Modes The Solo vs Open vs Groups Thread [See new thread]

[mandellorian]

You seem like a decent guy mate. Why would a post about a video game offend you? its just a game, i don't get why people get so offended by how they play a video game. furthermore, where the hell did you come by a hitler reference from someone making a comment on a forum about the reasons for using solo mode? I find your comments disturbing in the fact it shows you take this video game and the forums a little too serious.

I don't get what was so offensive. Again, i just think people cant read the posts properly or just don't bother. AGAIN - My point is this: No matter how people dress it up, the main reason solo seems to be so popular is because people like to hide there away from any danger of player interdictions. The fact that people try so hard to justify how badass they are and that they 'aren't afraid of pvp' just makes me even more sceptical that it isn't the exact opposite.

I just don't get why people use any reasoning they can think of as to why they prefer using solo apart from the most likely one, which is to reduce risk. Yes i know there are people who have other reasons for solo like internet connection, or they dont like other humans, im not saying EVERYONE plays solo to be safe, but its obvious when you browse other threads that it is the most popular reason. Wish people would stand by their convictions and accept it, instead of making out its not even a relevant use. Some people just seem to have an issue with it. I mean, its by far the most advantageous use for solo mode. And then even more, some take it personally and take offence, lol. I don't give a crap if someone wants to play solo or open, just wish people would stop acting like people aren't using it to completely avoid any risk of pvp. I get it, people can choose, its part of the game. Fine.

And before anyone lays out the old "its real easy to escape player interdictions" yeah it can be unless the pirate is in an asp, which many are now. Then a type 6 or anything smaller will be mass locked substantially. Suddenly the threat of player interdictions is much higher than just dudes in vipers and cobras.

If you don`t give a crap,stop talking about it and while you are at it stop transposing your mindset onto others..the only reason you can see for solo is fear...that reflects upon YOU not the player base...for me the solo question was simple..its how i`ve played Elite since 1986 and its sequels and its how i`ll continue to play the series..i`m not avoiding the risk of pvp..i simply don`t care about PVP in this series,if i want to PVP i`ll switch to one of my games that is actually designed for it..EVE or WOW..both have better netcode that doesn`t de-sync,better player comms and social tools.

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Crimson skies, ww2 fighters, war thunder, IL sturmovik, falcon 1.0, 4.0 and on and on. Ya I like aerial combat.

May i humbly suggest DCS..the manuals are a nightmare but the level of fidelity is amazing.

 

[withnail]

I use solo play when I am 1000 LY from Sol to reduce bandwidth. It is extraordinarily unlikely to meet another player out there so I don't bother.

I'm returning from my exploration trip now. When I'm back I will probably play in the all group doing some trading and bounty hunting. I haven't seen anyone else in so long that it will be good to interact with other commanders.

There you go, one example of why a player may use solo play.

Also, I use all three game modes, depending on what I am doing and who I want to play with. If my friends are in a group, then that's where I will play.

 

[Robert Maynard]

Though there are some exceptions, there are no other valid reasons for sticking to solo apart from either having a bad connection or being grumpy or old or scared of talking to people not known personally. The main reason i have seen for people preferring open at any one time, is by being scared witless of mythical pvp 'boogeymen' and hulks of burning CMDR type 6's floating around everywhere. I don't want to argue anymore about solo or open being better or worse, just let the devs handle it after this mind numbingly monotonous duscussion drawn out well beyond its actual merit. If they have bothered to read it they must by now understand every possible inch of the argument from both sides.

You offer an opinion as to what constitutes "valid" reasons for playing in particular modes. That opinion seems to completely disregard the fact that players are not required to subscribe to a single play-style to play the game. The discussion will rumble on, no doubt. If Frontier have read this thread it is simply a rehash of very old arguments attempting to persuade them to change the game to suit a subset of the player base - they released the game with the features intact, so I don't think that they are likely to pander to that subset of players.

