Open-Only in PP2.0?

[Venan]

As far as I know this reward only applies if you are killed by other Commanders (humans), that is, playing alone you are deprived of this reward altogether.

I agree - genius

So far every post from them has been giving a thumbs up and calling ideas genius that promote isolation and "a game for everyone" which again... is a game for nobody. There is no involvement in the galaxy because none of the decisions or actions impact the galaxy in a way that matters. It's not gneius, it's lacking forethought and structure. It's like if we did a combined task in the game to make the skybox change in brightness by .000001%. Did it technically change something? Sure. Did it matter or do anything? No. But by their logic "THEY'RE INVOLVED IN THE GALAXY, EVERYONE CAN! AND IT'S GENIUS!". Saying "other players are optionally" in again.. an MMO... nah. Not only is it not optional for the purpose of maintaining the game's advertising, but this game will die if it's not taking in other players to change the galaxy's economies/states and ya know... provide Elite an income.

Lord have mercy commanders.

I think powerplay 2.0 is still in the right direction with gradual increases in rewards leading up to free rebuys against other powers but ultimately none of this will matter if there's not a change in foundation for the game. Or there needs to be more factors beyond ranking/merits/system control in power play like how crime and pinishment works or some other functionality that's apart of PP to naturally promote players to engage in combat against each other as an option.

While it would certainly be misleading to say "Elite Dangerous is not a MMO", it's not exactly following the typical genre conventions of one either.

I've occasionally seen the term "Massively Single-Player Online" for games in that sort of niche - you can meet up with other people but it's not necessarily expected that you will; most inter-player interaction is indirect and asynchronous - but it's not exactly a widely-understood term that Frontier can advertise the game as.

That said, the main problem with meeting up with other players is not the modes but the map scale. The two systems I've spent most time in lately, looking at the traffic reports:
- one of them is just me, and maybe a player a day present in supercruise for a minute as they jump to somewhere else
- one of them has a bunch of haulers (traffic report pretty much purely T-9, T-8 and Cutter) probably doing 5 minute "supercruise to station, load, hyperspace out" trips. The total traffic report is about 40 ships, so the system is going to be occupied for maybe 3 hours out of the entire day. I sometimes see people there at the weekends, but it's not like there's much interaction possible beyond saying "hi" since we're both hauling different cargoes to different places on our own schedules
- there are some Powerplay systems nearby, which I've never seen anyone else in. Can't remember what the traffic reports look like - but they're right on the back of the Power's space facing the fringes of the bubble, so no other Power can plausibly attack them anyway. PP2 brings the "the map is huge" problem to Powerplay, so 99% of the time it makes no difference what mode anyone is in because no-one else (and certainly no-one else from another power) is going to be in the system anyway
- colonisation has just doubled the size of the bubble and spread people out even further

If Frontier had thought about this a bit more pre-release in 2013, and wanted to encourage same-instance interaction - which at least back then, they did - they'd have made the bubble considerably smaller (perhaps 1000 systems at most) and not kept the exact FE2/FFE setting. Obviously with colonisation they've decided that possibility is entirely messed up, and see no harm in it getting much bigger and player meetups being by appointment only.

I think the solution to this is normally to provide guidance in the game in a way that doesn't promote further linear gameplay. We have a GIANT sandbox available, the entirety of the galaxy filled with millions of systems to explore and we then have engineering forcing you to go a very specific route of doing very specific things that ruins apart of the generally free nature of the game. We also have VERY little in terms of actual tutorials explaining how some more basic functions work, how to read huds/maps, and the fact that INARA is a third party tool used to find anything since the game doesn't really have this innate search ability to find commodities or places to mine good resources. If they wanted it all to be RNG so the economy would actually change, I think that'd have to be recoded but as it is, it's not looking like that's going to change either. So far everything has a fixed position and the lacking tutorials is both a good and a bad thing, it's good in not holding your hand as it does require you to reach out to resources and other players to learn which is one way to promote socialization in an MMO. However with so little stats explained in some areas, even that's not enough.

My whole point with all of that is that the game can get around a big "world" by having more natural guiding patterns. Make wanted pirates/bounties have a marker or systems showcase high criminal activity when gankers are present to promote bounty hunters to come over and find PVP. Let pirates find hotspots where people are farming diamonds, since diamonds are harer to mine now, stealing them off NPC's who have them already would be a great incentive to do piracy and encourage more crime/punishment that would lead to boutny hunters actively looking for players. Thargoids attacking specific spots and being marked on the galactic map is another great way we've seen players come together too. Making noticable guidance to show players where and why they want to be there would at least give players an idea where others are to play together or pvp against each other. If you don't want any part of it, instead of having to go solo mode or making a private group, just avoid those areas on the map and you're GG don't have to "deal with gankers" as some people put it.

