Open-Only in PP2.0?

[Screemonster]

Just saw a guy on the reddit calling the idea of NPC enforcers "a blatant attack on the majority of elite dangerous players who play this game to relax".

You know, the enforcers who won't attack you if you're not pledged to a hostile power.
So the idea of facing any opposition at all while actively and deliberately attacking someone else is some sort of heinous sin to some people.

"I want to affect other people, but being affected is a violation of my rights"

 

[Robert Maynard]

Just saw a guy on the reddit calling the idea of NPC enforcers "a blatant attack on the majority of elite dangerous players who play this game to relax".

There's always one. Noting that there have been a few over the years who wanted NPCs removed from their game too. They are equally unlikely to get what they seem to want.

 

[WhiteHaulerMan]

Were you a member of the dev facing Powerplay leader / representative discord? If not then you'd not know about a fair many things. Not everything is or was on this forum.

The rest will simply have to wait, but everything I've stated is truthful.

Which is a problem this forums old guard tend to face; assuming that everything happens on this forum, or in english speaking circles.

Its why everyone got such a nasty shock when ED Gamers steamrolled the rise to power event.

 

[Rubbernuke]

Just saw a guy on the reddit calling the idea of NPC enforcers "a blatant attack on the majority of elite dangerous players who play this game to relax".

You know, the enforcers who won't attack you if you're not pledged to a hostile power.
So the idea of facing any opposition at all while actively and deliberately attacking someone else is some sort of heinous sin to some people.

"I want to affect other people, but being affected is a violation of my rights"

The thing is, I actually agree with them, to an extent.

In my mind ED should be about consequences- and that doing something should have a consequence depending on what it is.

For example, someone who is not pledged, never fired a shot and simply trades basic goods and flies a Lakon T series nobody ship in a well regulated system should rarely gain attention. If they want to relax and fly about they deal in things that no faction or pirate would really want.

This changes however as the player takes on missions for factions, pledges or farms anarchies etc- someone takes notice and through action starts to attract attention. As an example farming anarchy systems attracts the attention of gangs, or that rival factions don't like the players assistance to an enemy. To me Powerplay and pledging should be one of the most consequential actions you can take, considering you are then opposing eleven other powerful organisations. The only thing that should be even above this is superpowers and rep (thus making being truly independent a valid choice for gameplay as well as RP reasons).

This would hook into missions where pirates are likely to pop up- the cleaner your rep the less chance you'll see them.

So then to be as neutral as possible is possible, but is achieved through gameplay and conscious effort, while at the same time allowing a more nuanced experience for the rest of us that has long term context.

 

[Darrack]

The thing is, I actually agree with them, to an extent.

In my mind ED should be about consequences- and that doing something should have a consequence depending on what it is.

For example, someone who is not pledged, never fired a shot and simply trades basic goods and flies a Lakon T series nobody ship in a well regulated system should rarely gain attention. If they want to relax and fly about they deal in things that no faction or pirate would really want.

This changes however as the player takes on missions for factions, pledges or farms anarchies etc- someone takes notice and through action starts to attract attention. As an example farming anarchy systems attracts the attention of gangs, or that rival factions don't like the players assistance to an enemy. To me Powerplay and pledging should be one of the most consequential actions you can take, considering you are then opposing eleven other powerful organisations. The only thing that should be even above this is superpowers and rep (thus making being truly independent a valid choice for gameplay as well as RP reasons).

This would hook into missions where pirates are likely to pop up- the cleaner your rep the less chance you'll see them.

So then to be as neutral as possible is possible, but is achieved through gameplay and conscious effort, while at the same time allowing a more nuanced experience for the rest of us that has long term context.

The issue with everything revolving around PP, ie all actions permanently effecting it even if not a specific mission. is that many of us do lots of in game stuff without thinking about PP all the time.
PP is not the game, as things are at the moment i get interdicted a few times by oposing faction NPCs when im trading or mining (not for PP) which is fine.
If im going to be completely harassed all the time even when im not doing PP, im soon going to lose interest.

Not all actions should have consequences only those specifically done whilst doing PP stuff.
Which is why i am hoping its only stuff from a mission board that gets me the extra attention.

