These forums have been archived and are now read-only.

The new forums are live and can be found at https://forums.eveonline.com/

EVE Information Portal

 
  • Topic is locked indefinitely.
 

Dev blog: More Deployables from Super Friends

First post First post First post
Author
Previous Topic Next Topic
James Amril-Kesh
Viziam
Amarr Empire
#1601 - 2014-01-18 17:38:36 UTC
Scrap the ESS. Get rid of it entirely. Throw it out.
There's no way you can tweak it to make it good. Don't even try.
You've already transgressed by making a devblog about it before giving anybody the opportunity to comment on it.

Enjoying the rain today? ;)
Verskon Qaual
School of Applied Knowledge
Caldari State
#1602 - 2014-01-18 19:47:04 UTC
CCP. If the intent of Rubicon and its iterations is to increase conflict, please try fixing the code so that we can actually have battles we want before spending time on new 'content' that will not keep the subscription numbers up and will not draw new people in.

Some of your most active and proactive players have organized player events that are not enjoyable in the least by watching 6 'soul crushing lag' popups, waiting to jump into a system. The big conflicts are what make the news. The big kills, fail-cascades and player events are what set EVE apart and bring in new players.

Let us use the content already in EVE, that has gone through iterations of balancing, and actually have a conflict driving use.

If it takes two or three 'expansions' worth of time and resources to code, you might actually make it 5 more years, or even 10, but that's only if you reevaluate your strategy and actually face the facts of a woefully inadequate system, presently and for the future.
Sarkelias Anophius
Aliastra
Gallente Federation
#1603 - 2014-01-18 20:34:40 UTC
Verskon Qaual wrote:
CCP. If the intent of Rubicon and its iterations is to increase conflict, please try fixing the code so that we can actually have battles we want before spending time on new 'content' that will not keep the subscription numbers up and will not draw new people in.

Some of your most active and proactive players have organized player events that are not enjoyable in the least by watching 6 'soul crushing lag' popups, waiting to jump into a system. The big conflicts are what make the news. The big kills, fail-cascades and player events are what set EVE apart and bring in new players.

Let us use the content already in EVE, that has gone through iterations of balancing, and actually have a conflict driving use.

If it takes two or three 'expansions' worth of time and resources to code, you might actually make it 5 more years, or even 10, but that's only if you reevaluate your strategy and actually face the facts of a woefully inadequate system, presently and for the future.


Not empty quoting.

It gets really hard to enjoy the aspects of the game that I actually pay four subs to participate in - when the game can't handle itself and lags out, crashes, and generally makes a complete mess of everything we are doing with the tools provided.

I do not give two flying f***s about a new deployable structure or anything related to it; what I would like is for the epic conflicts that are theoretically allowed by the game, to actually occur, and I don't care to see new content until this fundamental issue is resolved.

If every epic battle is ruined because CCP isn't willing to re-code their system to support it, I will take my time and money elsewhere in the future.
Moor Deybe
Science and Trade Institute
Caldari State
#1604 - 2014-01-18 20:53:22 UTC
Hi CCP,

I tried out the ESS module on Singularity last night for several hours, and I would like to provide some customer feedback for you.

I did some Drone Hordes and have the following thoughts :

I found the 20% reduction to the normal bounty unacceptable. It made me want to do something else..........anything else i.e. log out of EVE.

I'm not interested in gambling any of the bounty for a bit more, even if the reward was 50% more, nope, not interested in rushing back to change to a PVP ship to defend a structure that's holding my ISK, any more than I'd be interested in abandoning a PVP roam to do some PVE mission or ratting.

Other players won't want to sit there hanging around staring at empty space for hours on end "defending it" either, how boring.

After 1.5 hours the "rate" had risen to 82%.........which basically means, forget solo ratting with the ESS deployed, as you'll have to arrange your gameplay around the schedule of others ALL the time which would be quite restrictive I think.

Other's I've spoken to feel the same and they won't be ratting with one of those in a system if it goes live.
Worse case scenario, people will take the 5% hit and rat at 95% of the previous bounty rate, or jump clone back to high sec until the ESS modules are gone and do something more interesting.

Some have posted to the effect that they are looking forward to dropping them in ratting systems and looping back around later on to see what's there in terms of ISK/tags or the possibility of a fight with people trying to take them down.

I can see how that would be fun if it were to actually happen, but human nature being what it is, I think they will just find that the devices have extracted 30M ISK from their wallets that they will never recoup, either in ISK or fun PVP encounters.

