Why can we not select one of our ships to start with at beginning of play?

[MadDogMurdock]

The same BGS effort, yes - not the same travelling time by any means - so no, it does not happen now (as instant relocation to a chosen location isn't a thing).

You're forgetting the extra effort required to have a ship worth using in that location.

It's one thing to have one fully optimized and engineered ship - it's something else to have one in every location where it might be convenient.

 

[Robert Maynard]

You're forgetting the extra effort required to have a ship worth using in that location.

It's one thing to have one fully optimized and engineered ship - it's something else to have one in every location where it might be convenient.

That rather assumes that the ship needs to be Engineered - and ignores the fact that we now have the ability to Engineer our ships anywhere there is a remote workshop.

 

[MadDogMurdock]

That rather assumes that the ship needs to be Engineered - and ignores the fact that we now have the ability to Engineer our ships anywhere there is a remote workshop.

The remote workshop is another chink in the argument that having to travel to specific places matters.

 

[Hell Razor5543]

What is being asked for seems (to me, at least) a lot like going to sleep at your home in one location, and waking up at a different home half way around the world. Unlikely.

I do think that, if you log into the game whilst at a station where you have more than one ship, having the choice under THESE circumstances is acceptable. It would be like (in Real Life), choosing which of the cars to drive to work. You cannot choose the Land Rover (as it is at your holiday home), the Ford Mondeo (it is at the garage for repairs), or the Ford Focus RS (that has been impounded by the Police), but the Citroen C4, the Peugeot 307 and the Honda Civic are all available.

 

[Robert Maynard]

The remote workshop is another chink in the argument that having to travel to specific places matters.

It can be seen as that, of course - however it can also be seen as an acceptable concession to gameplay as part of the reworking of Engineering, i.e. generic modifications can be carried out at remote workshops but the CMDR needs to travel to the relevant Engineer if they want to convert a legacy modification or apply an experimental effect.

 

[MadDogMurdock]

What is being asked for seems (to me, at least) a lot like going to sleep at your home in one location, and waking up at a different home half way around the world. Unlikely.

I do think that, if you log into the game whilst at a station where you have more than one ship, having the choice under THESE circumstances is acceptable. It would be like (in Real Life), choosing which of the cars to drive to work. You cannot choose the Land Rover (as it is at your holiday home), the Ford Mondeo (it is at the garage for repairs), or the Ford Focus RS (that has been impounded by the Police), but the Citroen C4, the Peugeot 307 and the Honda Civic are all available.

It's a game.
I'd like more accessibility to various aspects of the game without sacrificing half my game time to changing ship.

I'm fickle, I like to do different things, I like to avoid repetitive game loops. Doing so punishes me.

Going to sleep tonight in the Pleiades after helping to repair a station, and waking up tomorrow to do some mining in Delkar makes no difference to anyone except me.

 

[Robert Maynard]

Going to sleep tonight in the Pleiades after helping to repair a station, and waking up tomorrow to do some mining in Delkar makes no difference to anyone except me.

That's as may be - however less benign use cases for the proposed feature have already been put forward - use cases that would be used to affect other players.

 

[Hell Razor5543]

I can (and do) accept this limitation within the game. I have no further comments, other that to say I think it is working as advertised. Enough said.

 

[MadDogMurdock]

That's as may be - however less benign use cases for the proposed feature have already been put forward - use cases that would be used to affect other players.

None of which bypass the need to participate in the various activities actually required to achieve the less benign use cases.
There's no fast-tracking cargo delivery, mission completion, BGS work, or anything else.

Merely the convenience of being able to start that activity when you want to, provided you've made the prior effort to put a suitable ship in that location (which is why I feel differently on this subject compared to instant ship transfer).

 

[Robert Maynard]

None of which bypass the need to participate in the various activities actually required to achieve the less benign use cases.
There's no fast-tracking cargo delivery, mission completion, BGS work, or anything else.

Merely the convenience of being able to start that activity when you want to, provided you've made the prior effort to put a suitable ship in that location.

What is seen as an inconvenience is, in my opinion, a consequence of travel itself (and therefore of the size of the galaxy itself), i.e. one cannot simply decide where, from a list of systems with stored ships in them, to be in the galaxy and travel there instantly.

Instant travel is effectively a play-time multiplier, i.e. less time travelling leaves more time available for other stuff - for those that choose not to stay close to where they may want to do something, anyway.

 

[Old Duck]

Also allow us, as I said at the beginning, to just select one of the ships we have parked anywhere in the game (we can imagine that we travelled to that location, rather than have to do it EVERY time!)

I once suggested the idea of allowing our CMDRs to be transported using a similar mechanic like we have for ship transfer. We would basically be passengers like the NPCs in the Passenger Lounge. I'm opposed to instant travel, for the reasons others have stated in this thread, but what if my CMDR buys a ticket on a shuttle that takes me to one of my other ships? It's not instant travel, as there would be a time delay involved (just like ship transfer), but you could jump on a transport before dinner, eat, and then come back to the game in the system you want to be in, assuming you're not taking a transport to Colonia (61 hours for that trip). It's not exactly what you are asking for, but it does take away the tedium you speak of while not breaking the "rules" of the ED online galaxy.

 

[rootsrat]

some say to keep the realism. Well, guess what... None of the concepts are real. Warp drives are not real!!

