Vox Populi: send us your opinion about modes affecting community goals (details in first post)

[Yarsunas]

I see there as being two major facets to this situation:
The first is that solo players can completely sidestep the political realities of the ED galaxy in the case that those realities are player motivated. (the simplest example of this is a player maintained blockade)

I would think that a good solution to this would be to have increased NPC activity in Solo and group modes emulating certain types of recent player activity in open mode. Of course an NPC blockade wouldn't be as effective as a player run blockade but it would allow playrs in open to have some effect on players in solo similar to how a station can be depleted of a commodity across modes.


The second is that Players who play in open take on additional risks and challenges and should somehow receive greater rewards.

This is a much more difficult issue because any reward given in open cold be seen a favouritism.

In some cases the rewards can be the direct result of interacting with other players making them seem much more natural and less like favouritism. (however even this implementation has it's challenges because the basic unit of victory when fighting NPCs is destroying them while the basic unit of victory against a player is chasing them off)

In other cases like trading things are even harder because the risk exists more as the possibility of a player encounter then the actual event.

For this reason even though it may seem like favouritism I would heartily approve of traders working in open play getting an across the board benefit to profit and community goal contribution, both as fair compensation for taking on extra risk but also as an incentive for more traders to venture into open play.

Because really getting more traders into open play would be the foundation to the dynamic pvp play that can make this game great.

Regards,
Yarsunas

 

[Darkium]

Carefull about everything written here, what the people want is usually what favor how they play and not what would make the game better.

I'll try to be short and clear but english is not my usual language.

The problem here is the fact we can freely go from open play to solo. Of course, we can't create a solo and open universe for each since that would mean duplicating terabits of data. Proposal to add delay between the 2 only mitigeate the issue and had frustating mechanics. Proposal to increase/decrease a mode reward doesn't really work since a player can move between stations in solo and sell in open. Adding several of those proposals make some huge mess.

The only real way of patching the issue is to go at the root and separate the CMDR we play in Open from the one we play in Solo+Group. That way, we have a trully solo game in Solo with option of coop mode in Group. And we have a multiplayer CMDR in open where we make our legacy and earn everything fully in multiplayer.

But I would go further. Some players could use a solo CMDR to influence the galaxy in a way that profit the Open CMDR. Assymetric community goals are also impossible if we let Solo players affect the galaxy. Therefore, Solo CMDR shouldn't be able to affect market prices and community goals. In general a single player can't really affect the outcome after all. BUT they should be able to see how much they contributed and be rewarded handsomely. Indeed, reward wise, a Solo CMDR would only compete agains Open CMDRs since they wouldn't see or be affected by other Solo CMDRs actions. And Open players would only compete again each others since they can't see or be affected be Solo CMDRs.

Exemple:
1 000 tons is the community goal.
20 players contributed in Open and 20 contributed in Solo.
A total of 800 tons have been contributed in Open and 2 000 tons have been contributed in Solo.
Top 20% contributor to a goal receive special rewards. That mean 4 Open CMDRs.
The top 1st Open CMDR contributor gave 100 tons, the 2nd Open gave 80 tons, the 3rd gave 70 tons, and the 4th 60 tons.
All of them would receive the top 20% contributor reward and all the Solo CMDRs who gave above 60 tons would receive the reward too, even if all of them did. How much above 60 tons wouldn't matter for Open or Solo CMDRs unless there's higher tier rewards.
If we pretend half the Solo CMDRs gave 60 tons and more, that would mean 20% of the Open contributors and 50% of the Solo contributors got the top tier reward. For a total of 35% of the 40 contributors getting the top 20% rewards since Solo CMDRs only compete directly versus the Open CMDRs who compete agains themselves.
As for the community goal, the final value of the contribution would be 800 since Solo CMDR wouldn't affect other CMDRs or the galaxy.

In a perfect world, the ideal final community goal contribution should be Open contribution+the Solo CMDR contribution. Then make a specific version for the Solo contributors who tip over from failure to success the community goal. But that would take way too much effort and ressources on FD side. And anyway, in a realist community goal, less than 1% of the solo players would be in that situation since we are usually talking about millions of tons.

 

[Slacker]

I think it should remain as it is now. No difference between any of the modes, all vying for the same goals.

The one change that desperately needs to be made is for Commanders in open Conflict Zones to be given credits for partial hits on enemies in just the same way those in solo are rewarded if they have hit a ship that goes on to die.

I believe this is the biggest problem Commanders face in open and a big reason they see solo as being unfair.

