You could apply that to the whole game really.
Pull Your Fingers Out - Incrementally Improving PowerPlay
- Thread starter Edmund Black
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You could apply that to the whole game really.
I keep playing PowerPlay because I love the design concept. The ideas supporting PowerPlay are unique and full of potential for players who like to get invested long-term, like me, to have a tonne of fun.
And yet this game keeps pushing me away because the design execution is shoddy, lifeless, punishing, clunky, grind-y, frustrating to use, unrewarding, and ultimately un-fun. PowerPlay has a real chance to keep players who like to get invested, invested in Elite. Frontier have taken that chance, stuck it in a blender with the rest of their game execution, and homogenised it to every other "feature" they've installed in this game: deeply empty, and disappointingly incomplete.
And yet this game keeps pushing me away because the design execution is shoddy, lifeless, punishing, clunky, grind-y, frustrating to use, unrewarding, and ultimately un-fun. PowerPlay has a real chance to keep players who like to get invested, invested in Elite. Frontier have taken that chance, stuck it in a blender with the rest of their game execution, and homogenised it to every other "feature" they've installed in this game: deeply empty, and disappointingly incomplete.
I don't think forcing pvp makes anything better, tbh. You still have the problem of nothing worth fighting for, just now with an even harder fight to get it.
To me, that would make less players interact with powerplay, not more.
To me, that would make less players interact with powerplay, not more.
Well, what else is there?
The BGS does everything Powerplay does but better, currently- whatever FD do with Powerplay has to move away from BGS mechanics (pan modal, 24 hr time shifted tick based) otherwise you are simply building a second, inferior copy of what already exists.
My argument is that Powerplay has to provide a different experience to justify its existence in its current form.
Not to mention that PowerPlay by definition IS PvP. The only way anything moves in PowerPlay is if players move it, and the eleven Powers are in constant conflict. Your team can gain only at the expense of another; your team's loss is always to another one's benefit. Sure, alliances may form based on convenience or senseless mechanics (like how the Imps and Feds are forced to get along because they're penalised for attacking one another). But at its core, PowerPlay is inescapably PvP.
Without derailing the thread and posting it, my final evolution of Sandros proposal splits Powerplay into co-dependent Open and Solo sub-features; everyone gets a slice but the game 'experience' is different. If Powerplay is to be kept 'as is' this is the only way that I see the feature evolving.
I know what you are saying - but
Would it not better if, say, you could attack a megaship, or rob a megaship, or fix a megaship, or attack a surface base, hack a surface base, assasinate a politician, take out the spec OPs guys in a CZ scenario, scan an earthlike planet, take out X number of thargoids, mine 2 bajillion tonnes of bumph (etc etc fill in the rest) in order to prepare/fortify/undermine/whatever the other stuff is?
Instead of
Shoot some ships
Grab some cargo from some ships (arguably the coolest)
Deliver some renamed cargo.
??
It would be great, but then I'd ask what differentiates that from what we have with the BGS and its missions?
The suggestion I mention in my previous response hybridizes your position with mine: solo tasks which are mission based (as you describe) build up Powereplay cargo thats delivered in Open only (so players become NPCs in a way)- both are co-dependent on each other but both offer focused experiences.
I mean, sure, whatever, as long as there is more to DO.
And, who cares if it's "the same" as the BGS missions? - there's more of those! the current stuff is "the same" anyway, just with less variety.
It was just a quick implementation example.
If they were going to do it properly, then they'd want to make special scenarios using that system for Powerplay stuff.
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A total redesign might be the best possible outcome for PowerPlay, but Frontier have shown an unwillingness to even fix errors in the game's display text for PowerPlay. Start with changes to the system that exists already, because Frontier won't allocate any more major development resources to this game except for a paid expansion 
My simple solution would be to make just trading a specific commodity have the same impact as powerplay specific commodities, but with the added benefits of wealth.
For example, say Yuri Grom is attempting to take over a system. Everyone there suddenly starts buying Gold at vastly increased prices; like 50k-80k, instead of 10k, and each trade increases the support for Grom in the system. But at the same time, the price of things that will be banned also increase, like narcotics, and each trade reduces support for Grom.
