Please reduce travel times in the bubble

[VR Golgot]

I don't think its the player base that are committed regardless that keep the servers going...it's has to be new business/ CMDR's,every model depends on the in-flow of new customers.

That's pretty much how the CFO put it recently:

The majority of revenue for Elite Dangerous still comes from players coming fresh to the game

In that same excerpt he says cosmetics raised 4m last financial year (of 22m total revenue). Even accounting for long-haul Cmdrs buying multiple accounts / gifts etc, it seems that new influx is the main lifeblood of the franchise.

The new noob-smoothing definitely looks like them worrying about the attachment rate to me.

Impenetrability is obviously one blocker. Wouldn't be surprised if dead transit time was in the mix too.

 

[Darth CareBear]

That's pretty much how the CFO put it recently:



In that same excerpt he says cosmetics raised 4m last financial year (of 22m total revenue). Even accounting for long-haul Cmdrs buying multiple accounts / gifts etc, it seems that new influx is the main lifeblood of the franchise.

The new noob-smoothing definitely looks like them worrying about the attachment rate to me.

Impenetrability is obviously one blocker. Wouldn't be surprised if dead transit time was in the mix too.

Wow thx for sharing, i have never seen that, but i had my best guess of what the share of new vs recurring business split was, it is usually the same for every title or every business really.

So to me, and this proves it in a way, it is not about how hard it must be to now mine Billions of credits or how rewarding it must feel to reach Colonia on an economy route, or how quickly I got my 1st Anaconda...it does not impact my game in any way on how fast somebody else travelled or achieved those things. But the flow of Dollar Bills to shareholders will dictate entirely how this game proceeds.

 

[MickyG1982]

Something else I've noticed is, if I drop out of SC immediately after entering a system and then jump back into SC, I'm much more likely to encounter an NPC pirate.

The dice is rolled every time you change instance, you'll also notice that bonus messages will pop up just as you enter a system, drop to normal space or jump into SC (or sometimes when you lift off). That's why you'll see them more often than not on those occasions.

 

[Muetdhiver]

I think one should be carefull about not bagging all issues together.
I see three issues related to travel in ED that could use improvements and rework, for different reasons.

1) Coop play setup. Herding the cats is no fun, so to speak. I would suggest a simple (and limited change) :
1a) Upon login in the game you may pick any owned ship without cargo.
1b) Then, said ship can be spawn in any spaceport where you have a ship or a friend present in the system. The spawn may not be more than 200 lyr away from your last spawn.

2) Boring SC. Here the problem is that SC flying is awfully boring, save the times where one does clever mass lock dodge and/or gravity braking. Now, the problem here IMO is the lack of terrain to play with, especially over long hauls. Maybe having a SC "safety off" drive mode where acceleration and top speeds are higher, but SC space time becomes dangerous (SC anomalies that may slow you down, or that you may use to slingshot) could spice long hauls. All I will say is that despite liking the slow pace of exploration, I despise the 20-30min SC to get to secondary stars. Maybe following chains of SC anomalies lead you to some deep space anomalies, not unlike the notable stellar phenomenon.

IMO short cutting SC with mini-jumps is more of a cop-out than a true improvement. SC could be made cool. So would interdictions if instead of the mini-game it was about navigating the SC terrain with no safety net while sticking/losing the opposing ship.

3) Lacklustre Pathfinding in Exploration. Making the galaxy a maximally connected graph in term of Hyperspace lanes has nipped in the bud the chances of a pathfinding / route paving Exploration gameplay. Maybe restricting the existance of hyperspace lanes based one the bodies types and mass could make the game more interesting. Especially if players could drop nav beacons that ensure the existance of lanes between them and boost the number of conections from the considered system.

Case in point is the Formidine rift pre-engineering : finding crossing paths was a very fun experience, that got destroyed with engineering. Having hard to get places should be much more common and route pathing could be a way to make exploration more meaningfull and lead to nice player driven content.

Final case : The sense of scale (invoked to defend super long SC times). It makes not sense to me since said long SC travels are optional. Which is an other way of saying that the sense of scale is optional. Which is an other way of saying that the game does a poor job of conveying said sense of scale. Then what is the point again ? Scale is best felt during exploration when trying to reach far out stars and trying not to get lost or stuck from a mistake. SC ? It's like 2h of highway driving, it's mainly boring.

 

[peteuplink]

The dice is rolled every time you change instance, you'll also notice that bonus messages will pop up just as you enter a system, drop to normal space or jump into SC (or sometimes when you lift off). That's why you'll see them more often than not on those occasions.