The real point i'm making, is people can bang on about "play it your way" all they like, and yes you can of course play it your way as the game was intended. Just that some people choose to play with a 'safety blanket' as someone described earlier, while some don't. Its a simple truth. Some people just don't like hearing that, and so try and dress it up as a game style or something else edgy and liberal sounding.

Just because a player does not share your view of how to play the game does not give you any right to criticise their playstyle - you refer to Frontier's offer to all players, i.e. "play the game how you want to" and then seem to ascribe conditions to how the "game was intended" to be played. No players can dictate to others how to play the game.

What it actually is, is just people simply hiding from the open environment and the only truly dynamic aspect of this game, for fear of loss, be it loss of credits, or loss of time. If this applies to you, stop crying everytime someone says it for what it is. Even if you fall into the category of the exceptional reasons to play solo, there are still legions of people who happily trade solo for a perceived lack of threat over open, be it justified or not. That is hiding in its purest form. Embrace it, it is what it is, just stop trying to label it as something else.

In your opinion, of course - no one really cares what others think of their play-style and reducing the argument to name calling is hardly likely to make players more likely to take your side.

 

[T@F]

I play solo to save on bandwidth and avoid idiots and pvp'ers,as i don't care for online at all.this is why many of us wanted offline.
Example.
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=99857
That could happen in any station to anyone,so why would i want to risk all my time and effort just to lose it through an idiot like him?

 

[Robert Maynard]

The risk still remains with instancing.

Merely pointing out that, as others have said, the way the game handles multiple players in the same volume is a function of the networking model - the limit of visible players in an instance is 31 (plus the player) - the actual number of players in a single instance is probably going to be less than that due to QoS issues with individual P2P connections between players that the game tries to place in the same instance.

Thankfully, Frontier decided long ago that there would be no single points of entry to systems or around stations - to avoid the turning their game into the campsite that some other games have become.

 

[Ian Phillips]

<not modding in this post>

Got home last night to find two messages from my brother who started playing in open this week.

1) How do I stop those (insert swear word here) from interdicting and killing me. There are so many.
2) It's just boring. I can't fight them so I just can't get started in the game. Honestly can't see the point.

Woke up this morning to be presented with this doozy of a thread.

I'm going to see what I can do to help him to stay in open play, but this is an example of why solo is there and the in-game reporting and blocking functions are there.

</not modding in this post>

 

[Ian Phillips]

Back to mod mode

I'll pick up on one of the 'discussions' from the night.
Firstly your account does not get banned for a post, the system applies bans automatically when a threshhold of warnings has accumulated on an account. So saying that someone was banned for a single post is ..... erroneous..... Please read the rules before commenting on them!

Secondly - discussion of possible (or requested or wished for) moderation actions is really far of topic for a solo versus open play thread. Don't get carried away or sidetracked.

Thirdly, the overall standard of personal comments in this thread is pretty low and will stop forthwith. Discussion is fine. Insults are not.

Edit: between my two posts, there were two posts discussing the length of the thread <facpalm>.
They have been deleted. Stay on topic folks.

 

[tagos]

This is where the paradox comes in place. ED is the sandbox heavily relying on the player's generated content while with the current design it denies players with such content and this is why I think the current state is bad for the game.

'Willing' players generated content. The rest of us aren't here to be other's unwilling dynamic content so if we don't want to take part in the Lave blockade gameplay we won't. I mostly do because I like the extra danger but sometimes I don't want to be bothered.

My game bought with my money and my choice.

 

[Cowboy Bats]

Back to mod mode

You would be a Cardish, Ian would you? <I had to, I really, really, had to>

 

[{SAS}Stalker]

<not modding in this post>

Got home last night to find two messages from my brother who started playing in open this week.

1) How do I stop those (insert swear word here) from interdicting and killing me. There are so many.
2) It's just boring. I can't fight them so I just can't get started in the game. Honestly can't see the point.

Woke up this morning to be presented with this doozy of a thread.

I'm going to see what I can do to help him to stay in open play, but this is an example of why solo is there and the in-game reporting and blocking functions are there.

