Design 101 - Players must ALWAYS have choice to avoid or run instead of fight

[Sim Maker]

Your CV is wonderful.

I have been a gamer for over 20 years now, I was a sponsored gamer in my early 20's . Playing game such as Counter Strike and Unreal.
My various teams and I won many competitions and prizes. Both online and at UK LANS
After that I worked for a company building and selling IT hardware, including gaming machines for the last 8 years.
Ironically I have designed and supplied hardware into the MOD for training simulation.
The only game I can say that has really taken my interest since the early days was Battlefield 2.

I was hoping that Elite Dangerous would be a play your way and be heavily based around team work and players coordination.
I had in my head the hope that I might get to fight along in a scene very similar to the Battle of Endor in Return of the Jedi.
Fighters, Capital Ships, the whole shibang!

If you look at ANY long lasting gaming, the majority are based around real challenge and team work ( Maybe not Flight X )

So its wonderful that you want to sit at home alone, playing alone.

Elite Dangerous was never really designed for that, it was designed to be a live and "Dangerous" space sim.
Part of the sim, should be people like me who want to pirate, hunt, fight.

With team work, you could happily continue your simulated trading and leave the fighting to others as you FTL out of the area.

Crime DOES pay. It should in Elite Dangerous.

Cheers and yeah, I do see it from your side too. 100%. Tahst why I wonder if FD have dug themselves a Really deep hole....one they maybe can't get out of.
....
Once upon a time between jobs, I did freelance work on MS FlightSim. Making combat aircraft for people to fly.....they could'nt shoot, drop bombs, or do any "war" stuff......except land on carriers and "pretendy".......the dumbest thing MSFlightSim ever did, was not include BASCI Multiplayer Combat. I can remember chasing wire frame Bi-Planes on an old Atari running FlightSim 1066..........the game world looked like the original Light Cycle grid.....hehehe.......but, even back then, you could drop a bomb for "fun" in Flight Sim.......with modern tech I had dreams of Battle of Britain scale multiplayers and.......sigh............but, there was still a HUGE market for just "flying around the world".....a to b..........
.....
Thats kind of why I got Elite.....I like the idea of comabt, but of also exploring this amazing galaxy model that has been presented to us.......for some, they want the Asp to fight and trade, for me, I jsut want it becasue I work in graphics for a living and I want to SEE this amazing environment.............and I for sure dont have the time to grind for months to do it, and with no external views.....meh...........
.......

OOI....I did htink of a possible way to "invovle" all, together..........how about proper NPC Pirate targets...like the old Great Train Robbery......a known "Special" is heading through universe on planned trip.....Lots of value aboard............Pirates can interdict it, Traders could offer to scoop cargo for a panic-ed "Special Ship" crew and take it to safety..........and fighters could come in to protect the scene, fight off the pirates...........then everyone can have a bit of fun....still doing "their thing"............

 

[Roybe]

I've been warning about this since launch...... The whole balance is broken and is leading to that very situation already. I gave up Bounty Hunting as a career option because the few pirates out there can keep their legal status clean which makes Bounty Hunting impossible as a career choice (except for NPC's = boring).
I tried Piracy to make it work is almost impossible, I found that I ended up trading to fund my Pirating career which is hysterical.

I now just consider myself a sort of anarchistic opportunist and fly around attacking the odd player at random for fun and paying my repair bills with a bit of NPC bounty hunting and doing the occasional mission.

I do worry for the longevity of this game.....

I have posted this analogy since beta:

This game is about an ecosystem. There are food prey, traders and miners, and there are top chain hunters, bounty hunters and pirates. In a real ecosystem the shape is a pyramid...lots of food supporting a few hunters. In this game, as time goes on the pyramid is being inverted. Since this inversion is the expectation of the developers, since avoidance of danger is every preys best option and the game offers perfect protection via protected game modes, player vs. player fighting is not going to be a viable option. Without prey, the pirates cannot feed, which in turn means the bounty hunters cannot feed. Which means, again by design, the only options for these professions is NPC based. So, for those that wanted a target rich environment filled with PC's that want to play in this risky type of environment, it cannot happen. The game has been designed to push people into NPC killing and cooperative play. Even the background simulation, where I saw hope that it would bring about richer environments for players to play in, does not lend itself to creating an environment that allows for proper PvP interactions.

