Integrate more Playstyles for Colonization

[Cosmo]

The system colonization beta has only 1 viable playstyle: hauling supplies and materials. This is a monotonous activity. Many people dislike hauling especially for 100s of hours. So activities should be added to integrate other careers. For example:

1. Combat = defend or escort NPC traders from pirates in space or near the construction site. Protect construction workers / containers with supplies
2. Infiltrator = steal facility plans which can be sold to reduce the construction costs.
3. Trader = hire NPCs to build a facility. NPCs cost more and take extra time vs players
4. Explorer = identify valuable resources / mining spots which can be exploited for construction. Find crashed ships, abandoned bases with resources.
5. Passenger Carrier = transport NPCs to the construction site to speed it up.
6. Powerplay = add an HQ building or area in a station for members to hang out. Special Powerplay bases could be raided or defended. Maybe the Vanguards update will add it.
7. Mining = similar to explorer: identify resource-rich mining spots to fund construction projects. Do the mining by yourself or hire NPCs. This improves the utilization of mining outposts and settlements.
8. Pirate = more profit for pirate colonies via the black market and lower system security. Hack Megaship convoys for commodities.

These are some ideas that could make colonization less repetitive, more fun and deeper.

 

[Knoxelot]

These are great ideas. I finished a starport solo after 30 hours of straight hauling. I'm very disappointed however that I spent all that time delivering, made only 80 mil(in 30 hours hauling). I don't have any control over the starport I BUILT! There is zero financial incentive to build these things, and even less long term incentive of control over my system. With this system in place as is, it will die and most people will not engage in this activity unfortunately.

 

[Coolgroove]

To tie it all together - Mission board for Colonisation Ship / Construction Sites.

Instead of credits/other rewards - missions reward commodities directly to Colonisation / Construction. Player helps mission giver = mission giver delivers equal to credits reward quantity of commodities. Since colonization ships and construction sites buy commodities with fixed prices - calculation is pretty straightforward.

Mission types:

• Clear pirates plaguing the delivery route
• Take out pirates leader
• Rescue pods / boxes of haulers who were destroyed by pirates
• Disrupt pirates settlements
• Deliver data to/from another Colonisation contact
• Deliver (small quantity) of rare goods for the Construction crew
• Passenger missions to transport in/out construction crew
• ... mission can be adjusted to fit, as it's only in flavor text.

On mission complete screen, player can choose what type of commodity the mission reward will be in. Mission generation takes into account the list of remaining commodities for that specific Colonisation claim or Construction.

If the lack of any nav beacon is a limit to generate missions / signal sources for them - initial claim can be haul-only, the rest would have an option of a mission board. Missions range can also be increased, to accommodate for variety, and/or other construction site in nearby systems could be used for specific mission types (passengers, data).

 

[KRISXR]

Brilliant, both suggestions of gameplay from Cosmo and Coolgroove sound immersive, fun, and engaging. Wicked cool

 

[Hekateh]

I suggested something similar a while ago:

Colonisation Hub/Centre

My suggestion: Introduce a new T2 building (costing 1-3 T2 construction points) called "Colonisation Hub". It should be a dock able space installation / station. It must be built like any regular installation (perhaps with pre-requisites), but once you have built it, you can: See on the...

forums.frontier.co.uk

 

[CMDR X]

This would only work for installations after the first one. I shouldn't have to fight off savage hoards and do espionage while desperately trying to complete my first station in 3 weeks, 6 days, 23 hours 59 minutes.

 

[Ricenny NL]

Actually the case here is this; today the new Colonisation part (called Trailblazers) is almost nothing else than hauling and hauling. And that gets really boring. Even more when we discover that after all this hauling our hard work was not for ourselves, but for another 'owner' of the station(s) as we cannot do anything with it when they are completed. We are merely the architect for our system as we can chose the kind of stations we build but after all that effort there's nothing left to do.

As suggested by you guys, we need more diversity in the works. We need to make our systems more OURS, give it some personal items. Maybe via buying, maybe via earning it somehow, but definitely other ways than only hauling.

I even want to suggest that here is a great opportunity to introduce another future for ED: adding player designed modules! Modding is quite popular on many great games. I do not think that modding is suitable for the base game in ED, but modding for items within our Starports, on Planetbases, inside hubs or whatever could add real personal items to the game where you can make your "home" different from your neighbor.

So yes, as I think that with Trailblazers is (finally) added a great new feature to our beloved game which brought me and I think a lot of other players back to ED, Frontier must take the next step soon to make it more divers and with more 'personal touch' if they want to keep those players around. Hopefully they see that too!