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Feedback for Hacking/Archaeology feature from 27/5/13 onward

First post First post
Author
Johan Toralen
IIIJIIIITIIII
#201 - 2013-05-29 18:04:20 UTC
Any chance for virus strenght bonus to Force Recon Ships? That would create a nice progression from T1 Frigate>T2Frigate>T2 Cruiser>T3 Cruiser as Force Recon is somewhere in the middle of price range and in terms of versatility. Slot layout is nice for exploration + ability to fit cov ops.

Pilgrim used to be a popular ship for profession sites with the old sites.. Falcon looks like a good replacement after the removal of the rats.
Vincent Athena
Photosynth
#202 - 2013-05-29 18:05:04 UTC
CCP Prime wrote:
Nicola Arman wrote:
wrote:
When attempting to tractor in the mini-cans its very difficult to know when your ship is ready to tractor in a new can and if your too eager (because why wouldn't you be, your hard earned loot is about to despawn) to click a new can the system seems to "lock up" for want of a better phrase and won't do anything for a few precious seconds.


The cans turn green when they are clickable and in range. They turn yellow when the item is "busy". No color when out of range. When your hack is successful and the cans spew, take a moment to hover over them and decide which ones you want first over others (eg. avoiding scrap). They move much slower now and there is also an audio queue after you loot a can.

Correct me if I'm wrong.


Green = In range and you can take one
Yellow = In range but you are currently busy taking a can so you'll have to wait until they turn green
White = If the bracket is BIG and your tractor beam effect is connected, it is the can you are currently taking. Otherwise, it is a can that is out of range and you can gauge the distance by the opacity of the bracket.

The small cans are already differently shaped, but I'll admit, they are small! It's an ongoing challenge to decide how far we can go with brackets while staying within the UI design rules for brackets. (And if we have to expand upon those).

And they are red when someone else is tractoring it in.

Know a Frozen fan? Check this out

Frozen fanfiction

CCP RedDawn
C C P
C C P Alliance
#203 - 2013-05-29 18:07:59 UTC
Nar Tha wrote:
I think the coherence bonuses from rigs are not working.


This might be because you are encountering a known issue where the descriptions are misleading.
So the following happens below:

The Memetic Algorithm Bank rig has a description:
"This ship modification is designed to increase the efficiency of a ship's hacking modules."

This is correct as it only affects the hacking (Data) Analyzers, not the Relic Analyzers but it should display:
"This ship modification is designed to increase the efficiency of a ship's Data modules."


The Emission Scope Sharpener has the description:
"This ship modification is designed to increase the efficiency of a ship's analyzer modules."

This is incorrect as it only affects the Relic Analyzers and should be:
"This ship modification is designed to increase the efficiency of a ship's Relic modules."

This should be fixed before release.
Hope this helps.

Team Genesis

Nar Tha
Doomheim
#204 - 2013-05-29 18:22:23 UTC  |  Edited by: Nar Tha
Nevermind I'm stupid.
Rengerel en Distel
#205 - 2013-05-29 18:33:07 UTC
Should we be bug reporting the sites that still spawn rats on failed hacks, or are you guys just working down a list to remove them?

With the increase in shiptoasting, the Report timer needs to be shortened.

Sorcha Lothain
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#206 - 2013-05-29 19:00:18 UTC
Omnathious Deninard wrote:
Sorcha Lothain wrote:
I think the idea of making "loot pinata" a punishment for a failed hacking/archaeology attempt is an excellent idea. Having something blow up in your face is usually a bad thing. It seems really, really, odd as a reward. If you successfully hack the site you get everything in the can. If you fail you get "loot pinata" AND everything else that comes with a failed attempt (e.g. rats, explosive traps).

I guess from a pvp or loot ninja's perspective having the can explode with every success is a good thing.

Why should you have your cake and eat it too?
Loot piñata as a failure mechinac defeats the purpose of the mini game and any player skill/luck in exploration and will only glorify blobing in even more areas of the game.


It doesn't defeat the purpose of the mini game at all. If anything it would encourage you being successful at the mini game. If you've maxxed your skills and fitted your ship expressly for completing the mini game then why should my reward be the chance I don't get all my loot.

It isn't that I want to "have my cake and eat it too", I just don't want it to blow up in my face.

