Engineers When will there be a reason to play with your friends?

[revelationsr]

yes, and assume, that is very much by design. you know, all modes equal, you can play in any mode you want, experience the whole game in any modes etc...

that guildwards design looks neat. on the contrary in ED you have the problem of ship spawns depending on rank and shiptypes, which leads to the strange effect, that i can't help a newbie to battle harmless AspE, only he can "help" me to fight deadly anacondas... at least, if i don't fly an eagle on that occasion (which i mainly do).

Then do it through multi player quests. Like what I said in the original post.

I would like to see things like quest sharing. Or quests meant for multi player. You know more/harder enemies. Variation on quests such as defend an outpost. Escort a ship. Give us a reason for me to play as wing man for my friends tourist ship. Reward players for finding other people in the game that share their goals. Such a pirate group. Or traders sticking together because of saftly in numbers.

 

[ElectricZ]

I've been asking about co-op missions since this trailer came out for Wings:

[video=youtube;23GEX4pYL9w]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23GEX4pYL9w[/video]

Technically, some of the things in this trailer are possible. You can wing up and fight against other ships. But the key component of what they're selling here is that the players can all reap the rewards. "Let's get to the station and find out what this thing is worth." What happens then at the end of this video? The T7 Driver gets all of the rep and credits, and then buys enough gold or platinum to cover the shares of the wingmates, then they gather outside of a station somewhere while the T7 doles out cargo cannisters and the poor CMDRs in the fighters scoop them up 2-8 tons at a time because they don't fit large cargo bays.

Co-op play isn't killing the same assassination targets or teaming up for bounty hunting or mining. That's just doing the same thing in the same instance and that's pretty much the extent of it. You can work together to flip a system in the BGS by running missions, but again you don't actually fly together most of the time, you just keep each othrer company on the radio. You play together separately.

You can take the same missions if you and your friends have the same reputation and rank so they show up on the mission board, but you're still having to complete them separately. Everybody needs a similar cargo ship, or a similar combat ship, or a similar jump range if you plan to stick together to do the same thing. You have to try really hard to make this work on an ongoing basis. It introduces its own special kind of grind, but if you want to play co-op you have to do it.

Co-op play means wing missions: a single goal given to a group of players that they work together to achieve and share a reward. A true co-op mission would be accepted by a wing and be executed in such a way that a group of players would need to fill different roles to complete it. Say, a mission to deliver 300 tons of cargo 150 light years with the knowledge that pirates were going to stop them. It would be up to the wing on how to fly it. Does someone have a T9 who can take all the cargo in one lump, leaving the others free to fly FDLs and Vultures as escorts? Or do four players in Asps take 75 tons each and try to split up? Or two T7's and two Cobras? Give the players an objective where they have to work out how to complete it, then allow them to split the rewards for their efforts. Players who like to space truck get to haul cargo, players who like to fight get to play the role of protector. Exploration could be opened up with "Scan every body in System XYZ" for survey missions or search/rescue, with a wing breaking up the duties, again with the potential to have fighters acting as escorts for the scanning ships.

The new Passenger would be perfect for co-op, with escort ships for passengers or in danger or running interference for people who don't want to get scanned. I've tried this with a friend and it's a HUGE amount of fun - except when it comes to payment. Splitting a 4 million credit payout is a huge hassle, and no rep is gained. You either purchase and dump 100 tons of gold or settle for a warm fuzzy.

I've suggested multiple times in multiple forums a "Split Rewards with Wing" function. All FD needs to do is add add a button on the Mission Complete screen to split the rewards of the mission, credits and rep, evenly with wing members. Then you don't even have to worry about the mission board syncing up, instancing issues making people drop or not seeing mission objectives together. Put "must be present to win" conditions in to prevent abuse, that the wingmates must at least be winged up at the beginning and end of the mission, and been present at the mission objectives to qualify. If those flags are met, the mission taker has the option to split the take with the wing. It would allow people who want to fly together and work together to do so for in-game rewards.

But it's never happened. Maybe the potential for abuse is too high. Maybe the game engine can't support co op missions because of instancing/matchmaking. But with Multicrew as the next promised update, Frontier had better have a plan because multicrew by definition is cooperative. The players are going to want to be able to share in rewards, there needs to be gameplay to support and justify flying together, and if crew members on the same ship keep winking in and out because of connectivity issues, there's going to be a lot of unhappy CMDRs out there...

