Don't tell it to Apos, he's saying that it's fine.
Still waiting for the snipes.
Sorry, but I don't bite that your undermining wings can't handle the new NPCs, even with the security response. Call me crazy for having at least this much amount of trust on the skills of many Federal pilots.
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But can you believe that every single power who undermines is putting it all into sniping? There is certainly a big shift, some of that can be attributed to new features players are trying instead of PP.
The other powers always had less manpower, with the exception of ALD. This leads to less wings as well and thus a heavier penalty with the new NPCs.
Sorry, but I can't accept that a wing of 4 pilots can't undermine a system. I can see them losing some substantial amount of merits at some point due to losing 1-2 people from the rail beam/plasma uzi bug, but then get them back again.
And like you said, some of it is also due to people doing other things. That's a completely different issue altogether.
Frankly, all I care about right now when it comes to PP is the Antal/Delaine expansion merits bug. Undermining is something I won't go complaining about within the first week, with people still trying to faceroll everything.
If the grinders of combat powers can't bother undermining anymore and flock to their combat zones, that's not an issue. Grinders were always called a bother by the Feds when it comes to anything except their expansions, but now that they don't have their undermining power it's suddenly a problem?
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I replied you on Reddit, let me address some more points here.
Sniping: do you realize what it means now to carry merits while having a big bounty on your head? Anyway, some people hated sniping almost as 5C, so there's a problem less to think about. Some sniping may still occur, but forget the previous levels. It's good for Mahon.
Undermining: yes we can still undermine in wings, and it works. It's slower than before, and undermining ALD and Hudson is harder than undermining Mahon (because of security levels). It's good for us.
Solo (not the mode, but let's say "alone") undermining: it's gone, as you can see on the map. Good or bad? Dunno.
The problem is not undermining in se, is the fact that it gives nothing, and in return now you can't do your usual stuff when you don't do PP-related things (which is what most players do). Result: people leaving (fresh thread: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=257772). Surely bad for everyone.
Sniping: do you realize what it means now to carry merits while having a big bounty on your head? Anyway, some people hated sniping almost as 5C, so there's a problem less to think about. Some sniping may still occur, but forget the previous levels. It's good for Mahon.
Undermining: yes we can still undermine in wings, and it works. It's slower than before, and undermining ALD and Hudson is harder than undermining Mahon (because of security levels). It's good for us.
Solo (not the mode, but let's say "alone") undermining: it's gone, as you can see on the map. Good or bad? Dunno.
The problem is not undermining in se, is the fact that it gives nothing, and in return now you can't do your usual stuff when you don't do PP-related things (which is what most players do). Result: people leaving (fresh thread: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=257772). Surely bad for everyone.
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The thing is, that thread isn't much different from people complaining about NPCs outside of PP as well, like in general discussion. I don't consider this a PP isolated "issue".
Just like people have stopped farming RES en mass. Is it bad, well, dunno. But maybe the Imps finally have a chance to get back Facece in the BGS and us getting back Leesti. (and I'm saying that as someone who fought against the Imps when FD tried to bail them out by causing a war in Facece without the requirements met. I'm all for it if they do it fair and square.)
The extreme easiness of combat had extreme side-effects for everyone, which are now lessened by a lot. And that's good.
Whether merits/kill could be increased, that's debatable. Whether things should become as a much a stroll in a park as previously, that's not on my end.
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That's not on mine neither. As I said in my original posts, I enjoy the "hard" undermining. It's more challenging and funny than before. The problem is with the NPCs being a pain when you are not doing PP-related stuff. I know, fortifying and being interdicted is annoying. But you are only slowed. And it happens within the PP context. Now think about people who are pledged and mine, or BH in RES: they are all being forced either to drop PP or to do their activity outside the bubble. Guess what is the simplest solution?
The lack of undermining is just a symptom, not the problem.
Resuming:
- New undermining OK (more or less);
- Bounty Hunters hunting you if you have a big bounty OK;
- NOT OK: PP NPCs stopping people from doing their not-PP related stuff.
Maybe finally I managed to explain what I meant. Whew.
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I can agree, to an extent. However I can also see how PP ships appearing in places like RES makes sense. They are terrorists after all and they want to destabilize the economy.
Speaking of which, has anyone seen PP ships taking the role of miners? Because that would be an essential part in balancing this addition.
I compared PP ships to paramilitary troops attacking people in the streets. In both cases it's still lame that the security forces wouldn't do nothing in such a situation.
Outside Control Systems you can find only the "fighting type" PP NPCs, such as Alliance Enforcers, Sirius Security, etc. so probably they don't mine. The transport ships can only be found in CSs. I saw them at nav beacons, but I don't remember viewing them in RESs.