Good or bad, it seems this is the design that is designed. Confrontational PvP is not a supported play style, no matter how many times FDEV comes out and says it is, since it offers to much protection for the prey professions, and not enough sustainability for the hunters. This game is all about Cooperational player interactions.

 

[V3teran]

I think braben should stick to his vision of how the game should be. He knows what he's doing and he's had ideas in his head since elite 4 was cancelled along with the outsider many years ago. There are too many people moaning trying to change things, usually the console crowd and usually people who have never played an elite game in there lives. If you don't like interdictions then get a faster ship or play solo. Failing that quit the game and stop trying to spoil it for tbe hardcore elite players of old.

That's the trouble with todays generation of gamers, there silver spoon fed.

 

[EUS]

FD made a MASSIVE mistake by allowing solo mode switching, imo the longevity of the game will suffer because of the dynamics that causes.

This post doesn't make sense, since until the 11th hour, the game was to ship with offline sp mode. SP is the 2nd reason I purchased this game.
The 1st reason was to get the cobwebs off my X52.

 

[Skuli]

I think braben should stick to his vision of how the game should be. He knows what he's doing and he's had ideas in his head since elite 4 was cancelled along with the outsider many years ago. There are too many people moaning trying to change things, usually the console crowd and usually people who have never played an elite game in there lives. If you don't like interdictions then get a faster ship or play solo. Failing that quit the game and stop trying to spoil it for tbe hardcore elite players of old.

That's the trouble with todays generation of gamers, there silver spoon fed.

How many times do you think people used save/restore in Frontier Elite 2?

If that's not a crutch I don't know what to say...

 

[Jason S]

The thing is that at the moment in trading you can get to the gold while always avoiding the dragon.

i.e. you can make loads of money trading and always run from the fight, so trading is boring as it is too easy.

 

[Yokai]

I have posted this analogy since beta:

This game is about an ecosystem. There are food prey, traders and miners, and there are top chain hunters, bounty hunters and pirates. In a real ecosystem the shape is a pyramid...lots of food supporting a few hunters. In this game, as time goes on the pyramid is being inverted. Since this inversion is the expectation of the developers, since avoidance of danger is every preys best option and the game offers perfect protection via protected game modes, player vs. player fighting is not going to be a viable option. Without prey, the pirates cannot feed, which in turn means the bounty hunters cannot feed. Which means, again by design, the only options for these professions is NPC based. So, for those that wanted a target rich environment filled with PC's that want to play in this risky type of environment, it cannot happen. The game has been designed to push people into NPC killing and cooperative play. Even the background simulation, where I saw hope that it would bring about richer environments for players to play in, does not lend itself to creating an environment that allows for proper PvP interactions.

Good or bad, it seems this is the design that is designed. Confrontational PvP is not a supported play style, no matter how many times FDEV comes out and says it is, since it offers to much protection for the prey professions, and not enough sustainability for the hunters. This game is all about Cooperational player interactions.

I'm going to ask a serious question: Would _you_ want to ever play the "prey" role in your food chain analogy? Would _any_ player actually choose to play that role? Personally, I don't think so.

There are other ways to design a player ecosystem to encourage risk-taking and interaction. Your "food chain" vision is not a very smart nor effective way.

 

[Phier]

There are other ways to design a player ecosystem to encourage risk-taking and interaction. Your "food chain" vision is not a very smart nor effective way.

Ok... I'm listening.

 

[Theaghan Black]

I agree.

An interdiction is a test of skill - if you submit then you accept some losses. If you fight the interdiction you might win.

Equally I agree the response from the game right now is poor - it's in part why players are able to go on killing sprees (against NPCs / players) with no regard to the consequences.

IMO:
- Implement the piracy role as per the DDF (rating / surrender mechanic) as this will differentiate the real pirates from the killers
- Beef up the bounty system (interdicting someone should be a low fine // shooting clean big bounty // killing a clean ship HUGE bounty)
- Change the response from the game. Rich / High Tech / specific government types should respond quicker and more heavily armed
- Lastly add in thresholds to the game such that once your notoriety reaches certain levels the number of NPC BHs increases*

*I found someone with a 5.5m bounty on their head after a KWS and despite thinking I would not win I had to have a go ... Surely more NPCs / Players would think the same if the bounty was suitably large

Hear Hear!

