General Remove private Lobby and single Player

It wouldn't be an easier sell to those who would be actively excluded from engaging in it (or could not engage in it at all due to not being able to play in the multi-player game modes). For them it'd likely be a waste of development time that could otherwise be better expended on a game feature for all players.
Well, design it for all modes equally then. That encompasses a lot of the suggestions that have been made in here 🤷‍♂️.

Or if that's not possible, then giving some exclusive content to all modes seems at least equitable, and frees the devs from that constraint, allowing them to produce some stuff that might rise above the bland catch-alls. Pan-modal stuff seems like an economy of effort, but actually is difficult and constraining to do well (exhibit A, powerplay). Some mode-tailored content might actually be no more difficult to produce for three modes, and give a lot of player satisfaction (noting that all players could also use all of it by selecting the respective mode). At the same time, the existing shared content, one of the things that gives the sense of the shared universe, would be preserved.
 
Same as me. Being majority of time PvE player, I would simply like to see more commanders in open, for coop activities.
PvEer also. But I like to see the opposition too, whether they shoot at me or not. And either is good and part of the physical narrative of my game. I just like it to be an explicitly multiplayer game where anything can happen.
 
People act like it's the end of the world, when they die and lose cargo or exploration data.
Wait until it happens to you, when you go out into the black for weeks or months, and you get blown up on your way back to the bubble.
Not everyone is made of time, and people don't like their invested time wasted by someone being bored and "having fun". Fun for one might not be fun for the other.
 
Wait until it happens to you, when you go out into the black for weeks or months, and you get blown up on your way back to the bubble.
Not everyone is made of time, and people don't like their invested time wasted by someone being bored and "having fun". Fun for one might not be fun for the other.
That is broken mechanic in Elite. I guess OP would not disagree that it needs to be properly fixed first, to remove this barrier for explorers to come to open.
If I could be guaranteed a co-op experience I'd play in Open more often if not exclusively - unfortunately, as it's a PvP-enabled game mode, there's no guarantee that one won't be attacked by another player.
That's why I see all similar forum threads as opportunity to improve game mechanics. To make all the game modes equally enjoyable for everyone independent on playstyle.
 

Robert Maynard

Volunteer Moderator
That is broken mechanic in Elite. I guess OP would not disagree that it needs to be properly fixed first, to remove this barrier for explorers to come to open.
It's the way the Elite ranks have worked in all four iterations of the game - and, given the mixed reaction to the additional "prestige" Elite rank tiers added recently, I doubt that such a change would be well received.
That's why I see all similar forum threads as opportunity to improve game mechanics. To make all the game modes equally enjoyable for everyone independent on playstyle.
What constitutes an improvement for some players may be seen as a change that adversely affects other players - as we don't all want the same things.
 
The size of the play area needs as many players as it can get - an Open only "galaxy" could be a permit locked cluster of ten thousand systems (newly populated and seeded with Factions, Powers, etc.) that would only be accessible when in Open and still be "too big" for the number of players playing in it, in terms of average player density per system.

Incentives could be offered - as transferring assets between the two divergent galaxies would open up trivial exploitation so would need to be prohibited.
So not actually a galaxy, but then they're diverging? And you're talking about mode-restricted content that costs dev time (including new lore content). It might not need incentive if it was only separated geographically.
 
Getting attacked on the way back to the bubble seems no more likely to happen than at any other time. So basically, don't fly to Deciat or the current CG or a select few other places and you'll be fine?
 
Offer triple-credit rewards for anyone who plays in OPEN mode and OPEN will explode with new players overnight, players who would happily accept massively increased risk for a chance at massively increased reward. What does it cost FDev? Dots?
 
Offer triple-credit rewards for anyone who plays in OPEN mode and OPEN will explode with new players overnight, players who would happily accept massively increased risk for a chance at massively increased reward. What does it cost FDev? Dots?
That would definitely work. It would be very educational too: looks of people would expand their knowledge of router settings. There would even be more use of in-game tools found under the "Social" menu.

That's before we come to the development of awesome combat skills like hitting "Escape" followed by rapid mouse movement.
 
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Offer triple-credit rewards for anyone who plays in OPEN mode and OPEN will explode with new players overnight, players who would happily accept massively increased risk for a chance at massively increased reward. What does it cost FDev? Dots?
Credits are worthless, so what is the point of trippling rewards to a reward that is already more of less pointless? I don't think that would work, and you head down the path like previously mentioned in Elder Scrolls OL, with that PvP event, Pve folks will gritch about being "forced" into PvP. Honestly? It is a no win situation I think.
 

Robert Maynard

Volunteer Moderator
So not actually a galaxy, but then they're diverging? And you're talking about mode-restricted content that costs dev time (including new lore content). It might not need incentive if it was only separated geographically.
Apologies - I mixed two concepts in an attempt to put forward the idea that an Open only galaxy would be a very big playing area for fewer players than currently play the game. I have previously suggested an alternative to splitting the galaxy, i.e. the permit locked zone that it is only accessible in Open - which would be part of the same galaxy and would not then diverge.
 
Offer triple-credit rewards for anyone who plays in OPEN mode and OPEN will explode with new players overnight, players who would happily accept massively increased risk for a chance at massively increased reward. What does it cost FDev? Dots?
by players who messes with their connection, making it "impossible" to instance with them, so they are still playing "solo" or with select friends...

And this would also go against one of the core statements, that all modes are equal.
 
by players who messes with their connection, making it "impossible" to instance with them, so they are still playing "solo" or with select friends...

And this would also go against one of the core statements, that all modes are equal.
Unless FDev invests into dedicated servers for non-peer-to-peer gameplay, that is bound to happen.
 
I do not follow, how would your suggestion (not bad, I have made similar suggestion in the past, it is baiscally to have the mimic what the players are doing) solve the issue with players tinkering with their network and firewall settings, that is outside of the game?

Because it is not that hard to make your computer mostly inaccessible to other players to instance with.
what it comes down to, are a few simple steps.

Figure out what IP subnet Frontier uses for the server part of Elite. So you can whitelist those IP's
Configure your game for a static port
Add a FW rule that block all incoming traffic on that port except from Frontier servers (see above)
Add a FW rule that block all outgoing traffic from Elite except for traffic going to Frontiers servers (see above)


And now your client should basically be an "island" regardless of what game you chooses to start in, and Open should more or less be the same as Solo...

And if you want to to play in Open with friends, just adds your friends IP's to the while list, as you have done with the Frontiers servers...


the hardest part is to figure out all the relevant subnets that Frontiers servers are located on, and if they changes..


this is why forcing players into open that do not want to be there, is such a stupid idea...



NOTE!
The same principle should work on consoles, but it is made much harder as we cannot easy target just a specific game traffic... as we can when we mess around with the local firewall on our windows pc.
 
Background simulation was designed not as a tool for PvP, but as a way to make every player feel that what they do has some kind of effect and makes the game feel alive, not static. Its only because players love to compete with eachother, BGS became a game of numbers - who can grind more. You need to accept that.
When minor factions and their influence changes the values of PP it is a part of PP. Both PP and BGS is there for players to change outcome of how Galaxies works. And I'm pretty sure that most people that go to private/solo to push the direction of a war is very aware of what they are doing. The large number of rounds that had to be done to push stats is very targeted action. And the mechanics are designed so we should be able to stop that attack by entering the same conflict zone and fight the war.

I've never heard causal players grind for influence, the always grind for reputation. And doing that in a conflict zone is one of the hardest ways to grind for reps.
 
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