I feel like this was also the point of boom states and etc economic changes but there's just so little indicators in game naturally and it's not explained what it means or why it should matter to the player. Couple this with how little credits matter beyond fleet carriers right now... MAYBE colonization can change that but at least for now, they're missing some value and it's part of why bounty hunting will stay capped at 2mil too.

With power play, I feel like we could have smaller instances showcasing systems clashing against each other. We have a ton of data showing who's gaining or losing power but there's nothing popping up showing "THIS SYSTEM IS ABOUT TO LOSE/GAIN OWNERSHIP TO X POWER" or anything like that... you just have to assume people check every single system and see what's going on. There's just no activity in that, it's passive. If there was some kind've highlight to show boarders where powers were trying to take over one another or changing a system, I feel like even that would be enough to have players go there to do missions even in private or go into open play for PVP. We just need SOME kinda guidance to alleviate the issue of player spacing and world size.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

but there's nothing popping up showing "THIS SYSTEM IS ABOUT TO LOSE/GAIN OWNERSHIP TO X POWER" or anything like that... you just have to assume people check every single system and see what's going on.

They've just added the powerplay slider levels to the Journal data, so I expect the various planning teams of the major Powerplay groups are already building them (while instructing all their undermining teams not to run 3rd-party tools or they'll just give the game away)

Once I've had a week or two to see how it goes and what the data looks like I'll probably add a version of that to my own "everyone can have a go" Powerplay tools.

(Though, when it comes down to it, there's a roughly 10-to-1 ratio in favour of Reinforcement over Undermining coming through in the early data, so it's not as if the occasional system loss really matters when it comes to the ultimate goal of making everywhere a Stronghold)

 

[Venan]

They've just added the powerplay slider levels to the Journal data, so I expect the various planning teams of the major Powerplay groups are already building them (while instructing all their undermining teams not to run 3rd-party tools or they'll just give the game away)

Once I've had a week or two to see how it goes and what the data looks like I'll probably add a version of that to my own "everyone can have a go" Powerplay tools.

(Though, when it comes down to it, there's a roughly 10-to-1 ratio in favour of Reinforcement over Undermining coming through in the early data, so it's not as if the occasional system loss really matters when it comes to the ultimate goal of making everywhere a Stronghold)

If anything I would think a middle ground for preventing one form becoming a stronghold would be interesting. The stronghold should be a point to defend and strengthen from to hold your line with your power while the lesser systems act as walls in between to gain power over. But yeah, that's good progress at least, I hope it develops more and encourages some organic interactions somehow.

 

[Darrack]

So far every post from them has been giving a thumbs up and calling ideas genius that promote isolation and "a game for everyone" which again... is a game for nobody. There is no involvement in the galaxy because none of the decisions or actions impact the galaxy in a way that matters. It's not gneius, it's lacking forethought and structure. It's like if we did a combined task in the game to make the skybox change in brightness by .000001%. Did it technically change something? Sure. Did it matter or do anything? No. But by their logic "THEY'RE INVOLVED IN THE GALAXY, EVERYONE CAN! AND IT'S GENIUS!". Saying "other players are optionally" in again.. an MMO... nah. Not only is it not optional for the purpose of maintaining the game's advertising, but this game will die if it's not taking in other players to change the galaxy's economies/states and ya know... provide Elite an income.

Lord have mercy commanders.

I think powerplay 2.0 is still in the right direction with gradual increases in rewards leading up to free rebuys against other powers but ultimately none of this will matter if there's not a change in foundation for the game. Or there needs to be more factors beyond ranking/merits/system control in power play like how crime and pinishment works or some other functionality that's apart of PP to naturally promote players to engage in combat against each other as an option.


I think the solution to this is normally to provide guidance in the game in a way that doesn't promote further linear gameplay. We have a GIANT sandbox available, the entirety of the galaxy filled with millions of systems to explore and we then have engineering forcing you to go a very specific route of doing very specific things that ruins apart of the generally free nature of the game. We also have VERY little in terms of actual tutorials explaining how some more basic functions work, how to read huds/maps, and the fact that INARA is a third party tool used to find anything since the game doesn't really have this innate search ability to find commodities or places to mine good resources. If they wanted it all to be RNG so the economy would actually change, I think that'd have to be recoded but as it is, it's not looking like that's going to change either. So far everything has a fixed position and the lacking tutorials is both a good and a bad thing, it's good in not holding your hand as it does require you to reach out to resources and other players to learn which is one way to promote socialization in an MMO. However with so little stats explained in some areas, even that's not enough.