 

[revelationsr]

ElectricZ +1

Well put good sir.

 

[RamirezKurita]

While I'd like to see more wing encouragement mechanics, I generally wing up with my friends whenever we happen to be online at the same time already, so any extra benefits would just be extras on top of that. Before worrying about extra fancy wing mechanics, I'd rather they look into introducing wing mechanics into solo games and small private groups by allowing players to hire/be hired by NPCs. Once wing mechanics become both desirable and possible for the majority of players then they can look into creating more specialised wing content, but until then there's little point creating wing content that many players will never get to enjoy.

 

[revelationsr]

While I'd like to see more wing encouragement mechanics, I generally wing up with my friends whenever we happen to be online at the same time already, so any extra benefits would just be extras on top of that. Before worrying about extra fancy wing mechanics, I'd rather they look into introducing wing mechanics into solo games and small private groups by allowing players to hire/be hired by NPCs. Once wing mechanics become both desirable and possible for the majority of players then they can look into creating more specialised wing content, but until then there's little point creating wing content that many players will never get to enjoy.

I dont seem to understand your point. If you could please reword it. I think maybe you might have a different understanding of what I mean by reasons to team up. Something like this could be played my everyone. Even those who just have the starter sidewinder. Get a quest to go kill a corba to gether. Something that might be hard for a single player quest. But I think I am not understanding what you are saying. If you could please reword.

 

[ocflyer]

you can work together on upgrading your ships. what comes around goes around. i have several times winged up with explorers to get them their chemical manipulators (before those could be collected from combat aftermath). if a new player needs a hand in bounty hunting, i wing up, and let him the killing shot.... during BGS manipulation we often wing up, because trade vouchers bring additional influence to our minor faction etc.

but as said: there are no direct rewards for wing activities beating cr/h-solo-farming & i personally would like to see wing missions.

i was just pointing out, that there activities you can do together for fun. if you don't want that, it's fine for me.

My friends and I frequently do this. It is easier and more fun to attack a convoy as a wing to get Chemical Manipulators and other commodities. They also help in unlocking engineers. For example, my friend helped me get the Lavian Brandy in a fraction of the time that would be required because two friends bought brandy and dropped it to me waiting outside the station. Similarly, it is safer to fly in a CZ as a wing so that one of the members can scoop up the commodities while the others stand watch and fend off attacks.
.
The OP may be looking for more specific gameplay but his assertion that there is nothing to do with friends is false as there are too many activities that are more interesting and more viable only if you fly with friends.

 

[RamirezKurita]

I dont seem to understand your point. If you could please reword it. I think maybe you might have a different understanding of what I mean by reasons to team up. Something like this could be played my everyone. Even those who just have the starter sidewinder. Get a quest to go kill a corba to gether. Something that might be hard for a single player quest. But I think I am not understanding what you are saying. If you could please reword.

The way I see much of the team based mechanics, and lack thereof, is a bit of a chicken and the egg scenario. Many players play solo or effectively solo, so Frontier run the risk of spending a large amount of development resources on something that players might never use if they choose to make a load of multiplayer specific mechanics; by allowing many of the multiplayer specific mechanics work also with NPCs, those developmental resources wouldn't be risked because everyone would have access to them regardless of how they choose to play. By adding in increased NPC interactions, it creates the drive to introduce extra mechanics for wings which would then further give benefits to multiplayer, rather than adding in more mechanics to a niche aspect of gameplay.

For example, if they created wing-scale combat missions that would require 3-4 kitted out ships to reasonably do, how many players would actually take advantage of them? Would it be enough to justify all the headache to create and balance such a set of missions? Then there would be a portion of the playerbase that would feel left out and abandoned because they only play solo or in pairs, and leaving out portions of the playerbase is never a good idea. Without a way for everyone to enjoy such a set of mechanics, it would be too risky and too divisive for the players. Introducing a set of NPC wing mechanics would let everyone join in on these wing-specific mechanics regardless of their connection and sociability, while obviously those that do play with other players get to enjoy the mechanics with their friends.

Could you imagine how we would have responded if using SLFs required a second player idling on our ship rather than simply being able to hire an NPC? I know some players would enjoy it (and are looking forward to the PC multicrew stuff I presume), but equally many players would feel cheated out of an interesting gameplay mechanic.