You might want to go the whole hog and reward credits based on damage done rather than ships killed but that's up to you - the vital thing is that it's not down to the final shot getting all the credit(s).

 

[Jeeves]

I can see the concern of people who have noticed that it's easier to complete goals in Solo mode and group mode.

But the bigger issue really is how difficult it is to complete missions in open play. When multiple commanders fire at a ship, there's no telling who is going to get the kill. Even beam lasers are no guarantee. This begins to promote things like kill stealing, which generally just annoy everyone. I can recall the battle for Lugh, and how even with the most diligent work, and expert flying, and I still couldn't get the kill more than 1 out of 10 times. I tried this for awhile, but it started to look more like a group of sharks feasting on bait fish, but no one knew who was going to get the fish.

In open, this aspect actually made the game a lot easier, in that I was guaranteed to be under absolutely no threat from the AI. However, players (myself included) would pew pew for a little while, but the minute their shields dropped they were high tailing it out of there. It ended up being more of a distraction than anything else, because numbers basically guaranteed who was dominating the instance. Which pack of sharks got to feast on the minnows. And mighty inefficiently, I might add.

There really isn't a good way to change this. The idea of adding more AI ships to open will just crash the frame rate. Trying to alter the kill registering mechanism isn't so great either, you Devs have really done a thorough job striking a fair balance, and it's not time to alter that formula. To get that to work, you had to balance intermittent damage, and a lot of other formulas to give players a chance to earn their kills.

You could always give the kill to whoever did the most damage, but logging that is probably more processing than an instance should be doing anyways. Not to mention it still leaves out players in smaller ships who can't keep up with the damage output, but maybe played a significant role.

There's also elements of being annoying, and whether or not your annoyance levels help your team win. How do you quantify that? Perhaps Anacondas make more because everyone tries to kill it dead with fire? Saving your teammates from getting shot at? As you can see, finding a fair balance for actual work is really difficult.

So, at the Devs, I think at this point, completing community goals in solo mode shouldn't change. There is not enough of a good reason to keep people doing them if they aren't worth as much, or aren't accessible to others. The need to balance the workload players put in, versus the difficulty of reaping any kind of reward, make open play difficult.

I think the very best bet is a third option. Record the kills players make against other players. And give them a significant bonus and/or community goal support for doing it. Either make the combat bond for a character be significantly higher, say in the hundred thousand range, or give combat markers recording the number of players you manage to destroy. Give these player kills a much bigger impact on the game, due to how dangerous a player is compared to the AI.

This would give both a financial and a game incentive for playing in Open that wouldn't be available if you are playing in Solo. Player kills would be worth major prestige. And conversely, you could use this system to track the infamy of a pirate, or the deadliness of a bounty hunter as well. Generally the people who play in open do it for the challenge. Well do you want a challenge? Well then you should be rewarded accordingly. Keeping more stats, and giving more incentives to kill enemy players.

However, if this happens, you're going to have to fix the friendly fire issue. Otherwise you're going to get people in Eagles spam killing each other and farming the differences between the rebuy costs. Frankly you might see this happen anyways. So there's the counterpoint to that argument.

So for summary, don't touch the system. It will keep players engaged. If you need more players playing in Open, give them some bonuses for killing players. I would argue though that you shouldn't give a credit bonus, as then you can get insurance rebuy farming schemes going. Just give a significant bonus to the faction goal and to faction rep. That way you can't exploit the system without losing a significant amount of credits, but the difficulty and prestige actually are acknowledged.

Thanks for the hard work guys, keep it up.

 

[The Bosun]

There should be a huge difference in the rewards made by playing in open play.
If I am playing in solo/group, mode it is playing in easy mode . I have little risk so should get less reward. I would say making twice as much in open would counter the fact that I am risking massive re- buy costs by playing in open mode.
When I go to cash in my bonds in open, I should get twice as much.
To counter cheating, I would only get these bonds back if I have not logged out since I earned the bonds. This would stop players from playing in easy mode then logging into hard mode to get the bonus.
I play this game as a pirate and this also needs attention to get more players playing in open. I would go along with the argument that there should be huge penalties for murderers and much smaller penalties for those who take a few shots at other players to disable them and take part of their cargo.
This would encourage pirates not to kill their targets , thus not causing victims massive losses which is the main reason for traders staying out of open play in the first place.

 

[Vojaka]

All three modes should be able to earn goal rewards, however only actions taken in Open play should contribute towards the goals' progression.

