Feature Updates
- Thread starter Half-Lock
- Start date
Solo.
yeah that doesn't work when you're out in the oggins, you want to do combat, and CQC only lets you use the Imperial Eagle at the upper levels
an expanded CQC that lets you use various ships and also allows for single-player. even offline, if- and only if- necessary
I can't tell if you're asking and stating that ironically, so I'm just going to outline the salient points of the Elite Dangerous CQC game-mode as I've been made aware of it.What is that CQC you are talking about? I heard we once had a beta of that name, but it must have been canceled, i would know nobody who ever used anything of that name...
CQC is the close-combat simulator that has its own in-game/universe lore.
It is currently online and multi-player only.
I'd read that the most recent update permitted a reduction in minimum players from 4 to 2.
The battles are conducted around places similar to the in-game POI space installations and minefields
The available ships for contest are restricted to Ship-Launched Fighters and the Eagles (Core Dynamics and Imperial), each with various hardpoint loadouts
The combat is faster paced and occurs within 3? 4? different arena-type timed battles
Its fun
It would be nice to have a larger scale CQC available (online and offline) for when CQC matchups are a little harder to come by for various reasons and when out exploring in the deep recesses of the galaxy. Its one of the reasons I don't often do that anymore.
It would be nice to have, at least, up to the FDL in arenas that are slightly larger- maybe in arenas with Stronghold Carriers or larger mine-fields, possible even around Capital Ship and Carrier docks, and other such exciting places for mid-range to close combat settings.
You should try it out some time. You can find it in the Continue menu of the launcher, 4th from the left and 1st from the right under the tab "Arena"
Those would be nice upgrades to the CQC, in my opinion.
Sorry. I thought the way i wrote it, it was obvious that i knew about CQC and was sarcastic. Obviously i was wrong. Sorry and thanks for the writeup.
And i do see that it has some interesting elements, but according to my observation, it was very much dead on arrival. During the beta there were players in it, but already within a week after launch, it was mostly a waiting queue with nothing happening there. I could now write long passages of its history, how CQC was mostly an advertising tool for console sales, but after all these years, it's pointless.
What matters is: it quickly bled most of the players trying it. Even these days, when i now was in the waiting queue (alone) for a while, it immediately gave me the impression that i could also simply play the actual game, instead of waiting in the lobby.
Unfortunately i have no idea, on how to make it more attractive. By itself, as a small little lobby-based team combat game, it did work. For a few hours, it was fun. But how to make it stand up and compete with the big game it is attached to, i have no idea. I consider that close to impossible, so i guess CQC will forever remain "the small arena fighting thing" attached to the main game, having very few, if any, players using it and being basically forgotten by most players and seemingly the developers, too.
I'm not in disagreement with a lot of this. I met some of the folks I'd originally played the console version with and who'd made it into my effort with The Nain Logs (flthymick420 and doomfacekillah shoutout) through CQC and I still enjoy just piloting around installations just to feel how any given ship handles under such circumstances.
It's easy to brush that off with the claim that piloting to an installation in-game and waiting for an attack or installation raid should be sufficient replacement for the CQC experience, but it seems like the degree to which the developers would like to emphasize the "Trailblazers" element of expansion into the outer reaches of the galaxy would benefit from a small investment of their time and resources to expand the CQC in order to make CQC a little more accessible and appealing- especially under circumstances in which exploration does create a bit of an absence in the high-octane fun that comes with the pvp, mission-running, massacre and raiding, etc.
It doesn't seem too far of a stretch to boost the Utopixx-Reynhardt Intellisys corporate sponsorship by former president Hudson (as a Federal Navy Training and recruitment tool) into the current powerplay narrative as a narrative lead-in and In Real Life avenue to argue for the expansion/upgrade under the current conditions of the now two-year expansion effort. It's a currently unexploited segment of the property that can be leveraged to produce more interest in the entirety of the property.
