is for me, and maybe -- just maybe -- it's also the reason for a good portion of the other vocal opposition against insta-zap travel. And since you argue that everyone's perspective on the game is equally valid, then you also need to accept this particular perspective as valid.

What can we do about it? Find a compromise, is what I'd suggest. Find some way to make it reasonably easy to meet up, without diluting the value inherent in distance.

As for allowing two players to meet up even if one currently has a commander at Colonia and the other at Beagle, allowing for players to have two or three commanders each would be an acceptable way out in my book.

This would be more developer work to achieve the same end result, with very little change in player experience. The main pilot spends his time flying out to a point. Friend pops in. The instant join features just removes the meet up and drop off time. Which means more time is spent on the objective and shared experience, which is where the game is strong. Lets focus more on the positive aspects of game, and less on making life harder for players.

I agree that "standard stuff" shouldn't be made artificially difficult -- but at the same time, what makes Elite a true gem in my eyes is that it also has exceptionally hard stuff to do that take a lot of determination and perseverence, while promising rewards that I can't obtain via any shortcut whatsoever.

While there are types of shortcuts I can abstract away so that they won't spoil the party for me, there are shortcuts I cannot put aside and ignore, and which therefore do spoil the gem for me. An official in-game ability to essentially insta-teleport my commander to any other ship anywhere in the galaxy will, in all likelihood, be one such thing.