I saw some PP transport ships spawning in RES sites too, they acted as miners there. Seemed to be pretty rare to me though.
By the way, I reported the PP NPCs spawning in RESs during the beta as a bug. They told me they were looking into it, but they didn't tell me it was intended.
Given the change log, specifying that PowerPlay ships would now spawn in normal space, I don't see how it wasn't intended. RES are clearly part of normal space, just like stations and navbeacons.
The change log with that detail was published later.
My report (06/05): https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=247032
Change log (26/05): https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=253924
I suspected it was something they wanted, but they didn't provide me any feedback about it. A posteriori, I also misjudged the importance of the bug/feature.
My report (06/05): https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=247032
Change log (26/05): https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=253924
I suspected it was something they wanted, but they didn't provide me any feedback about it. A posteriori, I also misjudged the importance of the bug/feature.
It looks like there are four types of NPC ships, each with their own behavior script:
* Clean Combat, a.k.a. Bounty Hunters;
* Wanted Combat, a.k.a. Pirates;
* Wanted non-Combat, a.k.a. Smugglers;
* Clean non-Combat, a.k.a. Traders.
PP ships are not excepted from this classification, and will behave according to the script.
Many PP ships are combat ships, and those of the home-power are never wanted. So many PP ships act like regular Bounty Hunters.
What happening, is that those testing it, most likely have huge active bounties somewhere. So the BH chase them, including the PP ones.
I just did a test. I traveled to a Winters Control System - I'm aligned with LYR - and sat in SuperCruise at 12 Ls of the station, like a sitting duck. For over 30 minutes, until I got bored, I didn't get intercepted once. But I don't have any active bounties anywhere, so the BH NPCs leave me alone.
To summarize: There is increased activity of Bounty Hunters, and it's unrelated to PP.
* Clean Combat, a.k.a. Bounty Hunters;
* Wanted Combat, a.k.a. Pirates;
* Wanted non-Combat, a.k.a. Smugglers;
* Clean non-Combat, a.k.a. Traders.
PP ships are not excepted from this classification, and will behave according to the script.
Many PP ships are combat ships, and those of the home-power are never wanted. So many PP ships act like regular Bounty Hunters.
What happening, is that those testing it, most likely have huge active bounties somewhere. So the BH chase them, including the PP ones.
I just did a test. I traveled to a Winters Control System - I'm aligned with LYR - and sat in SuperCruise at 12 Ls of the station, like a sitting duck. For over 30 minutes, until I got bored, I didn't get intercepted once. But I don't have any active bounties anywhere, so the BH NPCs leave me alone.
To summarize: There is increased activity of Bounty Hunters, and it's unrelated to PP.
I went to a Torval system with a player who hasn't played in 5 months (so bounties would have cleared) and he was destroyed upon exiting the station by Torval PP NPCs.
We later went to a Sirius station to buy an Anaconda at discount, he was attacked by 2 Sirius PP Anacondas upon leaving the station.
So your experience is different from mine.
I play Solo, you clearly didn't (as you went together).
Could those two facts be related?!
But if the ALD and Hudson undermines (which is where I would think most of it comes from) wont undermine because they can earn many more merits at their combat expansions, then I'd say PP is dead.
Perhaps what FDev planned, but I doubt this was foreseen.
I understand that you guys with Mahon don't do much undermining, so a nerf to undermining is seen as good news, but without undermining whats the point?
I like that PP ships now spawn in RES sites (curious if they spawn at asteroids in space too), as I requested this myself a few weeks ago, but I think it needs a lot of tweaking.
Tried undermining in a RES, ignoring criminals and only shooting PP ships. But they only spawned as I entered the RES, after I killed those - none appeared for 15 minutes. Also police was too agressive and I had to leave.
I should try undermining in a anarchy RES, but those are like needles in a haystack.
Tried undermining in a RES, ignoring criminals and only shooting PP ships. But they only spawned as I entered the RES, after I killed those - none appeared for 15 minutes. Also police was too agressive and I had to leave.
I should try undermining in a anarchy RES, but those are like needles in a haystack.
I don't see it that way. I could place such questions a long time now.
Without a balanced population distribution due to at least somewhat equally distributed bonuses, what's the point? (and let's not even mention bonuses not even working.)
Without balanced mechanics like combat vs trading expansions and inward vs outward fortification/preparation, what's the point?
Without PP affecting storylines even after 50 weeks, what's the point?
etc, etc.
In the end of the day, we're all still here. And all of the above are more important than whether Hudson's and ALD's grinders will earn their Rating 5 paycheck and much stronger bonuses if you ask me.
I'm not saying that this issue doesn't need tweaking or that it's not extreme, but I consider other issues that have been there since Day 1 to be more important and those never got resolved.