I, myself, am currently on an exploration binge to regrind my exploration rankings and engineering before returning to do some more powerplay and pew pew, and am fully knowledgeable of the degree to which the exploration playloop tends to lead to a relative degree of skill reduction and, thus, has had a tendency to deter me from any long-term exploration expeditions- which, in full truth, was one of the game's biggest selling points to me when I'd first learned of its development.
It's just a suggestion, but I do see a degree of unexploited value. It's easily a 25% combat, core-detected: combat on my HUD
CQC? My experience with it.
I, new-ish player, decided to give it a go. Jumped into an empty lobby and waited and eventualyl matched with 1 other player. Somehow he had beam lasers and a maneuverable ship that could break my target lock. I got seal clubbed. He was level 40 or something, I was level 1 in my starter ship with a popgun.
Never went back, don't intend to go back.
The concept as a whole is something many games think is a great idea, but it is always in practive a hopeless cause. If they want anything combat related that's not the main game then it needs to be a fully equipped version of the game where you can try out many different loadouts in a simulated conflict zone. Choose your ships and weapons from everything, pick a number of enemies and let rip. If you want to expand that to PvP as well, fine, but make that opt-in. No doubt streamers will make much use of something liek that, players would use it for fun but mainly to try out builds that they otherwise wouldn't try playing with.
I, new-ish player, decided to give it a go. Jumped into an empty lobby and waited and eventualyl matched with 1 other player. Somehow he had beam lasers and a maneuverable ship that could break my target lock. I got seal clubbed. He was level 40 or something, I was level 1 in my starter ship with a popgun.
Never went back, don't intend to go back.
The concept as a whole is something many games think is a great idea, but it is always in practive a hopeless cause. If they want anything combat related that's not the main game then it needs to be a fully equipped version of the game where you can try out many different loadouts in a simulated conflict zone. Choose your ships and weapons from everything, pick a number of enemies and let rip. If you want to expand that to PvP as well, fine, but make that opt-in. No doubt streamers will make much use of something liek that, players would use it for fun but mainly to try out builds that they otherwise wouldn't try playing with.
I get your intention. I see how it can be a nice thing to have. Sorry for my kind of sarcastic posting above, but i also dare to say: you could have put something like the last posting right to the start, to get the thread running with more info.
I wish you good luck there. But i also think some more meat is needed for this suggestion. I very much see how CQC is underused since years, has very few users and basically no developer support. But unfortunately i don't have an idea on how to fix this with reasonable effort. So, bringing up such a suggestion or at least collecting material to formulate one should perhaps be the goal of this thread.
I wish you good luck there. But i also think some more meat is needed for this suggestion. I very much see how CQC is underused since years, has very few users and basically no developer support. But unfortunately i don't have an idea on how to fix this with reasonable effort. So, bringing up such a suggestion or at least collecting material to formulate one should perhaps be the goal of this thread.
This i can explain. He might have had another ship than yours. You unlock a bit of other ships when leveling up. But all in all, these ships and their weapons are actually mostly balanced. All the SLFs are VERY similar. Their differences in turn rate, speed, hull and shield are not that big. And all of them are very fragile. Only the sidewinder kind of stands out by being the sluggish but tougher option.
Yes, beam lasers have a bit higher DPS, but they need way more effort in terms of heat and energy management. An experienced player can get more damage out of them, but as the CQC fighters are not and can not be engineered, the "average" player actually fares better with what you get at the start.
This actually is not that bad game design. First give you something easy, then give you access to a bit harder to use equipment. Now on that breaking the target lock: that player used a setup with a heat sink launcher. And apparently knew very well, how to manage his ships heat. If you manage to get your ship below certain heat levels, the distance from where it can be detected is reduced. A skilled player can and will use these mechanics to his advantage.
But also, these are things which you have to learn. Due to no engineering and some thing working just a tad differently in CQC, you have to learn that by spending plenty of time there. And here we come to what you really ran into: an utter lack of matchmaking.