 

[revelationsr]

The way I see much of the team based mechanics, and lack thereof, is a bit of a chicken and the egg scenario. Many players play solo or effectively solo, so Frontier run the risk of spending a large amount of development resources on something that players might never use if they choose to make a load of multiplayer specific mechanics; by allowing many of the multiplayer specific mechanics work also with NPCs, those developmental resources wouldn't be risked because everyone would have access to them regardless of how they choose to play. By adding in increased NPC interactions, it creates the drive to introduce extra mechanics for wings which would then further give benefits to multiplayer, rather than adding in more mechanics to a niche aspect of gameplay.

For example, if they created wing-scale combat missions that would require 3-4 kitted out ships to reasonably do, how many players would actually take advantage of them? Would it be enough to justify all the headache to create and balance such a set of missions? Then there would be a portion of the playerbase that would feel left out and abandoned because they only play solo or in pairs, and leaving out portions of the playerbase is never a good idea. Without a way for everyone to enjoy such a set of mechanics, it would be too risky and too divisive for the players. Introducing a set of NPC wing mechanics would let everyone join in on these wing-specific mechanics regardless of their connection and sociability, while obviously those that do play with other players get to enjoy the mechanics with their friends.

Could you imagine how we would have responded if using SLFs required a second player idling on our ship rather than simply being able to hire an NPC? I know some players would enjoy it (and are looking forward to the PC multicrew stuff I presume), but equally many players would feel cheated out of an interesting gameplay mechanic.

O ok. I see what you are saying now. Thank you for clarifying.

I disagree. It makes sense if you think of it in the way of a "chicken and egg" scenario. But for this example an analogy of "shop keeper and egg" makes more sense. The shop keeper does not want to stock eggs because it would take alot of effort and time to stock them. What if no one buys them? Is it worth the risk of buying from the supplier and time to set them up when there is no proven market for the eggs? But no one will buy the eggs because it is not stocked and so the customers goes to the other shop down the street. This would be a very silly thing for a shop called "Legs, Eggs and Brests." to do.

When you are making an MMO. Which if I am not mistaken ED is meant to be. Then ignoring the "Multiplayer" component of "Massively Multiplayer Online" game is silly. Just like not stocking "Eggs" in a shop called "Leg, Eggs and Brests"

I hope I made myself perspective clear.

Cheers mate

 

[revelationsr]

The OP may be looking for more specific gameplay but his assertion that there is nothing to do with friends is false as there are too many activities that are more interesting and more viable only if you fly with friends.

I dont recall me ever saying that there is "nothing to do". If I did I am sure there was more context to it. I do recall saying.

"This game is a slightly above average single player sandbox that claims to be an MMO. With no reasons to ever play with other players. You can play in single player mode and never really feel that you are missing anything. " Which I assume you are referring to.

"no reason" is a far cry away from "nothing to do". Especially in the context of this being more a single player sandbox. Meaning almost everything you can do in single player can be done (with a greater degree of difficulty) in multiplayer. Giving the player no reason to leave single player.

What you did here is kind of like me saying "The president died laughing". Then you read that and understanding me as saying "The president died". Then representing my words to others as me saying "The president killed himself". Quite different from the original post.

If you dont understand what I mean then please ask. I would be happy to clarify. Ideas gets lost in translation all the time. I would prefer having a conversation with you. If you could please not assume negative intentions form me is all I ask.

Cheers mate

 

[foebits]

All these fools fanboi-ing, screaming that there's tons to do in wings...
My god guys can you scrape the bottom anymore? No, there are no multiplayer missions, no, there are no USS's that need wings, and to top it all off no, winging up doesn't even work. Get off your fan-pills guys this is getting disgusting.

 

[Ca$hback]

You need a reward out of principal, it's a tangible magnifier of the intangible experience. Even just a token reward but preferably a substantial one that in turn enhances the social experience as more positive and meaningful than just good vapors, good as they may be. Mastering your reward center out of a stoic belief of being enlightened can get tiresome and leave you out of some healthy endorphins. For missions that you need a wing for, there should be substantial relative rewards. Rewards you can't get on your own or are prohibitively difficult. Wing missions, accessible without mates but with warnings about the danger. That being said I think the rewards for elite missions shouldn't be much more than 1Mil, so I'd be looking at about 3Mil for wing missions.