My whole point with all of that is that the game can get around a big "world" by having more natural guiding patterns. Make wanted pirates/bounties have a marker or systems showcase high criminal activity when gankers are present to promote bounty hunters to come over and find PVP. Let pirates find hotspots where people are farming diamonds, since diamonds are harer to mine now, stealing them off NPC's who have them already would be a great incentive to do piracy and encourage more crime/punishment that would lead to boutny hunters actively looking for players. Thargoids attacking specific spots and being marked on the galactic map is another great way we've seen players come together too. Making noticable guidance to show players where and why they want to be there would at least give players an idea where others are to play together or pvp against each other. If you don't want any part of it, instead of having to go solo mode or making a private group, just avoid those areas on the map and you're GG don't have to "deal with gankers" as some people put it.

I feel like this was also the point of boom states and etc economic changes but there's just so little indicators in game naturally and it's not explained what it means or why it should matter to the player. Couple this with how little credits matter beyond fleet carriers right now... MAYBE colonization can change that but at least for now, they're missing some value and it's part of why bounty hunting will stay capped at 2mil too.

With power play, I feel like we could have smaller instances showcasing systems clashing against each other. We have a ton of data showing who's gaining or losing power but there's nothing popping up showing "THIS SYSTEM IS ABOUT TO LOSE/GAIN OWNERSHIP TO X POWER" or anything like that... you just have to assume people check every single system and see what's going on. There's just no activity in that, it's passive. If there was some kind've highlight to show boarders where powers were trying to take over one another or changing a system, I feel like even that would be enough to have players go there to do missions even in private or go into open play for PVP. We just need SOME kinda guidance to alleviate the issue of player spacing and world size.

So are you basically saying you're short of victims to gank because PvP in PP is utterly useless.
The PvP PP utopia that a small amount of folks bang on about is not what the majority want and with instancing, blocking and time zones its utter folly.

O7

 

[Venan]

So are you basically saying you're short of victims to gank because PvP in PP is utterly useless.
The PvP PP utopia that a small amount of folks bang on about is not what the majority want and with instancing, blocking and time zones its utter folly.

O7

I'm actually not a ganker :') I in fact want to hunt gankers and pirates, but neither exist so I can't even do that. The problem is there's no PVP except ganking because they're bored and WANT to pvp but there is currently no reason to or organic means of arranging it. I wouldn't call it a small amount of folks either because despite what the developers believe, there's quite a few vocal folks outside the forums here about this too. The bubble is ours to share and it is not centered on anyone in particular, not you or me. That said, we should see to appealing to people who want to truly engage in something meaningful besides just being a spaceship simulator, plenty of which exist. We should and NEED to embrace good changes, not requesting more conveniences that make it pointless to play to begin with and make nothing matter.

At some point I'd like to see the bounty hunt credit cap removed, PP PVP exist more commonly, in general more population engagement all around. I'd rather say I wish to see this and hope for it than stay where we are pretending I'm content. A lot of the community doesn't try because from what I've seen and heard, we got answers from the devs that shut people up and stopped them from even trying or caring anymore. That's problematic because the community and developers should be keeping in touch and communication general desires, not shutting them down outright. So again, I'd rather speak up about changes I'd like to see than act as though they'll never happen and thus never try.

 

[Brrokk]

I'm actually not a ganker :') I in fact want to hunt gankers and pirates, but neither exist so I can't even do that. The problem is there's no PVP except ganking because they're bored and WANT to pvp but there is currently no reason to or organic means of arranging it. I wouldn't call it a small amount of folks either because despite what the developers believe, there's quite a few vocal folks outside the forums here about this too. The bubble is ours to share and it is not centered on anyone in particular, not you or me. That said, we should see to appealing to people who want to truly engage in something meaningful besides just being a spaceship simulator, plenty of which exist. We should and NEED to embrace good changes, not requesting more conveniences that make it pointless to play to begin with and make nothing matter.

At some point I'd like to see the bounty hunt credit cap removed, PP PVP exist more commonly, in general more population engagement all around. I'd rather say I wish to see this and hope for it than stay where we are pretending I'm content. A lot of the community doesn't try because from what I've seen and heard, we got answers from the devs that shut people up and stopped them from even trying or caring anymore. That's problematic because the community and developers should be keeping in touch and communication general desires, not shutting them down outright. So again, I'd rather speak up about changes I'd like to see than act as though they'll never happen and thus never try.