Based upon this whole ESS design, I'm assuming that CCP employees aren't allowed to actually play the game once they're employed there (probably quite rightly) as nothing else could explain how far wide of the mark the ESS is both from the PVE'ers point of view and the PVPer's point of view with regard to creating more interesting fun gameplay for everyone.

Still, you have 80 pages and counting of customer feedback to read, so its a simple case of totting up for and against and deciding how many customers you want to irritate, or you could take the path of irritating none of them by consigning the ESS to the round filing cabinet (thats the bin BTW).

P.S. If you want a quick win to make up for the time spent on the ESS, just bring back level 5 security missions to high sec, honestly, the number of people I know who are bored out of their minds with level 4's will love you for it.
The ability to get in a fleet with others or a single ship specialised PVE fit that can handle level 5, will keep people entertained for quite a while.

And why don't they just do the current level 5 security missions in low sec you ask?
Glad you asked...............because of the difference in ship fitting between PVE and PVP is so wide, that taking a PVE fitted ship into a lowsec mainly PVP environment, leaves it so vulnerable that its a joke.........and taking a PVP fit ship into a low sec level 5 mission means that its probably not capable of even completing a level 5.

Anyway, I digress.

Those are this customers thoughts anyway.


Thanks for reading CPP.
Mah Boobz
Doomheim
#1605 - 2014-01-18 23:58:53 UTC
20 pages and counting since a dev reply.
Yup, their really interested in our feedback.
Little Dragon Khamez
Guardians of the Underworld
#1606 - 2014-01-19 01:13:56 UTC
I think it may be time for a vote of no confidence in CCP seagull as the plan is not working plus it's forcing the dynamics of the game to go in a direction that is anathema to the majority of the player base. All of changes have occurred under her watch have either served to dumb the game down or make engaging, interesting content such as exploration so trivial and valueless as to take the thrill, joy and discovery that would lead to engagement of new players into a boring theme park ride in the hope that it will somehow lead to more cooperative game play and bridge the social wall. Lootspill anyone?

Dumbing down of Eve Online will result in it's destruction...
Wyn Pharoh
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#1607 - 2014-01-19 04:32:01 UTC  |  Edited by: Wyn Pharoh
I read somewhere that improving the new player experience, from Hisec to Null aught to be a serious priority. Even over the concerns of those caught in Soul Crushing Lag in HED today. That was posted in fact by someone in that very fight. I admire some of the rather clever mechanics of the ESS concept, to be brutally honest. I like that CCP wants to shake up some of the status quo, and give a bone to small gang dogs along the way. We haven't heard much from Team CCP, but I'm pretty sure that its been posted, or at least implied that piecemeal explanations haven't been winning anyone over to seeing things 'their' way. I'm hoping that there are charts, graphs and an entire new devblog in the works, because I really want New Eden to be a great place to play.

If making the game better for newbros is a high level priority, this isn't the right implementation. Not as presented at least. There are too many 'outs' for those that can afford to not play the 'ESS game'. The richest parts of New Eden will just get richer, while the divide separating them from those on the margins will rise, partially as a direct result of trying to 'improve' their own fields with this new 'farms and fields' content. This hits the cellar of an already broken Trickle Down economic system in a way that, with too little upside, fails to inspire a willingness to endure. The ESS should be a lot more like the Combine was to all those before then that relied upon the yoke and oxen. Something that doesn't nerf fundamental 0.0 life so far below the crude income potential of Hisec that 0.0 is only a playplace for terribly spacerich nerds to posture over.

What an ESS like module aught to do, is give those tending the farms and fields enough upside to do something radically different. It should inspire them to farm in COMBAT SHIPS. Now that would be mindblowing, it would be lots of fun, and I have no idea at all how CCP could possibly make that happen, but it would be WOW, that was a GREAT idea CCP. If you look close enough, that is basically what they want out of the ESS as it is. As it is, it won't work. All the fears of isk faucet and whatnot is just gimping this thing into the ground so badly that 99% of the negrep community just won't use the thing, and have stated bluntly at the alliance level this thing will not be allowed. At all. Provibloc won't even touch it, and having lived there, that's some dirt poor folks saying, no, no way and maybe even never. If any part of New Eden should be embracing a potential wow, +5% TO ratting feature, it should be those guys. If Lol roleplayers and Lol some guy from Drones can't get behind this feature, then there has got to be something terribly terribly wrong.

