Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Can we have NPCs that do things? Shouldn't NPC corporations be shipping large amounts of their commodities from station to station? Shouldn't NPC corporations be mining things?

Space would like a lot more lively if we stopped assuming capsuleers (players) were the only people doing things anywhere. Right now our NPCs mostly fit into two categories: Aggressive NPCs that shoot us, like pirates or drones, and Defensive NPCs that protect us or their faction, like CONCORD. But space should have so many more types of NPCs.

Why not have freighters and industrial ships moving commodities from station to station? They could stay at subluminal speeds within 15km of both stations and gates to allow them to be engaged. Screwing with one would incur the faction/standings loss appropriate, and in highsec, a CONCORD response. While lowsec wouldn't involve CONCORD, these shipments would be escorted by NPC ships of the faction, that you would also have to engage. So it would give pirates some form of "mining" almost, in that they could steal truckloads of commodities from NPCs. I think I've seen *some* NPC freighters before, but nothing that makes giant space stations look like the commercial hubs they should.

And that goes for mining as well. Mining belts shouldn't just have pirates lurking about, there should actually be other ships mining there! NPCs should help deplete mining belts just as well as anyone else. And an enterprising force can skip the drills by attacking and stealing the payload of these NPC vessels.

STRETCH GOAL:

Furthermore, I was even wondering if this could be applied to sovereignty. The idea that only the players live in such giant swaths of space in nullsec is a bit odd, so one might suggest that alongside your ship crews, your sovereign territory is also filled with many citizens of the non-player variety. I haven't worked out the details on this one, bit of a longshot idea here at the end, is that your alliance could have sovereign NPCs working for you, both mining and shipping. Since we don't necessarily need more passive income, their resources could be explained away as upkeep/maintenance costs for structures in your alliance. It can either be explained away, or directly affecting your space, like having lost alliance NPCs could cost you more in upkeep for your sov.

I don't think so. I think I've seen the extremely rare occasional NPC ship. But also, highsec isn't a place where under normal sense, you'd attack an NPC corporation's ship. So I think lowsec would probably be the key here, though I think more highsec ships would help sell the atmosphere better.

Honestly, I would like to see Faction warfare grow a little with an idea like this.

For example, you take a look at corp vs corp warfare in eve now vs player's. Concord doesn't get involve correct? So why not have it set up to have "Faction NPCs" be fair game? And allow them to affect the universe more. For example A minmatar player group finds a convoy transporting a bunch of NPC books, the players kill those, so now NPCs that sold those books, their price goes up a tad. This in turn can give people things to do besides sit inside a complex all day long for money, instead they go around and actually protect these NPC convoy's for example to reduce the price on certain items or other things. :)

But hey, that is my two isk.

Slight problem there: All the ships on the market are put there by players. NPC sell orders are BPOs, Skillbooks and a handful of trade goods.

one consideration is that NPCs shouldn't be there doing things just for the sake of us watching them do things in our peripheral vision. While some people have asked for this, it would ultimately be just like a cardboard cutout on the background of a movie set. If NPCs take a higher profile, it should be doing things that are tied to the universe in some deeper way, one that incentivizes disruption or even protection, rather than just another infinite source of stuff to enter or leave the player marketplace.

Considering there are massive wrecks that we see only in Scan sites and missions, i have come to believe that for the safety and security of the universe, Capsuleers are prevented from seeing, attacking or otherwise interacting with the other denizens of space. So there could be massive amounts of people out in space but we never see them because our camera drones and software are conigured to hide them from us.

A valid point, true. Newbie skillbooks would probably need to be left out of this system or something. Could it affect other costs on the station? Inability to successfully ship in and out could hike materials used for ship repairs, for example, increasing repair costs.



Then why don't I bump off invisible giant ships all the time? ;)

Capsuleers couldn't leave their pods until the game had tech that let us. Every explanation is just a coverup for gameplay that'd eventually be nice to have.

I'd be okay with adding more NPCs if you could pirate the merchant convoys. I don't think they add a lot of depth though. Agree with Batelle on 'cardboard cut-out' feel with heavy NPC interaction.

Honestly, I'd like CCP to acknowledge the place it's taken on the game, and upgrade Jita 4-4 with a unique model. Perhaps a Frankenstein build-on of the station so it's original structure remains intact. Major trade hubs should be updated with unique art to signify their importance in the EVE universe.