This always makes me wonder why PvP enthusiasts think they're the only ones who shouldn't need to organise their own content. Explorers are organising DW3 at the moment. Traders search out the most profitable trade routes. Miners compare notes on good hotspots. PP factions all get organised on Discord channels. Players contribute vast amounts of data to Inara and Spansh. I remember an excellent stunt where a player claimed to have kidnapped the blue-hair princess and set tasks for the community to achieve to release her.

Why do PvPers just sit back and moan that there's no PvP content? Where's the regular tournament? Where's the anarchy system you can turn up and have a go in? (Actually, is it still San Tu? If so, where's the publicity?) Where's the PG where players take turns being pirates and haulers, and keep score?

In the end, the answer from the rest of us is "no". We won't play in Open just because you want us to; only when we want to. We won't entertain you seeing that you don't lift a finger to entertain yourselves. "Blaze your own trail", but it has to be your trail, and blazing it might take some effort.

I get that there's some disappointment now because there was an expectation that PP2 would encourage Open play and PvP. I don't think it was a reasonable expectation though; FD never said anything to encourage it.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

I get that there's some disappointment now because there was an expectation that PP2 would encourage Open play and PvP. I don't think it was a reasonable expectation though; FD never said anything to encourage it.

In fairness, Frontier said rather a lot that might have led one to conclude that PP2 was intended as a competitive feature - and therefore, that directly shooting down your competitors if you can is a reasonable action: the instructions on Acquisition systems out of range of your own power even suggest giving it a try on the grounds that nothing else is going to help either; the rebuy discount is clearly there to benefit PvPers since the PvE side really doesn't have anything challenging enough to need it.

That the actual implementation was a 12-way peace festival, and that's actually how most people like it, sure, that with hindsight was probably always going to happen. Direct PvP is an irrelevance when there isn't even really anything worthwhile to indirectly PvP over in your own separate instances.

 

[AEBRAM]

A lot of games these days are lowering their bar to allow more players "into" the game. Which is great for the developers... more people, more money. However the cost of this comes with the soul of the game. Everyone is successful, can do everything equally, and is allowed all the same fairness in every way. Now every achievement... is achieveable by anyone and everyone... easily. This means no one fails, only succeeds, everyone's receiving a participation trophy for hitting the install button.

Don't get me wrong, it's good to give players options to play how they want and take what they want of the game to enjoy it. However in the long run, this is EXTREMELY unhealthy as a mindset for the game's health and future as it promotes mediocrity and lower standards that don't challenge anyone anymore. If you remove conflict to the extremes and give players means to access everything they want to achieve easily, there is nothing to overcome, no challenge to beat, no difficulty, no reason to "need" anything. Why ask for protection from a vanguard of pvp players who protect miners in asteroid clusters when you can just go solo and avoid every bit of that interaction? Why influence a system with the idea of promoting benefits and ideals for a populace when you don't interact with the populace...


We really need to break this habit of trying to make every game acceptable to play for every single individual. It's simply killing games from having any value and removes a lot of the enjoyment on both ends for all players. I hate to beat a dead horse but the "a game for everyone is a game for no one" applies to this game too. The more open and easier we make the game without offering challenge to compensate, the less interested its playerbase will be to continue playing so it won't matter if new players come in if they just exit out in a week. You're left with a husk of a game that won't improve, won't get any better, won't try anything different.

Several released games, and even the dated, active ones, have "dumbed down" their original release. This typically occurs to expand the demographic audience to attract new players. The key feature about Elite is the cerebral quality of the game. For example, take a classic, such as Anarchy Online, in which character building is multi-dimensional: IP skill system, implants, equipment, weapons and the over-equipping mechanics. The combat encounters are tough, and even at maximum level, NPC enemies hit hard.

Transfer this into the dynamics of Elite Dangerous: Ship models, engineering blueprints, mission objectives and constraints, Odessey ground Ops difficulty, Power Play faction dynamics, squadron mechanics for controlling systems, colonization system, and dynamic supply and demand trade mechanics behind the scenes, and aliens/thargoid mechanics. All these characteristics of the game are hidden and not widely visible until you begin looking for them.

I have the philosophy, "When players feel awesome about their ship," then they'll explore and find their niche in the Elite Dangerous universe. On that note, I support smoothing out the access to engineering materials and how engineers are unlocked. Earning credits is part of "paying dues" to advance into better ships; however, improving the engineering mechanics accelerates players to "feel awesome about their ship," for whatever role or purpose they decided for the ship.