 

[Indy Original]

I'm going to ask a serious question: Would _you_ want to ever play the "prey" role in your food chain analogy? Would _any_ player actually choose to play that role? Personally, I don't think so.

There are other ways to design a player ecosystem to encourage risk-taking and interaction. Your "food chain" vision is not a very smart nor effective way.

Surely this is why trading is designed to be so profitable in Elite Dangerous - so that people choose to play as the 'prey', because there is actually a reason to do so! If trading offered no advantages over other careers, nobody would choose to be the prey... but as it is, people do, because the payoff is worth it.

What are the other ways you were thinking of, to design a player ecosystem?

 

[Snakebite]

I have posted this analogy since beta:

This game is about an ecosystem. There are food prey, traders and miners, and there are top chain hunters, bounty hunters and pirates. In a real ecosystem the shape is a pyramid...lots of food supporting a few hunters. In this game, as time goes on the pyramid is being inverted. Since this inversion is the expectation of the developers, since avoidance of danger is every preys only option and the game offers perfect protection via protected game modes, player vs. player fighting is not going to be a viable option. Without prey, the pirates cannot feed, which in turn means the bounty hunters cannot feed. Which means, again by design, the only options for these professions is NPC based. So, for those that wanted a target rich environment filled with PC's that want to play in this risky type of environment, it cannot happen. The game has been designed to push people into NPC killing and cooperative play. Even the background simulation, where I saw hope that it would bring about richer environments for players to play in, does not lend itself to creating an environment that allows for proper PvP interactions.

Good or bad, it seems this is the design that is designed. Confrontational PvP is not a supported play style, no matter how many times FDEV comes out and says it is, since it offers to much protection for the prey professions, and not enough sustainability for the hunters. This game is all about Cooperational player interactions.

Lol, Nice analogy..... I've been saying almost the exact same thing

Traders are either in solo or logoff when interdicted >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> this ruins it for Pirates and combined with other difficulties it just drives players away from that career path.

>>>>>>>>>>> Few pirates and those that exist keep clearing their bounties,>>>>>>>>>>>>>> This ruins it for Bounty Hunters and Drives players away from that career path.

>>>>>>>>>>> The frustrated ex-Pirates and ex-Bounty Hunters resort to a Greifing mentality just to get some action (I am at that point now) >>>>>>>> this drives more traders into Solo


>>>>>>>>>>> With No traders, pirates, or Bounty Hunters the Galaxy starts to become empty and the game starts to die >>>>>>>>>>>

The solutions to all this a so obvious, but FD have this huge white Elephant in the room called 'solo mode' and I'm guessing that they are scared of getting rid of it.
I actually dont think that they need to get rid of solo, what they need to do to save the 'food chain' is:

1: Prevent mode switching, solo is solo, and multiplayer is multiplayer. allow two seperate saves in people want. Or give a break-in period of say 40hrs in solo and then the option to permanently switch.
2: Limit (almost entirely) the effect that solo players can have on the living ecosystem. If they don't want to participate then why let them have an influence. Also prevents distortion of the simulation.
3: Tackle combat logging by having an AI take control of any ship that disconnects during combat. If the ship is destroyed under AI control, then it is destroyed for the player also.
4: Make Piracy a bit moreof a profitable and viable career path. Add Anarchy stations for pirates to land at, dont let them land at regular stations (they would be arrested if they do)
5: Make the Wanted status of Pirates more persistent, thus giving Bounty Hunters something to actually go after.

There are *loads* of tweeks and changes that can/should/will be made, lots of good ideas and suggestions around here and in the DDF but IMO they need to implement the above five critical items urgently or the game will die...........

 

[Skuli]

Surely this is why trading is designed to be so profitable in Elite Dangerous - so that people choose to play as the 'prey', because there is actually a reason to do so! If trading offered no advantages over other careers, nobody would choose to be the prey... but as it is, people do, because the payoff is worth it.

What are the other ways you were thinking of, to design a player ecosystem?

This is why Frontier's recent trading changes are so perplexing; it's almost like they want to make traders as hard to find as possible by pushing them further and further out into the vast unknown to try to make a decent profit.

Maybe they simply want everyone trading rares?