</not modding in this post>

My first comment would be to get him to watch a few twitch streams from a few of the pirates, I've been watching TGApples (he's on this forum as well) and learned so much about both avoidance and ship config its been unreal. Ironically pirating is very entertaining to watch and doing so really changes your perspective, he's also a decent chap in RL to boot (despite being in game pirate scum )

Secondly the rare routes are known and heavily populated, if he is trading rares on a circular route he will meet pirates. I once over thought rares were in the game to get starter players going, they aren't, they are there because humans are greedy and (as shown) they create large population systems and thus they attract hunters. Rares are a work of genius from FD, they really are.

He needs to get out of high populated areas and off the beaten track for a quieter life, its no coincidence that I went nearly 10 months without being human interdicted (although for some of those it was impossible anyway) and the first time it happened (last week) was at leesti on a rare trade.

Finally, embrace it because you are in control of it. It doest need to define your game but just the threat of it can enrich it. Admittedly if its happening over and over again then he needs to review his location (the pirates are there for a reason). He should also look up the procedure of what to do once he has entered SC having escaped an interdiction (or show him), as continuing on in the same system to port is highly likely to result in a repeat attack.

 

[tagos]

I think one of the major reasons for pro-open players to be annoyed by solo is that trading is so extremely lucrative and low risk, that when doing it in solo play-mode it gets absolutely ridiculously easy, but still very high profit. There's no need to do anything else, trading in solo mode is the way to get them cash in no time, meaning getting that python or anaconda in no time. To me solo play is a kind of cheat

How a person who has bought the game chooses to play the game is the business of precisely one person and one person only. So, so what if they choose low risk and high profit? Even if they suddenly interdict and kill me in their ground out solo Super Python it still isn't my business how they got it. It's a game and the more fun it is for more people the more successful it is going to be and as a long term fan of this game, this is all that matters to me.

There's a reason why most mmo's heavily circumscribe PvP and it's not because they've got tired of strangers giving them money.

I'm totally happy with the current system. The freedom to move between modes means I get to choose if I want to take the risk of PvP. Mostly I do. The system also acts as a brake on the actions of PvP types, or at least it should. Because the more unsporting or jerkish a PvP player is the more they risk being blocked themselves and the more they collectively risk lowering the number willing to play in Open.

Like I've said. I play in Open mostly but if I had to choose I would play only in solo or in a PvE only shard. I will not be bullied, manipulated by 'incentives' or abused into being the unwilling dynamic content for a small minority's preferred play style.

I'm completely uninterested in what they think is 'fair'. The game I have backed from the beginning is this game and if Frontier start moving goal posts I have no doubt at all it'll just make things even 'worse' from the PvP point of view in Open.

And this goes for all the proposed 'changes' designed to make it easier and quicker to kill people. Turn my freighter into even more of a sitting duck by removing or drastically nerfing my range of defensive capabilities then reluctantly I'll be gone from Open.

If I were a pirate I'd learn to be a better pirate rather than come complaining on the forums and no doubt that's what most pirates are actually doing.

It's been the same in every mmo I've played. When faced with something 'unfair' like in combat healing potions and the like, some players head for the armoury and the practice instances to get better and some head for the forums to complain.

 

[Joe Spivey]

I think one of the major reasons for pro-open players to be annoyed by solo is that trading is so extremely lucrative and low risk, that when doing it in solo play-mode it gets absolutely ridiculously easy, but still very high profit. There's no need to do anything else, trading in solo mode is the way to get them cash in no time, meaning getting that python or anaconda in no time. To me solo play is a kind of cheat

I can go to a quiet area of Open space and trade just as efficiently as I can in Solo. No more, no less. The concepts of Solo being safe, Open being risky and reward being commensurate with risk are all demonstrably fallacious. While it is true that Open play contains the human player element, the actual risk of PvP is minimal once you are outside of the core systems. Minimal because there is only a very small chance that you will meet another player and even if you do, the chance that it will be someone who wants to PvP is even smaller. Total risk factor, therefore, negligible.