You were dropped into a fight against a player, who had many hours of CQC exprience and knowledge of the mechanics there ahead of you. Which you also can't really get somewhere else, as some things are a bit different in CQC in terms of scaling, than in the base game. He used that knowledge against you and you basically had no chance to ever catch up and learn.
Which again circles back to one of the big problems of CQC: so few players. So few players, so no matchmaking can ever be implemented. Which again creates these bad experiences for anybody newly getting into it. Catch 22.
This has equally been my experience with it, the few times I'd tuned into it. It's been debated to death by other voices in the community, but at the end of the day, my argument above remains valid and sound, there's a workable frame-work, in the mechanics of the game itself, for a small expansion of the game mode; there's a huge new update that, by its own intention, produces a legitimate rationalization for a claim that increasing the accessibility for the game mode would create wider appeal for the whole of the property itself and minimize deterrence for participation game modes not to any given player's preferences (xeno-combat, literally anyone); and there's a particular narrative strand beginning with that update, which calls back to an early distinction between lore political leadership that found its way into the original powerplay update, that would highlight what combat CMDRs would find interesting in the Winters/Grom, and most recent Galnet post about the colonization efforts resulting in heightened political and military tensions
I can provide Steam-links to at least 3-5 games that are predicated on little more than the CQC and SIngle-player training modes alone and its easy for the developers to say "Well then why don't you go play those games instead of playing Elite Dangerous"
It's just not a particularly profitable model for a business, when it can just monopolize on its own offerings, especially with Star Citizen just sitting there siphoning attention and potential resources (ie gamers and investors)
I get your intention. I see how it can be a nice thing to have. Sorry for my kind of sarcastic posting above, but i also dare to say: you could have put something like the last posting right to the start, to get the thread running with more info.
I wish you good luck there. But i also think some more meat is needed for this suggestion. I very much see how CQC is underused since years, has very few users and basically no developer support. But unfortunately i don't have an idea on how to fix this with reasonable effort. So, bringing up such a suggestion or at least collecting material to formulate one should perhaps be the goal of this thread.
Meh, beyond what I've already pointed out, I don't see anything beyond the expansion of the game mode as its own motivating factor. I suppose it's possible to create unlocks or permits for people that reach a certain rank as an element of the CQC upgrade- Horsehead Nebula Guardian SLF Gauntlet or something, but the current state of the game justifies the update on its own
Random rewards like credits, decals or unlocks are not cutting it. That's merely a "now people grind it for a month, then be done for" deal. That's the first part: CQC has to be able to stand on its own legs. Be fun enough to draw people there. Which unfortunately already is the first problem: when it was new, i sometimes was at the launch screen, wondering if i should go for CQC. And the decided to rather go to the main game. Fun can be had more immediately and directly there, and with a lot bigger variety of potential activities. While CQC is all about combat and nothing else. And while not bad, also only in a few limited aspects really better than the normal game. (The tighter areas are indeed fun. But also limits on what kind of ships can be used there. )
And the "immediately" part above also hint towards the second, way more severe problem: how to get a big enough playerbase into CQC, that matches form quickly? During the beta, the few weeks where people actually were there, i found it to be an enjoyable experience for a few matches a day. Though, never having as much draw and keeping me in game for as long as the base game. (As said, bigger variety of possible activities in the main game. )
And again: I merely can ask the questions here. I don't have any answers. Sorry.
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First and foremost, you're apologizing too quickly. You don't know who I am, I don't know who you are, and this is an internet forum; sarcasm is run-of-the-mill and I'd be a little insulted if it was considered a zero-tolerance policeable offense.
Moving along to the next orders of serious, no-nonsense, video-gaming industry revolutionizing business:
I disagree. No, it doesn't. The only thing it has to do is provide an alternative experience to the base game that keeps players on the property as opposed to moving along to another one. That its still here and hasn't been pulled entirely testifies to its, at the very least, lingering utility in the same way that the Horizons servers on console are still in existence.
