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Player Features and Ideas Discussion

 
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Combat Exploration from a new player's perspective.

Author
Cellini Benvenuto
Ephemeral Syzygy
#1 - 2015-07-02 18:15:31 UTC
Please note that this is my first forum post outside the newbie's forum, so hopefully, you all will be a tad indulgent!

I've spent a fair amount of time exploring combat sites lately and these suggestions come from my (limited) experience:

1. Drones need some love. Perhaps I've just been unusually unlucky, but the drone DED 3/10 site is way too easy and absolutely not rewarding (which is, perhaps, the reason I find so many of them!). A Sansha/BR DED 3/10 can be a challenge in an Assault Frigate at my skill level, and I've had yields of up to 150M+ from a single site. The corresponding amount for a drone DED 3 is 3M (my max). Perhaps a chance to find frigate sized deadspace modules wouldn't be unwelcome? And making the site correspondingly harder? On the same note: why not a drone DED 4/10?

2. Escalations: several lower-end escalations seem to be broken. You warp into a site, kill the rats and.. nothing happens. Not that you didn't get the next escalation. Not that you successfully completed it. Just... nothing. The expedition log disappears 5 minutes later.

3. Escalations from combat anomalies: I think they make very little sense. A Blood Den can escalate into a DED 5/10. Which seems all nice, but I would think that people who are doing those anomalies are newer players in frigates/destroyers, especially since we are talking about hi-sec anomalies. We can't really handle the escalation. Wouldn't it make more sense to have escalations that the player who completed the site can actually hope to accomplish?

4. Low Sec. I love low sec. I want to live there. I made it my home. But the trouble is that I can't really do any of the signatures I find in low sec and consequently, when I'm exploring, I end up in hi-sec. Again, this is merely from a new player's perspective, but I (and I'm sure others like me) would love to have some signatures that we can actually do in low sec too. For instance the odd DED 3/10. Maybe a better chance of finding DED 4/10s. The Watches & Chemical Yards, et al. I haven't lived in nullsec, but from what I've read, I imagine it is a similar issue for newer players trying combat exploration. I believe that having these sites in low/null sec areas will allow more of us newer players to shift to low sec areas vis à vis PvE content.

5. And an 'out there' suggestion. Recently, I took on a couple of Sansha Nation Incursion ships (a frig & a cruiser). I lost my ship (I wasn't part of a fleet or anything... I just... well, attacked them. I lost my AF. But it was great fun! It was almost like... well, pvp. Almost! And it got me thinking: why is eve's PvE content so focussed on numbers instead of quality of rats? Wouldn't it be more fun to face up to similarly hard rats instead of thousands of nobodys?
Xe'Cara'eos
A Big Enough Lever
#2 - 2015-07-02 18:51:22 UTC  |  Edited by: Xe'Cara'eos
1. yup, supported......
2. didn't know this, but yup
3. would make sense, but I think it's to make the lower ends worth doing for an older player, can you sell the expedition BM's? if not, you should be able to
4. lowsec is supposed to be more risk, more reward..... but requiring more skill.... skill up, and perhaps go back to HS whilst you do.... if you let crappy anoms spawn in low, it'll become cluttered with them.

EDIT:
5. CCP is getting better on this one, with the introduction of the burners and the sanshas, but I think the sleeper AI needs to start being 'ported into some HS situations.....

For posting an idea into F&I: come up with idea, try and think how people could abuse this, try to fix your idea - loop the process until you can't see how it could be abused, then post to the forums to let us figure out how to abuse it..... If your idea can be abused, it [u]WILL[/u] be.

Cellini Benvenuto
Ephemeral Syzygy
#3 - 2015-07-02 19:20:05 UTC
Quote:
3. would make sense, but I think it's to make the lower ends worth doing for an older player, can you sell the expedition BM's? if not, you should be able to


I admit I have no idea about selling bookmarks. But on the other issue, I admit that I wouldn't touch a DED 3/10 with a two foot long poll if I could do DED 5/10s. PvE or PvP, a game should challenge you. Otherwise, it is just... well.. farming!

Quote:
4. lowsec is supposed to be more risk, more reward..... but requiring more skill.... skill up, and perhaps go back to HS whilst you do.... if you let crappy anoms spawn in low, it'll become cluttered with them.


I quite agree with the more risk and more reward part. And I'm speaking as a solo player in a MMO (which, I know, is 'duh!!!'!). But Hi Sec is literally... boring. I'm not saying that there is nothing to do for a low skilled player in low-sec. You can still hunt clone soldiers, et al. It isn't even about the amount of money you earn. And there's always faction warfare which is a boon to solo players like me who haven't joined player corps.

I merely think that having more opportunities of making money in low sec for newer players will incite more newer players into low/null sec environments and (perhaps?) increase the amount of players who end up staying for a longer period?

Again, I can only speak for myself and I don't know how many other players share my view. But if I'd stuck to hi-sec life, with Eve as it is right now, it wouldn't have retained my attention.
Serendipity Lost
Repo Industries
#4 - 2015-07-02 20:28:27 UTC
Xe'Cara'eos wrote:
1. yup, supported......
2. didn't know this, but yup
3. would make sense, but I think it's to make the lower ends worth doing for an older player, can you sell the expedition BM's? if not, you should be able to
4. lowsec is supposed to be more risk, more reward..... but requiring more skill.... skill up, and perhaps go back to HS whilst you do.... if you let crappy anoms spawn in low, it'll become cluttered with them.

EDIT:
5. CCP is getting better on this one, with the introduction of the burners and the sanshas, but I think the sleeper AI needs to start being 'ported into some HS situations.....


Sleeper AI needs to be ported into null sec as is. Null rats are just bigger HS rats. They need more npc scrams and nuets. I don't mean 2 rats scram out of 20. I mean waves 2 and 5 all scram you. Currently null anoms are a joke from the challenge point of view and there is no real commitment when you warp in. Meet wh anoms half way on the commitment side (more scramming rats spawning at the same time).

I'm not sure this would be good for HS - rats that scram. Maybe move the current null model to HS where 1 or maybe 2 rats per entire site point you. It would be helpful in teaching newer players to be aware of what's hurting them and how.

As to the OP. As a newer player - some things are supposed to be too hard. Figuring out what too hard actually means as your character progresses is a part of the game. The other piece is that you are doing them solo. Some folks like to play in groups, so too hard for you the new guy to solo is just right for 4 newbros working together. Something for everyone so to speak.
Celthric Kanerian
Viziam
Amarr Empire
#5 - 2015-07-02 20:53:13 UTC
My max from the ded 3/10 drone was 67 million isk from a Sentient tracking computer
Corraidhin Farsaidh
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#6 - 2015-07-02 21:04:13 UTC  |  Edited by: Corraidhin Farsaidh
Hisec explo is about the race to get there first. It is competitive rather than survival based. Someone mentioned whether rats that scram in hisec would be bad? They are already there, drones and sansha have both scram and web and it isn't bad for hisec at all.

Regarding drone sites, I don't mind them as such, nice and quick and you get the odd sentient module or SoE nexus chip. Again these are about the competition with other explorers, get there first-kill it faster.

I do like the sleeper caches though, limited sites are more of a race but the standard and superior caches give a decent challenge.