 

[smsKONG]

I'm going to ask a serious question: Would _you_ want to ever play the "prey" role in your food chain analogy? Would _any_ player actually choose to play that role? Personally, I don't think so.

There are other ways to design a player ecosystem to encourage risk-taking and interaction. Your "food chain" vision is not a very smart nor effective way.

I used to play a game called 'the hidden' - sometimes you would hunt, sometimes you were hunted; both playstyles were a lot of fun.

So yes, nothing wrong with being the meat for the grinder: especially if you manage to escape or break said grinder...

Needless to say that I don't agree with your views on how FD should design their game - I mainly trade by the way

 

[Commander Silex]

I'm going to ask a serious question: Would _you_ want to ever play the "prey" role in your food chain analogy? Would _any_ player actually choose to play that role? Personally, I don't think so.

There are other ways to design a player ecosystem to encourage risk-taking and interaction. Your "food chain" vision is not a very smart nor effective way.

For my part happily, and I have been I've traded exclusively in Open since release, had a few run ins some of which went sour and some of which ended up with me escaping. I'll say that I've largely found them enjoyable experiences. The draw of a setting that allows for unexpected multiplayer experiences good and bad is that I will probably have to get some allies and work together to make things safer, or take the risk of being picked on whilst alone. I'll plan accordingly and do my best to give myself a reasonable chance to escape, but if the way it was setup was to make it a cast iron strategy to slap shields and defenses on a trade vessel to avoid being preyed upon entirely, I'd soon be very bored with this game. I played Elite in the 80s and Frontier after it, they were amazing games but Dangerous needs to stretch beyond that now or this will only last as long as the nostalgia value does for me.

The big thing missing from Roybe's analogy is meaningful player co-operation. Once we can effectively tag along with others the balance will shift significantly. There's many other aspects of criminality that need to be worked on too, along with a serious look at the financial punishment a trader who has the worst outcome suffers. With effective damage mitigation to the purse and more significant penalties to the career criminal along with a deeper sub culture progression the system would work a lot better.

I can see where you're coming from, but generally your posts seem to come from the basic stance of fundamental opposition to anyone in Open doing something that you might not be able to push a button and say 'no' to, with 100% effectiveness. I'm sure you have a very valid point about ArcheAge but then again, if the human race had given up the first time a vehicle with wings failed to stay afloat we wouldn't even have Elite as a game right now.

 

[Indy Original]

This is why Frontier's recent trading changes are so perplexing; it's almost like they want to make traders as hard to find as possible by pushing them further and further out into the vast unknown to try to make a decent profit.

Maybe they simply want everyone trading rares?

Well I must admit, I don't know - I don't actually own the game! (My laptop is 11 years old this year!) But if I was Frontier, I would try and make it so that the 'safe' systems are not very profitable, since you would expect lots of traders to be there, keeping profits low - and I would make it so that the anarchies were much more profitable, to encourage traders to take risks! Of course, the traders could stay in the safe systems and grind if they wanted to... but the pirate-infested anarchies would always be there, beckoning them with the promise of quick profits!

 

[Snakebite]

Surely this is why trading is designed to be so profitable in Elite Dangerous - so that people choose to play as the 'prey', because there is actually a reason to do so! If trading offered no advantages over other careers, nobody would choose to be the prey... but as it is, people do, because the payoff is worth it.

What are the other ways you were thinking of, to design a player ecosystem?

Trading is fairly easy and you can do it without great skill or expensive equipment, You can start by sticking to the heavily policed core systems in a small unarmed ship and work your way up. It should be a reasonably profitable steady income career... With time, experience, and a big enough ship trading can be extremely profitable. But the overheads should mean that it takes a LONG TIME to build up to that Annaconda.....

Piracy is a much more dangerous option, not only do you have to engage in combat regularly with traders who may or may not be well armed and capable, but you constantly have the law, and bounty hunters after your skin, and perhaps even other pirate gangs.
Piracy should be highly profitable to balance the danger....

Bounty Hunting is a difficult, dangerous and lonely career. It should require a huge amount of combat skill and courage to earn the biggest rewards. The rewards should be there however for those who get good enough at it.....

 

[Gen-Han-Solo]

I have said for over 12 months though this version of Elite is by far the best i still think they have got the name wrong it should be called Elite Harmless if they start to make it more difficult then may be we can call it Elite Mostly Harmless.