If the ESS made enough of an impact that ratting in a PVP ship was preferable to being in a PVE ship, every FC in this game would love you. If I was in a small gang, looking at Dotlan for a high NPC kill area, and I had to send in a scout to check if there was an ESS, and then have to seriously consider if it was worth getting the fight that was sure to come, then the ESS would really be working as intended. Those gangs then would either get to pillage failfit PVE ships that thought they could get away with it, or they'd see ready formups happen, gudfites would be had and no one would be complaining about TIDI in HED, because they were just having too much fun elsewhere in New Eden.
Nicemeries
#1608 - 2014-01-19 10:17:07 UTC
Untill HED-GP last night I was trying really hard to find some positive things about the new deployables and new expansions in general. However after jumping in 10 corp dreads that basicly got stuck in the node and returned home as insurance pay outs without any control over them whatsoever, I gave up on trying to be positive about Rubicon 1.1 or even the next expansion. I can only guess what happened to the other 900 dreads that got jumped in.

I pay 75 euros / month for my 5 accounts. Use my money to improve your game or lose it altogether. We are moving towards a second Incarna here.

  • Last night made painfully clear that your servers cannot handle current SOV mechanics.
  • Stop devoting resources to adding small content like your new deployable that really no one is interested in until the basics are sound.
  • Spend resources on fixing a game mechanic that ruined the night for 4000 active accounts that were directly involved in what was supposed to be the biggest battle in EvE history.
  • Create an expansion that is worth waiting for. I rather have you guys work on an expansion for 2 years than making these 6 month deadlines with crappy stuff. Fix the core.


So:

Scrap the ESS, do not waste resources on trying to fix it. And for the love of EvE do not release this piece of junk.

Devote your resources to this:

  • Fix SOV mechanics. Either you remove the incentive for us to put 4.000 people with drone assist doctrines in 1 system, or fix the code/server to allow 10.000 of us.
  • Fix corp / alliance / coalition management.
  • When you have done this, fix the HORRENDOUS POS code that we have been screaming for even longer.


Cheers
Kotaru
Fusion Enterprises Ltd
Pandemic Horde
#1609 - 2014-01-19 11:22:51 UTC
Listen to your subscribers - 4000 accounts were screwed over last night by your failure to fix the basic game. HED last night should have been shot at birth - you managed to turn the clock back 20 years in a single night. Stop playing with silly little toys (particularly this useless one)
Inspiration
#1610 - 2014-01-19 12:02:53 UTC  |  Edited by: Inspiration
One major problem for 0.0 and that is the vision!

CCP is proud to have 2000 vs 2000 battles going on, which can only be decisively won by one side throwing another 1000 on top etc. This has all the hallmarks of a broken system, and is an evolutionary dead end!

From this perspective I really cannot phantom why so many 0.0 players (the rest don't care) seem to like big battles. In such battles there are at most a handful of people really playing (there playing chess at that). The rest is following order as when to be where and press a button and they must be in a prescribed doctrine ship. The actions of those players have not much influence on the outcome, only the numbers. Thy are drones, plain and simple.

This is why everything in 0.0 and its vast space should be made hospitable to smaller scale combat. And to be ahead of CCPs mindset on this, that does NOT mean smaller ships, dammit!! Right now 0.0 control is dominated by who can field the most "player drones". It is as care bear as it can get, no better then missions IMO.,

At some point CCP decided it was great to introduce FW, which quickly got attention of 0.0, turning low sec into the same sort of game 0.0 is. I long for the days a small corp with some assets could do something without constant influence and risk coming form 0.0 alliance battle groups. FW kind of killed the low sec game for me, the delusional grand aspirations of wanting ever more big fights, projected over longer areas is hurdling the game. Even the players that are part of these humongous fights are complaining.

CCP....can't you see this is a path to oblivion?

You taken wonder and personal gratification faction out of the game, all in the name of big blobs and the urge to satisfy a handful of high level 0.0 players. By social network and personal dependency mechanics, those are the people that will always be dominant in the CSM, advising you to serve only THEIR game. To hell with the majority of paying subscribers.

It's time to downscale battles and do it fast!

Imagine how awesome smaller scale battles would be without the constant thread of a 1000 man blob ruining everything. Imagine how well it would run and how fast a game pace would be possible with even the current infrastructure. Make big power blocks less feasible by making population spread out (by economic feasibility and reducing cyno/bridge). This makes room for new evolution in the other direction then bigger is better.

