Nice 
Wonder will there be a mining spike for the time left till it hits the game.
Wonder will there be a mining spike for the time left till it hits the game.
ANNOUNCEMENT Game Balancing
- Thread starter Bruce G
- Start date
What you need to consider is whether potential malicious use would be statistically significant, because the cost of any mitigations will affect the entire playerbase, not just the exploiters. Just look at PvP in general, and PvP bounty hunting especially as a pathological example. As it currently stands, people do PvP despite the fact that the game actively discourages against it by making it not even zero-sum but a huge credit sink that must be funded by completely orthogonal gameplay activities the player might have absolutely no interest in. That's how you get player reviews that revolve around the term "grind". Don't punish all players for relatively few bad apples. Besides, the more carrot you can provide rather than the stick, the less incentive there is to exploit.
Piracy would greatly benefit from something similar to what the core minerals did to mining - unique commodities found in specific circumstances with a very high price. If not for the fact that mining them is easier, manipulating the BGS to generate the precise circumstances that allow T7s full of low temperature diamonds to spawn reliably in systems with anarchy governments wouldn't be a bad payout at all.
If some new high-value, non-purchasable commodities were created, or even buffs given to the other commodities that only ever spawn as NPC cargo such as rebel transmissions and the like, and some ways created for players to track down the people carrying them, that would be pretty sweet.
Having some new signal source scenarios (like a convoy dispersal pattern with a threat value that isn't used yet) so people can track down that tasty cargo would be just... chef kiss.
Sorry, how would one game the system?
This is very true. I can easily solo-kill a Cyclops, but a Basilisk is a whole another story, not mentioning other variants. Payout for AX Combat should be increased, or remain the same with introduction of AX Missions available in systems where NHSS' or AX CZ's are present. AX Wing missions would be great as well. Even ordinary Massacre Thargoid Scouts missions would be a good idea.
I would be with this but Notoriety is lost too fast (2hrs/point) for this to be considerable
The point is that by opposing a player faction/power, you run the risk of getting punished by someone working for that group who happens to see you. That's interesting gameplay for both parties.And with blocking, no crossplay, instance limits and different timezones, all that talk of 'facing conseguences' is empty.
The things you mentioned are obstacles that need to be adjusted rather than reasons why BGS should not be open-only. And timezones are a completely different story.
What about two open play servers one Open and one Private/Solo?That's completely missing the point. Like I said, the BGS is dreadfully too fickle, it really should stay in the backfround and not be something single players or even small groups can game easily.
And with blocking, no crossplay, instance limits and different timezones, all that talk of 'facing conseguences' is empty.
Powerplay should be decoupled completely from the BGS, and could be open only. Having pledged should nullify all blocking and friend lists alike when considering matchmaking server.
Is there any chance of seeing a similar rebalancing for engineering mats? Currently the quickest and easiest method for a lot of things is going to a particular site on a planet, stripping it then logging out and back in to reset, rinse-and-repeat ad infinitum. Having missions that give a similar rate of rewards would be really nice.
One possible PvP outlet would be using Open Powerplay- it could be that merits held by the opposition scum / valiant hero could be 'won' by the victor on destruction. It can't really be gamed because the merits count to your personal weekly rank and are not 'direct' money.
Same boat here. Can do well against Cyclops. I admittedly need to “git gud” at the bigger versions.
And yes scouts should pay more. I’d wade into bigger NHSS filled with scouts if I knew they were worth the hassle. Right now 10000 credits is diddly squat to cover ammo and repairs from an unfortunate caustic missile.
I haven't seen mentioned yet:
Missions - long-distance trade missions, and long distance smuggling missions. I've seen screenshots where people have (albeit very rarely) seen long-distance trade and smuggling missions offered, for higher payouts. I have never seen one! Is there a bug that causes them to disappear, or be de-prioritized?
And already mentioned, and I will second:
Also Bruce, do you have numbers for prices of the other core-mined minerals you mentioned?
Missions - long-distance trade missions, and long distance smuggling missions. I've seen screenshots where people have (albeit very rarely) seen long-distance trade and smuggling missions offered, for higher payouts. I have never seen one! Is there a bug that causes them to disappear, or be de-prioritized?
And already mentioned, and I will second:
- Smuggling penalties - very rarely able to to make a profit on illegal goods. I don't think they should have a -25% penalty (however stolen goods should keep the penalty)
- AX combat bonds
- Combat bonds and bounties in general
Also Bruce, do you have numbers for prices of the other core-mined minerals you mentioned?
