New player, where is everyone?

[smiths121]

I started a second character about 2 weeks ago.

The starter system tend to be full of Sidewinders (makes the meanies easier to spot!). Typically I saw 8-12 other commanders during the day UK time in the starter system and Erivate (the next planet along, think I have the name wrong). I expect the low number is instance matching as I was playing over wifi. Traffic report showed 2xx,xxx over the last 24 hours. I would try using the port forwarding trick, as I would expect to see Sidewinders in the starting system, based on my own experience.

Simon

 

[badwolf77]

Started playing today but have either not encountered another player or people mostly mind their own business? Are people too spread out exploring or doing other activities?

Until you first jump out of LHS 3774, you're in your own private world.

Head to Eravate next door. If there aren't people there at peak times (say 1900 - 0000 GMT), then it's time to look at your internet configuration.

 

[Commandr Sam]

I play solely in open, currently around the SOL area (re) grinding my federation rep. I am seeing 1-5 players in each of the system nearby.

To clarify with all the massive scare mongering from those that do not even play in open. I have put in around 200 hours in open play (mostly in unarmed trading ships making money) since release and have not been attacked by a single player. Everyone I have met has been friendly.

 

[Lateralus]

I play solely in open, currently around the SOL area (re) grinding my federation rep. I am seeing 1-5 players in each of the system nearby.

To clarify with all the massive scare mongering from those that do not even play in open. I have put in around 200 hours in open play (mostly in unarmed trading ships making money) since release and have not been attacked by a single player. Everyone I have met has been friendly.

Yeah that's pretty similar to me....except I have been killed by players a few times early on (when I used to use a T7). Hostile players tend to hang around community goal systems and the Lave cluster mostly.

 

[dayrth]

There should be people around trevithik. It could be that you are being put into an instance on your own. If you friend someone and both go online together the server should put you both in the same instance. This may put you in an instance with other players as well.

 

[RMORTI]

There was, maybe still is, a PC game called Pirates of the Burning sea that was made by the now defunct Flying Labs Software. The scale is smaller, but in a way it's comparable. There were zones, where PVP was authorized and Islands that pirates called home. Traders had some options: 1). Fight the wind (these are sailing ships) and go around the PVP zones and trade your goods at the destination. 2). Risk running through the zones and take the chance of being engaged by a pirate(s). <----- they did tend to run in packs.

Island - planet or system. If there were planets or systems that were clearly marked as "pirate territory" and traders could opt to go around these areas, then I think a more acceptable pirate system would be agreeable to players . Then, the trader who opts to run the risk of flying through a pirate zone has no leg to stand on when complaining about being killed by a pirate. Going back to the game play mechanics of Pirates of the burning sea, it would be also acceptable for a single player or a grouped (wing) of players to go in and try to hunt these pirates down and get a bounty. Again, you chose to enter that area and have no leg to stand on. There should also be some trade mechanism for pirates to earn money. Smuggling would be one; they could bring "illegal" cargo into pirate systems and sell it there. I'd delete black markets outside of these pirate systems.

There needs to be some out of the box thinking on this, because otherwise your open may as well be called empty. If you can put colored blobs around PP systems, then you surely can put the same around pirate systems.

I just think the devs need to think of something else to try and make this work. Otherwise, I don't see much hope for open play.

And I think Pirate groups should be able to influence and flip a system to "pirate". Along prosperous trade routes, this could be quite interesting.

 

[Jayce]

This is basically a single player game whether you like it or not.

Although I never committed, nor was the victim of, the more toxic multiplayer behaviors; the ease at which solo mode allowed for an escape has also aided in the destruction of the open-mode experience. You see, rather than forming convoys for mutual protection, players just go solo/group. Rather than forming organizations that fly escort, perhaps even for a price, players just go solo/group. Rather than players banding together to hunt down the more toxic individuals, they just go solo/gruop. The list goes on and on...

Its not just that though, its more of a combination of factors. The toxicity is part of it, combined with the ease at which one can drop out of open mode, plus the general lack of infrastructure required for players to really organize and communicate, and the lack of direct player to player economy. These issues, among others, have created a situation where hunting down helpless victims is really the only multiplayer interaction that can be achieved easily with any degree of consistency, and where taking positive and cooperative measures against it are quite difficult by comparison.

