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Dev blog: Researching, the Future

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Quintessen
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#721 - 2014-05-08 13:18:49 UTC
LHA Tarawa wrote:
Quintessen wrote:
@Tarawa:

Putting on my usability hat, what you're proposing isn't really simpler. It may feel that way to you, but the proposed 10-point system uses an existing system that players will already be aware of. It reinforces the concept. All the arguments that you've made for the replacement system don't leverage that basic fact.


But you still have the complication of taking that % waste and comparing it to items needed to figure out if you really need to do more research or not.

Does 1% really reduce cost at all? Do you really need to go to 0% to be at 0%?

What existing systems us a 10-poiny system? What system does some of the work really not accomplish anything?

Quintessen wrote:

It's also not that complicated to reach your stated goals, keep CCP's goals in mind and move forward.


Their goals were to simplify. They only got half way there because their whole %s shown won't really be whole %s because of rounding when applied to items needed...

AND to go along with their fail attempt to simplify, they created a major cluster Foxtrot with rounding all ME 10 BPOs to perfect and Foxtroting all new players with 4-5x the research time to get to sub 1% waste (well deserved new player emo-rage inbound!!!!).

They didn't achieve the goal (mine does better because I actually integrate to items needed to show the REAL waste) and they broke stuff. FAIL, FAIL!


Quintessen wrote:

The current skill system maintains partial progress in skills. It does this by giving each level a certain number of points. You then progress a certain number of points an hour. It's actually fairly likely that at least some part of the new industry system shares code with the skill system given how similar they are -- or could if they don't.


No, they don't use point system and track partial. My system is closer to that with points as 100ths of what was a single PE level.

Quintessen wrote:

So you could change the system so that research levels required a certain number of points on an exponential scale. Then if you abort or stop a research job you still get partial credit for that research. That would satisfy many of CCP's stated goals and allow for partial improvement.


Exactly like I'm proposing!




It's not generally a good idea to propose entire game systems here. In general, they're going to have thought of a lot of things that aren't being taken into consideration here including technical feasibility, ease of writing tutorials, ease of communication, maintainability, and transference from old to new. Explain what you need and let them figure out if they can figure out if they can do it and how they would do it considering all the things above.

If I remember correctly, you mentioned that you were a code architect -- I may have misread. I can understand why you might feel that you have the necessary credentials to make these kinds of proposals and if you actually worked there and were in all the meetings you probably could. But coming in at the end not knowing all the considerations they're making and the hard trade-off and stating that their thing is crap, they should throw it all away, and instead use your thing reeks of arrogance and you're not likely to be heard. You can chalk that up to them not wanting to eat crow, but it's more likely you've missed some critical pieces as to why they decided to do it the way they decided to, and they don't owe it to you to bring you in on that discussion.

And before you think I'm just trying to ad hominem my way out, none of what I just said means your idea is good or bad. Your argument should be evaluated on the merits. And, with respect to that, I feel it still lacks for reasons I've previously stated.

I think we'll all get a lot farther simply communicating the two things being said over and over again:

* 4-5x research times post-Kronos are unacceptable;
* not allowing partial research (both initially and in the future) is a problem

That's the kind of feedback I believe is most useful to them. They can work with that and address it accordingly.
DetKhord Saisio
Seniors Clan
#722 - 2014-05-08 14:01:54 UTC
DetKhord Saisio wrote:
Researching, The Future Dev Blog wrote:
currently the trend is that T1 blueprints take 20x longer to copy than to build
If my math is correct below, your statement appears to be misleading. Do you have any examples of this trend you speak of, other than maybe doomsday devices?

