Modes The Solo vs Open vs Groups Thread - Mk III

[Jockey79]

Thanks for the picture, now I wonder....... what's that one a few lines above do? "upnpenabled="1"

Looks like the "make open into solo button" to my untrained eye.

When the game came out, that option was set to "0".

Check the popular forum posts for December 2014, they all sum up as "Why can I not see anyone in Open Mode?"
Players had to edit the file themselves, as a tutorial came out showing what to do - by a player, in response to a flooded forum on the topic.
FD went "opps" and patched it to default at "1" shortly afterwards.

In fact;

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=87388&highlight=enable+upnp

Check the "Code" box in that first post

So if people want to proclaim editing that file to "0" is "cheating".... then for the first weeks everyone who edited it to "1" must have also been "cheating"

 

[ViciousMink]

When the game came out, that option was set to "0".

Check the popular forum posts for December 2014, they all sum up as "Why can I not see anyone in Open Mode?"
Players had to edit the file themselves, as a tutorial came out showing what to do - by a player, in response to a flooded forum on the topic.
FD went "opps" and patched it to default at "1" shortly afterwards.

In fact;

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=87388&highlight=enable+upnp

Check the "Code" box in that first post

So if people want to proclaim editing that file to "0" is "cheating".... then for the first weeks everyone who edited it to "1" must have also been "cheating"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krD4hdGvGHM
TL;DC (Too Link, Didn't Click): Verrrrrrrrry Interesting!

 

[Asp Explorer]

then for the first weeks everyone who edited it to "1" must have also been "cheating"

Back in Multiplayer Alpha - all sorts of things were tried to get people to see each other - all sorts of networking tricks, equipment swaps, VPN's, running completely unprotected on a public IP with no firewall (and broadcasting it to the WHOLE INTERNET) - even new ISP's and networking hardware.

We so much wanted the multiplayer to work, we took huge risks, FD took our logs and telemetry and changed both their configuration model and their network coding, and positive results were reached. They are still making adjustments.

Many of us still want to play in multiplayer, many people don't, but the only important thing is that everyone has the choice on wether they do or not. The Open Only advocates want that choice taken away from others to satisfy their often poorly thought out needs with no regard at all to others. That must not be allowed to happen.

 

[Roybe]

Exactly this. But this is not the answer the pewpew crowd wants or will accept.

Those that come here with the express request of 'do x to Private to increase the y of Open' have not come to realize that the game is a PVP contest between groups collecting PVE trophies faster than each other. Any other type of PVP activity is a role play activity that the devs do not reward...at all. It costs those that shoot and those that lose credits to do either. It is a side show.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

From reading comments it seems like there must be a niche out there for a pure PvP space sim. Its not ED, but if only there was a game that catered to this crowd... why doesn't such a game exist considering the demand for it?

 

[Roybe]

From reading comments it seems like there must be a niche out there for a pure PvP space sim. Its not ED, but if only there was a game that catered to this crowd... why doesn't such a game exist considering the demand for it?

There are great pure PVP games out there...League of Legends, many of the shooter games, War Thunder, etc. There is no reason that War Thunder could not be reskinned to 'make people believe' that they were in space. However, if the game tries to model space accurately, the current internet latencies would make anything truly competitive untenable.

 

[Jockey79]

From reading comments it seems like there must be a niche out there for a pure PvP space sim. Its not ED, but if only there was a game that catered to this crowd... why doesn't such a game exist considering the demand for it?

Well, I'd suggest EVE Online or Star Citizen.

EVE is open only, but you don't fly your ship and SC isn't an actual game yet.
And when it is, it has a PvP <-> PvE slider as well as private servers that can update from the PU (one way though as far as I am aware).

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

Star conflict?
http://store.steampowered.com/app/212070/
It is the prequel to war thunder

 

[Jockey79]

Star conflict?
http://store.steampowered.com/app/212070/
It is the prequel to war thunder

That looks quite good, and it's F2P.

Hmm, I know where I'm going if the hype for Horizons gets annoying.

 

[Mouse]

I want to make clear right at the start, that I've only been playing for about a month. 90% of that time has been in solo or group, with a couple of games in CQC... So take this with the appropriate amount of gravity.