Just imagine if only a fraction of the solo/group players got organized, came back into Open, and launched a militarized campaign against toxicity. I am sure it would be an amazing thing to see or be a part of, but is it possible? I think not, at least not with the current tool set within the game. It would most likely require all kinds of meta gaming, external chat servers, and so on...

Anyway, I was just here checking to see if any major updates had been released that might get me interested again, but honestly, I'd rather bash my face into a wall than sit through another 5 minutes of super cruise.

Carry on.

 

[Metalstardust]

We are all spread out. Apart from some hot spots like community goals. I could tell you where my top secret home base is........................

 

[Mikalus]

I play solely in open, currently around the SOL area (re) grinding my federation rep. I am seeing 1-5 players in each of the system nearby.

To clarify with all the massive scare mongering from those that do not even play in open. I have put in around 200 hours in open play (mostly in unarmed trading ships making money) since release and have not been attacked by a single player. Everyone I have met has been friendly.

I agree with this. I have always played in open, never been attacked by a player and met plenty of nice players in the process. If I have questions, they usually answer and sometimes after deep space exploration I sit and chat with several players upon my return.

 

[Jem53]

People really are very negative about this game despite the continued efforts of the developers to right the wrongs. Very sad indeed.

That being said, to the OP, it is difficult to find people at the start as many have spread out over the rather large occupied area of space, and you're restricted in jump range due to the starter ships you can afford.

My advice to you is to stay hidden until you have a decent enough ship, a large bank of cash, and the experience to deal with most encounters.

Until then, find yourself a tucked away system without much through traffic and smash the local bulletin board for jobs (they pay quite well now).

Or on the flipside make the 400LY journey out to Ceos and Sothis on the edge of occupied space and you can see me! I will take care of ya

Edit: Oh and i have always played in Open, space wouldnt be the same on my own.

 

[Whiterose]

Have a look at the power play map in the galaxy map, and head to any power HQ.....loads of CMDR's. I have been interdicted, shot at, sworn at, and generally had a good time. Open is more fun, provided you have a sense of humour when all about are losing theirs. You will get attacked by another player, and you will get destroyed every now and again. The key thing is to learn and enjoy the experience.

 

[CMDR Derrida]

That's just open mode. It's like one of those low budget movies where the big battles should be full of extras but they can only afford a few. Billions of stars, but you still see the same old faces in each of them.

 

[CMDR Nightjar]

As badwolf77 said - until you first leave your starter system, you are in 'solo' mode. You have to jump to another system to truly get into 'Open'. After that, if you still don't see anyone, check the network as described above.

 

[Jex =TE=]

This is basically a single player game whether you like it or not.

Although I never committed, nor was the victim of, the more toxic multiplayer behaviors; the ease at which solo mode allowed for an escape has also aided in the destruction of the open-mode experience. You see, rather than forming convoys for mutual protection, players just go solo/group. Rather than forming organizations that fly escort, perhaps even for a price, players just go solo/group. Rather than players banding together to hunt down the more toxic individuals, they just go solo/gruop. The list goes on and on...

Its not just that though, its more of a combination of factors. The toxicity is part of it, combined with the ease at which one can drop out of open mode, plus the general lack of infrastructure required for players to really organize and communicate, and the lack of direct player to player economy. These issues, among others, have created a situation where hunting down helpless victims is really the only multiplayer interaction that can be achieved easily with any degree of consistency, and where taking positive and cooperative measures against it are quite difficult by comparison.

Just imagine if only a fraction of the solo/group players got organized, came back into Open, and launched a militarized campaign against toxicity. I am sure it would be an amazing thing to see or be a part of, but is it possible? I think not, at least not with the current tool set within the game. It would most likely require all kinds of meta gaming, external chat servers, and so on...

Anyway, I was just here checking to see if any major updates had been released that might get me interested again, but honestly, I'd rather bash my face into a wall than sit through another 5 minutes of super cruise.

Carry on.

