NO to "third party tools" for ED

[Armour]

Lots of stuff

I'm sure it was all devastating in your own mind, but it's more like a war of attrition, which I will forfeit through a need to do stuff IRL.

None of your arguments (or indeed any of the others) have derailed the main point that I'm tired of repeating (you'll be glad to hear). Wearing your character is one way of justifying things I suppose.

If people want all the information beforehand, why don't they just run a video playthrough of someone who is really good, and pretend it's them? They'd be just as involved in the discovery part of the gameplaying experience that way, and they are essentially allowing tools to direct their gameplay, as if on autopilot. If it wasn't for the pew-pew, there wouldn't be much left. (Maybe that's why people get bored and post "I quit" threads?)

 

[Bacalao]

Why did you have to bring actual facts to the discussion? We were having so much fun with fabrications, wrong assumptions and IMOs.

It's a terrible habit, I've been trying to kick it with deep forum immersion therapy but it keeps coming back! Maybe Antal has some way to wash my brain out and fix me!...wait, would my in game CMDR know that, I read about that on the forums...hmmmm, oh noes, I cheated!!!!!!

 

[Armour]

The system in the game is arbitrary and silly and a placeholder for an actual trade mechanic.

That's as may be, but that's how the game works, and bypassing it is not playing within the restrictions that the game employs, just like if you had a hack - I might think the current weapon damage levels are arbitrary and silly, but I'm not going to start using third-party tools to subvert them.

 

[Lex Looter]

I might think the current weapon damage levels are arbitrary and silly, but I'm not going to start using third-party tools to subvert them.

Apples and oranges. You can't use third party lists to change the prices of trade goods. You keep talking about different things as if they were the same.

 

[Armour]

Apples and oranges.

Pots and kettles.

 

[Bacalao]

That's as may be, but that's how the game works, and bypassing it is not playing within the restrictions that the game employs, just like if you had a hack - I might think the current weapon damage levels are arbitrary and silly, but I'm not going to start using third-party tools to subvert them.

Except cheating would be directly manipulating market prices to get better profits, or boosting my shield value, or weapon damage, or giving myself scan data I didn't go get. The equivalent of using slopey's or thrudd's or whatever for combat, is fitting my ship in Coriolis.io to maximize shields and dps, that isn't cheating. Cheating is manipulating the game directly.

 

[Khelder]

Using trading tools will lead to players getting bored quicker.

First, I think this comes down to how you use these tools. If your only intention is to find the best trading route so that you can grind that until you are mega-rich, then I guess many would find that boring. I would say that the same would be if you happened to stumble across a fantastic trade route by yourself and then decide to ply it until you are mega-rich. It has nothing to do with how you gained the information. It has everything to do with how you play the game.

Second, for some (perhaps many, I certainly include myself here) players who don't have a lot of time, searching endlessly for a half-decent trade by themselves would soon cause them to give up. I know I certainly would. I have such precious time to spend in this game and I often switch between professions depending on what mood takes me at the time. Docking from station to station with the sole intention of writing down commodity prices in a notebook doesn't hold my attention for long.

Using trading tools takes all 'play' elements out of the game... We might as well be using drones.

That's a weird one. I can use a trade tool to find a good trade route close to me. I still have to:

• Hope the data is current.
• Locate buy station on galaxy map.
• Jump to buy system.
• Cruise to buy station.
• Dock at buy station.
• Purchase commodities.
• Let's make a note here that I need enough credits to be able to buy commodities. I need a ship with a decent cargo hold. I need to spec that ship in a way that I feel comfortable to survive this journey safely against pirates, etc.
• Leave buy station.
• Locate sell station on galaxy map.
• Jump to sell station (usually multiple hops).
• Cruise to sell station (hoping that I don't get interdicted by someone with a much better ship than me and lose my uninsured cargo).
• Dock at sell station.
• Sell commodities (assuming the price was right).
• Decide what to do next.

I may have skipped the aimlessly searching for prices, but that certainly isn't the end of trading.

Using trading tools is wrong/unrealistic/impossible/whatever because it's not in-game.

If my ship gets destroyed and I eject, how do I get back home?
What is the name of my insurance company?
When do I eat, sleep, go to the toilet?
Do I grow old?
Where did all these factions come from?
What are their conflicts about?
If I complete this assassination mission, will I be leaving some poor wife and children without a husband and father?
How are slaves packaged for transport?

There are a lot of blanks in this game that need to be filled by our imaginations. I actually prefer it that way. Otherwise, it could end up like that feeling you get when you see a movie based on a book that you loved and you think that it is nothing like you imagined it to be.

