Remember in Genesis? The world was doomed and Noah saved the dinosaurs in the arx.What's ARX...?
CMDRs now playing for ARX
- Thread starter RexKraemer
- Start date
It's the ultimate, FD sanctioned, swear filter evader.
Hmm...
Coincidence?
...
Joking aside, I think there was some early leaked info calling it Arch, if I remember correctly – there's a fair chance I might not. I didn't give it much thought at the time.
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Yeah. I'm an impulse buyer too. The web store was the outlet for me to check if there was something I wanted. Can't do it now. I don't know what's there to buy now, and here's another thing. Because arx have a high number, 2250 or whatever for a thingy, it sounds expensive compared to, say $4.99. I could easily justify my mind and emotions with spending 10 or 20 bucks, but to spend 15,000 arx... urgh... my skin crawls. Can't do it. I know it's just a number and it's just about the same amount, but... it just sound too much. So I haven't bought anything that past week. I can't make myself do it.
The numbers have a psychological effect on me too.
And do not forget that you first have to buy more Arx than you need to buy the paintjob you want.
It is a hurdle I can't take. It feels wrong and unfair.
I have never bought mickey mouse money for any game, and it is very unlikely I I will change in that respect. Perhaps it's my age.
You think that's bad. I hear some people change the way they play for the imaginary currency called Credits and they are worth nothing at all.
They excel at that.
[TL/DR]
If players have started changing their play style in order to increase the ARX they make, then this is because Frontier have created a system which has inbuilt balance issues. But I'm not asking for more ARX personally, OK?
[Long version]
Down2Earth Astronomy's video is a pretty good summary of why the current system (as far as we can deduce) works in a way that will always annoy someone, and provoke the kind of posts we are already seeing along the lines of 'I did such and such for x hours and only got y ARX, whereas doing so and so for just one hour got another player substantially > y ARX... its just not fair'.
If I'd been asked to design this system, which wasn't likely to happen I know, I would have said to myself. Playing the game is time spent in game doing stuff™ , so as long as a player is doing stuff™ , I can grant said player x ARX per hour spent in game (or whatever time period is convenient). So I'd basically build an intelligent timer that only increases the time it records if the player is actually doing stuff™ , and if the player goes awol and leaves his/her/its ship in dock, or supercruise, or orbitting a planet, then the intelligent timer would spot the player was no longer doing stuff™ and put the clock on hold. Even if some clever son/daughter/gender neutral offspring of unmarried parents figures out a way to semi automate playing the game to fool my not so intelligent timer, they only make 400 ARX a week, or 23 pence or whatever it comes to. Big whoop. Not worth wasting developer time putting together a system, like the current one, which tries to be too clever, and which comes with apalling balance issues. [Edit: I'm almost certainly not the first person to say something like the above, plenty of good coders seem to play Elite]
Simple example. If you're getting bored, you can skip this paragraph... Ok then. Exporation seems to reserve most of the ARX reward for play for when the player sells their cartographic data. You certainly don't make many ARX flying around and scanning things, but apparently you get 400 ARX for selling a mere 40 million credits worth of data. This would be fine if players could sell the data as they went (or at least weekly), but they can't. I've haven't been in a station since March (I think) and don't expect to see one until next February at the earliest, so I won't make any ARX selling cartographic data until AFTER weeks of play. But my two billion credits worth will only net me... 400 ARX if I sell them all at once, so even though I'm earning much more than 40 million credits of cartographic data a week, I won't get anything like the intended level of ARX reward. So much for players not having to change the way they play the game.
Well done Frontier, you made a nice gesture: to reward players for playing your game, but didn't actually consider HOW players play your game.
Now, please don't misunderstand me. I really couldn't give a flying squirrel for how many ARX I get. I'm just pointing out that Frontier have not achieved their stated objective of rewarding the player for playing the game their way, due to poor design decisions. Design decisions which may... and this is the icing on the cake... which may also be largely responsible for the large number of new bugs in different areas of the game. Tellingly, very few of those bugs seem to effect exploration game play!
[Disclaimer: We don't know how Frontier implemented their ARX reward system, but D2EA's video is pretty compelling. Anecdotal evidence from this forum is used to provide the figures for ARX generation I've used above. I do not know how accurate this is. I only know exploration has a comparatively low rate of ARX generation when no cartographic data is being sold]
If players have started changing their play style in order to increase the ARX they make, then this is because Frontier have created a system which has inbuilt balance issues. But I'm not asking for more ARX personally, OK?
[Long version]
Down2Earth Astronomy's video is a pretty good summary of why the current system (as far as we can deduce) works in a way that will always annoy someone, and provoke the kind of posts we are already seeing along the lines of 'I did such and such for x hours and only got y ARX, whereas doing so and so for just one hour got another player substantially > y ARX... its just not fair'.
