Obviously, there are always going to be some players who participate purely for the personal narrative aspect. They will always participate no matter what, so let's set that aside.
What makes players motivated to participate? There are a few factors.
Profit. Some players like to participate for credits. However, this is predominately newer players. Older players such as myself have enough credits to last a lifetime, so this is not a powerful motivator for us. Furthermore, this is a self-defeating motivator, as doing it very often results in more players no longer needing credits. Further, the way the profit is actually achieved is often completely disconnected from the CG, like the current Tritium rush. This makes CGs feel trite and pointless.
FOMO. The universal motivator, offering unique modules guarantees massive motivation. However, this can only be done so many times, and can cause FOMO fatigue. You can end up with players not WANTING to play, but feeling obligated to do so. This can create a negative emotional link with the game and reduce long-term player count. This can also cause frustration for players who miss out, who often feel left behind.
Roleplay. This only works if players know that there WILL be a different result based on their actions. This ONLY works if players truly believe a failable CG CAN fail. There have been too many CGs that have supposedly been failable, but it was obvious that it couldn't actually fail. This breaks the suspension of disbelief, kills the roleplay, and reduces long-term player count.
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Some general suggestions.
Profit: If a CG is supposed to be about profit, make sure it actually causes profit enough to motivate. The current CG, for example, does not offer superior profit to normal mining, and the module reward is ordinary enough to not be a potent FOMO motivator, either. For Mining CGs especially, the ideal method would be to offer large tier-related credit rewards to encourage actually mining the stuff rather than just trading it. Another trick that could be beneficial is to offer different numbers of contribution for different commodities, especially more difficult to acquire commodities. In the current CG, for example, you can mine upwards of 1000t of Painite per hour with an optimized mapped setup, but you'll cap out at approximately 200t/hour for Tritium, because it comes from icy rings. Praseodymium and Lithium Hydroxide are even worse, as they lack hotspots. The CG could easily offer 8x for those 2, 4x for Tritium, and 1x for Painite, and make it actually somewhat reasonable for players to at least grab them as they go.
FOMO: Putting FOMO modules in tech brokers is a bad idea. Instead, they should be offered regularly from CGs. This will have multiple benefits. It allows repeated use of FOMO without making players feel inordinately frustrated that they might never get a particular module. It prevents CGs like the current one from having a largely meaningless reward, because it's easier to buy it than to do the CG, especially when players will likely want several.
Roleplay: Many community goals like this one feel like pointless fluff. If you're going to involve existing powerplay factions, why not offer rewards for being a pledged member? If I've been pledged to Torval for 2 years, why am I getting the exact same reward as some fedneck? Even CGs that nominally have minimal impact on the galaxy can still have personal impact. Anything from increased rewards for pledged members of a power, to reduced merit requirements for ranks, or even a permanent increase in minimum rank. Alternatively, if you're going to offer FOMO modules, why not offer powerplay modules as a reward?
I could go on and on, but my basic point is this; don't let CGs become something players are encouraged to bypass or ignore. That's the path to another pause on CGs, like we had before.
What makes players motivated to participate? There are a few factors.
Profit. Some players like to participate for credits. However, this is predominately newer players. Older players such as myself have enough credits to last a lifetime, so this is not a powerful motivator for us. Furthermore, this is a self-defeating motivator, as doing it very often results in more players no longer needing credits. Further, the way the profit is actually achieved is often completely disconnected from the CG, like the current Tritium rush. This makes CGs feel trite and pointless.
FOMO. The universal motivator, offering unique modules guarantees massive motivation. However, this can only be done so many times, and can cause FOMO fatigue. You can end up with players not WANTING to play, but feeling obligated to do so. This can create a negative emotional link with the game and reduce long-term player count. This can also cause frustration for players who miss out, who often feel left behind.
Roleplay. This only works if players know that there WILL be a different result based on their actions. This ONLY works if players truly believe a failable CG CAN fail. There have been too many CGs that have supposedly been failable, but it was obvious that it couldn't actually fail. This breaks the suspension of disbelief, kills the roleplay, and reduces long-term player count.
---
Some general suggestions.
Profit: If a CG is supposed to be about profit, make sure it actually causes profit enough to motivate. The current CG, for example, does not offer superior profit to normal mining, and the module reward is ordinary enough to not be a potent FOMO motivator, either. For Mining CGs especially, the ideal method would be to offer large tier-related credit rewards to encourage actually mining the stuff rather than just trading it. Another trick that could be beneficial is to offer different numbers of contribution for different commodities, especially more difficult to acquire commodities. In the current CG, for example, you can mine upwards of 1000t of Painite per hour with an optimized mapped setup, but you'll cap out at approximately 200t/hour for Tritium, because it comes from icy rings. Praseodymium and Lithium Hydroxide are even worse, as they lack hotspots. The CG could easily offer 8x for those 2, 4x for Tritium, and 1x for Painite, and make it actually somewhat reasonable for players to at least grab them as they go.
FOMO: Putting FOMO modules in tech brokers is a bad idea. Instead, they should be offered regularly from CGs. This will have multiple benefits. It allows repeated use of FOMO without making players feel inordinately frustrated that they might never get a particular module. It prevents CGs like the current one from having a largely meaningless reward, because it's easier to buy it than to do the CG, especially when players will likely want several.
Roleplay: Many community goals like this one feel like pointless fluff. If you're going to involve existing powerplay factions, why not offer rewards for being a pledged member? If I've been pledged to Torval for 2 years, why am I getting the exact same reward as some fedneck? Even CGs that nominally have minimal impact on the galaxy can still have personal impact. Anything from increased rewards for pledged members of a power, to reduced merit requirements for ranks, or even a permanent increase in minimum rank. Alternatively, if you're going to offer FOMO modules, why not offer powerplay modules as a reward?
I could go on and on, but my basic point is this; don't let CGs become something players are encouraged to bypass or ignore. That's the path to another pause on CGs, like we had before.