I don't entirely agree. Increasing the CQC player base could be useful if the intention is to make it appealing as a stand-alone game mode. Like you seem not to, I, too, don't have any major complains about the game as its currently available. I don't even play the Xeno loop, being as content as I am with the current state-of-game. A small update that expands the CQC mode and delinks or disentails it from the online multiplayer server- an "online or offline" option- would boost its viability and availability immediately
Continuing from the previous, an update with the small expansions of the mode (ships, arenas, loadouts, maybe in-game rewards, etc) including an offline option which makes the possibility for micro-sessions- and the continuation of the multiplayer (which would inherently draw from the increased interest stemming from people willing to go into the game-mode knowing they won't necessarily have a need to wait for anybody) make for the type of quick fun you'd normally have to look for combat-zones or RES sites or Missions, on top of possibly going into the outfitting hangar for, and restores the property as a viable quick-fix option for people looking for immediate combat while waiting for their pizza rolls to finish in the microwave before turning on a movie
In that case, i am not sorry... on apologizing quickly. I am just an old man, liking things around to be allright. And i learned that good manners, and apologizing when i feel that i might have missed the tone somewhere, intentionally or not, goes a long way for setting things in order again. Not knowing you, i clearly can not say how you see things. But i know how i like to be seen. And i rather prefer to be seen as too polite than too rude.
So, when putting it down like this and thinking about it, there might actually be a bit of selfishness in this.
Yet if you want it to be active, it has to be able to draw in players, no? Else it will remain as dead as it is now?
Oki. Offline-Solo-CQC. I heard that by now there are bots in there, but it's hearsay. I never checked myself. If that is the idea, that CQC should simply have the option to directly and on-demand drop you into a botmatch... that sounds feasible. And might indeed be a good idea. In pure theory, it would damage the multiplayer aspect of this game even more. But hey... one more nail into the coffin of a ten years old corpse won't really kill it any more. Having a pure PvE combat thing, available at any time, might indeed be a good idea. And if these bots already exist, implementing it might even be very limited effort.
In that case, i am not sorry... on apologizing quickly. I am just an old man, liking things around to be allright. And i learned that good manners, and apologizing when i feel that i might have missed the tone somewhere, intentionally or not, goes a long way for setting things in order again. Not knowing you, i clearly can not say how you see things. But i know how i like to be seen. And i rather prefer to be seen as too polite than too rude.
So, when putting it down like this and thinking about it, there might actually be a bit of selfishness in this.
Indeed so... I suppose at a certain point, the whole propriety eventually circles around a nexus of whether or not we should or should not do something based on our own ideas of what we should or should not do, which is a real testament to this conversation for all to considerI suspect that the playerbase will come to it if they find it to be a satisfying gaming experience, as with all games. There are plenty of Elite CQC CMDRs. For those that aren't, and for me- possibly you- the long-wait times and the lack of an offline mode make it a relative non-starter and, especially when not feeling like dedicating significant time, a deterrent to continuing to look into it as a viable gaming option.
The addition of ai BOTS (aka "computer controlled opponents" as opposed to macros or player-installed alternative account controlled by macros) would be a great option.
I don't necessarily think it would damage the multiplayer, necessarily. It's not as if bot-controlled opponents would have any need to be offline exclusive. They could equally be implemented in a timed-out Call of Duty or Battlefield-styled lobby that auto-loads them into a multiplayer set when not enough players show.
I don't mean to argue for a replacement of main-game RES nor CZ's but for a viable alternative to foregoing other playloops that will pull you away from combat and mission-running, and that still holds enough appeal that CMDRs to look into for a little variation without aiming to be the sole play experience (again, I can pull up 4-5 games on Steam right now that are centered around that particular playloop alone. Star Wars Squadrons was essentially a CQC with a Star Wars story wrapped around it and some racing sequences. I might dip into it once and again, and I'd play regularly if I didn't find the decision not to implement full-6DF (thrusts, strafes, fao) and the inertia-less flight engine less enjoyable than Elite Dangerous).
