You want personal player investment in humanity? - FDEV needs to introduce personal bases.

[Chaparral]

I have always wanted to be attached to some location or faction in this game, but the static portraits, and procgen dialogue mission splashes have always left me feeling like I am a cell in a spreadsheet and not a player with a real investment in the environment.

If the Thargoids seem to be on a bubble burning mission that the narrative demands, I'll grind out the credits and Fleet Carrier away from the green cloud like any other self respecting war refugee would do.

If FDEV want players invested in the bubble, the players need to have personal anchors within the space that they have to defend.

This means player owned bases on planetary surfaces.

These bases could be limited to a single base per player, and have singular landing pad on the surface that elevator descends into their own personal batcave.

No surface installation other than the landing pad would be required - unless it's easier for FDEV to model by cloning the small surface bases.

Players could have the ubiquitous walkabout station with a window looking out on the hangar showing a ship in the player's inventory (unless it's easier to have a small surface building with a view of the surface), absent the carnival barker mission givers.

Station services could be purchased / leased as they are on FCs.

Landing permissions and service access could be set like FCS by players.

Since the stations would not have mobility, they should have a purchase price less than FCs.

Each planet would have cap on the number of player bases possible.

Obviously, FDEV could sell customization of landing pad lights, and any other conceivable base cosmetics.

Holy cow, have the NPC SLF Pilots sitting in the lounge!

Would you buy a base?

EDIT: These bases would be vulnerable to Thargoid attack.

 

[Jmanis]

Wouuld you buy a base?

Nope.

 

[alexzk]

Wouuld you buy a base?

Nope. Another stationary carrier described. No need.

 

[aRJay]

…

Wouuld you buy a base?

I already did it is called a Fleet Carrier.

Actually despite having an FC I am disappointed they are in the game and consider them the start of a slippery slope leading away from the joy of the Elite game concept where our commanders where insignificant figures in the affairs of the billions and billions of people in the galaxy.

 

[Northpin]

While i'm not opposed to the idea of planetary base, it's quite pointless to pin yourself to a single planet in a galaxy with 400 billions stars and at least 10 times more planets.
Especially when we already do have mobile bases (Carriers)

 

[Dillon Fallon]

As with fleet carriers, one of the requirements by players will be that these can't be raided, damaged, decommissioned or destroyed by anything external. So basically it'll be a fleet carrier that can't move.

So I'm not sure how this will encourage people to be invested in a particular system, since their base will be invulnerable to thargoids. If they aren't, I'd bet you'd see all of these being built outside the bubble to keep them safe or players will stick to their carriers.

 

[Astaran]

As others have pointed out, planetary bases would just be FCs that cannot move.

That being said, a properly developed Colonization gameloop that allows players (or better: communities) to claim and develop(!) a star system of their own would be a great major addition to Elite. Giving players the opportunity to claim a piece of real estate and develop into whatever they want

What I loved the most about EVE Online were the player owned empires in Null Sec (what I hated the most about EVE Online were the constant PvP Wars and the "all hands on deck" Call-to-arms in the middle of the night to take down some irrelevant player-owned-structure in the middle of nowhere )

 

[Bgsma]

I've been saying for a long time that bases are needed.
And the most important thing is that, in my opinion, it is quite possible to do all this by existing means. These are not atmospheric planets, which it is unclear how to implement on this engine. Bases are quite realistic to do already now. IMHO, of course.

But not as a finished product, but as a construction project. Building a base according to your own individual plan from modules, the installation of which requires materials, preparation, engineering, etc. Gradual expansion of such a base, from the first separate building to a large complex (depending on your resources).
And let it even be expensive.
And it doesn't matter how it will be included in the lore, the economy, politics, etc., what benefits it will give, the market there, the shipyard, or whatever else, all this can be somehow invented and beaten. Even if nothing will give, and will be vulnerable to thargoids - I just want to build my own planetary base, and that's it.

 

[Rebel Yell]

I'm still wondering why powerplay HQs don't have customised assets like bases and stations... I mean, something that can really distinguish the power HQ from any other common system.

Go figure.

 

[BigBANGtheory [VR]]

Wouuld you buy a base?

Buy one no, build one yes.... as long as it does something like permit surface mining, research and not just for show.

 

[Jmanis]

Buy one no, build one yes.... as long as it does something like permit surface mining, research and not just for show.

Which is why i just say nope.

Funnily enough, those things don't need bases... there are plenty of extent mechanics and systems that could be tweaked to achieve those functional outcomes already... it's just for whatever reason, FD keep just introducing more canvas, instead of painting the canvas we already have.

Planetary bases are just more canvas. The game doesn't need more of that to achieve better and more involved mechanics around mining and research.

 

[Ultra Fluffy]

It would have to be something that you could customise or build up. It should be vulnerable to Thargoids but not to gankers. Otherwise the OP's suggestion sounds like a crashed FC. It should have immersion, a purpose and multi player interactions. It should be relatively expensive and difficult to upkeep so that it is not just a buy and dump item like FC's. It should be something that is the main theme of a certain subset of the player base. It should have a multiple set of activities that can be performed there that cannot be done at the stock bases.