All players should know by now because of the name Frontier Develoments and David Braben chose the game should be DANGEROUS.

 

[Skuli]

Well I must admit, I don't know - I don't actually own the game! (My laptop is 11 years old this year!) But if I was Frontier, I would try and make it so that the 'safe' systems are not very profitable, since you would expect lots of traders to be there, keeping profits low - and I would make it so that the anarchies were much more profitable, to encourage traders to take risks! Of course, the traders could stay in the safe systems and grind if they wanted to... but the pirate-infested anarchies would always be there, beckoning them with the promise of quick profits!

Yeah, but is it spreading people too thing? I really feel like they're making a short-sighted decision and forcing people to spread out when they really ought to be focused on somehow getting some trading corridors going, analogous to sharks circling the large schools of fish and picking off the stragglers/weak/slow fish.

I mean, it's great to have OMG SUPPLY AND DEMAND BACKGROUND SIMULATION and all, but I honestly think the current implementation is detrimental to interactivity.

 

[Indy Original]

Trading is easy and you can do it without great skill of expensive equipment, it should be a reasonably profitable steady income career... With time, experience, and a big enough ship trading can be extremely profitable. But the overheads should mean that it takes a LONG TIME to build up to that Annaconda.....

Piracy is a much more dangerous option, not only do you have to engage in combat regularly with traders who may or may not be well armed and capable, but you constantly have the law, and bounty hunters after your skin, and perhaps even other pirate gangs.
Piracy should be highly profitable to balance the danger....

Bounty Hunting is a difficult, dangerous and lonely career. It should require a huge amount of combat skill and courage to earn the biggest rewards. The rewards should be there however for those who get good enough at it.....

I can't deny that piracy is a more challenging role than space trucking, but I would say it is also more fun - and in a game, the fun is surely the biggest payoff of all? As long as piracy is somewhat profitable, I think people will be happy doing it, even if it takes them weeks to save up enough to buy a better ship... FD don't need to reward pirates, in my opinion, they just make piracy viable.

Bounty Hunting, as you say, should be very challenging, but very rewarding - and by all accounts, it currently isn't! Well, maybe in the future it will be...

 

[ChrisUK27]

1. Ask yourself this: "Why, exactly, should combat be any less profitable than trading? Is that some law cast in stone?"

2. In the larger scope of the game, NO player is restricted from trading. Or combat. Or exploration. ALL players have EQUAL access to monetary income.

3. Why should someone who simply dislikes trading be _entitled_ to a much greater chance of both initiating and winning a PvP encounter with a player who enjoys trading?

PvP should be consensual. If you want to entice ALL players to consent to PvP, you need to make it worth everyone's while. EQUALLY WORTH.

Right now, this is not the case.

You cannot use the scope of one entirely different imbalance (the fact that trading makes far more money at present) as a defense against the more narrow scope of the imbalance for the proposed interdiction changes. Doing so is a strawman fallacy.

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A problem with FD's definition as you state it is that even if the trader is not "blown up", they still suffer a hugely imbalanced loss compared to the "pirate". A viper takes 6 minutes of trading to completely recoup the cost of a total loss, by the typical player. A Python takes 102 minutes to recoup the loss just for the hull damage. And another 60 minutes to recoup the cost from the lost cargo.

6 minutes versus 162 minutes.....

1. Trading is more profitable than combat.

2. Combat takes skill, exploring also takes skill, trading involves negotiating a spreadsheet.

3. Why should someone who simply likes trading be _entitled_ to a much greater chance of avoiding and a PvP encounter with a player who enjoys combat?

4. PvP should be consensual - Why why why? It's not throwing down a gauntlet and pistols at dawn.

5. The last bit. 6 minutes of trading to recoup a viper? based on what? Is everyone in the same position as you, do they all have the same profitable trade routes? Are they even interested in trading? If they like combat they may have no ship in a fit state to trade, what if all they have is an eagle. You call for player choice yet in the same breath restrict that of the player who likes combat. These figures mean nothing.

Posts like this and many others of it's ilk give players a slanted view of Open, it is not all PvP. A small number of foxes are making the whole barn cluck the roof off.

ps. I'm not into PvP but will fight if I need to, I play exclusively in Open (Since Beta), never interdicted by a player (Other than a 1.1 test).