TBH, I have more of a problem with the tedious bad grind of Solo and Open, than I do with the modes.
Modes The Solo vs Open vs Groups Thread - Part the Second [Now With Added Platforms].
- Thread starter Robert Maynard
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To be fair, the analogy that you make has only ever been suggested by Open advocates, that they get a bonus for playing in Open even though many freely admit that encounters with other CMDRs are rare. Hardly seems a fair request to me.
Everything anyone gets in this game is fairly acquired (I will accept there have been exploits, but the modes aren't an exploit). A PvP fight between two CMDRs might be more difficult than a fight between a CMDR and an NPC or even a wing of NPCs (not uncommon in my experience), then again, might not be, but fighting isn't by any means the only dangerous thing in this game that can result in a rebuy screen. You can smash into an asteroid at a RES, you can fly too close to a star exploring, you can boost into a station while trading. Plenty of ways to be destroyed, so anybody playing the game who has acquired stuff without known exploits has done so fairly.
You might think it was easier, but many have attested to finding lucrative trade runs in Open far away from CMDR populated space, and if you feel that it's not fair to have to leave the core areas to make money 'risk free', then perhaps you should revisit your suggestion that everyone play in Open, but leave the populated areas if they want to avoid meeting others.
The game was already sold, with one of the modes explicitly having so small a bandwidth and connection quality requirement that it can be fulfilled by a tethered GSM connection in a moving train. The players that have a connection that bad have already purchased the game, which works perfectly fine for them. That specific argument is not about reducing the requirements after the fact, but rather about not increasing them needlessly, for no real gain, while robbing legitimate customers of the game they paid for.
You do know that about everything said of Solo applies to Group too, yes? Including the Mobius group, whose number of members is already over 9K, making it the largest group in ED by far?
After all, you — and those that think like you — don't want to simply limit Solo. You want to make sure the game is only enjoyable and rewarding for those in Open, perhaps due to a misguided impression that the only "true" way to play is in Open. Which means you are going to target Groups too.
Many, perhaps most, solo players aren't against playing with others. They are just against playing with others that want to intrude on their play-style, with players that think forcing people into specific ways to play is cool.
Gotta remember that a game is meant to be enjoyable. For many of us any kind of forced PvP is the complete opposite of that. Thus, forced PvP — including forcing players into Open, or else hiding content or reward behind it to make players feel like the only way to play is in Open — should never happen.
If the game was announced and sold, from the start, as a forced PvP game, it would be different; for one, I would never have backed it, and thus wouldn't be here. But ED was sold as a game where PvP is always consensual, where players are always able to just remove any undesirable individual from their game, for whichever reason — even simply attempting to engage in PvP.
Solidarity brother!
Robert Maynard
Volunteer Moderator
For players who never want to meet another player, there is a fundamental need for Solo mode. Why should they avoid the core systems that are popular in Open just because they want not to meet players - when the game includes a core feature that allows them to?
I play predominantly in Open (except when I suffer lag that makes my controls unresponsive)....
Largest private group. Open is the largest group by a fairly large margin. Which makes it really silly the amount of complaints from people complaining about how solo and group players are undermining their efforts and affecting their galaxy.
Its like pushing a really fat guy on a cart up a hill, then complaining about the weight on a cat that jumps on it.
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You'd be surprised how heavy a cat can be!
^^^^^me, too!
You'd be surprised how heavy a cat can be!
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What is with these horrific analogies lately? Why would a fat guy push a cart uphill? Why is the cat on the cart? Why analogies whY?!?!?!!?!?!
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I haven't really been a part of this discussion, even though I have been pretty vocal in other threads about my opinion on the game's decision to have an open mode and solo mode. I guess I'll give my $0.03.
I am strictly an open player. I enjoy running into other random commanders on my ventures... and I enjoy the heart racing experience I get when my encounters are simultaneously undesired, and unfriendly. It is what makes this game exciting to me. I choose to play open, even though there are FAR more risks.