In the decades of playing MMOs, the most common player type that wants everything handed to them are the PVP base; Their the more inclined to spend RL$ for game content from other people. Or want to get past all the unlocks to begin doing PVP activities. Now, some people can say otherwise, however this is fairly consistent. Typically, the same player types are more inclined to implement 3rd party cheats or "assists" for an edge over other players:

This basically circles back to the question: Do game developers dumb down their game to counter players who lack game skills, dependent on cheats to assist, in an endeavor to help the disadvantaged players; or was their initial release too complex and needs to smooth out mechanics for clarity and understanding?

 

[Rainbro]

This basically circles back to the question: Do game developers dumb down their game to counter players who lack game skills, dependent on cheats to assist, in an endeavor to help the disadvantaged players; or was their initial release too complex and needs to smooth out mechanics for clarity and understanding?

I'm not convinced Elite has been dumbed down at all, if anything the actual difficulty level for early-midgame players has increased with the possibility for encountering engineered ships. But at worst, its no easier. Elite was always easy. It just took longer.

The example I usually hear is how much "easier" it is to acquire credits. An Anaconda in a week? Back in my day it took a year. But if a mission offers 1000 credits or 100,000, all that changes is how many of them you need to do. That has definitely changed a lot, in many areas of the game. But the skill and knowledge required to complete the mission hasn't really changed.
Elite's upgrade costs are exponential but the upgrades themselves are not, Frontier can only balance activities to one end of the scale, either focusing on the early-game or the endgame. Makes sense that over time it would slowly shift to the end, rather than require you to have started playing years ago with everyone else.

I think (based on a Folding Ideas video about World of Warcraft) that we just want to believe that the games we enjoy are hard. We like good games, we're good at games, games we enjoyed must have been hard. What's hard about Elite? Combat, probably, but the AI used to be way dumber and would frequently come to a complete halt and start spinning. Trading is the interdiction minigame and solved when you know that ships pitch fast, or when you find out it's really easy to build defensively. Exploration is pressing J and trying not to fall asleep at the wheel. There are buttons on the main screen to turn off the greatest threats you could encounter.

Most of that is probably irrelevant because when you say game skills you're clearly referring to game knowledge. But I don't think that's "dumbing down" either to make that more accessible, a game that gives you no information isn't inherently more skillful than a game that gives you all the information you need. It would be dumbing down if there were fewer meaningful choices to make, say if there was a single ship that objectively was the best at everything. Not if it's commonly known that half the engineering blueprints are completely pointless filler. Would the game be more cerebral if we had another dozen pointless Power Distributor mods? It's not a meaningful choice. Engineering increased our options generally but most decisions are still ultimately the same as on release.

For experienced players, it definitely feels easier because we know more now, even if the game hasnt changed in the slightest. Its hard to remember what it was like to not know the best routes, and easy to assume the game is just worse now. In conclusion I should go to sleep.

 

[Venan]

This always makes me wonder why PvP enthusiasts think they're the only ones who shouldn't need to organise their own content. Explorers are organising DW3 at the moment. Traders search out the most profitable trade routes. Miners compare notes on good hotspots. PP factions all get organised on Discord channels. Players contribute vast amounts of data to Inara and Spansh. I remember an excellent stunt where a player claimed to have kidnapped the blue-hair princess and set tasks for the community to achieve to release her.

Why do PvPers just sit back and moan that there's no PvP content? Where's the regular tournament? Where's the anarchy system you can turn up and have a go in? (Actually, is it still San Tu? If so, where's the publicity?) Where's the PG where players take turns being pirates and haulers, and keep score?

In the end, the answer from the rest of us is "no". We won't play in Open just because you want us to; only when we want to. We won't entertain you seeing that you don't lift a finger to entertain yourselves. "Blaze your own trail", but it has to be your trail, and blazing it might take some effort.

I get that there's some disappointment now because there was an expectation that PP2 would encourage Open play and PvP. I don't think it was a reasonable expectation though; FD never said anything to encourage it.

I wouldn't say this is just a PVP issue regarding the fact people have to make niche communities to fulfill something that can't "actually" do because there's no organic means of encouraging it. Piracy? No reason to, crime and punishment is too harsh and it doesn't reward well enough. Bounty Hunting? No reason to, no pirates, no players in open to hunt, not rewarding enough. PVE? That'll be a bit encouraged when vanguards come out with people willing to get together more easily and do harder content, thargoids follow the same ruling where everyone has a likeminded goal and works together. But there's plenty of other areas like you mentioned that are just left to the dust because the game couldn't figure out how to bring all of its components together to work organically and encourage a truly free world with both consequences AND rewards. It would rather keep everyone on a leach doing grinds to keep them playing and paying. That's problematic in itself imo.

