Open Play - Player interaction discussion

[Razeth]

Are there any plans to expand the player interaction for those choosing to play in open play mode?

I ask because I've followed a lot of the threads on here and something stuck out to me. The recent CG event CODE "blockaded" the system. I read through several anecdotes of open play traders saying they were basically disappointed they traded for 8+ hours in open and didn't get interdicted by anyone once. To me the glaring issue with this game is that even if people want to play in open play they won't get the same instance, they'll still have the same boring experience of solo play. So I ask are there any plans to somehow expand the amount of players in a given instance and or any other plans to increase player interaction? All the focus seems to be on 1.3 and the powerplay but I am sitting here feeling like I am crazy because I don't think the update will really affect anything for me. I crave doing something like interdicting a player who has a bounty hunter escort and having PVP ensue. Currently you could waste hours and hours waiting as a group of pirates in the same system as someone trading and never even see them because of instancing.

Anyone else share some of these thoughts?

 

[Pendra]

For me, it seems players are assigned to instances based on their latency. A European will never enter the same instance as an Australian. Unless they are winged somehow.

 

[Razeth]

Perhaps I need to go to a more "inhabited" part of space. It would be cool to be able to somehow view on the galaxy map "player density" or something over the last week.

 

[Midian27]

I see people all over. Even regularly in my hone system which sees less than 30 ships worth of traffic per day.

 

[CMDR Zadian Lichtfrost]

…I crave doing something like interdicting a player who has a bounty hunter escort and having PVP ensue. Currently you could waste hours and hours waiting as a group of pirates in the same system as someone trading and never even see them because of instancing.
…

While instancing is causing some problems, I think the main reason there are no (or not many) wanted pirates out there is because they can simply pay their bounty. This will change with 1.3 and I hope that this will result in more interesting things to do for PvP-lovers than piracy as bounty hunting could become something doable.

Instancing is causing "meta" problems. As you mentioned, if somebody happens to play in the wrong instance he is out of luck. Player driven events like blockading only works if all play in the same instance, but the game isn't designed that way. Time zones make these things even more fractured. Matchmaking doesn't seem to work from what I've read about CZ with one instance full of CMDRs supporting one fraction and an other instance full CMDRs supporting the other.
The result is a galaxy where not many players interact, but a lot of players participate in the same event. This makes things like blockading, taking over systems and similar large scale things pointless since the players never know if the opposing force is in solo or just in an other instance.

In the end it's just an illusion of one galaxy and free player interaction - making the whole open vs. solo discussion pointless.

Maybe the matchmaking could become better and more balanced at the price of separating friends if needed.

 

[WiseDuck]

I see people all over. Even regularly in my hone system which sees less than 30 ships worth of traffic per day.

As a Pirate I see only dead people.

 

[Razeth]

While instancing is causing some problems, I think the main reason there are no (or not many) wanted pirates out there is because they can simply pay their bounty. This will change with 1.3 and I hope that this will result in more interesting things to do for PvP-lovers than piracy as bounty hunting could become something doable.

Instancing is causing "meta" problems. As you mentioned, if somebody happens to play in the wrong instance he is out of luck. Player driven events like blockading only works if all play in the same instance, but the game isn't designed that way. Time zones make these things even more fractured. Matchmaking doesn't seem to work from what I've read about CZ with one instance full of CMDRs supporting one fraction and an other instance full CMDRs supporting the other.
The result is a galaxy where not many players interact, but a lot of players participate in the same event. This makes things like blockading, taking over systems and similar large scale things pointless since the players never know if the opposing force is in solo or just in an other instance.

In the end it's just an illusion of one galaxy and free player interaction - making the whole open vs. solo discussion pointless.

Maybe the matchmaking could become better and more balanced at the price of separating friends if needed.

Thanks for summing up what I was saying more or less perfectly. The discussion between open/solo is totally pointless in essence. The real discussion needs to be on how to improve open play so that we players can get the real experience we are craving. I personally am looking for one galaxy not the ability to expand a faction through a million fractional instances of the same system. I'm not sure how they can do this other then to get more money and expand their infrastructure to allow more players in a particular instance of a system.

 

[Jorlin]

Thanks for summing up what I was saying more or less perfectly. The discussion between open/solo is totally pointless in essence. The real discussion needs to be on how to improve open play so that we players can get the real experience we are craving. I personally am looking for one galaxy not the ability to expand a faction through a million fractional instances of the same system. I'm not sure how they can do this other then to get more money and expand their infrastructure to allow more players in a particular instance of a system.

It's not a matter of infrastructure but choosing the P2P model.
Sure, you could rewrite the whole game to make it client/server based and add the infrastructure.
This won't happen though.

It's not just about adding a few servers.
The whole network part would have to be done from scratch, the ruleset adapted, the finance model changed.
This is impossible to do with a game already running.