Make it hard

[Dagwit]

I'm combat Elite, but I have no illusions that that means I'm actually any good.

Anyway, I was in a CNB yesterday, farming Deadly and Elite ships to rank up my SLF pilot, when I scanned a wing of Wanted NPCs. This wing consisted of an Elite Anaconda and two Deadly Federal Gunships.

And I looked at this wing from the cockpit of my K2 and thought: no.

The game can sometimes be just a bit harder than I'm comfortable with.

 

[[PS4] Lorenzo Waringos]

Yeah NO FUN ALLOWED in ED! Remember that!

I must be playing it wrong.

 

[Rat Catcher]

It's not like we could make different hazzard levels so players can test their skill in different difficulties.
Yeah NO FUN ALLOWED in ED! Remember that!

Difficulty is optional - if you wan't to get away from just blowing up vanilla NPC's you can take a foray into a High CZ or hunt Thargoids in a Threat 8+ NHSS...
Plenty of hazards there, if you are really bored (or just so darned good!) try doing that in an unshielded Challenger

 

[Rat Catcher]

I'm combat Elite, but I have no illusions that that means I'm actually any good.

Anyway, I was in a CNB yesterday, farming Deadly and Elite ships to rank up my SLF pilot, when I scanned a wing of Wanted NPCs. This wing consisted of an Elite Anaconda and two Deadly Federal Gunships.

And I looked at this wing from the cockpit of my K2 and thought: no.

The game can sometimes be just a bit harder than I'm comfortable with.

Next time go in something other than your Keelback?

(I won't mention the CNB I dropped in to with 'forgotten' 2nd owner cargo on board - even in a reasonably equipped Corvette I had to make a discrete withdrawal when around 20 ships took interest in me )

 

[Rubbernuke]

In your opinion you may be correct. In my opinion it's fine as it is. I get to survive most of the time. That's good enough for me.

And what part did you not comprehend?

I've been arguing to add top end challenge, not re-calibrate the whole spectrum which would be wrong.

Top end missions are too easy. Any G5 medium or large ship can button mash them- what we need are additional Elite+ levels of hard, with two Corvettes, various wings and compositions. When an adjuster comes after a defector, it needs to be potent. The same for bounty hunters who are easily farmed.

So once again- make ED tougher in the right areas. But not everywhere.

 

[Rubbernuke]

Difficulty is optional - if you wan't to get away from just blowing up vanilla NPC's you can take a foray into a High CZ or hunt Thargoids in a Threat 8+ NHSS...
Plenty of hazards there, if you are really bored (or just so darned good!) try doing that in an unshielded Challenger

What I find a bit disturbing is that no-where are people talking about security levels and their complications. The reverse should be true for PvE crime, with high med and low + anarchy feeling more threatening based on your behaviour.

 

[Dagwit]

Next time go in something other than your Keelback?

Apologies for the elision. Krait Mk II, engineered to the hilt and shield tanked, two fixed overcharged beam lasers with thermal vent, three hi-cap railguns, two with super pen, one with reverberating cascade. Plus a fighter, of course. Still not going to tackle that wing.

And I wouldn't be seen dead in a Keelback. Mainly because I'd soon be seen dead in a Keelback.

 

[Rat Catcher]

What I find a bit disturbing is that no-where are people talking about security levels and their complications. The reverse should be true for PvE crime, with high med and low + anarchy feeling more threatening based on your behaviour.

Because they are all nice, law-abiding CMDR's who have never been on the wrong side of an ATR visit?

 

[Rat Catcher]

Apologies for the elision. Krait Mk II, engineered to the hilt and shield tanked, two fixed overcharged beam lasers, three hi-cap railguns, two with super pen, one with reverberating cascade. Plus a fighter, of course. Still not going to tackle that wing.

And I wouldn't be seen dead in a Keelback. Mainly because I'd soon be seen dead in a Keelback.

Ah, the Keelback, happy memories of playing (in a PG) with one of my Canadian friends - gave him the SLF to play with, we were messing around, he hit 3 times and the canopy went...

I don't think I've laughed so much since the last time a White Dwarf ate my ship

 

[Rubbernuke]

Because they are all nice, law-abiding CMDR's who have never been on the wrong side of an ATR visit?