Several released games, and even the dated, active ones, have "dumbed down" their original release. This typically occurs to expand the demographic audience to attract new players. The key feature about Elite is the cerebral quality of the game. For example, take a classic, such as Anarchy Online, in which character building is multi-dimensional: IP skill system, implants, equipment, weapons and the over-equipping mechanics. The combat encounters are tough, and even at maximum level, NPC enemies hit hard.

Transfer this into the dynamics of Elite Dangerous: Ship models, engineering blueprints, mission objectives and constraints, Odessey ground Ops difficulty, Power Play faction dynamics, squadron mechanics for controlling systems, colonization system, and dynamic supply and demand trade mechanics behind the scenes, and aliens/thargoid mechanics. All these characteristics of the game are hidden and not widely visible until you begin looking for them.

I have the philosophy, "When players feel awesome about their ship," then they'll explore and find their niche in the Elite Dangerous universe. On that note, I support smoothing out the access to engineering materials and how engineers are unlocked. Earning credits is part of "paying dues" to advance into better ships; however, improving the engineering mechanics accelerates players to "feel awesome about their ship," for whatever role or purpose they decided for the ship.

In the decades of playing MMOs, the most common player type that wants everything handed to them are the PVP base; Their the more inclined to spend RL$ for game content from other people. Or want to get past all the unlocks to begin doing PVP activities. Now, some people can say otherwise, however this is fairly consistent. Typically, the same player types are more inclined to implement 3rd party cheats or "assists" for an edge over other players:

This basically circles back to the question: Do game developers dumb down their game to counter players who lack game skills, dependent on cheats to assist, in an endeavor to help the disadvantaged players; or was their initial release too complex and needs to smooth out mechanics for clarity and understanding?

I'm going to say neither. Personally, I'm not strictly a pvp person. I LOVE pvpve environments where you can use anythign to get away or gain advantage and it feels like an active thrill knowing the world around you is a threat or a friend depending on the choices you make in it. However pvpve is nonexistant when there's no natural pvp to be had or incentive to. If the problem is truly to cover those who "lack the skill" to protect themselves... I've always thought it was a fantastic idea to implement the crime and punishment system as well as maybe even contract systems to counter this. If the report system is designed to give bounties to gankers, then I feel this should be something players can scan and read to see "oh, this person will give me a hefty bounty and notoriety if I decide to attack them, I won't do it" and it should be ACTUALLY punishing. Can't go into star prts for a bit, target on your head for nearby bounty hunters to actively pursue you, ya know.. a crime worthy of the punishment. Not just a slap on the wrist few thousand credits.

In terms of contracts I say implementing something to encourage group play to defend someone or escourt players. One of the funnest ideas in MMO's is one happening recently in Ashes of Creation, where players have to physically travel across the map and prepare to bring what they need. They bring guards to protect them and a caravan to trade goods and if someone organizes a group to attack them, they have a chance of making away with that as a treasure while the guards protecting the caravan have a reason to fight and defend it getting to both enjoy pvp and fight for their reward to be earned. May not even run into any trouble at all, in which case this is just insurance to secure someone's safety and an easy pay for the guards who didn't have to do much at all but travel with a caravan which is a risk on the traders paying them for the protection to begin with.


These kinda systems should be organic and circle around to support the multiplayer design of the game but Elite just doesn't do that and instead promotes everyone getting their own lil sphere to play in by themselves on their own standards and it results in no meaning to anything. Having 10 billion credits after you've bought a fleet carrier and every ship? Now what do you do? System powers for pvp? What pvp when you can't find it, need to ORGANIZE it(who's going to do this to purposefully lose their system for themselves?), and there's no means to find it naturally? A lot of PP's incentive includes rebuy cost reductions and improvements for what would I assume be PVP as mentioned. If we had systems in place to protect miners from pirates and if pirates had a reason to even be pirates for example... we'd see more group play and it'd actually FEEL like something as opposed to the scripted events that are repetitive and unchnging.