Item -- Copy Time -- Build time -- Copy to Build Ratio
Prototype Cloaking Device I -- 3 Hours, 20 Minutes -- 1 Hour, 46 Minutes -- ~1.8868
Moros -- 44 Days, 10 Hours, 40 Minutes -- 11 Days, 20 Hours, 26 Minutes -- ~ 3.7493
Condor -- 1 Hour, 40 Minutes -- 1 Hour, 20 Minutes -- 1.25
Large Shield Extender I -- 1 Minute -- 8 Minutes -- 0.125
Mega Beam Laser I -- 1 Minute -- 8 Minutes -- 0.125
Judgement -- 31 Days, 6 Hours -- 1 Day, 16 Hours -- 18.75
Scourge Torpedo -- 6 Seconds -- 4 Minutes -- 0.025
Avatar -- 177 Days, 18 Hours, 40 Minutes -- 47 Days, 9 Hours, 46 Minutes -- ~3.75
Celestis -- 6 Hours, 40 Minutes -- 2 Hours, 40 Minutes -- 2.5
Tempest -- 15 Hours -- 4 Hours -- 3.75
Catalyst -- 3 Hours, 45 Minutes -- 2 Hours -- 1.875
Cap Booster 400 -- 2 Seconds -- 1 Minute, 36 Seconds -- ~0.0208
Core Scanner Probe I -- 3 Seconds -- 1 Minute, 36 Seconds -- 0.03125
Bump for reply from CCP Greyscale or CCP Phantom.
Weaselior
GoonWaffe
Goonswarm Federation
#723 - 2014-05-08 14:18:10 UTC
Angelina Duvolle wrote:
If I have a supercap bpo in for pe1 now, and approximately 75% done (3 mos out of 4 total completed) when the patch hits in june, how will that be handled. Will it still come out at TE1, after 4 months of research, when the "new" TE1 would have taken much much less overall time? It seems like it should come out at a higher level given the amount of time it will have spent in research, but If the conversion is just based off the current level on the bpo, I'll fall thru the cracks?


i misunderstood this initially: greyscale clarified that when it comes out, it will come out at the same value as if your research was done pre-patch (i.e. you will have te10%)

Head of the Goonswarm Economic Warfare Cabal Pubbie Management and Exploitation Division.
DireNecessity
Mayhem-Industries
#724 - 2014-05-08 14:45:00 UTC
Following wall of text shamelessly lifted relatively intact from a different thread (https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=340416&p=4)

DireNecessity states:
Many (myself included) have been arguing that when one combines the proposed new research times with the proposed transition from the current system nearly unassailable blueprint efficiency gets locked into the game for those fortunate individuals currently sitting on fairly well researched blueprints.

Honing in on the transition portion of the problem, several suggestions have been forwarded like greater granularity (100 levels instead of 10) and/or some version of blueprint research points (similar to the current skill points system). The idea behind both suggestions is to split loooong research times into more manageable chunks thereby limiting the creation of *unassailable* advantage.

Weaselior, instead, treats the situation as a purely new system problem where research times on top end products vary between harsh, obscene and impossible. Accordingly, if the research times are adjusted to sane levels the transition problems evaporate since no *unassailable* advantage is created.

As always, the devil is in the details . . .

Weaselior, care to toss out a purely speculative number of what a sane Titan BPO research to perfect time would be? 6 months? 2 years? The idea being that we start with the top end and build research rank times down from there.

T'would be sweet to discover that there's less dispute about the end goal than initially thought.

>>><<<

Weaselior responds:
Probably 3 years or so. It's a pretty tiny benefit and so there's no real need to make it completely infeasible to get there.

>>><<<

DireNecessity comments:
Damn, that seems pretty reasonable. Not exactly easy, but if you're playing the long game certainly within reach. If comparatively similar research to perfect times are established throughout the entire new system getting in too big a twist about the transition is much ado about nothing.

Special note - much shorter research times absolutely crushes one aspect of the current blueprint copy market which is built on the insane amount of time it takes to squeeze minimal affect (but stunning looking!) additional ME/TE numbers into a BPO. I'll be saddened to see that disappear (along with the deliciously scammy option to research BPOs beyond perfect and thereby sell even better than perfect blueprint copies).

>>><<<

Now that you’re up to speed . . .

Retaining the granular specificity of the old blueprint system almost certainly looks to be sacrificed at the altar of undue complexity – CCP Greyscale:
If anything I'm concerned that the entire package of changes ends up being too challenging for players to deal with. The math is all deliberately simple because there are a *lot* of moving parts going in different directions at the same time. We've simplified as much as possible round the edges (eg blueprint research) to try and balance out the changes to the core of the system: what do I build, and where, and when?

Unless Greyscale intends to retain/create unassailable time sunk blueprint advantage in the new system (surely he’s not that foolish), transition win/loss isn’t going to be that big a deal but the current blueprint copy market is still crushed. So I ask you blueprint copy sellers, “Can you think of a way to save your niche that isn’t based on nearly unassailable (though hard won) time already played advantage?” If you can’t, your future prospects look rather dim because a market that never ever lets younger players compete is suicidal game design and probably won’t get much ongoing support from CCP.
Weaselior
GoonWaffe
Goonswarm Federation
#725 - 2014-05-08 16:00:19 UTC
DireNecessity wrote:

...