I have made this comment before, but I really hope that some of the features available in 3rd party tools and communities never make it in-game. I believe that players coming together and extending the game in their own way is something special.

Final Note.

Lex Looter, please stop commenting. I can't rep you anymore.

 

[Armour]

Except cheating would be directly manipulating market prices to get better profits, or boosting my shield value, or weapon damage, or giving myself scan data I didn't go get. The equivalent of using slopey's or thrudd's or whatever for combat, is fitting my ship in Coriolis.io to maximize shields and dps, that isn't cheating. Cheating is manipulating the game directly.

This is a game of imperfect and incomplete information, and the level of access to that information is restricted by design. Otherwise we'd have all the market data at our fingertips in the game, wouldn't we? Getting access to that information outside the game is ignoring or subverting the game's original design to gain an advantage - usually in the form of lower bad-trade risk levels, and an artificially-increased credit balance. Sounds very similar to hacks that directly affect stats...

 

[Renegade Roach]

If people want all the information beforehand, why don't they just run a video playthrough of someone who is really good, and pretend it's them? They'd be just as involved in the discovery part of the gameplaying experience that way, and they are essentially allowing tools to direct their gameplay, as if on autopilot. If it wasn't for the pew-pew, there wouldn't be much left. (Maybe that's why people get bored and post "I quit" threads?)

This is complete drivel, at least as far as outfitting tools go. I know the power usage and cost of the modules, they're in game. I can write them all down and work out my loadouts with a pen and paper. Or I can use a helpful little tool which somebody has kindly coded for that purpose. I would make one myself but I can't code and don't have the time or real desire to learn. As for the pen and paper, well... I'd rather actually play the game instead of self flagellating due to a bizarre notion that using such a tool is cheating.

You painted yourself into a corner with the 'anything not in game is cheating' stance.

 

[Raile]

Sounds very similar to hacks that directly affect stats...

No it doesn't.
That's like complaining that using the forums is cheating because you can communicate with other people playing the game when not in the game.

 

[Lex Looter]

Getting access to that information outside the game is ignoring or subverting the game's original design to gain an advantage - usually in the form of lower bad-trade risk levels, and an artificially-increased credit balance. Sounds very similar to hacks that directly affect stats...

Pretty much in the same way that chatting with other customers in the checkout line about discounts and coupons in nearby stores is very similar to armed robbery and aggravated assault.

Like in, "not similar at all".

You can't stretch and twist reality THAT much and still expect people to take you seriously.

 

[Ben Ryder]

I dont even play with the light on

 

[Armour]

You painted yourself into a corner with the 'anything not in game is cheating' stance.

Paint me into whatever corner your imagination builds for you. Loadouts tend to be the same price everywhere (barring special faction deals and the like). They don't usually get affected by other player actions (unless it's faction flipping or something). Commodity prices are affected. Static data like the astronomical/ship/gear stats are more like a fixed part of the ruleset than the BGS. Look, you can play the "list all the things that are not part of the game that aren't trading tools" game if you like, but if we're not just trying to be pedantic to score points or something, it's obvious what point I was making. I don't know whether the OP would agree, but I suspect so.

- - - Updated - - -

Pretty much in the same way that chatting with other customers in the checkout line about discounts and coupons in nearby stores is very similar to armed robbery and aggravated assault.

Yes, the comparison I made is very similar to that. Well done.

- - - Updated - - -

No it doesn't.
That's like complaining that using the forums is cheating because you can communicate with other people playing the game when not in the game.

If you are providing them with information that can be exploited in game, I suppose it is.

 

[Darkfyre99]

Galnet does it, wings do it, CQC technically does it, Powerplay does it...instantaneous comms cross galaxy exist...faster than light. FD hiding trade data in game is just a way to make an underdeveloped feature feel like a game. I'll say it again, even if you had to fly a fleet of sidewinders all around the bubble collecting market data by hand and voice comm it around, a corporation would make oodles of money doing so. Even if they had to write it all down by hand, take it all back to a central location, then redistribute it to every system, the data would be far less than a day old and you would make oodles upon oodles of money doing it. The system in the game is arbitrary and silly and a placeholder for an actual trade mechanic.

The system is neither arbitrary or silly. It is how the Elite Galaxy works: corporations jealousy guard trade data to artificially increase their profits, to the point of ordering assassination attempts on those who spread that information, and the four major powers in the galaxy (The Empire, the Federation, the Alliance, and the Pilot's Federation) aides and abets this strategy, because that is how many of their members make their fortunes and remain in power.