Its not even that (well, sort of not ) but in PvE at least security should matter to mix things up for lawful and unlawful gaming. Timings need to be mixed up to make more "whoa"" moments. I once played while having my speakers off, and I missed the ATR message and got quite the fright

 

[cheesenbiscuits]

Considering I’m not very good at combat I shouldn’t be able to take on multiple wing missions with relative ease,these should be the ultimate challenge for a solo player.

 

[S0rkvild]

Making it hard? But what? Tougher enemies? Fly to your nearest combat zone and see that making things harder turns the enemies into bullet sponges.

 

[Snowymonk]

I agree with the OP.
I made it through to Combat Elite. Not because I am good at combat, but because I held to the grind long enough to get there.

I have said in posts before that if I was buildng the ranking system again from scratch, I would have only a top x% of the player base be allowed to be classified as Elite. You acrue points for every ship you destroy based on their respecitve rank and top end NPC pilots should be bl**dy difficult to beat. Even go so far as overpower them. Give them unreasonable builds. What they have in firepower can be balanced by the fact that they are AI and therefore can be predictable. (but if you get it wrong, they will kill you)

 

[[PS4] Lorenzo Waringos]

A CMDR made a post last night that him and his mate had been doing a trade mission (so presumably it was a wing one) and that they 'lost' one of the loads meaning they couldn't complete the mission, losing out on the 5mCr reward. He said that this was a waste of a day.

So firstly, I'm guessing when he says 'lost', one of them got blown up by an NPC, secondly, the pair of them running a wing mission that pays 5m, to my memory, isn't thousands of units (I can obviously be wrong about this). It did however take them 'all day'. So these guys are finding that hard enough.

I guess it is worth examining some of the nostalgic type posts we see. "Remember when I was in a Keelback trying to do stuff, hardly engineered? The NPC's were tough then. Since I have put in 4k hours into the game, have everything engineered to the max and have become extremely familiar with NPC behaviour, combat tactics and the best loadout for preservation, the NPC's seem to be a lot easier."

Yes indeed, they have.

This isn't a criticism, it's also not an 'everything is fine' post. But it is a reminder that plenty of people find the NPC's tough. I totally agree that NPC's ranked ELITE should be really tough but players who have been playing forever, have a fantastic working knowledge of the mechanics of the game are always going to bump into some ceiling at some point. I can just imagine some changes happen and we'd see "I have 4k hours experience in the game, an A-Rated, engineered to the max, I'm Bruce Lee hard ship and I can't do this mission, this is ridiculous" posts.

I don't know of any game that you could play for a year or more and not find the NPC's predictable and easy to kill. Asking ED to invent that system when I don't believe it exists, whilst keeping players of all abilities moderately happy sounds like a big ask, nigh impossible if you ask me.

Just a thought.

 

[CMDR Harada]

Because they are all nice, law-abiding CMDR's who have never been on the wrong side of an ATR visit?

You're right. I was just on the "wrong side" of an ATR visit the other night in my Corvette and decided to make a discreet withdrawal.Taking fire from 6 or 7 ships at once, with more popping in, was a challenge. Sure, I could blast them out of the sky, but it was "death of a thousand cuts", and more kept coming. I found a new respect for the Notoriety system.

There are plenty of challenges if you go looking.. Try a CNB with a ton of "gold in the hold".

Ditto for a HazRES. It's a little harder in a HazRES, since you have to break the rings mass lock before you can jump out.

AX/Bug Hunting is another, but never appealed to me because of the AX specific builds that were less effective against human ships.

 

[VR StarLightPL]

Given that only about 50% of the potential player-base even own a copy of Horizons,

Where's that number from?

 

[thistle]

I hope someone already said Fnarr.

 

[Robert Maynard]

Where's that number from?

A market statement made by Frontier not that long ago.

 

[WR3ND]

It was never particularly hard. I remember some bugged NPCs having turbo rail guns and that sort of thing during the Engineers beta and update, I think it was. Took a few heavy hits, but didn't lose a ship to it.

My vote: get rid of ship rebuys altogether. Too bad it'll never happen.

 

[EUS]

The difficulty slider exists, it's the level to which you engineer.