O7

 

[Rubbernuke]

The issue with everything revolving around PP, ie all actions permanently effecting it even if not a specific mission. is that many of us do lots of in game stuff without thinking about PP all the time.
PP is not the game, as things are at the moment i get interdicted a few times by oposing faction NPCs when im trading or mining (not for PP) which is fine.
If im going to be completely harassed all the time even when im not doing PP, im soon going to lose interest.

Not all actions should have consequences only those specifically done whilst doing PP stuff.
Which is why i am hoping its only stuff from a mission board that gets me the extra attention.

O7

In a PP context what should get the attention is how much you do within PP itself, really. If you pledge but do little then realistically rivals won't see you as a threat- so if you take a break that week, you are not being a valuable target. However, if you are the one keeping a power afloat and in the top 10 pilots, other powers should hunt you wherever you go.

 

[Tifu]

Not all actions should have consequences only those specifically done whilst doing PP stuff.
Which is why i am hoping its only stuff from a mission board that gets me the extra attention.

O7

In a PP context what should get the attention is how much you do within PP itself, really. If you pledge but do little then realistically rivals won't see you as a threat- so if you take a break that week, you are not being a valuable target. However, if you are the one keeping a power afloat and in the top 10 pilots, other powers should hunt you wherever you go.

I think that if your loyalty ranking for a PP 2.0 power is high and you're currently undertaking a PP mission for it then the chances of interference from an opposing faction NPC should be correspondingly high.

Scale down as needed for the lower loyalty ranks.

 

[Screemonster]

Which is a problem this forums old guard tend to face; assuming that everything happens on this forum, or in english speaking circles.

Its why everyone got such a nasty shock when ED Gamers steamrolled the rise to power event.

Sample bias is a real thing that affects game communities.

It comes up all the time when people bring up the bartle test - the number of "socialisers" you'll find on forums massively exceeds how many there are in the playerbase at large almost by definition, because socialisers are specifically the group driven to seek out large out-of-game communities.

 

[Rubbernuke]

I think that if your loyalty ranking for a PP 2.0 power is high and you're currently undertaking a PP mission for it then the chances of interference from an opposing faction NPC should be correspondingly high.

Scale down as needed for the lower loyalty ranks.

In V2 there are no ranks though IIRC, and personal reward tiers never decay

But the more involved you get the more interested rivals should be.

 

[Darrack]

In V2 there are no ranks though IIRC, and personal reward tiers never decay

But the more involved you get the more interested rivals should be.

This was something i hope they would do away with, i tend to do a few weeks PP then head out into the Black for a couple of months, coming back i could rank back to L5 in a few nights but those extra clicks for loading up the cutter (fast tracking) got really tedious.
So no rank decay would be great for us casuals.

O7

 

[Rubbernuke]

This was something i hope they would do away with, i tend to do a few weeks PP then head out into the Black for a couple of months, coming back i could rank back to L5 in a few nights but those extra clicks for loading up the cutter (fast tracking) got really tedious.
So no rank decay would be great for us casuals.

O7

The evil part of me would have Powerplay NPCs scan your exploration data and count that as participation (because it is, given some of the UM criteria from FU-4).

It raises the question regards PP NPC opposition since for some phases of V2 expansion (from power unoccupied to exploited) you are doing general activity that aligns with your power but not strictly Power 'stuff' (like pamphlets). If NPCs are to be proper replacements for players, even being pledged is elevating your potential threat profile contextually and an interesting grey area given the BGS bias now.

 

[Screemonster]

Honestly though, I'd love to see some way of rewarding players for doing "risky" behaviour such as flying in open, but the only way to really make that practical without running into stuff like blocklists, instancing and all the other million ways people could cheese """"""flying in open"""""" would be to just... reward actually instancing with opponents.

Not a strategic reward, necessarily, but a personal one. I'm not talking about giving a bonus to your next mission's slider-movement-points because you passed a hostile player in supercruise (though that wouldn't be too terrible, it'd be open to 5th-column nonsense of someone parking a "hostile" alt in a system while their buddies run missions)

Like, if you get into a fight with another player pledged to an opposing power, then win or lose you're still fighting for your power which makes your power think more highly of you. Even escaping from an attempted bushwhack could grant you kudos. For instance, successfully initiating a jump with a hostile player present could just give you a handful of rank points. Hell, being blown up could grant you a consolation prize. (no prizes for just logging out though - escape, kill, or die, those are your options)

This would in practice work out to be an open-only benefit since it's not a thing that can happen in solo. Sure I guess in private they could arrange to meet and interdict each other to boost their ranks, but honestly... if that's how they wanna spend their playtime then let 'em, same with any other technically-effective-but-incredibly-boring way of rank grinding. Maybe put a rate limit on how often you can benefit from being pulled by the same player? idk.