Remember, an efficiently working economy is one where profits are slim, and people who make their living via profits will be required to actually work for a living. Corporations and the Pilots Federation are organizations who make their living via profit. The current state of the galaxy is by design by the powers that be. The democratization of information is a direct threat to those profits, and the power such wealth brings.

THAT is the nature of the Elite Galaxy: a galaxy where corporations rule over most of humanity, who are kept ignorant of the true value of their labor, and distracted from learning more by various forms of entertainment. A galaxy where these corporations outright buy representatives in Federation's parliment, are owned by the oligarchs of the Empire, and are member-states in the Alliance. A galaxy where these corporations ensure that the colonies they control are specialized to the point of being crippled without the imports those corporations bring in, making it harder for the people to revolt against their corporate overlords. A galaxy where these corporations don't want their competitors undercutting their carefully crafted monopolies.

And it's in the Pilot's Federation's best interest to maintain this status quo, because by maintaining the ignorance of the planetbound, we can earn hundreds of thousands of credits per hour, even in a small ship, as opposed to the meager 3 credits per hour earned by most of humanity.

The very heart of the problem, IMO, is that some of the "technologies" you mentioned above were tacked on very late in this game's development. There was to be no in-game FTL comms by design. The wings update, and the comm channels it added, were a gameplay compromise that needed to be made, just like the "speed limit" in combat and the Frame-shift Drive, because in reality we are playing multi-player game, not a single-player game like past Elite. But just because some compromises needed to be made doesn't mean we have to throw away the very heart of Elite, the thing that makes the Elite Universe different from other sci-fi universes.

 

[Lex Looter]

Commodity prices are affected.

Not until you actually log in, hop aboard your freighter and make a zillion runs in that trade route.

Only then you will be able to affect the prices... and you will do that in the same exact way and at the same exact pace you would if you'd charted that route without any external information.

The point here is that even though you can use third party tools to speed up the process of finding a viable trade route, you can't use those tools to speed up or automate the process of making money out of it.

Let that sink in for a few minutes before you go right ahead insisting that it's the same thing as using a shield/damage hack to make millions while AFK, because failing to see that distinction NOW really wouldn't do wonders for your credibility.

Simply put, this "unfair advantage" on which you're basing your whole argument doesn't exist. Crowdsourced data is just people helping each other, to everyone's benefit.

And before you go again about how we're not supposed to have instant access to data because such technology doesn't exist in the game, remember that you can buy data packets to update your galaxy map instantly - and those packets also include market information on distant systems, such as market locations, forbidden commodities on each one, the existence of a black market, services provided and so on). That's not static information, and if this kind of data can be relayed instantly anywhere, anytime, well... you can see where I'm going with this, right?

The system is neither arbitrary or silly. It is how the Elite Galaxy works: corporations jealousy guard trade data to artificially increase their profits, to the point of ordering assassination attempts on those who spread that information, and the four major powers in the galaxy (The Empire, the Federation, the Alliance, and the Pilot's Federation) aides and abets this strategy, because that is how many of their members make their fortunes and remain in power.

Remember, an efficiently working economy is one where profits are slim, and people who make their living via profits will be required to actually work for a living. Corporations and the Pilots Federation are organizations who make their living via profit. The current state of the galaxy is by design by the powers that be. The democratization of information is a direct threat to those profits, and the power such wealth brings.

I'm a bit confused now.

So they are increasing their margins by denying their *customers* access to the most basic information about prices and availability of their products?

But at the same time profits are slim, so all this secrecy actually works to multiply the number of transactions in order to increase earnings, because somehow people buy more when they don't even know how much things cost and where they can find it?

That's a very... innovative strategy.

 

[Armour]

Not until you actually log in, hop aboard your freighter and make a zillion runs in that trade route.

Or until multiple traders jump on the tradewagon and bleed it dry a lot quicker than that, which was one of the points I was making, but whatever...

Only then you will be able to affect the prices... and you will do that in the same exact way and at the same exact pace you would if you'd charted that route without any external information.

Except I wouldn't have charted that route, because I didn't discover it, and nobody provided the information over my ship comms.

Simply put, this "unfair advantage" on which you're basing your whole argument doesn't exist. Crowdsourced data is just people helping each other, to everyone's benefit.

It's not to the benefit of those who might think they've found a lucrative nice run known to few traders, only to find it picked clean by the swarm in no time flat. Bypassing the whole trade route discovery process means that, in pure credits/hour terms, you are making more in less time, because you don't have to "waste time" searching for your next decent trade route.

you can buy data packets to update your galaxy map instantly - and those packets also include market information on distant systems, such as market locations, forbidden commodities on each one, the existence of a black market, services provided and so on). That's not static information, and if this kind of data can be relayed instantly anywhere, anytime, well... you can see where I'm going with this, right?