I, as a strict open player... am not against solo mode, or players that decide to play in solo. But I am ADAMANTLY against the ability to swap back and forth between the two play modes, at will. To me, it feels a lot like people that combat log. They play in open.. as soon as they encounter something they don't like (perhaps pirates showing up in their home system)... they either switch to solo on first sight.. and/or combat log if they get caught in a dangerous situation. An hour later? or the next night? They are back in open. This crap drives me crazy... If you want the benefits of open (which is the scary risk)... why go back and forth? why combat log?
What I would like to see, is when you are creating your CMDR... right below where you pick your CMDR's name, you choose if you want to be in open, or in solo.. and that CMDR is stuck there. BUT... combine this feature with the ability to purchase more CMDR slots for a reasonable price... a slot that works right in your single copy of the game. Maybe the open play mode is limited to a single CMDR.
Naturally there would need to be some small improvements made to certain aspects of the game before the mode swapping was eliminated... like when you dock at outposts, there is either a time limit, or your ship always goes into the belly of the outpost so the frequency that ships can land increases enough where permanent docking denied messages wouldn't' happen (or as often). There are others I imagine as well.... but nothing I would consider a large task for the devs.
Eliminate combat logging (by whatever means), and eliminate mode swapping... and this game would instantly be 10x better.
I am strictly an open player. I enjoy running into other random commanders on my ventures... and I enjoy the heart racing experience I get when my encounters are simultaneously undesired, and unfriendly. It is what makes this game exciting to me. I choose to play open, even though there are FAR more risks.
I, as a strict open player... am not against solo mode, or players that decide to play in solo. But I am ADAMANTLY against the ability to swap back and forth between the two play modes, at will. To me, it feels a lot like people that combat log. They play in open.. as soon as they encounter something they don't like (perhaps pirates showing up in their home system)... they either switch to solo on first sight.. and/or combat log if they get caught in a dangerous situation. An hour later? or the next night? They are back in open. This crap drives me crazy... If you want the benefits of open (which is the scary risk)... why go back and forth? why combat log?
What I would like to see, is when you are creating your CMDR... right below where you pick your CMDR's name, you choose if you want to be in open, or in solo.. and that CMDR is stuck there. BUT... combine this feature with the ability to purchase more CMDR slots for a reasonable price... a slot that works right in your single copy of the game. Maybe the open play mode is limited to a single CMDR.
Naturally there would need to be some small improvements made to certain aspects of the game before the mode swapping was eliminated... like when you dock at outposts, there is either a time limit, or your ship always goes into the belly of the outpost so the frequency that ships can land increases enough where permanent docking denied messages wouldn't' happen (or as often). There are others I imagine as well.... but nothing I would consider a large task for the devs.
Eliminate combat logging (by whatever means), and eliminate mode swapping... and this game would instantly be 10x better.
Hmm. I'm sure you don't mean this, but likening people who choose to play in Solo to combat loggers is pretty offensive.
This idea that there are hordes of players who play in Open but immediately disappear into Solo the moment things hot up says way more about the calibre of Open players than it does about people who simply choose to play the game in Solo or private groups.
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Robert Maynard
Volunteer Moderator
While you obviously feel that the changes you propose would enhance your game, I doubt that they would similarly enhance the game for all players who may well hold differing opinions on the topic.
Just the other day, DBOBE gave an interview to Arstechnica at E3 where he is quoted as stating:
I very much doubt that these core game features are going to be changed now.
Would you really prefer Open play to have even fewer players?
I think if an ultimatum were presented to the current player base... open players would choose open. solo players would choose solo. And the guys that go back and forth, would choose open.
Robert Maynard
Volunteer Moderator
Subject to the usual caveats about small sample size, self-selected respondents, etc., this poll suggests that there are fewer players who play Open only than might be expected.
Doubtful.
Robert Maynard
Volunteer Moderator
.... or Private Groups where we can experience Solo, Private Group play and, I expect in time (if Open became a walled off garden) a large Open-surrogate group would emerge for those who don't want their play-style to be dictated to them by others.
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I kinda doubt it, Group would be the perfect choice for them. There they can switch between a Group with nobody in (that is like solo) and some sort of Open Group. Pretty sure someone would create a Group that is just like Open.
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