This way, if a player wanted to earn credits through community goals, they could still play in Solo or Private with friends and earn their way in to the "Top 40%" or "Top 15%". To actually contribute towards the outcome however, they would need to play in Open.

This would make group efforts in Open such as blockades more meaningful, while letting players continue to have fun and earn credits in Solo.

It would also mean players wouldn't be able to "double-up" by earning both solo and open rewards from a single event.

 

[Salvatory]

I think the player grouping system/server needs a major change.

There is a huge conflict of personalities that need to be divided or the complaining will never stop (ever)

There needs to be a pvp / non-open server and universe.

A pvp/pve (with a select option for pvp flag in anarchy systems or opposing factions due to alignment down to the servers progression/background sim)

And a pve server (so that people can either go solo or 'open' and enjoy peoples company)


These are known working systems and cater for the fundamental play types.

Unfortunately would require a huge amount of work from FD and if it doesn't happen I'd hope there's another way to appease these different groups of people!

 

[Lenroc elisav]

This entire debate stems from an unfortunate design choice (IMIO-in my irrelevant opinion) on top of a very rudimentary law system (read consequences for unlawful actions). There is a very simple way out of this and it's been used with success in many on-line games. For ED that would translate in introduction of a multi-verse (or dual-verse if you will) system. Two separate mirrored galaxies, one yin and one yang for a full circle. Yin galaxy used for the solo and private mode and yang for the open mode. Players may chose what version they wanna play in at any-time but their actions would have effect only in the corresponding galaxy for that gaming session. Will rehash for clarity that they should be able to switch at their leisure between modes. Would be nice if the players could use the same characters to access both servers and IMO would be an improvement over the base concept (only ships and cash should traverse between servers)

I've been following this thread for some time now and I'm well aware of FDevs stance on the matter but I honestly don't think that there is another way to resolve this so both sides of this debate be satisfied.
Also it's worth mentioning that the, above mentioned, law system needs a lot of improvement or open mode would become a ghost town.

This comes from a car..(oups sorry mods ) avid solo player that have done just a few incursions in open but does realize that you can't play tennis alone at the concrete wall and pretend to be recognized as no. 1 ATP tennis player .

Or you could take inspiration from another game which should not be named here and area separate people with different play-styles but that would mean only one mode and I bet you'll have quite a stormy forum if you go that way.

Or you could just let it be and play it out .

 

[SteveLaw]

First of all I come from a very recent starting point and with no experience of Open Play in Elite Dangerous or most of the community discussion of the subject but I would like to offer my limited perspective. Most or all of it has very likely been stated before in some form and may not add to the discussion per se, but it may still be valuable to help build a more reflective representation of the player base at large.

While I do very much like the idea of a dynamic open world populated by PCs as well as NPCs I play in Solo/Group mode for three main factors beyond my control:

• I don't have the best hardware.
• I don't have the best hand-eye coordination/reflexes*.
• I don't have unlimited playing time.

Even if I am able to mostly avoid aggressive, unsportsmanlike PvP players in Open Play it cannot be guaranteed and that would spoil a lot of my fun**. Open Play isn't even fully open either as I understand it, it's more or less random (from a player's POV) who you share your instance with. Having said all that once I've trained myself against some NPCs I may well play some Open but likely not all or even most of the time.

I am grateful that I am able to enjoy the game in my own way in Solo but I would love to also be able to participate in Community Goals somehow. However I do sympathise with idea of blockades or similar, this is the sort of thing that Open Play should be able to do, and one of the reasons it's so potentially dynamic and exciting.

Unfortunately I don't have the experience of the game/community to offer any real suggestions at this point.

* If this was real life I just wouldn't be a space pilot, I just don't have the skill for it.

** Let's never forget that this is a game and we all paid our money to have fun. Fun is subjective.

 

[Rowander]

First of all, my opinion on the subject is that nothing should be different between modes. Each one contributes in their own way, and making it different across modes may cause more harm than good. As it stands now, I don't think open players are bothered by the fact that solo players are having an easier time. That's the reason most play solo, to have a quieter, easier, undisturbed play session.

I would bet most of the players that play in Solo, do it to escape griefers and player-killers. If there was a system in place that gave real meaning to killing others, where pirates and killers would be forced to respond to their actions and live and die by them, then probably a sizable chunk of solo players would turn to open.

 

[kfriman]

All modes should have the same influence, rewards etc in community goals.

 

[smiths121]

Hi All,

I want to avoid CGs being reserved for longer term players in 6 months time. Without solo/group mode the combat orientated ones are in danger of not being useable by newer players. We need the community to get bigger for the long term success of ED.