However if you do that then people will tend to stick in one place and not travel the stars, which is what this game is about.

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

PErsonal base....... i would not be opposed to having one (so long as with in game mechanics and not microtransactions), tho would like limits on them in terms of you cant have more than one or 2 etc.

i actually think i would prefer them to be npc controlled ... we take a mission off the mission board to drop off a group of colonists........ and then depending on how well we look after them would depend on if they keep in tiny small bases or expand into a large sprawling mega colony on a planet surface.

obviously we need to be able to take time off the game and them not die out, but at the same time, i would like some system where if you do ignore for too long them they ultimately fail, and eventually another mission board mission would pop up to salvage the remains of the base - to stop them littering up.

in the mean time abandoned bases before dismantled for a time could also generate kill badguy raider missions, or alternatively bad guy raid missions where you steal stuff from abandoned bases.

i would have no interest at all if players could smash up the base or kill the colony. that kind of thing keeps me off public servers in any games where stuff you build can be wrecked by players

 

[metatheurgist]

I lost all interest in the bubble when PMFs took over everything. My attitude is if they want to own everything they can fix it themselves, I'm not going to raise a finger to help them.

 

[Shadowsnog]

However if you do that then people will tend to stick in one place and not travel the stars, which is what this game is about.

blaze your own trail. if my trail is going to be planetary megacorp why not? not to mention: who said anything about those bases being restricted only to the bubble? travel the stars and then build a base there...

if bases would get more interactive (jobs, processing and manufacture, research[?]) it would make more sense. while i understand and share the sentiment of having your very own place, i think all the purposes of this kind of base are effectively already in the game in one way or the other, so there isnt really a 'need' to expand the content this way.

 

[Ultra Fluffy]

blaze your own trail. if my trail is going to be planetary megacorp why not? not to mention: who said anything about those bases being restricted only to the bubble? travel the stars and then build a base there...

if bases would get more interactive (jobs, processing and manufacture, research[?]) it would make more sense. while i understand and share the sentiment of having your very own place, i think all the purposes of this kind of base are effectively already in the game in one way or the other, so there isnt really a 'need' to expand the content this way.

My comment related to the fact that if you are continually having to return to your base to repair/interact/build then you won't wander far. At least FC can follow you around. Now if you could explore, build or enhance your FC more, instead of being restricted to half a dozen rooms on a ship that so massive, then that may satisfy the base builders whilst not locking them to one rock out of 400 billion.

 

[Rat Catcher]

If FDEV want players invested in the bubble, the players need to have personal anchors within the space that they have to defend.

Not this player, sorry.
There is nothing worse that could be added to the game in my opinion.

How are you going to defend your base 24/7/365.25 in open, PG and solo?

 

[rootsrat]

It would have to be something that you could customise or build up. It should be vulnerable to Thargoids but not to gankers. Otherwise the OP's suggestion sounds like a crashed FC. It should have immersion, a purpose and multi player interactions.

THIS is the most important thing.

What's it for? To just be there and look nice? No thanks. I'd rather they expanded Fleet Carrier gameplay significantly. Because we already have a (mobile) base.

 

[Alaska Sædelære]

The idea of home bases is very nice, and certainly not the first time this occurred to someone exploring the vastness who found himself a hilltop with a view to park and gaze at the stars for a while. I'd take a little cabin in such a place, thank you! The right to doing so should be tied to first discovery and footfall (or are there good reasons against this restriction?) Only one per person, of course.

If this is to be a proper base with services comparable to fleet carriers, then likewise a cost for its upkeep needs to be introduced. Or possibly even a subscription for hard currency (cf. Second Life, which is free to play until you want to own land.) The reason is that this will incur cost and effort on the server side for the expanded database and data traffic these features require. I actually wonder that this is not already the case for fleet carriers, or maybe they didn't expect them to proliferate that much.

I would imagine the ability to claim a personal space in the game's universe would be popular and, if the cost is reasonable, a decent source of income that doesn't feel like an excuse for charging for trinkets. Someone else around here recently asked for a voluntary subscription to help development. I think this could be it.

 

[Jmanis]

Not this player, sorry.
There is nothing worse that could be added to the game in my opinion.

How are you going to defend your base 24/7/365.25 in open, PG and solo?

We need a hostess club simulator put in the game right? It worked so well for the yakuza series it clearly makes sense for FD. XD

THIS is the most important thing.

What's it for? To just be there and look nice? No thanks. I'd rather they expanded Fleet Carrier gameplay significantly. Because we already have a (mobile) base.

And flesh out the extant mechanics.

Research? Sure, we could have a base facility... but research amounts to "get tissue samples, make profit"... that doesn't change if we have bases. So the reality isn't "get bases in the game", it's "make research puposeful".... and there's no reason to couple that to bases when there's so many under-cooked mechanics in the game.

Same for salvage, same for crime, same for any non- basic profession.