What, are you going to go on to mention that it doesn't include any actual commodity prices? Yeah, I know. I noticed. I guess that's by design, or they'd have included it probably. It's almost like the designers of the game want the players to travel around the galaxy and find the profits for themselves...but that would be silly.

 

[Monk]

I dont even play with the light on

I don't even play with with my senses on

Spoiler

 

[Khelder]

The system is neither arbitrary or silly. It is how the Elite Galaxy works: corporations jealousy guard trade data to artificially increase their profits, to the point of ordering assassination attempts on those who spread that information, and the four major powers in the galaxy (The Empire, the Federation, the Alliance, and the Pilot's Federation) aides and abets this strategy, because that is how many of their members make their fortunes and remain in power.

Remember, an efficiently working economy is one where profits are slim, and people who make their living via profits will be required to actually work for a living. Corporations and the Pilots Federation are organizations who make their living via profit. The current state of the galaxy is by design by the powers that be. The democratization of information is a direct threat to those profits, and the power such wealth brings.

THAT is the nature of the Elite Galaxy: a galaxy where corporations rule over most of humanity, who are kept ignorant of the true value of their labor, and distracted from learning more by various forms of entertainment. A galaxy where these corporations outright buy representatives in Federation's parliment, are owned by the oligarchs of the Empire, and are member-states in the Alliance. A galaxy where these corporations ensure that the colonies they control are specialized to the point of being crippled without the imports those corporations bring in, making it harder for the people to revolt against their corporate overlords. A galaxy where these corporations don't want their competitors undercutting their carefully crafted monopolies.

And it's in the Pilot's Federation's best interest to maintain this status quo, because by maintaining the ignorance of the planetbound, we can earn hundreds of thousands of credits per hour, even in a small ship, as opposed to the meager 3 credits per hour earned by most of humanity.

The very heart of the problem, IMO, is that some of the "technologies" you mentioned above were tacked on very late in this game's development. There was to be no in-game FTL comms by design. The wings update, and the comm channels it added, were a gameplay compromise that needed to be made, just like the "speed limit" in combat and the Frame-shift Drive, because in reality we are playing multi-player game, not a single-player game like past Elite. But just because some compromises needed to be made doesn't mean we have to throw away the very heart of Elite, the thing that makes the Elite Universe different from other sci-fi universes.

Is that what the lore is? Really? I don't know because on the most part I tend to create my own lore if it's needed at all. But if this is what it is, it really doesn't make sense to me. Yes, the whole thing is fantasy, so I guess you can come up with whatever social rules you want and say 'yeah, that's how things work'. But this is pushing it.

So every system in the populated galaxy, regardless of type of government, even the independents, hold to this view of secrecy-is-best? Really? Every one?

Commerce just doesn't work this way. It's crazy. These aren't specialist items or anything. We're talking about selling fish! I don't understand how secrecy could possibly help markets be more profitable. There may be many cases where corporations choose not to disclose special pricing they grant with special trade deals. But that isn't general commodity prices.

This need to control everything for greater profit that you talk about sounds remarkably similar to the current problems with the media industry. They have been fighting to maintain that old method of commerce for so long. But the majority of people who understand how technology works these days are demanding something different. They want to buy things the way they want. They demand it... or they circumvent. Are you telling me that out of all of these populated systems, the general populace haven't figured out that there's potentially a better way of doing business? You don't think traders would be passing messages to each other or collecting this information together. I know if I lived in this galaxy I certainly would be.

I'm sorry. It just doesn't have the ring of truth for me.

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

So many excuses

When I posted this thread I wanted to underline that I choose not to use tools because that's how this game is meant to be played (otherwise tools would be included) - and I welcomed everyone doing the same.

I didn't want to hear excuses why you play with tools - because they are just excuses. If you want to use them - use them. Just don't claim universal acclaim for that.

 

[OamodSias]

So many excuses

When I posted this thread I wanted to underline that I choose not to use tools because that's how this game is meant to be played (otherwise tools would be included) - and I welcomed everyone doing the same.

I didn't want to hear excuses why you play with tools - because they are just excuses. If you want to use them - use them. Just don't claim universal acclaim for that.

That's fine, because that's your preference and that's your opinion (even if it is wrong).
But, FD decide how a game is meant to be played, not you. They may not have included it in the game, but they do support the use of 3rd party tools.