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Player Features and Ideas Discussion

 
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The surprise effect

Author
ALINKA Aivo
Science and Trade Institute
Caldari State
#1 - 2013-12-05 11:33:38 UTC
Quote:
The Eve-online Universe is a huge space. Everything is the game is logical, elaborately and known. Just imagine it was reality… The gargantuan space, where in hidden from the eye corners of the macrocosm, in systems with security status 0.0 or even below, the control over law and order is so low that anything can happen.

Everything in Eve-online is investigated and known. Even if the client does not have enough information, he always can find it on forums. That is really great, especially for the beginners. But what should experienced gamers do? The system is stable, permanent. Every time is the same even the most extreme mode PvP is predictable because everything is explored. The enemy has foreseeable ship with almost guessable fit. Ask yourself “What can amaze you?”. Actually the reinforce of your POS/station/clime would not surprise you much as it is expectable due to gameplay.

My suggestions
In such a global game about space the surprise effect should surely be. And besides, everybody has to feel it. Something extraordinary should happen moreover nobody should know any information about it.

1. technical script. CCP selects creative personnel and keeps secret with the purpose to save the idea and the surprise effect. It means that there is no any information about this project at all. It could be downloaded small patches on a server in several steps in order not to arouse suspicion and provoke guesses on forums.

2. feature script. At any given point in any system (solar system), which is on the edge of the Eve-online galaxy map opens the wormhole. A huge invasion of UNKNOWN forces from UNKNOWN civilization starts (I can take a part in the script writing, creating models of aliens, ships ect.). The invasion is so powerful that captures the constellation in two days. Players will be compelled to retreat to safe areas for regrouping, assemble a large fleet, conduct reconnaissance on the invasion territory evacuate civilians in a safer area. Alien ships are much stronger, for example 1:10. The Alien ships are classified in already know categories in overview – frigate, cruiser, battleship, car etc. The alien artificial intelligence level should be raised to the level of players. It makes fights fierce and unpredictable. Otherwise this will lead to the destruction of nation Sansha. NPC continues to capture the territory, they fly in format fleet, make an ambush around the star gates and different objects in solar system. In order not to contribute the imbalance we can allow the full destruction of the ships. The ships of aliens should have the weak point to the some type of weapon.

At the moment of the invasion the Concord creates promotion Fund that encourages the gamers for destroying of unknown civilization. The system of wages should be elaborated taking into account not only the interests of players who live in seized territories, but also any player in Eve-online.
The history of Eve-online would be written by real people in real time.

For example:
Some unknown form of life consists of plasma (including ammunition and weapon) and shoots with the same plasma. Lets say blue glowing plasma. The alien ship can be designed in the form of plasma clouds to make writing of ship models easier. They can be divided in some groups (frigate, cruiser, battleship) according to the size. The all captured objects can be marked with blue plasma. The gate of the captured systems is damaged with blue plasma, the gate throughput deteriorates. Flashes and discharges coming from the gate visually show the boundary of incursion. The aliens should have protective cordons and also logisticians which supply the new plasma (probably not remotely but directly when docking). Aliens also have the mothership. Its size corresponds to the possibility to create new support ships (approximate length 40-50km.) The committee proclaims player a “hero” and “defender of the Universe” if he destroys the mothership. For example the lifetime pension can be given to such player. The big DPS (app. 10 Titans) is needed for the mothership destroying.
As mentioned above, the destroying should be without wrecks in order not to overload unnecessary actions and game server.
And one more thing… the sounds coming from the aliens should be changed as it is the unknown civilization. So I do not suggest introducing a new kind of NPC, I offer to add something psychologically groundbreaking – “the surprise effect “, as it was said.

я против АФК режима в игре, РЕБАЛАНС афк режиму!

Sura Sadiva
Entropic Tactical Crew
#2 - 2013-12-05 13:34:09 UTC
Blue glowing plasma?

isn't better to just shoot at ammarians?

Zvaarian the Red
Evil Leprechaun Brigade
#3 - 2013-12-05 13:39:07 UTC
Try not using bold text next time. I might actually read it.
Malphas Inanis
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
#4 - 2013-12-26 15:59:54 UTC
I don't like the aliens but having another human faction do this would be cool, there are many ancient human factions that are rumored throughout the lore and having one do mass incursions would be a neat idea! I do like the surprise effect most though!

TLDR: make it humans, surprise ok though

This is one of the hardest lessons for humans to learn. We cannot admit that things might be neither good nor evil, neither cruel nor kind, but simply callous – indifferent to all suffering, lacking all purpose.

Nariya Kentaya
Ministry of War
Amarr Empire
#5 - 2013-12-26 17:05:33 UTC
Malphas Inanis wrote:
I don't like the aliens but having another human faction do this would be cool, there are many ancient human factions that are rumored throughout the lore and having one do mass incursions would be a neat idea! I do like the surprise effect most though!

