I've been thinking for a while about FD's statements about intended changes to "make interdictions harder to avoid", and how to concisely say what I think is very fundamentally wrong about that from a design and player retention standpoint. I'm going to sidestep all the constant arguments about whether "pirate" mechanics should be in the game or whether the game is too easy to hack and grief with it's P2P networking design. Let's just focus on basic _design_ fundamentals that are firmly within FD's control.
Every single game I've ever seen, not just "massive multiplayer" ones, always revolve around a basic design fundamental that I seriously wonder if FD is planning to circumvent:
"A player should _always_ have the option to either run from a potential fight or to avoid a fight altogether"
Players need agency. They need choice. They need decisions. One such fundamental decision is whether to get into a fight or not. With other players. With NPCs. It doesn't matter. Fights can be "fun". They can also be "costly". The "fun" should be balanced against the "cost", and that balancing should be left 100% in the hands of the player, not the game.
Some simple examples from the history of MMOs:
* In games where aggressive CC mechanics like stuns, etc. were largely _unavoidable_ and _uncounterable_, the players very often speak with their feet and their wallets and either leave or stay away. And those that stay complain bitterly.
* In every MMO since the genre began, the game gives you plenty of visual cues or even visible mini-map "blips" to see potential trouble ahead _before you are detected by the game AI_ and you have the choice to try to find a different path to avoid the fight entirely. Or, some games might force you into "surprise attacks", but you always have the option and tools to simply try to run away successfully.
Interdictions as they stand today still give players agency and choice. You can simply submit, boost/evade for a very short time, and then FSD away. Or, you can stay and fight. Choice. It's good.
But what FD has been hinting at is an upcoming change whereby (as I interpret their comments), players will essentially be _forced_ into interdictions and their FSD will be forcibly disabled for much longer than it is now. This is VERY bad, IMO. I don't care whether we're talking about player pirates or NPC pirates: there are too many ship-ship matchups where the interdicting ship has a strong and unfair advantage against the interdicted ship. In many such matchups, the interdicted ship might be able to get away, but with a certain amount of hull damage which is far too costly. If you do not give the interdicted ship a chance to decide for themselves that the matchup is not in their favor, and you do not give them the tools to effectively run from such an imbalanced fight, then you are _doing design wrong_.
It's that simple.
EDIT: Copying up here some additional points I made on page 19 of the thread.
Let's look at the following _particular_ statements by Sandro. This is where I think they get it _fundamentally_ wrong from a design and player retention standpoint. Highlighting is mine for emphasis. I'm going to comment on a few different aspects of Sandro's thinking:
I'll also remind Sandro that even when properly equipped with shields and a crap ton of turrets, along with PvP know-how to keep the interdicting ship in range of all turrets with 95% uptime, any _NPC_ ship from an Asp upwards can inflict at least 12% hull damage on a Python "trader with teeth" configuration, and that's 200K in repair cost right there. 250K if I put an A-class powerplant in the ship (everything else is already A-classed) Shields get stripped quickly, and hull damage happens. Now: against a _player_ in a viper or cobra, you can expect the same hull damage or more if you stick around to fight like a porcupine. Get it, Sandro? THERE is NO winning or break even scenario for a trader in your vision of lopsided, imbalanced PvP. The only winning or break even scenario is to successfully run away before shields are lost. Even in solo mode.
* The pirate is flying a smaller, cheaper ship so their monetary loss from a fight is much smaller than the trader.
* The trader stands to also lose their investment in cargo cost. What does the pirate stand to lose to balance this cost risk?
A complete viper loss is 6 minutes of tradiing to recoup for the average player in an A-classed Viper, who also has a T6 or Asp on the side for cargo hauling. Meanwhile the trader in an A-classed Python is looking at 102 minutes of trading to recoup the monentary loss of the ship replacement alone. Add another 60 minutes on top of that to recoup the loss of lost cargo. And the numbers get WORSE from there for a T9 or Anaconda.
This is utterly, fundamentally imbalanced.