When you get to AX, I agree with a better scaling of Thargoid return. But, my squadron definitely finds Cyclops to be end-game when solo - so dropping the bond there will literally kill the game for them. Please do not do that. I can do it, but they struggle and I've yet to solo a Basilisk so the risk there is still extremely high. Six of one, half a dozen of another I realise, but a lot of us are more casual than the hardcore out there
this is a good point. much of the game multiplies rewards for wing/group action. this works if the goal is to incentivize group action, but is contrary to the stated goal of rewards being proportional to skill. for that, rewards should be divided between the members of the group.
this affects all combat, thargoid or otherwise.
it also applies to trading, but since trading ends up being mostly hauling there is no skill component to balance, it's just another oddity.
I think it will be rather easy to distinguish between proper, honest feedback from people who want the game world to make sense, from all the "I just want MOAR billions!" kind of feedback.
As a fairly new player, I've been playing about 2 weeks, I figure I'll drop my 2 cents.
Is mining excessive right now ? Yes, I scooted through the early part of the game.
However as devils advocate, it just lets you play the actual game, so is it a problem? Jumping around 50 times in my sidewinder grinding out 50k missions is only so much fun off the bat.
I think as a design philosophy , Frontier needs to decide about how long the want players to grind for stuff. Get a Cr/hr goal you want to hit with each activity at each stage of the game and balance around that separately, in each mode. As another player said work in risk factors at that point to see if you can make more money.
The last thing I honestly want Frontier to think about is the grind. I know they have a vision and maybe once odyssey comes out it will really flesh out, but the game is a little shallow. If you make players grind stupid missions to get anywhere, they quit. I would like a much larger playerbase and I think you are on the right track, I would just lean towards making the grind less not more. Like MASSIVE buffs to payouts for other missions.
My FDL is 8 mill buyback and I dont have much engineering so it takes me a bit to kill in CZ's, and frankly they are a waste a time. It takes too long to kill ships for what a 50k reward? why so cheap I don't get it.
Your first priority should be buffing everything else not nerfing mining.
Is mining excessive right now ? Yes, I scooted through the early part of the game.
However as devils advocate, it just lets you play the actual game, so is it a problem? Jumping around 50 times in my sidewinder grinding out 50k missions is only so much fun off the bat.
I think as a design philosophy , Frontier needs to decide about how long the want players to grind for stuff. Get a Cr/hr goal you want to hit with each activity at each stage of the game and balance around that separately, in each mode. As another player said work in risk factors at that point to see if you can make more money.
The last thing I honestly want Frontier to think about is the grind. I know they have a vision and maybe once odyssey comes out it will really flesh out, but the game is a little shallow. If you make players grind stupid missions to get anywhere, they quit. I would like a much larger playerbase and I think you are on the right track, I would just lean towards making the grind less not more. Like MASSIVE buffs to payouts for other missions.
My FDL is 8 mill buyback and I dont have much engineering so it takes me a bit to kill in CZ's, and frankly they are a waste a time. It takes too long to kill ships for what a 50k reward? why so cheap I don't get it.
Your first priority should be buffing everything else not nerfing mining.
I would just add that you compared the new no-skill baseline earning through mining to what top AX pilots should earn. I don't think that's quite right. Anyone who can solo a meduse (or even a basilisk) should earn more than laser miners IMO, so I would buff those numbers a little bit.
I saw a couple posts regarding power play tweaks and have honestly had this rattling around in the back of my head for.. well a couple years tbh:
All of the reward modules should be available in all class sizes, similar to how prismatic shields can be fit to any size shield slot. Weapons should be able to fit as small, medium, large and huge hardpoints, with a similar stat distribution compared to their non power play counterpart at the same size.
(I also think that having the pack hounds having the same missile size at each weapon size and just decrease/increase the number of missiles fired and magazine size to be in line with the size/damage estimates would make sense purely from a logistical standpoint when assembling them)
As for balancing the remainder of power play, I'm honestly not sure as it's been a while since I actively participated.
All of the reward modules should be available in all class sizes, similar to how prismatic shields can be fit to any size shield slot. Weapons should be able to fit as small, medium, large and huge hardpoints, with a similar stat distribution compared to their non power play counterpart at the same size.
(I also think that having the pack hounds having the same missile size at each weapon size and just decrease/increase the number of missiles fired and magazine size to be in line with the size/damage estimates would make sense purely from a logistical standpoint when assembling them)
As for balancing the remainder of power play, I'm honestly not sure as it's been a while since I actively participated.
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As a PC using non Powerplayer who doesn’t deliberately do BGS stuff I am opposed to open only anything until console players can join in without having to pay for premium access.