If I'd been asked to design this system, which wasn't likely to happen I know, I would have said to myself. Playing the game is time spent in game doing stuff™ , so as long as a player is doing stuff™ , I can grant said player x ARX per hour spent in game (or whatever time period is convenient). So I'd basically build an intelligent timer that only increases the time it records if the player is actually doing stuff™ , and if the player goes awol and leaves his/her/its ship in dock, or supercruise, or orbitting a planet, then the intelligent timer would spot the player was no longer doing stuff™ and put the clock on hold. Even if some clever son/daughter/gender neutral offspring of unmarried parents figures out a way to semi automate playing the game to fool my not so intelligent timer, they only make 400 ARX a week, or 23 pence or whatever it comes to. Big whoop. Not worth wasting developer time putting together a system, like the current one, which tries to be too clever, and which comes with apalling balance issues. [Edit: I'm almost certainly not the first person to say something like the above, plenty of good coders seem to play Elite]
Simple example. If you're getting bored, you can skip this paragraph... Ok then. Exporation seems to reserve most of the ARX reward for play for when the player sells their cartographic data. You certainly don't make many ARX flying around and scanning things, but apparently you get 400 ARX for selling a mere 40 million credits worth of data. This would be fine if players could sell the data as they went (or at least weekly), but they can't. I've haven't been in a station since March (I think) and don't expect to see one until next February at the earliest, so I won't make any ARX selling cartographic data until AFTER weeks of play. But my two billion credits worth will only net me... 400 ARX if I sell them all at once, so even though I'm earning much more than 40 million credits of cartographic data a week, I won't get anything like the intended level of ARX reward. So much for players not having to change the way they play the game.
Well done Frontier, you made a nice gesture: to reward players for playing your game, but didn't actually consider HOW players play your game.
Now, please don't misunderstand me. I really couldn't give a flying squirrel for how many ARX I get. I'm just pointing out that Frontier have not achieved their stated objective of rewarding the player for playing the game their way, due to poor design decisions. Design decisions which may... and this is the icing on the cake... which may also be largely responsible for the large number of new bugs in different areas of the game. Tellingly, very few of those bugs seem to effect exploration game play!
[Disclaimer: We don't know how Frontier implemented their ARX reward system, but D2EA's video is pretty compelling. Anecdotal evidence from this forum is used to provide the figures for ARX generation I've used above. I do not know how accurate this is. I only know exploration has a comparatively low rate of ARX generation when no cartographic data is being sold]
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The ARX must flow...at 2.8 %.
Pity I have to convert to US dollars...
I'm past at least one of those, and I don't expect my Earth bobblehead for at least the rest of this year...
I already have it. Other Elite players might try it too.
The Genesis Device?
i must play too much only done exploring and took out a cpl of pirates and hit the limit of arx
only done exploring and took out a cpl of pirates and hit the limit of arx
I found 50p in my coat pocket this morning... for two weeks I can live like an Arx-king.
I'm still playing for goals.
My latest being landing on the planet of death and doing the White Dwarf transit ride.
In November my goal will be returning from Colonia, where I have been for a few months, to the bubble. Then working on a few 'Raxxla location' ideas I have and ostensibly completing the return leg of DW2, ten months after setting out.
December's goals will depend on if my 1.2 billion is enough for a fleet carrier. If it is I will buy one and explore its uses. If not I will mine cores for credits.
Beyond that I have wild ideas about buying and engineering a Mamba and tyring pvp seriously. It will of course need a graphite paint job. I will ether buy ARX for that for less than a bottle of beer, or not. We will see.
My latest being landing on the planet of death and doing the White Dwarf transit ride.
In November my goal will be returning from Colonia, where I have been for a few months, to the bubble. Then working on a few 'Raxxla location' ideas I have and ostensibly completing the return leg of DW2, ten months after setting out.
December's goals will depend on if my 1.2 billion is enough for a fleet carrier. If it is I will buy one and explore its uses. If not I will mine cores for credits.
Beyond that I have wild ideas about buying and engineering a Mamba and tyring pvp seriously. It will of course need a graphite paint job. I will ether buy ARX for that for less than a bottle of beer, or not. We will see.
Does no one play for FUN any more? You all need your rewards, and strokes... Jesus... if people find the game so dull they need a REWARD for playing it, why are they even here? It's not a ****ing job... it's a game.
Well said and yep I still play for fun. Every time I find I am not enjoying the game I take a break until I get that urge again. Strangely this is the only game I have had since the mid 80's that I can do that, leave for a break then come back and pick it straight up and the game will look fresh and exciting again.
I've been asking similar questions.. I've only been playing since July, maybe the novelty hasn't worn off because I'm still finding things that make me go "Wow!"... Just random exploring.. Finally worked out Engingeering in time for the Sep Update to drop.. lol I've done a few missions, tried a few ships, but above all, I'm having fun.. Scored a 2nd hand stick on the cheap to add to that - controller jsut didn't quite cut it.
Without ARX I wouldn't play at all currently. I'm waiting for fleet carriers or anything else of interest to come to the game. Also I am not preemptively grinding money without knowing the actual cost of the carriers. Before ARX I would only login anymore to engineer a new ship that I got an idea for or to remod an existing ship to be more efficient. Since ARX I do ~3 hours shooting per week to get it over with. I bought ARX anyway when the Clipper kit came out. If something comes to the shop that I like, which happens rarely these days, I buy it. Capping the ARX every week will prolong the time until I have to refill my ARX with real money.