Solo is not so safe either, according to FD. The devs have said that the NPCs in Solo are or can be 'beefed up' precisely to avoid Solo being considered 'safe'. I don't know about beefed up because my experience in Solo is small. All I do know is that I am attacked more often by NPCs in Solo than I am in Open.

As for the risk/reward thing? I have just explained how the, so called, risk amounts to hardly anything. So what about the presumed increased reward for this presumed increased risk? Please explain how someone makes more cr in Open than they do in Solo and how this extra reward is related to any perceived 'risk'?

 

[CMDR Bansidhe]

I can go to a quiet area of Open space and trade just as efficiently as I can in Solo. No more, no less. The concepts of Solo being safe, Open being risky and reward being commensurate with risk are all demonstrably fallacious. While it is true that Open play contains the human player element, the actual risk of PvP is minimal once you are outside of the core systems. Minimal because there is only a very small chance that you will meet another player and even if you do, the chance that it will be someone who wants to PvP is even smaller. Total risk factor, therefore, negligible.

Solo is not so safe either, according to FD. The devs have said that the NPCs in Solo are or can be 'beefed up' precisely to avoid Solo being considered 'safe'. I don't know about beefed up because my experience in Solo is small. All I do know is that I am attacked more often by NPCs in Solo than I am in Open.

As for the risk/reward thing? I have just explained how the, so called, risk amounts to hardly anything. So what about the presumed increased reward for this presumed increased risk? Please explain how someone makes more cr in Open than they do in Solo and how this extra reward is related to any perceived 'risk'?

This again.

So how does Joe argue that it is just as safe in solo as it is in open? By comparing the safety of Lave in solo to the safety of the back of beyond in open. He makes an erroneous comparison. Ask him to compare Lave in solo with Lave in open and he will just bluster as to why a direct, exact comparison somehow ISN'T the correct way. We have been here already with him in this very thread but he is mistaken in his method.

 

[T@F]

Ppl saying solo mode is easy mode makes me laugh.
I was watching a guy on twitch playing elite.he killed 6-7 harmless npc and then said npc are too easy.
So I said go kill higher ranks ones then.

Anyway he came up against a dangerous one and started to pew pew.within secs his shields was down and he was running.
Waited for his shield back up then went back in combat but now he was using them shield cells and finally killed the npc.
Then had the cheek to say npc's are still easy,if it wasn't for them shield cells he would have died without a doubt.
(Shield cells are not suppose to be abused like that,and i can bet these pvp'ers are stocked up on them as well.)

Anyway Solo mode is not as easy as some ppl think.
npc's can bite back as well.

 

[CMDR Bansidhe]

Ppl saying solo mode is easy mode makes me laugh.
I was watching a guy on twitch playing elite.he killed 6-7 harmless npc and then said npc are too easy.
So I said go kill higher ranks ones then.

Anyway he came up against a dangerous one and started to pew pew.within secs his shields was down and he was running.
Waited for his shield back up then went back in combat but now he was using them shield cells and finally killed the npc.
Then still had the cheek to say npc's are easy,if it was'nt for them shield cells he would have died without a doubt.
(Shield cells are not suppose to be abused like that.)

Anyway Solo mode is not as easy as some ppl think.

I once watched my girlfriend get killed by wolves in Elwyn Forest. I don't think it was because the wolves in Elwyn Forest were particularly hard.

 

[Ikari]

I think this argument could be solved quite easily all Fdev have to do is create an open PVE mode and an open PVP mode that are two separate universes. Given the popularity of the Mobius group I cannot see why this idea is off the table.

Solo would then be defunct as the PVE open mode would cater to those who didn't want interaction if they chose not to get involved. I think most PVP players worrying comes from so called combat logging and switching modes when a fight isn't going your way, even as a PVE player I do think that's a pretty low thing to do so you could implement a lock between the two and everyone would be happy.


Those that want occasional PVP could still get that in PVE mode like in the Mobius group through the use of conflicts zones where players have to choose a side and consensual PVP is unavoidable.