CQC need to die and be replace with something more useful, redesign on-foot combat so you can select air support (SLF basically CQC)or ground combat in CZ (settlements) and let players deploy from a war fleet carrier, I mean it would be much more engaging and fun.What is that CQC you are talking about? I heard we once had a beta of that name, but it must have been canceled, i would know nobody who ever used anything of that name...
The Air Support SLF idea sounds great. Seems like they'd already successfully implemented a version of it which would work from the ground-combat perspective with the Thargoid Revenants playloop. There wouldn't even have to be any major changes to the game mechanics to implement an option as to how to conduct ground combat, as much as opening tick-box that let's you pilot an SLF from a Cobra MK5 that comes in to drop off vessel-manslaughter victims and launch SLFs
I'm not sure what the ground combat CZ War Fleet carrier suggestion refers to.
I suppose, from an industry-wide perspective, the numbers would support an argument that the spacelegs FPS engine would be a more profitable investment to expand and update, but I don't think anyone looking to Elite Dangerous as a gaming experience is going to be looking at it to replace the myriad AAA franchises for that particular playloop, even if FDEV did add a melee hammer. I'm not sitting in the marketing and PR offices throwing out numbers about what one game or the next is doing based on what they'd made improvements on.
Games like Call of Duty, Battlefield, Rust, the Streamiums like Fortnite/Apex Legends/etc, the NU-RPG's like Assassin's Creed, Skyrim, Starfield... the list goes on and on... I don't have any realistic expectation that Elite Dangerous is gonna place the degree of effort into competing with those franchises in that particular segment of the industry. I'm not even particularly interested in making the argument on the basis of the gaming industry on the whole. All those franchises have what they're offering, and I do play those games on occasion (The Smurfs franchise is actually pretty solid), and they have a certain mastery of those offerings. In that sense, Elite Dangerous has is its flight engine. All the other playloops in the game revolve around that single set of decisions regarding the game's mechanics.
As dead-on-arrival as it might seem to be, CQC is a nest-egg, in relation to the game's overall value in its current-state that's just been sitting there waiting for someone to get up and check to see if its ripe or whatever eggs are called when they're ready to be hatched.
To go hog wild, I don't see any reason not to include an update that allows CMDR's to take on the role of space legs transports where you just jettison passengers over surface CZs, which is equally something that could be implemented into a CQC that allows for surface combat and magboot drop-offs on installations, a la that one game that for some reason seems to no longer be available but involved FPS arena styled combat, time-management, and time-travel - ** EDIT** Lemnis Gate by Ratloops Games Canada, not to be confused with Ratloops Games in Houston, TX, USA
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Some more stuff for ground combat: Maybe. (*) That's a whole different topic. But why would the old CQC be removed for that? I mean, as seen above, i also consider it kind of dead. But unless a few kilobytes or harddisc memory make all the difference (the engine and most of the assets used in CQC are in the main game, too), i don't really see much gained by deleting CQC.
I merely currently see little reason to wait in the lobbies, while the main game promises fun just the next button over. But for somebody who's out in the void, many hours of jumping away from any combat oriented gameplay, the bot matches described above might indeed be quick access to some more action oriented gameplay.
*: The maybe includes a very long list of "what needs to be implemented to actually have a reason for air support in the game at all", along with "and why, if that is actually implemented, would you not build it in a way that it should be provided by other players, thus encouraging cooperative gameplay", followed by hints towards the trailers at the launch of Odyssey, which tried to sell us exactly that combined arms gameplay, which neither at the release of Odyssey nor now existed in any way or shape.
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My mind is audibly cracking and squeaking now...