Don't try to tinker it with deployables, develop a vision, build it and let the rest up to the players!

I am serious!

Ravcharas
Infinite Point
Pandemic Horde
#1611 - 2014-01-19 13:04:23 UTC
Inspiration wrote:
Make big power blocks less feasible by making population spread out (by economic feasibility and reducing cyno/bridge). !

Null systems are already so bad that they can pretty much only support a couple of people at a time. And you want to make them worse?

This is starting to feel like Dr. Strangelove. "You can't play together in here, this is a MMO!"
Fix Sov
#1612 - 2014-01-19 13:07:17 UTC
There's no reason to make "big power blocs (not blocks, blocs) less feasible". The problem isn't "big power blocs", it's "huge, node-breaking fights".

It's possible to have big power blocs without every single engagement being node-breakers.

The current sov system is too heavily reliant on the defender saving systems by stuffing as many people as possible into the system for the final timer, instead of incentivizing attacking (and defending) multiple systems at the same time by splitting their forces into multiple fleets and using actual intelligence/strategy. This must change.
Inspiration
#1613 - 2014-01-19 15:17:42 UTC
Ravcharas wrote:
Inspiration wrote:
Make big power blocks less feasible by making population spread out (by economic feasibility and reducing cyno/bridge). !

Null systems are already so bad that they can pretty much only support a couple of people at a time. And you want to make them worse?

This is starting to feel like Dr. Strangelove. "You can't play together in here, this is a MMO!"


Together is something else as 4000 players in one system...that is just ludicrous!

Of course if you reshape null to limit quick troop buildup and make spreading out preferable, you will need to make those systems worth living in for dozens of people. And we can always add regions and systems as the population grows (as it will when its worth it).

For certain size conflicts to occur that the server will always handle gracefully with nearly no time dilation, you need a certain maximum population tho. If things escalate reinforcements must come from surrounding systems and not all over eve in the blink of an eye. I don;t think it will stop larger planned conflicts, and that is perfect, but it will make day to day living somewhere more viable.

I am serious!

Fix Sov
#1614 - 2014-01-19 15:22:03 UTC
There's no reason to add more space to nullsec, it's heavily underutilized as it is.

And there's no point in talking about size conflicts, as the problem isn't with the bloc sizes, but the number of people final system timers tend to bring to one single system at a time.

The current sov system is too heavily reliant on the defender saving systems by stuffing as many people as possible into the system for the final timer, instead of incentivizing attacking (and defending) multiple systems at the same time by splitting their forces into multiple fleets and using actual intelligence/strategy. This must change.
Inspiration
#1615 - 2014-01-19 15:22:39 UTC  |  Edited by: Inspiration
Fix Sov wrote:
There's no reason to make "big power blocs (not blocks, blocs) less feasible". The problem isn't "big power blocs", it's "huge, node-breaking fights".

It's possible to have big power blocs without every single engagement being node-breakers.


Honestly...I do agree with you 100%.

I was not advocating limiting player organisation, in fact, there is little one can do against such a thing. But there is a certain connection...power blocks work because they can project power by using large numbers of players. They work because those players are mobile enough as to make it easy to concentrate that firepower quickly. And that is in turn what drives the large fights.

Limiting troop mobility, automatically means a more modest role for big power blocks. They won't disappear, and there will be room for new ones to form and grow if the existing ones are more power projection constraint.

I am serious!

Fix Sov
#1616 - 2014-01-19 15:27:58 UTC
No, what drives the large fights is that it's a timer that both sides has a lot of time to prepare for, and which both sides must win (the defenders so they'll reset all progress for the attacker, and the attacker to finally get that final push into taking a system after a week's worth of work). Fix it so both sides has to attack/defend in multiple systems at the same time, and chances are you'll see much smaller fleets spread over multiple systems, which means the nodes'll be able to deal with it without going to sub-10% tidi every time. And there'd be more interesting strategy involved in choosing where to send which forces.

The current sov system is too heavily reliant on the defender saving systems by stuffing as many people as possible into the system for the final timer, instead of incentivizing attacking (and defending) multiple systems at the same time by splitting their forces into multiple fleets and using actual intelligence/strategy. This must change.
Falkor1984
The Love Dragons
#1617 - 2014-01-19 15:41:24 UTC
81 pages mostly filled with rage in this thread. GG again, keep pushing more stuff in that sucks and keep pushing more customers out.