I agree with your philosophy overall and I see how you can see PVP'ers being this way as it is usually the case in games too. I think there's way to prevent this though and engineering needs to be tweaked to be side grades to allow your ship to be personalized, not just "better than yours". Coupling that with the fact it's a grind and a half to get your ship up to standards.... it just makes a pretty awful gap between players and only further encourages people play safely which makes it all mean nothing by the end anyways too. Elite's gone through some odd decisions along its lifespan but it CAN change, just sounds like people are content with settling for less because feeling coddled and safe is always comfortable. Comfortable is familiar and change is scary. However we don't accomplilsh anything in content states, we just repeat everything and nothing results of it. You changed some systems while solo in PP2? Nice work!... what'd that do for you or anyone else knowing no one's using open play? You have all the ships and best upgrades on all of em, richest in the galaxy, and colonized a system you discovered entirely by yourself? That's so cool!.... and who cares when no one's around to share or see that or look at it except the few friends you choose to invite that may or may not care either? Where do things "matter" at the core of the game is the problem I see in general. This isn't just a PVP issue, it's that nothing in the "gameplay loop" connects in a natural way. Open ended universe to pick your trail to blaze, linear engineer grind and gather to force you to do things instead of discovering them yourself being the biggest example to date.

 

[Robert Maynard]

But there's plenty of other areas like you mentioned that are just left to the dust because the game couldn't figure out how to bring all of its components together to work organically and encourage a truly free world with both consequences AND rewards.

If those other areas require players to present themselves as targets for other players then they are always vulnerable to the desired targets deciding not to do so.

 

[Venan]

If those other areas require players to present themselves as targets for other players then they are always vulnerable to the desired targets deciding not to do so.

The wording here is so manipulative lol. "Present themselves as targets". This is proof people only see open play as a ganking zone, they don't have any reason to group with players or see others, it's pure fear of being a victim. Again, don't get me confused for a ganker in that all I want to see is players I can shoot at or kill "for fun". That's as mindless as the current state is already and has just as little value and meaning. A pvp player isn't vulnerable to people choosing not to play socially, they're vulnerable to other pvp players and threats themselves AND what should be crime and punishment. What you see is a result of designs not coordinating together to supplement each other. The pvper doesn't get to play in pvp because everyone's afraid due to lack of reliable protection and meaning for it. The pve'er who wants to play with friends or meet new ones can't open play because no protection or meaningful reason to either and has additional gained means to play solo or set privately to do so as a safeguard. Elite secured it's comfy veterans and makes no risks in changing this because those comfy veterans would riot and leave, then no more income from them buying from their ship to support the game. It's all problematic due to fear of displeasing different parts of the playerbase and instead opting to make quality for the loudest voices. And currently the loudest voices are "I know it's all crap right now, but we'll settle for this plz omg". Which... is really sad for how much potential this game has given what it is and what it's capable of doing.

 

[Darrack]

they don't have any reason to group with players or see others, it's pure fear of being a victim

We group in a PG yes to cut out the needless interactions with those pesky gankers, we don't need them.

O7

 

[Venan]

We group in a PG yes to cut out the needless interactions with those pesky gankers, we don't need them.

O7

Ignored the entire rest of my post like you're ignoring everyone else. Close minded and self centered. You do you son.

"o7"

 

[Darrack]

son

Son im nearly 60

O7

 

[Robert Maynard]

The wording here is so manipulative lol. "Present themselves as targets". This is proof people only see open play as a ganking zone, they don't have any reason to group with players or see others, it's pure fear of being a victim. Again, don't get me confused for a ganker in that all I want to see is players I can shoot at or kill "for fun". That's as mindless as the current state is already and has just as little value and meaning.

There is no "fear" in a video game played for enjoyment in the comfort and safety of ones preferred gaming environment, with an immortal space pixie as an avatar and an unlimited supply of free ships....

Frontier chose to offer a single shared galaxy state, with three game modes affecting it, and giving players the choice each session which one they want to play in. They chose not to force players to play among other players while experiencing and affecting the mode shared galaxy.

While some enjoy, or at least tolerate, the possibility of PvP in their game, the fact that other players have always been an optional extra in this game means that it will have attracted players with zero interest in in-the-same-instance PvP - and we all bought the game on the same basis - something that those who want to force players to play in Open to affect game features leave out as inconvenient to their argument.

Those who want to bounty hunt players rely on players to bounty hunt - noting that players can gain bounties without engaging in PvP - only those players with bounties who choose to play in Open are available to bounty hunters.

 

[Venan]

Son im nearly 60

O7

You lack the wisdom of someone who's 60.

There is no "fear" in a video game played for enjoyment in the comfort and safety of ones preferred gaming environment, with an immortal space pixie as an avatar and an unlimited supply of free ships....

Frontier chose to offer a single shared galaxy state, with three game modes affecting it, and giving players the choice each session which one they want to play in. They chose not to force players to play among other players while experiencing and affecting the mode shared galaxy.