Well, when people say "realism" in relation to games, most of the times it's in the context in the game's world/universe.

Magic in Skyrim is REAL. Warp drive in Star Trek is REAL.

When it comes to Elite, Frame Shift Drive is very much a REAL thing. Teleportation isn't however. If you dock at a station, you can't just magically appear at a different station next day.

Now, I am not opposed to the idea as a whole, as long as it's justified in game's reality terms.

Example: When the following conditions are met:

1) You are docked
2) You are logging out

Before you log out you can choose to pay some amount of money for a passenger transport. Upon next log in you can choose to start in any system you have a ship docked at.

But I say NO to anything that's not realistic in the context of the game's world. (Yes, I am fully aware there are things like that in game already, but I am still strictly opposed to putting more of them in game).

 

[Valen Zendaris]

What is seen as an inconvenience is, in my opinion, a consequence of travel itself, i.e. one cannot simply decide where to be in the galaxy..

Absolutely agree with that statement.

Instead of instant travel - I'd much rather see the option to send your CMDR to another station via the same transfer mechanic used for ships (just the other way around).

To avoid any exploits:

1. You must dock at a starport with a shipyard, and can only travel to a starport that currently has one of your ships stored.
2. You may have no ongoing/active missions when commencing your journey.
3. You may not have any cargo aboard your current ship.
4. You pay a fee based on distance to your destination (same system as with ship transfer)

Why would I like to see something like this?

A) It's immersive and lore friendly - I mean, it's not like all those passenger ships ONLY carry tourists... What would be the point of business class then? (Plus we had a CG to build three stations between the bubble to Colonia for the creation of a "freight and passenger transportation service known as the Blue Star Line")
B) A player can head out to Colonia with a ship, then decide to head back to the bubble via transit (which in this "extreme" case would take a couple of days to complete). That makes it possible for CMDRs who have limited time, to also travel greater distances in the game.

EDIT: Old Duck and rootsrat beat me to it!

 

[Robert Maynard]

Before you log out you can choose to pay some amount of money for a passenger transport. Upon next log in you can choose to start in any system you have a ship docked at.

Presumably subject to a similar delay to the non-instantaneous ship transfer implementation (as to make it instant would just be to add a fee to the existing proposal)?

 

[rootsrat]

Presumably subject to a similar delay to the non-instantaneous ship transfer implementation (as to make it instant would just be to add a fee to the existing proposal)?

Definitely!

 

[MadDogMurdock]

What is seen as an inconvenience is, in my opinion, a consequence of travel itself, i.e. one cannot simply decide where, from a list of systems with stored ships in them, to be in the galaxy and travel there instantly.

Instant travel is effectively a play-time multiplier, i.e. less time travelling leaves more time available for other stuff - for those that choose not to stay close to where they may want to do something, anyway.

This is the key - I'm not arguing to reduce the travel time required while engaged in a specific gameplay activities, but to remove the travel between gameplay activities.

ED is a very large play area - good thing.
ED has a wide variety of activities to do - good thing.
ED has a high level of equipment specialization - good thing.

However, all these features promote and highlight the significant flaw in the game design.
Taken individually, most of the game activities are repetitive.
The game actively rewards you if you highly specialize a ship for a very specific task and grind it to death in one specific location for a significant period of time.

I enjoy most of the activities in the game up to a certain point, and then I feel like I need a change of pace.

That means I can do various things:
- I can trend towards multi-role ships that can do a bit of everything but not as well as more specialized ships.
- I can spend a great deal of my game time shleping between bases to swap into a ship suited for the thing I want to do next.
- I can taxi around and waste valuable time and money transferring the ship I want to use.

To take advantage of the proposal I still need to actively engage with all the key elements of the game:
- Purchase, equip, and engineer ships suited to the activities I want to do.
- Find locations suited to those activities and move the relevant ship to them.
- For movable feasts like CGs, and Damaged Stations, I need to follow the events in the relevant ships.
- To achieve anything in the game, I still need to participate in the activities required to achieve them.

The proposal actively encourages more participation in more things for those who don't want a single activity to consume the entire game.

There are people who want to go to Beagle Point, but the idea of committing a week or more (at a leisurely pace) to doing it is off-putting.
There are people who enjoy combat, but an hour or two at a time is enough.
There are people who like to participate in Trade CGs, but 4 or 5 round trips is enough.
There are people who would like to use more specialized ships more often but don't want to fully commit to that gameplay style.
There are people who want to engage the Thargoids but spending all your time in an AX-equipped ship that can't do anything else is off-putting.

The proposal makes all of the gameplay far more accessible and would likely increase player retention and possibly adoption.

I see far more upsides to this than downsides.

 

[Robert Maynard]

Definitely!

.... just making sure we were on the same page....

 

[Robert Maynard]

I see far more upsides to this than downsides.

Not everyone shares that opinion.

 

[MadDogMurdock]

Not everyone shares that opinion.

Hence the discussion in 'Dangerous Discussion'

 

[Robert Maynard]

Hence the discussion in 'Dangerous Discussion'

Indeed (well, the Suggestions and Feature Requests sub-forum, anyway) - where players with potentially differing opinions will express them (so that the thread doesn't just become an echo-chamber of agreement).