However, I'm used to playing PvP open style games, and can't help but feel that the overall longevity of this game will depend on emergent gameplay, and player-driven content. I've stayed in Solo or group up until now, because I could. There was no incentive to venture into Open, other than the draw of PvP, and that wasn't very appealing during the early stages of the learning curve.

I can absolutely see a need (more than one) for Solo mode and PvE... makes game entry less disheartening than some games I've played, some players just like PvE, and less dangerous place to try out new builds.... oh.. and somewhere to go if funds get low enough that you are risking ending up in a Startwinder again... Did I miss any?

Now, while I think it's perfectly fine (even a good idea) that Solo mode players can have an effect on the background simulation and that each type of player is accommodated, I think there needs to be some incentive to play Open mode. There's more risk, possibly a chance of dying more often, and the associated costs. Players are inevitably going to be harder and more unpredictable than NPCs.

Solo mode players aren't affected by other players (other than the background simulation), so why would it matter to them if Open players got a little bit more, for being a little bit braver?

Maybe more rewards for missions in Open. If you collect a mission in open, it must be completed in open. PvP missions/rewards/bonuses for killing/pirating CMDRs of opposing factions etc.

I'll acknowledge that the focus of FD on making the environment so detailed will help with longevity, but I just think that ultimately at some stage, PvE won't be able to compete with player driven content.

How are PVPers more "brave"? And how is Open more dangerous? These are some of the misconceptions that are driving the elitism that has been created. A group of PVPers flying in a wing of 4 find a single trader and destroy them. Where was the danger in that for the PVPers? There was none, for the trader there was massive danger. Same thing can happen to the trader in solo, but it is a wing of NPC's.. only difference was a human or computer shooting at them. In Open as well as other modes the danger is subjective. Sometimes there is danger other times not. The only "incentive" open gets is the same incentives the other modes get. A chance to play your way. Why is Open special and deserve more than everyone else?

And Bravery? The trader was brave, the PVPers not so much. Flying an unarmed ship through areas that may contain hostiles that interdict and destroy you.. is not as brave or braver than shooting at another ship? I fly a trade ship mostly, I'm also aligned with a power. So I have other PP powers trying to destroy me as well as pirates.. am I braver than a trader who has no allegiance and just has pirates to contend with?

I am just using this as a scenario, there are countless different scenarios that can happen, in each both in Open and in Solo.. in every scenario in both Open and Solo, someone can be at the disadvantage who's more brave? Where is there more danger? I'm sorry but you are asking for Open to be altered and promoted over the other modes over subjective reasonings. Just because you may be up against a human pilot does not automatically mean you are braver and facing more danger. It depends on the scenario.

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

It's OK but it is no war thunder.

To be honest CQC I find far more enjoyable but as you say its free so well worth a look!

 

[Dave1235]

When the game came out, that option was set to "0".

Check the popular forum posts for December 2014, they all sum up as "Why can I not see anyone in Open Mode?"
Players had to edit the file themselves, as a tutorial came out showing what to do - by a player, in response to a flooded forum on the topic.
FD went "opps" and patched it to default at "1" shortly afterwards.

In fact;

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=87388&highlight=enable+upnp

Check the "Code" box in that first post

So if people want to proclaim editing that file to "0" is "cheating".... then for the first weeks everyone who edited it to "1" must have also been "cheating"

Thanks for the info, I was not sure if upnp was a game setting (I had a vague recollection of people editing file to fix it as you point out, but for some reason I also thought it was a router setting), I did say I wasn't sure, is it a router thing too?

Anyway, I am in solo tonight avoiding all the cheaters of all kinds

 

[Asp Explorer]

Thanks for the info, I was not sure if upnp was a game setting (I had a vague recollection of people editing file to fix it as you point out, but for some reason I also thought it was a router setting), I did say I wasn't sure, is it a router thing too?

Anyway, I am in solo tonight avoiding all the cheaters of all kinds

Basically, UPnP is a function of a router to allow automatic configuration both from requests inside and outside. It's a bit like a nightclub bouncer that will let anyone in or out if they are passed a sneaky 20 quid.

It's absolutely horrible stuff from a security perspective, but given that most home computer users have no idea how things work (or should work) when it comes to their Internet Box, it's a tradeoff between convenience, security, and availability.

 

[Khelder]

Thanks for the picture, now I wonder....... what's that one a few lines above do? "upnpenabled="1"

Looks like the "make open into solo button" to my untrained eye.

When the game came out, that option was set to "0".