This. As an almost exclusively Coop/online/pvp player in all my games, I have no issue with players that want to attack me. I don't go looking for fights either but with ED, it's the entire MP method which puts me off wanting to bother.

From the start, I have a game where I can make an affect on the universe with some friends or a clan/whatever but which can be undermined by 2 other play options that you have absolutely no defence against - Solo and Group. How was this a reasonable design decision? Imagine playing a FPS like BF or COD (I don't play either) where you could switch a mode and camp a flag point in solo play. This, ofr me, is an instant turn off. Why even bother trying.

The whole p2p idea is also ridiculous in a game as big as this. You want to make a 400 billion system galaxy and yet you want to support that on a system which would struggle supporting 32 players in the same space (has this ever been achieved btw?)

Then we have the size of the galaxy. It's so big it's managed to make itself pointless. The main problem with this is that in such a huge galaxy, there's only so many planet textures to go around and to any explorer, this is probably the most noticeable but it doesn't end there. Once you go over exploring the unknown galaxy, it's also not long before you realize that you can do nothing but view big balls floating in space. Yes there will be some things that you rarely see that make things nice, but with so little interaction it becomes pointless and boring. There's not going to be any weird space anomalies and if there were, what would you use to interact with it. Space in ED is sterile and lifeless.

The lack of MP options really limit what you can do with your friends. Games need to challenge us in complexity and skill for us to find them rewarding. ED should have a 1000 systems and they could expand from that with a well thought out MP system.

 

[CMDR_Havok]

Well whatever the number it is diluted against a huge number of places to be.

Except that 99.9% of players are (and will always) stay in the 1,000 or so inhabited systems where stuff happens.

So (very rough statistics) assuming 700k players playing an average of an hour a day (I personally play about 2x2hr sessions per week) that means roughly 8k people online at any one time spread over a thousand active systems that means roughly 8 people in any inhabited system at any time.

With a few systems that are busy exceptions, I see far less than this personally....

 

[shadragon]

I have a sixteen episode YouTube series that covers 75 hours of game play in Open. In that time, I saw maybe twenty to twenty-five CMDR's. Lots play in Solo or Private groups. Mobius is near the 10,000 player mark now alone.

Its a big galaxy.

 

[CMDR_Havok]

Been in Mobius for several hours a day for two days, not met a single real player. Not even scanned one, and I've been all over the starter systems and beyond.

EDIT: forget what i just said, it was stupid and pointless .

 

[jacozilla]

I have a sixteen episode YouTube series that covers 75 hours of game play in Open. In that time, I saw maybe twenty to twenty-five CMDR's. Lots play in Solo or Private groups. Mobius is near the 10,000 player mark now alone.

Its a big galaxy.

I only started playing bit over week ago, but in that time I've tried open a few times - and each time, where ever I run my cargo hauler I meet tons of the pew pew crowd trying to gank my freighter.

On very first day trying open, it was multiple encounters on every segment of my route, every system. On occasional repeat forays into open, similar experiences.

So I'd say your meeting people or not meeting people will be very much YMMV.

The only way I would assume you have all those hours of recordings with so little contact is a) you don't pilot a trade ship because the pew pew "pvp" crowd doesn't pvp against targets that can be formidable, or b) you were in off the beaten path places where you would expect to not find many people

 

[Ryder35]

I'll simplify things for Open Play :

Due to implementing a massively toxic atmosphere and disgusting tons of clean/normal/nice Players in Open Play, Frontier basically lost over 80% of their entire Player base already.

Its OK to be negative about the game but do you have some evidence to back up your jaded views? Over 80% of the player base lost? Where do you get that figure from?

 

[jacozilla]

Its OK to be negative about the game but do you have some evidence to back up your jaded views? Over 80% of the player base lost? Where do you get that figure from?

Don't know and don't really care about possibly player base lost, but given Elite only very recently launched on Steam, the world's largest PC distribution platform - which is how I found Elite - and kicking myself for not finding out about game earlier because I love it so much - I would expect player base to substantially grow.

It's got a pretty good exposure level on steam with the featured titles so seems like player base will at least for the short term grow unless new updates really foul things up to turn the new people (like me) away.