Some CGs are mode sensative some are not. Where there is a clear difference between open and solo/group risk/reward, defined as there will probably be players opposing your efforts towards the goal (Lugh and Khaka in my three examples below), the CG goal needs to have a solo/group sub-goal, and an open sub-goal. The CG can only succeed if both sub-goals are reached. Each sub-goal has its own global award structure, and players are measured separately on each.

My CG/mode experience:

Tanmark worked well, it was just NPC farming mission in any mode, so risk/reward the same in all 3 modes. Actually solo might be slightly harder, as you cannot wing up. Tanmark style community goal well run well under the current CG capabilities.

Lugh combat zones often required direct interaction with players from the opposing goal in open mode, but was just NPC farming in group/solo. Open was not a place for newer players. I never signed up after touring the zones, choosing Fed and 3+ Vulture+ on CSG side, against my single Viper, in each zone. The only way I could have contributed was in solo. I know some commanders that did it this way.

Khaka was owned by CSG ran interference at Khaka - not sure it was expected, certainly the apparent level of organisation was not expected by me. Open was not the place for Newer commander in a Hauler or low cost Type-6. There is clear frustration amongst the guilds/groups that blockades do not work effectively, may went for solo- indeed there was a suggestion to do this in the forums, in the Fed thread on 26th March.

Simon

 

[R.Tekener Cs.Smiler]

I hope my english is not to bad, ok I dont know if it possible but why not set a ratio between Playtime in one mode from the total playtime to the influence for Community Goals?
So a real Solo Player/Group player has no handicap but the "cheater" dont influence the real open Player.
Example I play 99% in Solo, so I influence a CG in Solo 99% aka 100%.
With the Xbox One Version many more Players come to the game without any Chance for the open players to stop them.
A player always switch to solo only to "exploit" the mechanic and has example only 40% or less from his total playtime in Solo, he influence only for this % the CG.
I think this will work not only for CG, the same for PKler they kill in open, then only in open they can clear the Bounties.

 

[Thebadmf]

Making the rules, including the rules about how much reward is awarded or how they contribute to the goals, different between modes is gamey, heavyhanded, and outright offensive for players that prefer the mode that got the short end of the stick.

What's more, players like me will simply use firewalls and programs that selectively degrade connections in order to get the unwarranted benefits being doled out in open while still making ourselves unavailable for PvP.

Instead, if there are efficiency differences that are worth of concern, take a closer look at the actual reasons those differences exist and tweak the rules to reduce the difference, but keeping the rules the same for all groups. For example:

- If there is an issue with every player turning on any new player that appears on the opposite side: make, for the community event sites only, players indistinguishable from NPCs, either for a limited time or until scanned.

- If players in open are losing bonds too frequently due to deaths while the ones in solo/group rarely die, make those bonds, from the community event only, survive death either partially or in full.

- If the time to kill is too high in open, reduce the reward for killing an enemy ship, and use that difference to reward players for being engaged in combat, thus reducing the potential difference.

In short, be more intelligent with how rewards are awarded, create smarter rules that don't discriminate against a specific group, but keep the rules the same for everyone..

Pretty much this. I don't really role play (only as much as I'm an Imperial double agent). I play primarily in Mobius and other PG's with friends. I do not care for non-concentual pvp; I care about a rich universe with depth of background simulation. I care about the finely crafted flight model. I care about the story.

I played Eve from early beta to 1 year after release. I have absolutely no wish to see ED become Eve in any way shape or form. I've played all the Elite games and hoped this would be a successor to First Encounters with planetary landings, diverse missions and an interactive story. To be frank I would have preferred the default mode of play to be similar to Mobius; if you want to play in open, do so as you wish but don't expect any special treatment as you're the one wanting the extra layer of interactivity most of which is negative in my eyes.

This is supposed to be a successor to Elite, a game that fosters cooperation and exploration, not Eve a game about player power struggles and Empire building. I should not be penalised for wanting to play Elite since this is the game I bought in to.

Open should not get any special treatment. It's their choice to add that layer of interaction.

 

[Chrisfs]

I think the status of modes (Open, Solo , Group) depends on the type of goal.
As far as I know, the only complaint is that people is solo can avoid people trying to block them from achieving the goal.
If that's the case, then it really depends on the type of goal. Some goals don't need opposition. If it's an exploration goal or a trading goal, then it's a cooperative goal and you don't need an opposition and people who are complaining about not being able to blockade are just being spoilers. They can join the goal or find something else to do. Open or Solo is fine.
If there needs to be opposition, you can set up opposing goals like in Lugh (but watch out for people switching goals which is apparently happening),
and/or you can increase the chance of encountering hostile NPCS in solo mode (if that's feasible in the software).

