o7 CMDRs!
Who has ever played powerplay knows it - loading and unloading merits (e.g. fortification merits) is punished by a non-value adding unnecessary complicated and slow mechanic.
Merit allocations come in fixed allotments of 10, 15, 20, 25 and 50 depending on rank and fast-tracking them is a stupid repetitive process.
Let's compare numbers, as an example a Cutter taken with 752 t cargo capacity.
If I go to the commodity market and buy 752 tons of a single commodity it takes me 6 (six) seconds to load and buy.
If I go to another commodity market and sell my 752 tons it takes me 6 (six) seconds to unload and sell.
Now the same exercise with loading merits in the power contact.
750 tons equals to 15 allotments of 50 merits - provided I am at rank 5. Loading/fast-tracking them adds up to a total process time of 1' 40'' = 100 seconds!
Or on average 6.7 seconds per allotment.
Unloading the merits at the destination system can be done in one go - but still takes 40 seconds!
Why does unloading merits take 6.7 times longer than unloading a commodity?
Let's assume for a moment an explorer is coming home from weeks or months exploring and would for instance consider pledging to LYR in order to fast-track to rank 5 and get the exploration bonus next cycle.
Fast-tracking the 10.000 merits required - rank 1 means allotments of 10 - equals to insignificant 1.000 cycles of fast-tracking/loading.
It will take said CMDR 1 hour and 51 minutes.
Doing nothing else than loading merits.
Unloading not yet done. Travelling to the destination system not yet done.
No added value but a pure pain in the ...
You get my point.
Now - FDev you have done a great job in the last weeks and months by improving cargo mission mechanics for both wing and solo missions. Allowing to load cargo via a slider (don't know how you call it) in reasonable short time.
I would ask you to do two things.
First - please apply the same load/unload mechanic to powerplay merits as you have done to cargo missions. (Or even better like with commodities in the market).
Second - uncouple the excruciating allotment size from the load mechanic.
When your CMDRs decide to fast-track they will do it anyway. Why punishing them with multiple interruptions of the process?
Instead of providing only cargo in a quantity depending on rank let us pick as many we want in one go. Fill 50 or 200 or 750 or 278 or whatsoever by just loading your ship.
Charge the money and provided the CMDR has been allotted another 30 minute merit amount simply deduct that credit amount (100k/150k/200k/250k/500k) from the pay charged for the requested merit amount.
This would be one of the biggest quality of life improvements at all and would ease the life of all powerplayers.
Doesn't require any change of the powerplay system currently in place (powerplay change discussions can still continue).
Does only require implementation of a mechanic you already provide for the rest of the game.
Please help us powerplayers and reduce unnecessary waste of playing time.
Thanks a lot!
o7
Who has ever played powerplay knows it - loading and unloading merits (e.g. fortification merits) is punished by a non-value adding unnecessary complicated and slow mechanic.
Merit allocations come in fixed allotments of 10, 15, 20, 25 and 50 depending on rank and fast-tracking them is a stupid repetitive process.
Let's compare numbers, as an example a Cutter taken with 752 t cargo capacity.
If I go to the commodity market and buy 752 tons of a single commodity it takes me 6 (six) seconds to load and buy.
If I go to another commodity market and sell my 752 tons it takes me 6 (six) seconds to unload and sell.
Now the same exercise with loading merits in the power contact.
750 tons equals to 15 allotments of 50 merits - provided I am at rank 5. Loading/fast-tracking them adds up to a total process time of 1' 40'' = 100 seconds!
Or on average 6.7 seconds per allotment.
Unloading the merits at the destination system can be done in one go - but still takes 40 seconds!
Why does unloading merits take 6.7 times longer than unloading a commodity?
Let's assume for a moment an explorer is coming home from weeks or months exploring and would for instance consider pledging to LYR in order to fast-track to rank 5 and get the exploration bonus next cycle.
Fast-tracking the 10.000 merits required - rank 1 means allotments of 10 - equals to insignificant 1.000 cycles of fast-tracking/loading.
It will take said CMDR 1 hour and 51 minutes.
Doing nothing else than loading merits.
Unloading not yet done. Travelling to the destination system not yet done.
No added value but a pure pain in the ...
You get my point.
Now - FDev you have done a great job in the last weeks and months by improving cargo mission mechanics for both wing and solo missions. Allowing to load cargo via a slider (don't know how you call it) in reasonable short time.
I would ask you to do two things.
First - please apply the same load/unload mechanic to powerplay merits as you have done to cargo missions. (Or even better like with commodities in the market).
Second - uncouple the excruciating allotment size from the load mechanic.
When your CMDRs decide to fast-track they will do it anyway. Why punishing them with multiple interruptions of the process?
Instead of providing only cargo in a quantity depending on rank let us pick as many we want in one go. Fill 50 or 200 or 750 or 278 or whatsoever by just loading your ship.
Charge the money and provided the CMDR has been allotted another 30 minute merit amount simply deduct that credit amount (100k/150k/200k/250k/500k) from the pay charged for the requested merit amount.
This would be one of the biggest quality of life improvements at all and would ease the life of all powerplayers.
Doesn't require any change of the powerplay system currently in place (powerplay change discussions can still continue).
Does only require implementation of a mechanic you already provide for the rest of the game.
Please help us powerplayers and reduce unnecessary waste of playing time.
Thanks a lot!
o7