 

[Robert Maynard]

In V2 there are no ranks though IIRC, and personal reward tiers never decay

But the more involved you get the more interested rivals should be.

Given that the Powerplay 2.0 reward tier seems to be another long service award (like the existing Elite ranks) rather than a measure of skill hopefully it will be to a large extent ignored in terms of NPC reactivity - but current activity rate would be a factor in determining the intensity of NPC opposition.

 

[Darrack]

Honestly though, I'd love to see some way of rewarding players for doing "risky" behaviour such as flying in open, but the only way to really make that practical without running into stuff like blocklists, instancing and all the other million ways people could cheese """"""flying in open"""""" would be to just... reward actually instancing with opponents.

Not a strategic reward, necessarily, but a personal one. I'm not talking about giving a bonus to your next mission's slider-movement-points because you passed a hostile player in supercruise (though that wouldn't be too terrible, it'd be open to 5th-column nonsense of someone parking a "hostile" alt in a system while their buddies run missions)

Like, if you get into a fight with another player pledged to an opposing power, then win or lose you're still fighting for your power which makes your power think more highly of you. Even escaping from an attempted bushwhack could grant you kudos. For instance, successfully initiating a jump with a hostile player present could just give you a handful of rank points. Hell, being blown up could grant you a consolation prize. (no prizes for just logging out though - escape, kill, or die, those are your options)

This would in practice work out to be an open-only benefit since it's not a thing that can happen in solo. Sure I guess in private they could arrange to meet and interdict each other to boost their ranks, but honestly... if that's how they wanna spend their playtime then let 'em, same with any other technically-effective-but-incredibly-boring way of rank grinding. Maybe put a rate limit on how often you can benefit from being pulled by the same player? idk.

There should never be any rewards for mode of play, its personal choice and nowt to do with risk, flying in Open you often see nobody and his/her Dog.

O7

 

[Screemonster]

There should never be any rewards for mode of play, its personal choice and nowt to do with risk, flying in Open you often see nobody and his/her Dog.

O7

I'm not proposing to reward the mode, I'm proposing to reward interaction. Not even a reward that affects you.

 

[Darrack]

I'm not proposing to reward the mode, I'm proposing to reward interaction. Not even a reward that affects you.

No but a reward that favours a game play (pvp) that many don't take part in.

O7

 

[Rubbernuke]

There should never be any rewards for mode of play, its personal choice and nowt to do with risk, flying in Open you often see nobody and his/her Dog.

O7

The ideal would be bonuses / multiplier based on what actually happened- sort of danger pay. Then you can scale to anything in any mode.

But at the same time you don't actually know what you'd come across, especially in the core systems with large powers. Even when I was flying at 5am France time I'd have Patty Patrol or PMF guys about and you'd have to fly and build ships with at least some viability in mind.

 

[Screemonster]

No but a reward that favours a game play (pvp) that many don't take part in.

O7

So is "getting paid for selling mined materials". What's your point?

 

[Screemonster]

The ideal would be bonuses / multiplier based on what actually happened- sort of danger pay. Then you can scale to anything in any mode.

But at the same time you don't actually know what you'd come across, especially in the core systems with large powers. Even when I was flying at 5am France time I'd have Patty Patrol or PMF guys about and you'd have to fly and build ships with at least some viability in mind.

That's why I was suggesting something for actually meeting people.

The counterbalancing "reward" for not meeting people is, naturally, the fact that you can just mindlessly beeline to the station at maximum efficiency and thus get more missions in.

 

[Rubbernuke]

No but a reward that favours a game play (pvp) that many don't take part in.

O7

Taking V1 PP as an example, the players were the opposition though outside of PvE zones like CZs. It was not unusual in Solo (when I started PP) to see no NPCs at all and having a bonus for that risk would be appropriate.