ESS is a bad idea, mkay? And you could and should have known it.

Also we all know sov is not working since Dominion (or maybe even before that), maybe address this issue first instead of creating more of the fail deployables.
Inspiration
#1618 - 2014-01-19 15:51:39 UTC  |  Edited by: Inspiration
Fix Sov wrote:
No, what drives the large fights is that it's a timer that both sides has a lot of time to prepare for, and which both sides must win (the defenders so they'll reset all progress for the attacker, and the attacker to finally get that final push into taking a system after a week's worth of work). Fix it so both sides has to attack/defend in multiple systems at the same time, and chances are you'll see much smaller fleets spread over multiple systems, which means the nodes'll be able to deal with it without going to sub-10% tidi every time. And there'd be more interesting strategy involved in choosing where to send which forces.


There is that too :)

And I think both play a role, one maybe more urgent then the other. Big structures with timers is just part of CCP aiming deliberately to create large fights. I personally don't believe that putting objectives in multiple systems will change much. The amount of players in a few systems will still be staggering and the basic theme of if the other side brings 1000, we must and can bring 2000, remains. You will keep stuck in the same system and run into the same brick wall...its time to break that mold!

I am serious!

Andrea Keuvo
Rusty Pricks
#1619 - 2014-01-19 17:14:56 UTC
Nicemeries wrote:
Untill HED-GP last night I was trying really hard to find some positive things about the new deployables and new expansions in general. However after jumping in 10 corp dreads that basicly got stuck in the node and returned home as insurance pay outs without any control over them whatsoever, I gave up on trying to be positive about Rubicon 1.1 or even the next expansion. I can only guess what happened to the other 900 dreads that got jumped in.

I pay 75 euros / month for my 5 accounts. Use my money to improve your game or lose it altogether. We are moving towards a second Incarna here.

  • Last night made painfully clear that your servers cannot handle current SOV mechanics.
  • Stop devoting resources to adding small content like your new deployable that really no one is interested in until the basics are sound.
  • Spend resources on fixing a game mechanic that ruined the night for 4000 active accounts that were directly involved in what was supposed to be the biggest battle in EvE history.
  • Create an expansion that is worth waiting for. I rather have you guys work on an expansion for 2 years than making these 6 month deadlines with crappy stuff. Fix the core.


So:

Scrap the ESS, do not waste resources on trying to fix it. And for the love of EvE do not release this piece of junk.

Devote your resources to this:

  • Fix SOV mechanics. Either you remove the incentive for us to put 4.000 people with drone assist doctrines in 1 system, or fix the code/server to allow 10.000 of us.
  • Fix corp / alliance / coalition management.
  • When you have done this, fix the HORRENDOUS POS code that we have been screaming for even longer.


Cheers





This. Stop creating new crap while the old crap is still broken. I don't care if it's 2 years of "sorry, still working on it" and not one new expansion/feature is introduced in that time. You created sov, your software and hardware can't support what you created, now it's on you to fix it. You should be able to understand why seeing dev time spent on stupid deployables would **** off your customers. It's like having a car that won't even run but you install a new stereo in it. It's bad enough that the time was spent but it will be worse if you take 80 pages of negative customer feedback and decide "we know better" and shove it down our throats anyway.

I mean you guys are walking in stations level of out of touch with your player base at the moment.m. A massive portion of the game is completely broken. How long do you really expect your players to keep playing a broken game with not even a mention from you as to when it will be fixed.
greiton starfire
Accidentally Hardcore
#1620 - 2014-01-19 17:26:33 UTC
this topic got derailed a bit. yes sov right now is **** and pushing people into one system per fight is a bad idea, but the topic at hand is the ess.

the ess, does not tackle the problem of sov in any way, in fact it doesn't affect it at all. it does not, and may not ever be able to promote small gang warfare. at a fundamental level it fails to take into account the real issues of the game.

this would work if:
a) pve was done in pvp ships
b)null sec could support more ratters in a system
c)ratters had ample time to defend it
d)ratters had actual benefit to it's deployment
e)interceptors were not nullified and able to warp before the server ticks
f)probably another factor i have forgotten

it is not a fix one of the above situation, it is fix all of the above before it sees any kind of use. if it is your desire for all of the above to be true, then you must tackle them in a logical way. you don't try to hang ornaments before cutting down the Christmas tree, otherwise you will just make a mess. don't put out shiny toys for a system you have not yet instituted.