Missions & Complexes

All the hardcore pvpers will complain if you make the missions any different. Missions are really good at establishing the basics of what a player does. Also explains a lot of the core concepts of the game. I think CCP really needs to explain the whole standing thing so players do screw them selves out of certain factions spaces.....

it does that already, granted it is nearly meaningless, a 450k or 437k bounty npc battleship is pretty much the same thing.

and imo if you want to have an impact on the world a mission is not the way to do it. the empires are old, it is nice that fw finally allows station flips. I mean to invade highsec you would have to go against massive npc fleets, I'm assuming they would fight back at that point.

lastly I have no problem with missions as is right now. they are the dailies, the grind, or w/e you want to call it of eve. they are a nice low commitment thing to do that nearly everyone in game can do.

maybe some "random" pve would be fun but where would it lie on the zomgboring <----> zomgalpha'd scale? and wouldn't a lot of the middle ground be just as boring/uneventful as missions? and where would the payout be? too low and one zomgalpha'd mission and you would have been better off running level 4s, too high and you avoid a zomgalpha'd mission and well then I guess lucky you. although I'd think the payouts would be mostly LP as to not flow too much isk into the game.

Different people have different roles within CCP. Content designers work on missions, none of us are working on the contract system.

Missions are spectacularly bad at establishing any basics or explaining core concepts. There is a huge gap between real EVE mechanics, and the scripted Empire NPC AI grind. Mission walk-throughs are the final nail in the coffin, ruining even the slightest chance of surprise.

Repetitive missions shouldn't be in this persistent, single-shard universe in the first place. In their current form, they are detached from the rest of the sandbox, and only promote botting or bot-like playing, bad fits and GD whines.

Most importantly new players should be protected from the terrible idea of missioning-career. I would be happy to see the missions removed from the game, or completely revamped to be one-time storylines with improved NPC AI and realistic mechanics.

I can appreciate the fact that you like to grind, that's a valid argument. But that there needs to be a (semi) afk activity and that hisec should have a risk-free version of belt ratting are really terrible arguments.

Plexing exists also in hisec.

I'm not a "grind" player by nature, so I've never understood the appeal of AFK "playing". If you're "playing" the game without actually playing it, that's a weakness in game design. I've long maintained that AFK "playing" should not even be feasible in EVE, even in hisec space. However, I also understand that to many MMO players, grinding is fun -- I don't get it myself, but some people just like that sort of thing.

But missioning at present -- especially early on -- is not only a boring grind-fest, but also not particularly lucrative. You don't start to make real money until Level 3 missions, but it's not obvious to new players that you have to grind your security level doing Level 1 and 2 until you can get a Level 3 agent to talk to you. The missioning system never explains the sec-level requirements at all.

Level 1 missions are waste of time, ISK-wise. You can make more money in a mining frigate grinding Veldspar (especially at current prices). Average haul for a Level 1 combat mission is about 80K ISK (bounty plus bonus). You might double that on a mission like "Angel Extravaganza" or "Worlds Collide". Salvaging isn't worth the time, so each misssion will run about 10-15 minutes (longer for missions like "Worlds Collide"). That's about 320K ISK/hr, and you can pull down 500K ISK/hr just doing jetcan mining of Veldspar and selling the ore. (Can flipping is pretty rare in my corner of EVE, but even if you take into account losses due to can-flipping, you'll still come out ahead.) So in addition to being boring, repetitive, and meaningless in terms of in-game "story", it turns out that missions are also a really lousy way to make ISK. The only reason to do them is to grind sec status, but the game never really explains why this is necessary or desirable. (Many's the naive noob who spent weeks killing opposing faction ships in missions only to find themselves unable to get missions in foreign systems. Or they may even be attacked by faction navies if their sec status has fallen too low.)

And don't even get me started on the uselessness and lousy pay of courier or mining missions in levels 1-3. (I've seen Level 2 courier missions that ask pilots to divert into .4 systems, all for some measly 50K ISK payoff.)

Missions should be where you learn game lore, and learn how to use in-game skills to become a better player. EVE's missions do neither.

Now, mining is mind-bendingly boring and almost promotes AFK play. I've long been praying for a change to the mining mechanic because it is just horribly badly-designed from a gameplay perspective. Something to make it more interactive, more "game-like", something that would discourage AFK play and botting. But after ten years, I doubt CCP is willing to make so fundamental a change, so we're stuck with it. But a new combat pilot should never have to resort to mining just to make ISK early in the game -- most new players come into the game wanting to get into fights, not sit and watch lasers grind asteroids into dust ever so slowly. But combat costs ISK (new ships, modules, etc.) and if missioning doesn't pay the bills then mining is all that's left.

Somehow I don't think that advertising EVE as the world's foremost space-mining sim would be much of a draw to new players.

this guy seems legit.

I would love to see missions that require teamwork. Sure, a bunch of folks will just run with their dozen alts, but L4 missions of slightly lesser difficulty than Incursion Vanguards would be great (or retune Scout sites for ~5 pilots in T1 cruiser hulls).

Making solo PvE more entertaining will not provide any incentive to socialize.

Ok, I get you now, and that makes sense.

You had to ask tough questions ... now CCP Affinity is gone.

You done did it!