While some enjoy, or at least tolerate, the possibility of PvP in their game, the fact that other players have always been an optional extra in this game means that it will have attracted players with zero interest in in-the-same-instance PvP - and we all bought the game on the same basis - something that those who want to force players to play in Open to affect game features leave out as inconvenient to their argument.

Those who want to bounty hunt players rely on players to bounty hunt - noting that players can gain bounties without engaging in PvP - only those players with bounties who choose to play in Open are available to bounty hunters.

Then don't you think there's a fundamental issue with the game advertising itself as an "MMO" rather than a singleplayer game with optional multiplayer? Don't you think it's odd the game is designing concepts and rewards around securing your safety and comfort in a game where nothing is relevant enough to threaten that safety or comfort? It's this illusion that you do something and it has impact when really... it doesn't? You now have unlimited supplies of ships and play by yourself in a system that will not reflect anything you do in it. You can pve the AI pirates, you can mine, you can do all the things to gain reputation and see the pretty lights reflect you did a thing and see your credits go up... but what did that genuinely change or do for you or anyone else? Nothing. What advantages and benefits did you gain for yourself to protect and empower yourself in an empty space with no one but yourself or those you deem fit to join you in it? What did it REALLY do to make an impact or change you can be proud of or look at and go "I did that!"?

 

[Robert Maynard]

A pvp player isn't vulnerable to people choosing not to play socially, they're vulnerable to other pvp players and threats themselves AND what should be crime and punishment. What you see is a result of designs not coordinating together to supplement each other. The pvper doesn't get to play in pvp because everyone's afraid due to lack of reliable protection and meaning for it. The pve'er who wants to play with friends or meet new ones can't open play because no protection or meaningful reason to either and has additional gained means to play solo or set privately to do so as a safeguard. Elite secured it's comfy veterans and makes no risks in changing this because those comfy veterans would riot and leave, then no more income from them buying from their ship to support the game. It's all problematic due to fear of displeasing different parts of the playerbase and instead opting to make quality for the loudest voices. And currently the loudest voices are "I know it's all crap right now, but we'll settle for this plz omg". Which... is really sad for how much potential this game has given what it is and what it's capable of doing.

PvP players are indeed vulnerable to players choosing to play socially - as there is no requirement for social players to play in Open to meet up with friends in a dedicated Private Group.

Elite has gathered the player-base it has based on its feature set - noting that some have come and gone because Frontier have not chosen to PvP-gate any game content (apart from CQC, of course). They know that they sold the game to all players "as it is" - they can only speculate as to how many players they would gain, or lose, if they were to make any significant changes to player choice in terms of access to game features in different game modes.

 

[Darrack]

You lack the wisdom of someone who's 60.

A very famous physicist once disagreed with an idea i had, it was nowt to do with wisdom, he was a genius.

O7

 

[Venan]

A very famous physicist once disagreed with an idea i had, it was nowt to do with wisdom, he was a genius.

O7

You're not offering ideas. You're encouraging complacency and this game will be dead in time as a result of this. That's a lack of wisdom and insight from considering others and their isnights. As much as I've considered yours, you've not done me the same grace. So after this post, I'm going to ignore you.

PvP players are indeed vulnerable to players choosing to play socially - as there is no requirement for social players to play in Open to meet up with friends in a dedicated Private Group.

Elite has gathered the player-base it has based on its feature set - noting that some have come and gone because Frontier have not chosen to PvP-gate any game content (apart from CQC, of course). They know that they sold the game to all players "as it is" - they can only speculate as to how many players they would gain, or lose, if they were to make any significant changes to player choice in terms of access to game features in different game modes.

If that's the route they've chosen, I think they need to find ways to make open play more encouraged then. Let me be clear on this as well and say I don't mind solo play and private play as an option except for the fact there's now no one in open to play with or against and it creates a very "organized" open space despite it being a galaxy full of potential and change being something to embrace as a player(that the devs advertise as well by blazing your trail so to speak). If anything were to happen, I'm on the same page currently as those who want PP2 to be more effective in open play than solo as an example. You're right, there is no requirement, because again... nothing is built naturally to support each of the designs in a way for it to connect. All of the gameplay offered is segmented and disjointed creating different spaces. If that's the path they want and think will support more of the playerbase, who am I to judge when I don't have their statistics in front of me? But at the same time, they're very clearly trying to improve this aspect with PP2 changed how it has, so I can't help but think they do likely want to TRY and support those of us who want to engage in an active world as well?