I wanted exploration to be my solo profession because it was much more satisfying than mining. Though sadly it's starting to seem more appealing. As a miner if you dedicate your skills to your trade and fit your ship you get 100% of your loot in your hold every single time. There's something to do in every single system and you don't really need to bring a friend or a second ship.
Omnathious Deninard
University of Caille
Gallente Federation
#207 - 2013-05-29 19:05:21 UTC
Sorcha Lothain wrote:
Omnathious Deninard wrote:
Sorcha Lothain wrote:
I think the idea of making "loot pinata" a punishment for a failed hacking/archaeology attempt is an excellent idea. Having something blow up in your face is usually a bad thing. It seems really, really, odd as a reward. If you successfully hack the site you get everything in the can. If you fail you get "loot pinata" AND everything else that comes with a failed attempt (e.g. rats, explosive traps).

I guess from a pvp or loot ninja's perspective having the can explode with every success is a good thing.

Why should you have your cake and eat it too?
Loot piñata as a failure mechinac defeats the purpose of the mini game and any player skill/luck in exploration and will only glorify blobing in even more areas of the game.


It doesn't defeat the purpose of the mini game at all. If anything it would encourage you being successful at the mini game. If you've maxxed your skills and fitted your ship expressly for completing the mini game then why should my reward be the chance I don't get all my loot.

It isn't that I want to "have my cake and eat it too", I just don't want it to blow up in my face.

I wanted exploration to be my solo profession because it was much more satisfying than mining. Though sadly it's starting to seem more appealing. As a miner if you dedicate your skills to your trade and fit your ship you get 100% of your loot in your hold every single time. There's something to do in every single system and you don't really need to bring a friend or a second ship.

Right now if you are successful you get loot, if you are not I will be destroyed with no loot at all. With what you are proposing if you are successful you get loot, if you fail you still get loot. How is that not having your cake and eating it too?

If you don't follow the rules, neither will I.

CCP RedDawn
C C P
C C P Alliance
#208 - 2013-05-29 19:12:36 UTC
Rengerel en Distel wrote:
Should we be bug reporting the sites that still spawn rats on failed hacks, or are you guys just working down a list to remove them?


No need for bug reports for this right now.
We are in the process of fixing all of these containers and it should be finished soon, but please hold off on the reports about the rats.

Thanks!

Team Genesis

Sven Viko VIkolander
In space we are briefly free
#209 - 2013-05-29 19:41:31 UTC
CCP Prime wrote:
Vincent Athena wrote:
Maybe we need "sticky mice". That is the pointer starts following things I set it on. Sort of like sticky aiming in Dust.


Indeed, we've already (not out on SiSi though) changed it so that the command to take happens when the mouse button goes down as opposed to up.

If we get to iterate, ideas like a magnetic mouse, bracket selection prediction etc are on the table because they would improve the eve experience not only for this feature, but for the game in general.


Forget about "if we get to iterate," the hacking game and loot scatter should not go on live until you figure out:
1. That on one likes the loot spew, and
2. That the mini-game, to be enjoyable, needs to involve much more strategy and much less random clicks.

You are basically putting something that is only a neat prototype straight on to live, and after 10 years I'd except CCP to know not to do that. After the first wave of trial I think you are going to get far less people doing these sites than even do them now. The only reason I am going to scan them down is so I can cloak in them and wait for people to kill.
Sorcha Lothain
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#210 - 2013-05-29 19:59:03 UTC  |  Edited by: Sorcha Lothain
Omnathious Deninard wrote:
Sorcha Lothain wrote:
Omnathious Deninard wrote:
Sorcha Lothain wrote:
I think the idea of making "loot pinata" a punishment for a failed hacking/archaeology attempt is an excellent idea. Having something blow up in your face is usually a bad thing. It seems really, really, odd as a reward. If you successfully hack the site you get everything in the can. If you fail you get "loot pinata" AND everything else that comes with a failed attempt (e.g. rats, explosive traps).

I guess from a pvp or loot ninja's perspective having the can explode with every success is a good thing.

Why should you have your cake and eat it too?
Loot piñata as a failure mechinac defeats the purpose of the mini game and any player skill/luck in exploration and will only glorify blobing in even more areas of the game.


It doesn't defeat the purpose of the mini game at all. If anything it would encourage you being successful at the mini game. If you've maxxed your skills and fitted your ship expressly for completing the mini game then why should my reward be the chance I don't get all my loot.

It isn't that I want to "have my cake and eat it too", I just don't want it to blow up in my face.

I wanted exploration to be my solo profession because it was much more satisfying than mining. Though sadly it's starting to seem more appealing. As a miner if you dedicate your skills to your trade and fit your ship you get 100% of your loot in your hold every single time. There's something to do in every single system and you don't really need to bring a friend or a second ship.

Right now if you are successful you get loot, if you are not I will be destroyed with no loot at all. With what you are proposing if you are successful you get loot, if you fail you still get loot. How is that not having your cake and eating it too?


