Player Features and Ideas Discussion

So last night I was sitting in TS and a player brought up the fact that coming back into the game, you're ultimately behind everybody you use to play with. Unlike other game's where this disposition is easily resolved with the help of these old friends, you are unfortunely stuck playing catch up.

I too, coming back into the game, felt somewhat behind. I don't after all have all the skills I wanted. I left because I didn't have the time to play, and if i'm not playing, I have no desire to pay. However paying for something I enjoy isn't an issue. So I started thinking how could this setback be address to appeal older player's to return, and get caught up.

The first and ONLY factor in my brainstorm as "The Character Bazaar". No matter what I thought of it had to go hand in hand, without ruining the value, and demand, of the player's that actually payed to continue training. Although ultimately it was how do I not ruin CCP's cash cow. Honestly... I'm sure half, if not more, of the character's bought are new player's buying plex to pay for them.

===SOLUTION===
*FOR RETURNING PLAYER'S ONLY*
Upon re-activating your account you'll be allowed the option to pay for the time lost, at the cost of a plex per month. Doing so will grant the player 30day's of SP lost, at the rate of 1800 SP/hr. This work's out to be 1,296,000sp retrieved. This is the equalivent of a raw character, with no attribute's boosted, training for a month.

This apply's for every month inactive, and only towards the time inactive. If you were gone for 3month's, you can use 3 PLEX's. 6 Month? 6 PLEX's. A returning player will only be allowed to take advantage of this for 30day's after re-activation. This is prevent abusing it later on to buy SP for a new skill.

===WHY WOULD THIS WORK?===
The SP/hr you gain is that of a raw character, with no attribute's. What this mean's is that any player that actively train's their character will have more SP. Thus having no affect on the value of character's on the bazaar, or even the value of those played. The restriction of it is only to buy back the lost time, mean's that no one can achieve more SP then they would of otherwise had. Aswell the 30day window is to prevent player's from holding on a month or two, and using it later. Which I feel could easily be abused.

===WHY?===
I like this character, it's mine. I could buy one off the bazaar and have all the skill's I need, sure, but it's not mine. I bought PLEX when I returned, because I remember how much of a pain making isk was, and didn't want my first week grinding. I had fun though with the extra isk, for sure. However if I could of used that to get the SP I missed out on, and fly the ship's I wanted to but couldn't... I would of taken that option instead. I wouldn't of paid for the full 2yr's gone... HELL NO... but I would of bought I think 3month's back, and been happy for it.

Anyways, FEEDBACK
Is the drawback to the feature effective in maintaining the value of those who played?
Potential mean's at which this could be abused?
Does it really matter that you paid actively for those 2 years, and someone is allowed the ability to buy back? even though they will have no where's close to the amount of SP you gained?

HIT IT!!!

I disagree. This would be raw SP, free to be spent on whatever flavor of the month. I think it would massively decrease the value of specialized characters, and effectively gives you the option to skip less favored periods in your EVE time where whatever you enjoy flying doesn't fit in the current metagame.

So then what about not allowing the gained SP to be applied to the final rank of a skill. This would be if you want to actually specialize you have to play, however you'll still be able to grab all the other skill's that make flying in eve easier.

OR...

Even having a cap that you're allowed to even take advantage of this... either at 20m or 40m (roughly 1 or 2 year's of playing) this way this prevent's players who have the skill's already to fly the ship they wanted effectively can't leave for a year and come back and cash in on something else.

I knew that.... when I did start having time to play game's again though it took me 6month's to come back to EVE. Allot to do in part with, I felt even before playing again that I was behind everyone I played with. I don't have all the skill's I need to fly the ship's I want effectively, so when I came back, it's harder for me. It's harder for everyone who come's back without all those skills. If I played for a year straight, then left, it wouldn't be that hard.

Am I playing now, sure. However I don't like the feeling of considering buying a character off the bazaar... because I want to play this one.

No. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

Also:

This is a myth I am intent on seeing destroyed every time I see it brought up.

There is no such thing as "catching up" in EVE.

Total skillpoints and the concept of "catching up" are meaningless because...