Every single game I've ever seen, not just "massive multiplayer" ones, always revolve around a basic design fundamental that I seriously wonder if FD is planning to circumvent:
"A player should _always_ have the option to either run from a potential fight or to avoid a fight altogether"
Players need agency. They need choice. They need decisions. One such fundamental decision is whether to get into a fight or not. With other players. With NPCs. It doesn't matter. Fights can be "fun". They can also be "costly". The "fun" should be balanced against the "cost", and that balancing should be left 100% in the hands of the player, not the game.
Some simple examples from the history of MMOs:
* In games where aggressive CC mechanics like stuns, etc. were largely _unavoidable_ and _uncounterable_, the players very often speak with their feet and their wallets and either leave or stay away. And those that stay complain bitterly.
* In every MMO since the genre began, the game gives you plenty of visual cues or even visible mini-map "blips" to see potential trouble ahead _before you are detected by the game AI_ and you have the choice to try to find a different path to avoid the fight entirely. Or, some games might force you into "surprise attacks", but you always have the option and tools to simply try to run away successfully.
Interdictions as they stand today still give players agency and choice. You can simply submit, boost/evade for a very short time, and then FSD away. Or, you can stay and fight. Choice. It's good.
But what FD has been hinting at is an upcoming change whereby (as I interpret their comments), players will essentially be _forced_ into interdictions and their FSD will be forcibly disabled for much longer than it is now. This is VERY bad, IMO. I don't care whether we're talking about player pirates or NPC pirates: there are too many ship-ship matchups where the interdicting ship has a strong and unfair advantage against the interdicted ship. In many such matchups, the interdicted ship might be able to get away, but with a certain amount of hull damage which is far too costly. If you do not give the interdicted ship a chance to decide for themselves that the matchup is not in their favor, and you do not give them the tools to effectively run from such an imbalanced fight, then you are _doing design wrong_.
It's that simple.
EDIT: Copying up here some additional points I made on page 19 of the thread.
Let's look at the following _particular_ statements by Sandro. This is where I think they get it _fundamentally_ wrong from a design and player retention standpoint. Highlighting is mine for emphasis. I'm going to comment on a few different aspects of Sandro's thinking:
I'll just point out here that Sandro already knows that the interdicting player (or NPC) has a _material advantage_ over the interdicted player. This is a fundamental PvP imbalance right from the start.
I'll also remind Sandro that even when properly equipped with shields and a crap ton of turrets, along with PvP know-how to keep the interdicting ship in range of all turrets with 95% uptime, any _NPC_ ship from an Asp upwards can inflict at least 12% hull damage on a Python "trader with teeth" configuration, and that's 200K in repair cost right there. 250K if I put an A-class powerplant in the ship (everything else is already A-classed) Shields get stripped quickly, and hull damage happens. Now: against a _player_ in a viper or cobra, you can expect the same hull damage or more if you stick around to fight like a porcupine. Get it, Sandro? THERE is NO winning or break even scenario for a trader in your vision of lopsided, imbalanced PvP. The only winning or break even scenario is to successfully run away before shields are lost. Even in solo mode.
Isolated summary by Sandro for emphasis. This is fundamentally imbalanced and a total, complete LOSING proposition for traders. This is every bit as bad as the fundamental pirate-trader imbalance in ArcheAge. And if you want to see how well that's working out for Trion Worlds, reach out to them, developer to developer, and ask them how happy their playerbase is and how their financials are doing these days.
Now you're on the right track, but this _directly_ contradicts what you've stated above. You have _contradictory_ design goals at play here.
Where in all this line of thinking is the notion of "what does the pirate risk losing versus what the player risks losing"? Right now, all risk is on the trader, and zero risk is on the pirate:
* The pirate is flying a smaller, cheaper ship so their monetary loss from a fight is much smaller than the trader.
* The trader stands to also lose their investment in cargo cost. What does the pirate stand to lose to balance this cost risk?
A complete viper loss is 6 minutes of tradiing to recoup for the average player in an A-classed Viper, who also has a T6 or Asp on the side for cargo hauling. Meanwhile the trader in an A-classed Python is looking at 102 minutes of trading to recoup the monentary loss of the ship replacement alone. Add another 60 minutes on top of that to recoup the loss of lost cargo. And the numbers get WORSE from there for a T9 or Anaconda.
This is utterly, fundamentally imbalanced.
I have no problem with this design principle as long as the risk/reward is BALANCED for both parties. Right now, the game is nowhere near that state.
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