CCP made a remarkable game some years back, and they learned many things about the players and how to make a good game. Some would say its not, but face it, it is featured in the Museum of Modern Art and made the cover of a few prestigious periodicals more than once. We can say it is a remarkable game and leave it there. I'm not saying they got everything right for every player, lord knows as many didn't play as did, but the important thing is to find wisdom.
In CCP's game you have players killing other players. That can end badly, I'm sure some people take it very hard and get upset, which is never something that motivates a player to play. You don't sit down and say 'I think I'll play because I want to be upset'. You play to have fun, and that can be difficult when others want to have fun by killing you. Huge mess. In response to this CCP did two important things; They created Concord, a ruthless police force, who guarantees destruction of lawbreakers in Secure space. This doesn't mean they stop bad guys from doing bad things, but after the crime has been committed they appear and the transgressor is promptly vaporized. This means most of the PVP in secure space is voluntary, mutual or sanctioned allowing players freedom from most griefing. It doesn't stop suicidal maniacs, but then what does?
Elite could use some 'secure' spaces with similar 'security'. This should definitely extend to starter areas.
The second thing CCP did is introduce a bounty system and implants. A bounty is no big deal if you can grab a cheap ship and loose it, so CCP included some very expensive implants to adorn and improve your pilot. These vanish upon death. It doesn't matter what ship you fly, if you spent enough on implants its not worth dying over to clear a bounty, and the system is surprisingly effective at stopping bounty exploiting. A 10M bounty isn't worth loosing 20M in implants kind of thing. This makes the criminals persistent and keeps them out of civilized space. Elite doesn't need implants, but this idea could be adopted and *something* could be done that would simulate the effect.
There is plenty that can be learned from other games. When the problems are a blanket problem, like griefing, its good to borrow solutions and find ways to fit them in. These are not 'new' problems to any game, but the solutions CCP discovered fit very well into sci-fi and I think Elite Dangerous would benefit from similar mechanics. At best we may see less QQ shot me threads.
In CCP's game you have players killing other players. That can end badly, I'm sure some people take it very hard and get upset, which is never something that motivates a player to play. You don't sit down and say 'I think I'll play because I want to be upset'. You play to have fun, and that can be difficult when others want to have fun by killing you. Huge mess. In response to this CCP did two important things; They created Concord, a ruthless police force, who guarantees destruction of lawbreakers in Secure space. This doesn't mean they stop bad guys from doing bad things, but after the crime has been committed they appear and the transgressor is promptly vaporized. This means most of the PVP in secure space is voluntary, mutual or sanctioned allowing players freedom from most griefing. It doesn't stop suicidal maniacs, but then what does?
Elite could use some 'secure' spaces with similar 'security'. This should definitely extend to starter areas.
The second thing CCP did is introduce a bounty system and implants. A bounty is no big deal if you can grab a cheap ship and loose it, so CCP included some very expensive implants to adorn and improve your pilot. These vanish upon death. It doesn't matter what ship you fly, if you spent enough on implants its not worth dying over to clear a bounty, and the system is surprisingly effective at stopping bounty exploiting. A 10M bounty isn't worth loosing 20M in implants kind of thing. This makes the criminals persistent and keeps them out of civilized space. Elite doesn't need implants, but this idea could be adopted and *something* could be done that would simulate the effect.
There is plenty that can be learned from other games. When the problems are a blanket problem, like griefing, its good to borrow solutions and find ways to fit them in. These are not 'new' problems to any game, but the solutions CCP discovered fit very well into sci-fi and I think Elite Dangerous would benefit from similar mechanics. At best we may see less QQ shot me threads.