It seems pretty obvious the only thing that really motivates players is wealth. Add that as incentive and people will play the heck out of powerplay.
For example, say Yuri Grom is attempting to take over a system. Everyone there suddenly starts buying Gold at vastly increased prices; like 50k-80k, instead of 10k, and each trade increases the support for Grom in the system. But at the same time, the price of things that will be banned also increase, like narcotics, and each trade reduces support for Grom.
It seems pretty obvious the only thing that really motivates players is wealth. Add that as incentive and people will play the heck out of powerplay.
The only 'new' gameplay left in ED is really Open applied to a team based game. Its like night and day- one makes real time co-operation and support a thing, while the other is what we have now. People always talk about CGs in Open- imagine that applied across the bubble in player defined real time strategic battles.
Thats new.
I agree but also bgs too, there is zero risk attacking someone bgs in solo/private.
Holistically I disagree, mainly as ED has to cater to a wide audience. The BGS works in a time shifted way and is ill suited to Open, while Powerplay if Open only would become is mirror opposite- both complimenting each other.
That's the big question, why bother? What does the average player get from it apart from previously mentioned grind.
There's way too much grind as it is.
But how do you stop one huge active player faction from taking over the whole bubble? I guess that's the most important point. And the current mechanics make that impossible I'm guessing, or almost.
Like most l just holiday with it for weps shields etc.
Seems to me to be wholly complicated while at the same time very simple. The bgs should have alot more of an impact.
Player groups should have more impact too. But it isn't it's just leaflet hauling boring.
So apart from weps etc what's to be gained.
Also why is it so easy to unpledge and not suffer for it. The assassins are pants hehe.
Just needs an overhaul to make it more relevant to the galaxy as a whole.
And players should lose or benefit accordingly. To see some actual change their influencing in a big way. Over alot of time of course. A true career path. So players affiliated to one pp power will shoot or have the right to shoot, pirate, pursue etc another pp power. Ranking up as they do.. skirmishes on empire and alliance borders for example.
It's not all politics u need an army to enforce it.
There's way too much grind as it is.
But how do you stop one huge active player faction from taking over the whole bubble? I guess that's the most important point. And the current mechanics make that impossible I'm guessing, or almost.
Like most l just holiday with it for weps shields etc.
Seems to me to be wholly complicated while at the same time very simple. The bgs should have alot more of an impact.
Player groups should have more impact too. But it isn't it's just leaflet hauling boring.
So apart from weps etc what's to be gained.
Also why is it so easy to unpledge and not suffer for it. The assassins are pants hehe.
Just needs an overhaul to make it more relevant to the galaxy as a whole.
And players should lose or benefit accordingly. To see some actual change their influencing in a big way. Over alot of time of course. A true career path. So players affiliated to one pp power will shoot or have the right to shoot, pirate, pursue etc another pp power. Ranking up as they do.. skirmishes on empire and alliance borders for example.
It's not all politics u need an army to enforce it.
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yeah, and I agree, or don't care about that.
I'm just saying, make the actual things you DO while in that environment you are pushing for, be more varied.
That's it really, don't really care about the rest.
I care about what you do in the team based game - what the action you take are, the variety of possible gameplay things you can do.
You (I think) care about the team based game existing in a certain environment, but aren't really that bothered about what you are doing in that game.
And that's fine, just pointing it out.
perhaps open bgs missions are far more rewarding than solo/private. More risk, more reward?
And I agree with you
just I feel that the mission based elements should be where NPCs can be applied the best, to me IMO is in a solo / PG half- where incidentally RP and lore can be brought to the fore while the simplistic jobs currently become complex and engaging in Open (because the gameplay comes from direct teamplay).I think the problem will always be trying to quantify that risk and balancing that with more grinding in other modes. But the big problem for me is that the BGS is not set up for Open encounters like Powerplay is; outcomes are aggregated over time and are disconnected from causes (i.e. players). In the BGS you often have to work against your faction in some way so outwardly it looks dodgy (i.e. no way to really know intention). Powerplay has all this covered, explicit pledges, proper territory, simple tasks etc.
The BGS is entirely deterministic and 100% dependent on player inputs. Yes, many factions make strategic choices to work "against" themselves, but the only two reasons I'm aware of for that are diplomacy and PowerPlay.