Never seems to trigger when I enter a system, though. Only when I enter then disengage and re-engage SC. So I;m guess it's probably not working as intended all the time.

 

[lenna]

In an ideal world that rate of interdiction would be tied into the security rating and state of the system and ignore your combat rank completely.

I disagree, the current situation is a combination of all 3 as well as including other factors and IMO that is the way it should remain.

Combat Rank should always be a consideration since it does provide at least some measure of PvE combat capability and should allow for encounters to be scaled accordingly.

 

[lenna]

1) Coop play setup. Herding the cats is no fun, so to speak.

This is on the most part a fallacious argument - easy answer, pick your gathering locations with a greater degree of common sense... Locations nearer the system entry point for example. The problem is with the user not the product.

2) Boring SC

Lets not get bogged down with stupid SC mini-games. Longer SC times are an unavoidable consequence of system sizes in general and messing with the acceleration/deceleration curves is unwarranted.

Imposing greater risk if you stray away from the notional shortest-path based trade lanes is largely unnecessary and on the most part illogical. It is already there to at least some degree but the trade lanes are the most logical place for pirates to target in systems with lower security levels. In higher security level systems, pirates are more likely to pirate away from the natural patrol paths (notionally the trade lanes) but finding their targets is naturally going to be at least an order of magnitude harder due to the variables involved.

3) Lacklustre Pathfinding in Exploration.

ED is not jump network based thus this line of argument is on the most part complete and utter irrelevant tripe.

Final case : The sense of scale (invoked to defend super long SC times).

The scale argument is also utter tripe - system sizes cause long SC journeys by natural consequence and there is no avoiding this. The issue is less to do with scale and more to do with the natural consequences of the 1:1 scale and (at least close to) realistic galaxy design.

 

[WinterKing2112]

I disagree, the current situation is a combination of all 3 as well as including other factors and IMO that is the way it should remain.

Combat Rank should always be a consideration since it does provide at least some measure of PvE combat capability and should allow for encounters to be scaled accordingly.

I just realised something. I was getting a truckload if interdictions just before I ranked up in combat (competent to expert). Does the game do that to get you over the line to the next rank? If it's deliberate then that is a brilliant idea.

 

[lenna]

I just realised something. I was getting a truckload if interdictions just before I ranked up in combat (competent to expert). Does the game do that to get you over the line to the next rank? If it's deliberate then that is a brilliant idea.

I think you are either encountering RNG based statistical singularities and/or have picked cargo/missions that had a higher probability of being targeted and/or have been operating in systems more susceptible to piracy. There could be other factors I have not considered but these seem to be the key ones IME.

 

[WinterKing2112]

Would you think from a point of competing with other games that Frontier might be introducing these improvements for new players, ARX, etc as there are many CMDR's but they probably see very few spend quality time with their game...the Die Hard White Knights will always be there no matter what...but i see the introduction of these new enhancements which to my knowledge, nobody asked for except maybe for fleet carriers as a way to compete with other titles. I don't think its the player base that are committed regardless that keep the servers going...it's has to be new business/ CMDR's,every model depends on the in-flow of new customers.

They HAVE to please the Majority most of the time, and i don't know this but it seems the majority are not actve or signing up as much as they want.

You don't know this but...... maybe stick to commenting on facts, not speculation. Facts are actually a lot more useful than speculation. Like, 100% more useful.....!

 

[WinterKing2112]

That's pretty much how the CFO put it recently:



In that same excerpt he says cosmetics raised 4m last financial year (of 22m total revenue). Even accounting for long-haul Cmdrs buying multiple accounts / gifts etc, it seems that new influx is the main lifeblood of the franchise.

The new noob-smoothing definitely looks like them worrying about the attachment rate to me.

Impenetrability is obviously one blocker. Wouldn't be surprised if dead transit time was in the mix too.

Looks like.... wouldn't be surprised if..... Great, more speculation, just what we needed!

 

[WinterKing2112]

I think one should be carefull about not bagging all issues together.
I see three issues related to travel in ED that could use improvements and rework, for different reasons.

1) Coop play setup. Herding the cats is no fun, so to speak. I would suggest a simple (and limited change) :
1a) Upon login in the game you may pick any owned ship without cargo.
1b) Then, said ship can be spawn in any spaceport where you have a ship or a friend present in the system. The spawn may not be more than 200 lyr away from your last spawn.