- Only a limited number of skills affect any one ship, module, weapon system, and specialty at any given time.
Ex1: Someone you are facing has about 20 million SP, but how much of that overall SP is actually combat related? He/she could be a HUGE industrial player with limited combat skills.
Ex2: A veteran player has just trained up the skill Large Hybrid Turret to level 5. That skill in no way affects the skill Small Hybrid Turret and thus the veteran will be no better or worse than before at the frigate level.

- All skills max out at level 5. Once you get a skill there... you are no better or worse in that aspect than any veteran player.

- Getting a skill from level 4 to level 5 only adds on an extra 2% here, 5% there (exceptions apply). If you simply train up all the skills within a specialty to level 4 (which takes a fraction of the amount of time it takes to get all those same skills to level 5), you will find yourself flying at about 80 to 90% of the effectiveness of a multi-year veteran with those same skills in that specific specialty at level 5.

- Ships and weapons have been balanced against one another.
Ex: A battleship can potentially instapop a frigate... but the frigate can fly very fast, making it difficult for the battleship's weapons to track, especially at very close range... then again, the battleship can deploy drones to deal with the frigate... and the frigate can shoot the drones down... however the battleship might have a Large Energy Neutralizer fitted to nuke the frigate's capacitor every 24 seconds... in which case the frigate could use a Small Nosferatu that sucks out capacitor from the battleship every 3 seconds... etc. etc.

- "Better" and more expensive ships and mods do not automatically confer "IWIN" status. They simply give a player a linear edge at an exponentially higher cost.
Ex: A group of two or three T1-fit frigates costing about 500 to 800 thousand ISK CAN kill a faction frigate worth about 50 to 100 million ISK... provided they are using the right mods in the right configuration and know what they are doing (that last part is key).


That's rather the point. In being limited you learn the game's mechanics and nuances in cheaper equipment and ships... so when you DO gain access to more expensive equipment and ships, you know HOW to use them properly.

this still allows char farming.

Even at base stats you can make an alt, let it cook for 8 months, see what is new in the new expansion and build the new FOTM char from that. Or a char that is less sp may not waste them on deprecated skills with your setup.

Example: After june astronomics 5 is about useless, deep spaces probes are getting pulled and they are limiting probe releases to 7.

If they had what you wanted in place to make a pro probe alt from a char put on ice you'd have less sp's but unlike many current maxed probers you will not waste the sp's like they have in astro 5. You break even. Less sp, but sp not wasted if had it andd wasted it.

If leaving and knowing/thinking are coming back you have 3 options.

Keep on paying the CC billl.
Or use the in game life savings to plex as much as you can
come back and work what you got from when you left no trains


I have done a mix of the first 2. My eve vacations were jsut lets go play some other game. The day comes I emo rage quit I will not mess around. Some random player may get a gift, I go to biomass and get my life back for good. So far its been I just need time away from eve...I knew I would be back a few times.

...and so is everyone just starting the game. So if returning player can buy skills to "catch up", why couldn't newb as well? See where it goes?

The SP are rewards for keeping the account active. If you look at them this way, you will understand why buying them shouldn't be possible.

Apart from that, ShahFluffers explained better than I could why inability to buy skill points isn't a problem at all.

Just put SP to the cash shop and flush Eve down the drain.

Now this last bit might be an idea.

Allow people to buy chars of the bazar, put them on the same account as their favorite guy and recycle the bought char permanently gaining 50% of his SPs as assignable SPs on the main char.

This is actually a very CCP minded idea:

- An SP sink.
- according to the doctrine of diminishing returns,
- will drive the Bazar to a frenzy thus upping transactions and plex earnings (maybee...)

I am not clever enough to think of all the consequances but it has the smell of ending up with fewer high SP chard on TQ which is probably a good thing... yes? no? And more choice to the player is always a good thing... no maybees there.

Feel left out? Buy a new Character via the Bazaar. Don't like that option? Then deal with it and play the game with what SP you left with.

Really, playing 'catch up' is for games with levels 1 through to friggin 1 billion.. play that if 'catch up' is what you believe eve is all about because unfortunately it isn't.

I'm not being harsh just realistic here and you best get that idea of buying SP outta ya head as well... the sooner the better.

The only limitation in eve is your imagination and not the skill system.