I am rank 5 pledged to Utopia for about 18 weeks now. Bounty Hunting , fortifying , life is good. Except it could be better.
it's been over 17 weeks of the same thing over and over and over and it makes no sense the actions that occur vs the in-game universe that we are pretending exists. Millions of people trucked to the capital, sometimes more in a week than even populate the system they're coming from. Then like a switch is flipped, it gets reset and happens over again like the previous week didn't happen. It makes it very hard to get your head into the game.
I get the pace was chosen to keep things from getting stagnant and boring. But there is a better way.
1. separate the background sim cycle from the player reward cycle.
Players would be paid weekly and their merits decay etc, all that doesn't change. What changes is that the background sim cycle is now 4 weeks and only related to power rank and existence.
1B. The Triggers for everything would be multiplied about 5 times what they currently are so that no single person would be able to complete in a realistic amount of time any of the activities for a system alone.
This removes sniping. It adds strategy, since even large powers would be resource limited and it requires much more cooperation with members of your power to do anything.
What you've done now is retained the rate of reward so players are still vested to be involved week to week but you're slowed the rate of change players have on the galaxy to a more realistic and meaningful level. Now it becomes a huge deal when a system is undermined or fortified or prepped even. It's not something someone like me can do by myself in a few hours of grinding.
2. Reaching a trigger results in an immediately visible effect in the game.
Perhaps while a system is undermined it provides no power bonuses/benefits. Fortified systems could provide more. Cancelling either would reset the undermine/fortify levels to 0. Progress can then start again. The status of a system changes the cost of the system on the hourly basis described below.
3. Systems do not reset magically on cycle changes.
Costs and profits are calculated hourly with the current status of any given system factored in, this is similar to Galnet hourly updates but instead of the hourly update pretending each hour is the cycle end of the week, my idea is that we divide the weekly cost/profit/overhead by 168 (hours in a week) and it's a running rate. The power economy then becomes fluid, reflecting the status of the systems as they exist rather than determined by a single moment of their existence once a week.
4. Rather than wait for a cycle change, if a power remains in the negative and thus unable to pay for upkeep for more than a 24 hours, the power enters a state of turmoil and if the turmoil state can't be reversed after 3 days then they lose their most undermined systems until income is >= 0 per hour. If no systems are undermined the most expensive non-fortified systems are lost. If all remaining systems are fortified, the most expensive of them is lost. Power bonuses/benefits are suspended while in turmoil. Salary is not affected by turmoil.
5. Then on week 4, the power is measured and ranking is determined, it is also at this point that a power could be removed entirely or added.
Something like that would make the powerplay mechanic feel a lot less artificial and forced and much more like you're involved.
it's been over 17 weeks of the same thing over and over and over and it makes no sense the actions that occur vs the in-game universe that we are pretending exists. Millions of people trucked to the capital, sometimes more in a week than even populate the system they're coming from. Then like a switch is flipped, it gets reset and happens over again like the previous week didn't happen. It makes it very hard to get your head into the game.
I get the pace was chosen to keep things from getting stagnant and boring. But there is a better way.
1. separate the background sim cycle from the player reward cycle.
Players would be paid weekly and their merits decay etc, all that doesn't change. What changes is that the background sim cycle is now 4 weeks and only related to power rank and existence.
1B. The Triggers for everything would be multiplied about 5 times what they currently are so that no single person would be able to complete in a realistic amount of time any of the activities for a system alone.
This removes sniping. It adds strategy, since even large powers would be resource limited and it requires much more cooperation with members of your power to do anything.
What you've done now is retained the rate of reward so players are still vested to be involved week to week but you're slowed the rate of change players have on the galaxy to a more realistic and meaningful level. Now it becomes a huge deal when a system is undermined or fortified or prepped even. It's not something someone like me can do by myself in a few hours of grinding.
2. Reaching a trigger results in an immediately visible effect in the game.
Perhaps while a system is undermined it provides no power bonuses/benefits. Fortified systems could provide more. Cancelling either would reset the undermine/fortify levels to 0. Progress can then start again. The status of a system changes the cost of the system on the hourly basis described below.
3. Systems do not reset magically on cycle changes.
Costs and profits are calculated hourly with the current status of any given system factored in, this is similar to Galnet hourly updates but instead of the hourly update pretending each hour is the cycle end of the week, my idea is that we divide the weekly cost/profit/overhead by 168 (hours in a week) and it's a running rate. The power economy then becomes fluid, reflecting the status of the systems as they exist rather than determined by a single moment of their existence once a week.
4. Rather than wait for a cycle change, if a power remains in the negative and thus unable to pay for upkeep for more than a 24 hours, the power enters a state of turmoil and if the turmoil state can't be reversed after 3 days then they lose their most undermined systems until income is >= 0 per hour. If no systems are undermined the most expensive non-fortified systems are lost. If all remaining systems are fortified, the most expensive of them is lost. Power bonuses/benefits are suspended while in turmoil. Salary is not affected by turmoil.
5. Then on week 4, the power is measured and ranking is determined, it is also at this point that a power could be removed entirely or added.
Something like that would make the powerplay mechanic feel a lot less artificial and forced and much more like you're involved.