2) Boring SC. Here the problem is that SC flying is awfully boring, save the times where one does clever mass lock dodge and/or gravity braking. Now, the problem here IMO is the lack of terrain to play with, especially over long hauls. Maybe having a SC "safety off" drive mode where acceleration and top speeds are higher, but SC space time becomes dangerous (SC anomalies that may slow you down, or that you may use to slingshot) could spice long hauls. All I will say is that despite liking the slow pace of exploration, I despise the 20-30min SC to get to secondary stars. Maybe following chains of SC anomalies lead you to some deep space anomalies, not unlike the notable stellar phenomenon.

IMO short cutting SC with mini-jumps is more of a cop-out than a true improvement. SC could be made cool. So would interdictions if instead of the mini-game it was about navigating the SC terrain with no safety net while sticking/losing the opposing ship.

3) Lacklustre Pathfinding in Exploration. Making the galaxy a maximally connected graph in term of Hyperspace lanes has nipped in the bud the chances of a pathfinding / route paving Exploration gameplay. Maybe restricting the existance of hyperspace lanes based one the bodies types and mass could make the game more interesting. Especially if players could drop nav beacons that ensure the existance of lanes between them and boost the number of conections from the considered system.

Case in point is the Formidine rift pre-engineering : finding crossing paths was a very fun experience, that got destroyed with engineering. Having hard to get places should be much more common and route pathing could be a way to make exploration more meaningfull and lead to nice player driven content.

Final case : The sense of scale (invoked to defend super long SC times). It makes not sense to me since said long SC travels are optional. Which is an other way of saying that the sense of scale is optional. Which is an other way of saying that the game does a poor job of conveying said sense of scale. Then what is the point again ? Scale is best felt during exploration when trying to reach far out stars and trying not to get lost or stuck from a mistake. SC ? It's like 2h of highway driving, it's mainly boring.

Hmmm, I never got to drive at close to 1,000 x the speed of light on any highways round here, while in a big, f@#$ off space ship. Where u from again?

 

[Crook]

I don't mind a few hyperspace long travel gates being invented and set up as a network within the bubble, to be used for a fair price. The time taken performing jumps can be put to better use. I'd prefer a mechanism where you can jump in the background and in the foreground either just wait it out or scan systems as you pass them. But, that's not going to happen is it?

 

[VR Golgot]

rslg, you old charmer, you really need to distinguish between your opinion and fact. Just slamming down words like 'irrelevant tripe' after everything doesn't actually make it so.

This is on the most part a fallacious argument - easy answer, pick your gathering locations with a greater degree of common sense... Locations nearer the system entry point for example. The problem is with the user not the product.

A subjective appreciation of what is fun cannot be 'fallacious'. The OP's feelings on the co-op experience are perfectly legitimate. You do not get to nay-say them in this fashion.

On your 'pragmatic' solution, it doesn't resolve the issue. They can pick their gathering locations as carefully as they like, but if they're on opposite ends of the bubble (or indeed out in Colonia etc or whatever) then that resolves absolutely nothing.

Most games that purport to support co-op gameplay don't normally require a 30 minute+ form of 'matchmaking'. The OP's solution of cargo-free station-spawn choice at login would be a pragmatic one.

Longer SC times are an unavoidable consequence of system sizes in general and messing with the acceleration/deceleration curves is unwarranted.

This is all opinion. Not fact.

ED is not jump network based thus this line of argument is on the most part complete and utter irrelevant tripe.

There is no law against suggesting the game change or adapt. Dismissing suggested changes purely on the grounds that they're not currently in the game (well, duh), is 'irrelevant tripe'

The scale argument is also utter tripe - system sizes cause long SC journeys by natural consequence and there is no avoiding this. The issue is less to do with scale and more to do with the natural consequences of the 1:1 scale and (at least close to) realistic galaxy design.

This is also opinion, not fact.

 

[lenna]

...

I think it is the sc-is-too-slow moaners that need to distinguish between opinion and fact...

Yes - there are long SC times and this is NOT unreasonable given the FACT they are not actually either required nor are unavoidable. Plus keep in mind the FACT that the nominal SC times in the bubble are less than being clamed by the moaners.

 

[VR Golgot]

I think it is the sc-is-too-slow moaners that need to distinguish between opinion and fact...

Yes - there are long SC times and this is NOT unreasonable given the FACT they are not actually either required nor are unavoidable. Plus keep in mind the FACT that the nominal SC times in the bubble are less than being clamed by the moaners.