Check the popular forum posts for December 2014, they all sum up as "Why can I not see anyone in Open Mode?"
Players had to edit the file themselves, as a tutorial came out showing what to do - by a player, in response to a flooded forum on the topic.
FD went "opps" and patched it to default at "1" shortly afterwards.

In fact;

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=87388&highlight=enable+upnp

Check the "Code" box in that first post

So if people want to proclaim editing that file to "0" is "cheating".... then for the first weeks everyone who edited it to "1" must have also been "cheating"

Thanks for the info, I was not sure if upnp was a game setting (I had a vague recollection of people editing file to fix it as you point out, but for some reason I also thought it was a router setting), I did say I wasn't sure, is it a router thing too?

Anyway, I am in solo tonight avoiding all the cheaters of all kinds

Networking isn't my specialty, so I won't get overly technical. It's probably a good idea to look at it really simply anyway.

Some hardware devices or software applications require that they be discoverable and that network communication can be made with them directly without them asking for it first. For example, a printer will sit on a network waiting for a client to talk directly to it, not continually ask clients if they have anything to print. The problem is that sometimes this means you have to configure the devices that control how the networks communicate in such a way that they allow traffic to these devices when required. This is particularly troublesome in home/consumer networks where people generally just want to plug things in and have it work.

uPnP is a protocol that basically helps facilitate all of that configuration... automatically. If your router supports uPnP and you plug a uPnP-enabled device into your network the conversation might go roughly like this: Device broadcasts out (sends to everything) "Hey! I'm here. You need to talk to me on port 1234." The router picks this up and says, "Sure. Oh, wait. I've had my firewall turned on. Let me just make a quick adjustment here so that your traffic is allowed through."

In general, a router that is connecting your home network to the internet does not know what to do with incoming connections (coming from the internet) if it's not in response to an existing outgoing connection. So you need to tell it, "I've got this computer sitting in my network. I'm playing ED on it. FD is going to try to send me data on port 5100. If you see any of that, send it my way." uPnp allows for this to be configured automatically for you.

It would make sense for this to be turned on since many consumer routers support uPnP and this makes client configuration a whole lot easier for everyone.

It doesn't always make sense, though. My network sits behind a software firewall/gateway that does not support uPnP at all (and I wouldn't really want it to - I prefer to have control). So when my ED client sends out it's uPnP broadcasts, they are completely ignored and nothing gets set up. So I have to disabled that setting and configure my firewall manually to forward ED traffic to the PC I play on.

There is a fallback, of course, which should work. There is the ability (which now seems to be selectable rather than automatic) to relay through FDs servers. The gets around the inbound connection problem because once your client determines that it needs to do this, it will start making outgoing connections first which FDs servers can then respond to.

Hmm. I had every intention of making this a short, quick, response. Oh, well.

...and I certainly hope I didn't oversimplify it to the point of being condescending. That wasn't my intention.

- - - Updated - - -

Basically, UPnP is a function of a router to allow automatic configuration both from requests inside and outside. It's a bit like a nightclub bouncer that will let anyone in or out if they are passed a sneaky 20 quid.

And then someone goes and sums it up in two sentences.

 

[Khelder]

I had to force myself to go to bed last night (2am actually). In doing so I've now missed a good 3 or 4 pages worth of conversation. I did read through all the comments. I think there is something I said that wasn't quite correct back there. I kind of feel the need to clarify... but I'm just going to leave it instead.

 

[Jockey79]

Networking isn't my specialty, so I won't get overly technical. It's probably a good idea to look at it really simply anyway.

Some hardware devices or software applications require that they be discoverable and that network communication can be made with them directly without them asking for it first. For example, a printer will sit on a network waiting for a client to talk directly to it, not continually ask clients if they have anything to print. The problem is that sometimes this means you have to configure the devices that control how the networks communicate in such a way that they allow traffic to these devices when required. This is particularly troublesome in home/consumer networks where people generally just want to plug things in and have it work.

uPnP is a protocol that basically helps facilitate all of that configuration... automatically. If your router supports uPnp and you plug a uPnp-enabled device into your network the conversation might go roughly like this: Device broadcasts out (sends to everything) "Hey! I'm here. You need to talk to me on port 1234." The router picks this up and says, "Sure. Oh, wait. I've had my firewall turned on. Let me just make a quick adjustment here so that your traffic is allowed through."