Loot pinata means you get LESS loot. I've always considered less loot a bad thing. Being successful means you get all the loot or minimally get to pick through the crappy stuff. I'm trying hard to justify a mechanic that seems more functional as punishment. Not to mention the fact that there's the chance you will end up with crap no matter what. The loot pinata greatly increases that chance.
Yugo Reventlov
Keeping Up Appearances
#211 - 2013-05-29 20:03:39 UTC
The hacking minigame UI seems to have issues with UI scaling.

I have my UI scaling set to 90% and the minigame UI overflows out of the window.

Screen: http://i.imgur.com/oPHegZ9.png
James Amril-Kesh
Viziam
Amarr Empire
#212 - 2013-05-29 20:16:32 UTC
CCP RedDawn wrote:
Rengerel en Distel wrote:
Should we be bug reporting the sites that still spawn rats on failed hacks, or are you guys just working down a list to remove them?


No need for bug reports for this right now.
We are in the process of fixing all of these containers and it should be finished soon, but please hold off on the reports about the rats.

Thanks!

Some of the data sites seem to have even more rats than before, now not just as a fail mechanic.

Enjoying the rain today? ;)

Von Keigai
#213 - 2013-05-29 20:18:38 UTC
I have read through all of both of these threads, with a mounting sense of horror about the loot spew feature. As soon as I read about the loot spew mechanic, I thought it was unrealistic, magical, and wrong for EVE. Kahns captures much of what I feel about it here, so I'll just quote his:

Kahns wrote:
CCP Bayesian wrote:
For the people saying the 'loot pinata sucks' and the like could you vocalise the problems you have with it?


    ...
  • We do not have direct control of our ships, so don't expect it from us! Moving towards floating cans that you can't select in the overview highlights some of the worst parts of how Eve's ship control mechanics work. It was already frustrating to nimbly move our ships around in Eve, we just typically didn't have to do it. As you know, we don't have direct control of our ships, but in this case you're basically asking us to pretend we do.
  • ...
  • It's completely inconsistent with the metaphors you've used elsewhere in the game. Clicking on something doesn't bring something towards you anywhere but in this one single little mini-game. Worse yet, you've got the metaphor of tractoring using a module elsewhere in the game and it works completely differently. It's just bad design!


Let me add a few points about "realism". A game should be internally consistent, and also consistent with real reality with the exception of magical or scifi elements within the game's reality. The loot spew mechanic fails massively on both of these criteria.

Kahns points out some of the internal inconsistency. Let me add to that: in no other part of EVE is loot collection in any way a twitch game, or significantly time-limited. Loot just sits there, be it in a wreck or a can. Yes, wrecks eventually evaporate and cans eventually will be despawned. But these things are never time-sensitive on the scale of seconds, and they never involve fast mousing. Fast mousing is necessary in combat, to gain access to rewards. It is never required for the reward itself. I think it is this aspect of it that many player find feels wrong: they've just succeeded at the ostensible challenge, only to find an even harder challenge. Is "exploration" or "treasure finding" supposed to be a thinking game or a twitch game? In real reality, at least, it is a thinking game.

Now let me turn to real reality. This is another way in which loot spew fails, at least for me. It just makes no sense because there is no real world analog at all. In the real world, loot (like pretty much all other physical objects) just sits there, just like all current EVE loot. Certainly the only thing likely to spew loot out in the real world would be an explosion. But since you don't do loot-spew for loot on exploding ships (and please don't get any ideas), it is inconsistent to do it to loot coming out of much-less-explodey computer systems and ancient relics. Furthermore, there is almost nothing in the real world that is analogous to radically time-sensitive moving loot. Perhaps a fiery explosion?

And this is doubly true in computers. A file is either there, or not; it never self-erases, it does not burn up if you copy it. Nor, especially, does a file copy itself onto a physical object, erase itself, then light itself on fire and shoot out of the computer into nearby space. It's just ludicrous. And yet that is what is evidently supposed to be happening in EVE.

You are ruining my fictional-world immersion on every loot-spew. Suddenly I am not in new Eden, grabbing hard-won loot. I am staring a screen watching something stupid and nonsensical.

Look, I grasp the idea behind the mechanic. It is to reward small group play because you believe only social groups stay in EVE long term. Social group == long term == subscriptions == money. I realize why you want the mechanic. It's a perfectly good reason. It's just a bad mechanic.

Why is it bad? Human irrationality: we feel differently about things lost (which connote wrongdoing) and bonuses (which connote success). It is functionally equivalent to either give 2x loot and then take away half from the soloer, as to give 1x loot but then double it for non-soloers. But the two things feel entirely different: in the first, the soloer is punished, in the second, the group is rewarded. It's the same reason why stores have sales, but never surcharges, even though economically the two are equivalent.