TLDR: make it humans, surprise ok though

Aliens in general are a no-no

EVE is a game about human conflict, the SECOND you introduce aliens it will end up following the same pattern as every other scifi

All of species A is based on THIS human stereotype or sole-emotion, and therefore are unanimously good/evil forever.

which will quickly turn it from "complex political intrigue with no clear good guys just alot of militaries and ideologies" (reason why i liked some of the OLD gundam series') to "us versus them, cause they look different and that makes genocide OK"
NEONOVUS
Mindstar Technology
Goonswarm Federation
#6 - 2013-12-26 17:42:47 UTC
Take Sanasha, ditch incursion mapping and make it by word of mouth.
Random select wh effects and leave them unlisted.
Bam what you want, no more ability to time things to where a dippy bird battery can play the game.
And best of all, content.
Seranova Farreach
Biomass Negative
#7 - 2013-12-26 18:33:11 UTC
Malphas Inanis wrote:
I don't like the aliens but having another human faction do this would be cool, there are many ancient human factions that are rumored throughout the lore and having one do mass incursions would be a neat idea! I do like the surprise effect most though!

TLDR: make it humans, surprise ok though



jovian as a playable race but everything takes much much longer to train but we get to fly the jove ships and start in jove space and only jovians can go to and from jove space :P

[u]___________________ http://i.imgur.com/d9Ee2ik.jpg[/u]

Mascha Tzash
Ministry of War
Amarr Empire
#8 - 2013-12-26 19:36:20 UTC  |  Edited by: Mascha Tzash
The element of surprise!

Edit:

Care to elaborate on the difference btween this proposal and incursions?

If you want good content you could... like... create some of your own.
Daenika
Chambers of Shaolin
#9 - 2013-12-27 02:09:36 UTC  |  Edited by: Daenika
A) This will never occur:

ALINKA Aivo wrote:
(I can take a part in the script writing, creating models of aliens, ships ect.).


Sorry, but CCP isn't going to hire you based on a seed of an idea, particularly given the questionable communication skills you've displayed in this post.

B) You don't really understand game balance:

Quote:
Alien ships are much stronger, for example 1:10.


This is already more or less the case in C5 and C6 sleeper sites, as well as Incursions. What makes this different? 1:10 isn't much of a weighting factor for something that supposed to be this scary.

C) You don't seem to really understand the concept of AI, or it's limits:

Quote:
The alien artificial intelligence level should be raised to the level of players. It makes fights fierce and unpredictable.


Um, do you have the impression that AI in EVE is kept weak and, for lack of a better word, "stupid" because CCP prefers it that way? Making AI that reacts like a human is bloody hard. To the point where we still, with all of our resources, research, and time spent on it, have not yet really achieved it. Even limiting it to the context of tactical strategy, it takes enormous processing power, coding expertise, coding size, and flat cleverness to even reasonably mimic that level of intelligence. You have to realize, computers (and thus AI) are inherently deterministic. Every input must have a single discrete output. You can introduce a weighted random element to it, but that's still not actually an intelligent response, it just seems more intelligent because we've come to associate unpredictability with intelligence (when, technically speaking, the opposite is quite the case).

In short, there's no magic "make the NPCs think like players" switch. Sleepers already represent a major advance in the capabilities of NPC AI, and they still aren't much more than having multiple aggro tables (one for DPS, one for EWAR, etc) and a timed reset and/or depreciation of threat.

D) Aliens are bad, mmmkay? EVE is a game about the interaction a large number of very morally-ambiguous human societies. As noted above, once you introduce aliens, it becomes an us-versus-them thing. The politics, ethical grey areas, and drama fall to the side, and it becomes nothing but a generic (and boring) "aliens attacked" sci-fi story.

Seriously, CCP's refusal to engage in that most central of sci-fi tropes is the very reason EVE lore is as rich as it is.
NEONOVUS
Mindstar Technology
Goonswarm Federation
#10 - 2013-12-27 04:20:47 UTC
To simplify, beatable AI is hard
Making an AI that kills the player is easy.
Making it do so that you can defeat it is difficult.
Remember the AI will know everything about you as a matter of course be able to assign your ehp and then react to take say the easiest swap on rep and keep at a precise range to minimize your damage, all on the rising edge of the clock cycle output at the level and then enact on the falling.
So in .6 seconds its reacted perfectly to everything you have done.
It is currently boring and undefeatable.

Now you can destroy it through sufficient DPS, but it doesnt defeat the AI, only destroy the vessel.

To make something where you can win against the AI and not just have removed its pieces is hard.
Think of every rat that slaps ewar on.
Imagine if I programmed ewar on when locked, spam until active maintain active.

Now it mimics a player nicely, but is also very unfun when 20 frigs web tp neut and td your ship.
All while BS pound away and launch defender missiles that actively deny your missiles.
Suddenly PVE isnt fun.

Mind you I would love something like that as it would make PVE interesting, but then it becomes you versus a blob.