In general, a router that is connecting your home network to the internet does not know what to do with incoming connections (coming from the internet) if it's not in response to an existing outgoing connection. So you need to tell it, "I've got this computer sitting in my network. I'm playing ED on it. FD is going to try to send me data on port 5100. If you see any of that, send it my way." uPnp allows for this to be configured automatically for you.

It would make sense for this to be turned on since many consumer routers support uPnp and this makes client configuration a whole lot easier for everyone.

It doesn't always make sense, though. My network sits behind a software firewall/gateway that does not support uPnp at all (and I wouldn't really want it to - I prefer to have control). So when my ED client sends out it's uPnp broadcasts, they are completely ignored and nothing gets set up. So I have to disabled that setting and configure my firewall manually to forward ED traffic to the PC I play on.

There is a fallback, of course, which should work. There is the ability (which now seems to be selectable rather than automatic) to relay through FDs servers. The gets around the inbound connection problem because once your client determines that it needs to do this, it will start making outgoing connections first which FDs servers can then respond to.

Hmm. I had every intention of making this a short, quick, response. Oh, well.

...and I certainly hope I didn't oversimplify it to the point of being condescending. That wasn't my intention.

- - - Updated - - -



And then someone goes and sums it up in two sentences.

Not sure why I'm in there, as I know this. I was explaining that FD made a right ball drop on release and had uPnP off by default - something we (the players) had to deal with ourselves by manually changing a file to enable it so we could in fact, play the multiplayer game, with other players.

As you were not around before, my last comment alludes back to prior comments in previous threads about disabling uPnP should FD ever make the game Open Only, or BGS interaction locked to Open Mode - as in, we've messed with the files before and we can again. With the added twist of, it wasn't "cheating" the first time we messed with networking settings to benefit ourselves - so you cannot class it as "cheating" a second time.

(You also missed chats about router settings, network overloading, firewalls and various other was to get the matchmaker to place you on your own regardless of what FD want)

- - - Updated - - -

I had to force myself to go to bed last night (2am actually). In doing so I've now missed a good 3 or 4 pages worth of conversation. I did read through all the comments. I think there is something I said that wasn't quite correct back there. I kind of feel the need to clarify... but I'm just going to leave it instead.

I would not worry about it - if a mistake comment is not directly aimed at someone, it gets forgotten quite quickly.
If it was aimed at someone and there has been no response by now - I'd imagine they either missed it or ignored it - so you're off the hook either way

 

[Khelder]

Not sure why I'm in there, as I know this. I was explaining that FD made a right ball drop on release and had uPnP off by default - something we (the players) had to deal with ourselves by manually changing a file to enable it so we could in fact, play the multiplayer game, with other players.

As you were not around before, my last comment alludes back to prior comments in previous threads about disabling uPnP should FD ever make the game Open Only, or BGS interaction locked to Open Mode - as in, we've messed with the files before and we can again. With the added twist of, it wasn't "cheating" the first time we messed with networking settings to benefit ourselves - so you cannot class it as "cheating" a second time.

(You also missed chats about router settings, network overloading, firewalls and various other was to get the matchmaker to place you on your own regardless of what FD want)

Sorry. I didn't mean to imply that you didn't know. I just quickly selected a few of the comments related to the subject.

I also took a really quick look at the thread you linked to there. But then I forgot to comment on it. I really only read the first few posts though. I'm curious about the 'Self' element there. But it's gone now so really irrelevant.

It would be nice if you could edit settings like this from EDLaunch. But, then, I'd really like them to just start by fixing the upgrade process so that it doesn't just blow away your custom settings every time.

 

[Mouse]

Beer4TheBeerGod everyone of your arguments is almost literally.. I don't care what mechanics there , if I cannot shoot someone than there is no way to counter people and it is unfair and they should shadowban every one who doesn't let me shoot them.

 

[Dave1235]

<snip>

And then someone goes and sums it up in two sentences.

I thank you both for the info.

 

[Jordan Cobalt]

Well, I'd suggest EVE Online or Star Citizen.

EVE is open only, but you don't fly your ship and SC isn't an actual game yet.
And when it is, it has a PvP <-> PvE slider as well as private servers that can update from the PU (one way though as far as I am aware).

Any news on no man's sky?I saw the trailer and it looks awesome. I'm really looking forward to it.