Loot spew comes across to the solo player (which, currently at least, I guess that almost all explorers are) as a hose. I feel you ought to balance the desirability of rewarding small groups against the undesirability of putting in a mechanic that 98% of the players feel as a punishment. Find a way to increase loot for groups, not decrease it for soloers.

If it is not too late, I'd suggest that you put off rewarding groups for a later iteration, where it should be done via cooperative play within the minigame. (I.e.: if two+ players click on the same node at the same time (within, say, 1 second of each other), they get better results.) Lower the loot amounts back to current levels, and get rid of the spew.

vonkeigai.blogspot.com

Heinel Coventina
University of Caille
Gallente Federation
#214 - 2013-05-29 20:35:02 UTC  |  Edited by: Heinel Coventina
Rob Crowley wrote:
CCP RedDawn wrote:
Lowered the Virus Strength stat bonus on all the Tech I exploration frigates from +10 to + 5.
Given all the the Tech II exploration frigates a +10 Virus Strength stat bonus.
That's excellent, I still think a certain cruiser class linked closely to exploration should get some strength bonus too, but the above is already a good start towards a working ship progression and risk/reward balancing.
.


I'd rather they re-vamp deep space transport completely into an exploration vessel class instead. Especially if they're going to make exploration into an industrial activity, rather than combat.
James Amril-Kesh
Viziam
Amarr Empire
#215 - 2013-05-29 20:38:13 UTC
http://i.imgur.com/pQ94uKh.jpg
Holy **** CCP, are you serious? What's all this ridiculous particulate crap? It's killing my graphics and it's here for no reason. I also have GPU particles turned off, but it seems you're just ignoring that setting with every new little cloud and smoke, etc.

Enjoying the rain today? ;)

Ali Aras
Nobody in Local
Deepwater Hooligans
#216 - 2013-05-29 21:44:13 UTC
So I understand why the loot speed was changed, but I think you guys went too far-- on sisi today, I was able to collect 9/12 and usually 10/12 cans all by my lonesome. Even when loot went out in two completely opposite directions I rarely saw a can turn white.

Prior to the change, I got closer to 5/12 or 6/12, up to 8/12 on one good run. I'm an interceptor pilot (read: not bad at manual piloting) and like a challenge, so I may not be the Typical EVE Player here, but the advantage is back to soloing with the loot speed change. With the new mechanic, if it's going to benefit you to bring a friend people are always going to miss out on some cans if it's working as intended.

I understand that people are mad about that, but I feel that that's something for them to get over and start treating like a challenge. If loot values are still too low, they can be tweaked a bit. EVE isn't supposed to be easy.

http://warp-to-sun.tumblr.com -- my blog

CCP Bayesian
#217 - 2013-05-29 22:26:45 UTC
Yugo Reventlov wrote:
The hacking minigame UI seems to have issues with UI scaling.

I have my UI scaling set to 90% and the minigame UI overflows out of the window.

Screen: http://i.imgur.com/oPHegZ9.png


Will defect it when I get in tomorrow morning.

EVE Software Engineer Team Space Glitter

CCP Bayesian
#218 - 2013-05-29 22:35:29 UTC
With regards the previous strategy posts the things to look for to judge your success is the kind of object you hacked as this indicates difficulty, how regularly you win and how much coherence you have left when you do win. Fewer clicks is also a good metric for being better but somewhat at the mercy of the layout that is generated. Obviously as its EVE, skills and your fit play a part in how easy any difficulty tier is. There is also an updated tutorial and we intend to put together a small explanation video. All of that is on top of the information displayed in the lower right of the modules UI window which updates when hovering over nodes.

EVE Software Engineer Team Space Glitter

Salpun
Global Telstar Federation Offices
Masters of Flying Objects
#219 - 2013-05-29 23:26:33 UTC
CCP Bayesian wrote:
Yugo Reventlov wrote:
The hacking minigame UI seems to have issues with UI scaling.

I have my UI scaling set to 90% and the minigame UI overflows out of the window.

Screen: http://i.imgur.com/oPHegZ9.png


Will defect it when I get in tomorrow morning.

Might want to check the Tutorial also. The scaling code also gets forgotten there allot.

If i dont know something about EVE. I check https://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/ISK_The_Guide

See you around the universe.

Nicola Arman
Deep Maw Salvage
#220 - 2013-05-29 23:32:10 UTC
It feels a lot better right now. It's so easy to gank people in Odyssey that this will actually be a pretty thrilling profession. I have good skills. Most of the cans are scooped. I'm able to watch Local and D-Scan with the slower cans. It's fun! I'm gonna make a killing at something I'm good at while the rest keep crying about the growing pains. This will be a fun expansion.