I was waiting for an opportunity to post directly to FDev via a dedicated thread, but this is all there is! ...Which I find surprising? Here goes anyway!
Several points I have mulled over, over the last few days, so that you can consider your position before things get BEYOND hope!!
1 - The new Exploration "remodelling" is overly complicated and flawed!
The "initial honk" mod leaves the pilot of solo crewed vesels not only vulnerable to attack by pirates/assasins, but too distracted to fully operate his/her vessel! The new UI adds ANOTHER menu that blinds pilots from the main scanner AND the cockpit view! This has to be done whilst within range of the local star for effective time management and, this puts you in weapons range of any enemy, dropping into the system whilst you are "occupied". This removes incentive to "scan further than the "initial honk"!
2 - The new Exploration "remodelling" is not adequately integrated into other systems! Surface scans should be integrated into MINING systems! Topography and mineral concentrations as well as locations should be included in Exploration surface scans! This would allow the inclusion of specialist mining SRV/Crawler variants open to future development and very much "in the frame"?
3 - The restricted "visibilty" of USS adds a whole world of complexity to "discoveries"! WHY should something you have just discovered disappear? Finding a "salvage" location should be visable for the entire time you are in that system as your map will be marked the moment the signal is received! If you leave that location due to attack or partial completion, you SHOULD be able to jump back in to that locale without having to re-locate the point again! ....OR re-log to reset the instance, because it has disappeared altogether!
4 - Adding "grind" to more and more aspects of the ED experience, is not clever or desired by the community! This is NOT how you force "involvement" upon the adventurer. It is just a sign of LAZY development! There is no reason to do it! It adds NOTHING but tedium to the game and this has been reflected by the reducing player base! NO-ONE has accepted the claim of 100,000 daily players! If this were the case, general duties around the "bubble" would yield many more random meetings of Cmdrs! These meetings are becoming much more RARE!
5 - Finally, "Cross-Play"! Whilst we (the community) are aware of Sony's reluctance to engage in cross-play, both PC and XBox operate in a Windows 10 environment, and NO-ONE can understand the reason why those two platforms don't combine their player bases to concentrate populations into a better multi-player experience! FDev explanations on this matter have been evasive at best! Evasion breeds suspicion and distrust! I notice the PR staff pushed upfront at events and in online streams and vids are extremely young. Maybe this lack of "worldly wisdom" has something to do with this?
I have tried, repeatedly, to try and disceetly establish a dialogue with FDev and share the concerns I and many others have with the problems with Elite and it's excelent IP! I was one of those 1984 players back on the BBC 'B'. I would like to meet and discuss some solutiions to the concerns you have created over the last few years! It would be a VERY churlish organisation that denied it had those problems in the face of such overwhelming critique from so many quarters, would it not? Your player-base is not stupid! ...DON'T TREAT THEM LIKE THEY ARE!
Several points I have mulled over, over the last few days, so that you can consider your position before things get BEYOND hope!!
1 - The new Exploration "remodelling" is overly complicated and flawed!
The "initial honk" mod leaves the pilot of solo crewed vesels not only vulnerable to attack by pirates/assasins, but too distracted to fully operate his/her vessel! The new UI adds ANOTHER menu that blinds pilots from the main scanner AND the cockpit view! This has to be done whilst within range of the local star for effective time management and, this puts you in weapons range of any enemy, dropping into the system whilst you are "occupied". This removes incentive to "scan further than the "initial honk"!
2 - The new Exploration "remodelling" is not adequately integrated into other systems! Surface scans should be integrated into MINING systems! Topography and mineral concentrations as well as locations should be included in Exploration surface scans! This would allow the inclusion of specialist mining SRV/Crawler variants open to future development and very much "in the frame"?
3 - The restricted "visibilty" of USS adds a whole world of complexity to "discoveries"! WHY should something you have just discovered disappear? Finding a "salvage" location should be visable for the entire time you are in that system as your map will be marked the moment the signal is received! If you leave that location due to attack or partial completion, you SHOULD be able to jump back in to that locale without having to re-locate the point again! ....OR re-log to reset the instance, because it has disappeared altogether!
4 - Adding "grind" to more and more aspects of the ED experience, is not clever or desired by the community! This is NOT how you force "involvement" upon the adventurer. It is just a sign of LAZY development! There is no reason to do it! It adds NOTHING but tedium to the game and this has been reflected by the reducing player base! NO-ONE has accepted the claim of 100,000 daily players! If this were the case, general duties around the "bubble" would yield many more random meetings of Cmdrs! These meetings are becoming much more RARE!
5 - Finally, "Cross-Play"! Whilst we (the community) are aware of Sony's reluctance to engage in cross-play, both PC and XBox operate in a Windows 10 environment, and NO-ONE can understand the reason why those two platforms don't combine their player bases to concentrate populations into a better multi-player experience! FDev explanations on this matter have been evasive at best! Evasion breeds suspicion and distrust! I notice the PR staff pushed upfront at events and in online streams and vids are extremely young. Maybe this lack of "worldly wisdom" has something to do with this?
I have tried, repeatedly, to try and disceetly establish a dialogue with FDev and share the concerns I and many others have with the problems with Elite and it's excelent IP! I was one of those 1984 players back on the BBC 'B'. I would like to meet and discuss some solutiions to the concerns you have created over the last few years! It would be a VERY churlish organisation that denied it had those problems in the face of such overwhelming critique from so many quarters, would it not? Your player-base is not stupid! ...DON'T TREAT THEM LIKE THEY ARE!