LOL

Umm, capitalising things also does not make them immediately true either...

As mentioned multiple times on these threads, it's not that they are unavoidable, it's that avoiding them does not constitute fun gameplay for many players. 'FACT'

Given that it's defenders of long transit times who keep citing the 'only 10% of stations are far away' thing as proof of it being a nominal issue, I would again contest the 'FACT' quotient here. Given that a significant number of the complaints centre around mission redirects to planets (not just stations), and the placement of other points of interest on planetary bodies (story locations, rare discoverables etc), then this would appear to still be very much up for debate.

In lieu of someone digging out the percentage of 'distant systems' out of EDDB or whatever you're way shy of the 'FACT' threshold there buddy

None of which would change the legitimacy of subjective objections that said aspects are unfun and feel frequent to the point of impinging on game enjoyment, but it's good to have a basis for discussion.

But congratulations on another post that was big on assertions and light on proofs. Go you

 

[lenna]

...

There are some that complain about various things regardless of the actual facts of the matter, the truth of the matter is that it is that it is unreasonable to expect super-cruise times to be effectively capped as some would like regardless of the size of given systems - it would be artificial and is unwarranted. Doing so would be tantamount to saying something like "Cruising at high-altitudes in Microsoft Flight Simulator X is boring so things should be made less realistic to make it more fun for group X (regardless of implications)".

Super-cruise is just a means of motion in ED, it does not need to be skill/risk based nor fun in itself, the lengths of journeys are not unreasonable in the main, and on the whole the mechanics are consistent with prevailing scientific theories on FTL type technologies. There are currently means of engaging in super-cruise optimally that keep transit times in the main to moderate levels, and there are various radiant and emergent incidents/encounters that can and do happen.

There has been a generally consistent argument effectively against ED being a 1:1 notionally true-scale universe product from various angles, the "super-cruise is boring" argument is just the current version of that. If people expect arbitrary hacks and tweaks to reduce travel times or increase frequency of incidents then on the whole they are being unreasonable in their expectations.

FD need to be careful not to change the already sold product in a way that kow-tows to the "bored" crowd too much, the FSS/DSS changes are already perhaps a step too far in that direction. To do so would be to change the fundamental nature of the product that some of us bought and would be tantamount to breaching their notional obligations to maintain their product in a consistent and acceptable way.

 

[Chrisfs]

For me, 10/20 mins staring at screen to get somewhere is ok if exploring.... Not ok for the majority of missions, mining, trade, bounty etc

If you aren't exploring, you shouldn't need 10 minutes to go anywhere. It takes me one to two hopes (three at most) to get to any of the mission systems. Doesn't take me 10 minutes to get to most of the stations once I get to the system. I check the distances before hand and don't take the missions. And anyways, I like flying to things because that's what the game is about. Also seeing things along the way. Veering off to see a USS and pick up some loot. Being waylaid by a pirate and having to fight or run. None of that would happen if you got to your goal instantly. Space needs to be somewhat unpredictable, to be 'dangerous'

 

[lenna]

If you aren't exploring, you shouldn't need 10 minutes to go anywhere. It takes me one to two hopes (three at most) to get to any of the mission systems. Doesn't take me 10 minutes to get to most of the stations once I get to the system. I check the distances before hand and don't take the missions. And anyways, I like flying to things because that's what the game is about. Also seeing things along the way. Veering off to see a USS and pick up some loot. Being waylaid by a pirate and having to fight or run. None of that would happen if you got to your goal instantly. Space needs to be somewhat unpredictable, to be 'dangerous'

There are some exceptions to the <10 minutes supercruise rule, but they are not as common as some like to make them out to be. Hutton Orbital is the most famous of these and it is not unreasonable for these exceptions to exist despite the complaining of some.

 

[Chrisfs]

There are some exceptions to the <10 minutes supercruise rule, but they are not as common as some like to make them out to be. Hutton Orbital is the most famous of these and it is not unreasonable for these exceptions to exist despite the complaining of some.

Hutton is a special case. It was likely built to be that far out, just so people who wanted to could do that.
Even something that is say 2,000ls out from the main star is not that far in terms of actual time. Just a few minutes. And SC speeds up over time, so you can hit over 900 times the speed of light.
I fly around and take the 'scenic route' and look at undiscovered plents etc, and that can take time, but I also consider that fun. If I have a definite place to go within the Bubble and I want to get there fast, I can and I don't have a fancy ship (except for engineered hyper drive, still that's about 20 ly)