 

[T@F]

I once watched my girlfriend get killed by wolves in Elwyn Forest. I don't think it was because the wolves in Elwyn Forest were particularly hard.

You talking about wow?
ok i'll bite.

Maybe because she was under geared when she took on the wolfs.
or a beginner at the game.

A lot different than a well geared pvp'er ship in elite with all the mod cons to make the game a lot easer for them.To start killing newbies because they know they cannot lose.

If it wasn't for the starting protection in wow,you would get a lot of ganking there as well.

Also Ikari solo is also about ppl on bandwidth caps or bad connections or tethering, it's not all about pvp or grouping.
I solo mainly to save bandwidth as well when i'm close to my quarter otherwise i go in mobius group when i have enough bandwidth.

 

[Darian]

I think this argument could be solved quite easily all Fdev have to do is create an open PVE mode and an open PVP mode that are two separate universes. Given the popularity of the Mobius group I cannot see why this idea is off the table.

No they will still whine because that means even less "dynamic content we can shoot at".
I am to lazy to link but there are PLENTY of threads in EVE forums where people demand the removal of the non pvp core systhems (or rather turn them into PvP areas.)
PvE shards as much as solo mode or group means less avaiabel targets.

 

[CMDR Bansidhe]

You talking about wow?
ok i'll bite.

Maybe because she was under geared when she took on the wolfs.
or a beginner of the game.
A lot different than a well geared ship with all the mod cons to make the game a lot easer for them.
Then start killing newbies because they know they cannot lose.
If it wasn't for the starting protection in wow,you would get a lot of ganking there as well.

Hang on - you were talking about somebody nearly losing to NPCs, what has that to do with fully geared ships killing newbies? You aren't even following your own conversation now.

My point was that you cannot claim something is difficult just because it once gave a bad player some trouble.

If the NPCs are difficult in Solo then they are just the same in Open. In Open there are also players. However way you look at this there are always more enemies in Open. Solo will ALWAYS be safer than Open.

Now some people will tell you that the NPCs in Solo are tougher. Then again the same people will also tell you elsewhere on the forum that there is no difference between open and solo and never can be as they are nothing more than matchmaking options and the underlying game is the same. So who knows what to believe.

 

[Robert Maynard]

I think this argument could be solved quite easily all Fdev have to do is create an open PVE mode and an open PVP mode that are two separate universes. Given the popularity of the Mobius group I cannot see why this idea is off the table.

Solo would then be defunct as the PVE open mode would cater to those who didn't want interaction if they chose not to get involved. I think most PVP players worrying comes from so called combat logging and switching modes when a fight isn't going your way, even as a PVE player I do think that's a pretty low thing to do so you could implement a lock between the two and everyone would be happy.


Those that want occasional PVP could still get that in PVE mode like in the Mobius group through the use of conflicts zones where players have to choose a side and consensual PVP is unavoidable.

Solo will never be defunct - some players simply do not wish to play with *anyone* else regardless of whether the other players are PvE or PvP inclined.

The proposal to create an open-PvE mode would go a long way to satisfy those who simply don't want to engage in PvP and want to be able to meet all other players who prefer to play that way (rather than having to go through hoops to join a PvE oriented private group).

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Hang on - you were talking about somebody nearly losing to NPCs, what has that to do with fully geared ships killing newbies? You aren't even following your own conversation now.

My point was that you cannot claim something is difficult just because it once gave a bad player some trouble.

If the NPCs are difficult in Solo then they are just the same in Open. In Open there are also players. However way you look at this there are always more enemies in Open. Solo will ALWAYS be safer than Open.

Now some people will tell you that the NPCs in Solo are tougher. Then again the same people will also tell you elsewhere on the forum that there is no difference between open and solo and never can be as they are nothing more than matchmaking options and the underlying game is the same. So who knows what to believe.

Opinions are great, aren't they? Everyone has them and they seldom agree with those held by others.

If "you cannot claim something is difficult just because it once game a bad player some trouble" then, equally, one cannot contend that the game is easy simply because "good" players never experience trouble.