Some people feel they need to be the 'bad guys' ('Faction X has a goal, well I want to blockade that!' 'I am a xenophobe, why can't I shoot down ships returning from exploration, causing people misery is how I play the game'),

I have read several times that 'People who would like to play Open are forced into solo by community goals'. No one is FORCED to play Solo rather than Open. People who do so, play solo because it is easier. Because their desire for hard rewards like credits are greater than their love for tough battle and player interaction, REGARDLESS of what they say on a forum. If you really are in it for the interaction, play open. If you want credit, play solo
(or FD can increase the toughness of NPCs in solo in areas around the goal)

 

[Mohrgan]

Just in case you are counting votes, I'll contribute. Even though I may echo other posts.
.
It would be a mistake to prioritize one mode over another. It comes down to asking: Should the personal gaming code of some 'staying in open' hold enough weight to diminish another players contribution?
.
Playing in any of the modes is just another question a player has to answer when they sit down to play. The CG's should be designed for equal participation by all. Any weighing or balancing based on what mode a player chooses betrays the the players that prefer the mode being reduced.
.
The fact that all three modes are open to any who chose them is all the balance that is required.

 

[Artophwar]

I think all that really needs to be changed is that more progress is applied to the Community Goals and Background Simulation in Open play. That way the in game rewards for players is the same no matter the mode you prefer but at least if people want to play in the more dangerous mode their efforts towards the goals and influence changes are rewarded. Killing players on the opposing side of conflict zones could also count for more behind the scenes.


Currently in Solo/Group the goals get done faster. If they made Open have a modifier to the background progress that was 10x higher, just for example, then every ton you hand in, and every npc killed would be the same as 10 killed/tons in Solo/Group. They can figure out a number that balances it but Im willing to bet that Solo/Group is at least 10x more efficient.

 

[Riff Rider]

Solo players shouldn't have their rewards or contribution amounts adjusted downwards, that's very unfair.

It's reasonable to assume that if a player is after higher kills and faster/higher credit rewards, they would go solo or wing in a private group to avoid competing with random commanders. Likewise, if a player wants to compete for kills and fight other commanders, open play obviously provides this, however the two styles don't mix well in open. The controversy and complaining is largely coming from open only players, and the argument is old: they want to fight solo players if they have to share the galaxy.

I see it this way; if there were NO solo mode, would the community event have turned out any differently? I don't think so, considering the strict limitations with instancing - open play would simply have fewer NPC ships.

So, the solution seems simple: solo play doesn't need to change. Community events in open play should provide a significant boost in credit rewards and contribution for defeating other commanders (only). As I've pointed out, if there were no solo mode, players themselves would replace NPC's. Make defeating other commanders worth the added risk and challenge. Speaking as a solo player, and probably for many others, I have no problem at all with open players being more greatly rewarded *for fighting other commanders*.

Consider this: if a commander is fighting in a combat zone at some odd hour of the morning and he has it all to himself, why then should a solo commander doing the same thing be of any less value to the goal of the event?

 

[ADCKnight]

Why do we even have 3 modes anyway? It's silly, all this could be done in one mode, just have a PvP settings in the right panel, off by default.

Excessively shooting a player, entering a conflict zone, entering hostile territory, or manually switching on PvP mode would flag you for PvP.
5 minutes of non combat outside a hostile area would be needed to remove the flag.

Entering event zones would also flag you.

To avoid grieving, collision damage from players would need to do no damage unless flagged.
And a player wouldn't be able to interdiction an inflagged player.

 

[CaptainKremmen]

I've always been a strong proponent of FD's design approach of free and flexible play modes. It's a very effective circuit breaker when it comes to the kind of organised/Institutionalised domination gameplay that some gamers really enjoy... but that some other gamers find abhorrent and unbearable.

For me, is important that no play mode is a "second class" play style.

From a CG perspective, I feel it is important that players who greatly prefer one play style should neither have to "sit out" an entire storyline/campaign, nor feel like they must change play modes to achieve their aims.

How to deliver that? Well, that is the trick... because the available play modes ARE quite different when it comes to gameplay factors - especially in a competitive campaign.

Apologies for any typos - I am pecking this out on the world's worst phone...!