Basically, as I said in the other thread my largest concern is with the scaling on capital and above BPOs. While I recognize it's somewhat unfair for a new industrialist to have to research his bpo for four months instead of two in order to get a perfect Raven bpo, I consider this an acceptable level of grandfathering. The advantage gained is temporary and easily overcome and really acts as a mild benefit to current bpo holders in the same way, say, a gift of a gnosis or gecko did (they get a one-time bonus, new subscribers have to pay to get the same thing but can easily do so).

The real issue is supercap bpos because there the time-scaling turns a minor disadvantage into an insurmountable obstacle. For example, I have a leviathan BPO that will convert as a ME4/PE2 bpo. That's a lot of research: probably a year or two (but leviathans were in so little demand that amount of research was just done during its downtime). But post-patch that's like half a decade or more. That's an absolutely insurmountable obstacle for a new leviathan bpo holder: it is more akin to a t2 bpo than a gnosis, something that will be a permanent advantage.

So there, you've got to rethink it a little bit. The simplest solution to me is to just cut the research time of these high-end BPOs: make it so that researching to "perfect" is doable in timespans shorter than a standard college education. It won't seriously cut the price of titans and it will prevent old-bpoers from being inassalably better (even if only to a relatively small degree). It's much simpler than adjusting the increasing price at the high end (though I do think it ramps up too hard and would benefit from reducing the multiplicitive increase from level to level and starting out initial research higher).

Head of the Goonswarm Economic Warfare Cabal Pubbie Management and Exploitation Division.
Babbet Bunny
#726 - 2014-05-08 16:36:46 UTC
Love the change, not that the math was complicated, but that others were too lazy to calculate.

Would like to see more gradients in the levels i.e. Small-XL ammo 1-4, T1 Modules start at 5. A change in starting time and step multiplier would make this more palpable. The total time to new ME 5 should be equal to old ME 1. For example, new ME 10 freighters should not take 12 years to achieve, but closer to the old ME 10 ~20 months (Unskilled NPC station etc.).

So using a freighter or carrier for example base time 15 minutes, rank 400, multiplier 1.6 will give a result of 65.9 days to new ME 5 and 756.6 days to new ME 10.

Using small ammo at rank one all else, the same results in 45 hours to ME 10
DireNecessity
Mayhem-Industries
#727 - 2014-05-08 18:42:22 UTC
Weaselior wrote:
DireNecessity wrote:

...


Basically, as I said in the other thread my largest concern is with the scaling on capital and above BPOs. While I recognize it's somewhat unfair for a new industrialist to have to research his bpo for four months instead of two in order to get a perfect Raven bpo, I consider this an acceptable level of grandfathering. The advantage gained is temporary and easily overcome and really acts as a mild benefit to current bpo holders in the same way, say, a gift of a gnosis or gecko did (they get a one-time bonus, new subscribers have to pay to get the same thing but can easily do so).

The real issue is supercap bpos because there the time-scaling turns a minor disadvantage into an insurmountable obstacle. For example, I have a leviathan BPO that will convert as a ME4/PE2 bpo. That's a lot of research: probably a year or two (but leviathans were in so little demand that amount of research was just done during its downtime). But post-patch that's like half a decade or more. That's an absolutely insurmountable obstacle for a new leviathan bpo holder: it is more akin to a t2 bpo than a gnosis, something that will be a permanent advantage.

So there, you've got to rethink it a little bit. The simplest solution to me is to just cut the research time of these high-end BPOs: make it so that researching to "perfect" is doable in timespans shorter than a standard college education. It won't seriously cut the price of titans and it will prevent old-bpoers from being inassalably better (even if only to a relatively small degree). It's much simpler than adjusting the increasing price at the high end (though I do think it ramps up too hard and would benefit from reducing the multiplicitive increase from level to level and starting out initial research higher).


Weaselior,

I could quibble about little things (I'd be comfortable with slightly longer than 4 months to perfect for a Raven bpo) but such quibbles are just that, quibbles. The important point that I've finally became aware of is that in the new system BPO research must become *a* thing among others (like team availability and labor shortages) rather than *the* thing as it is now. My apologies to all readers who endured my tortured logic getting from there to here.

We could speak about whether "re-ramping" time to perfect BPOs should be extended down to less high-end BPOs. It would be far more elegant to have all BPO research ramp the same way (though actual time required would vary) but it may be practically difficult to achieve this in a satisfying manner. Since the goal is to avoid introducing undue complexity, it might be worth looking at.

Having finally moved on from concerns about the transition (which were mostly due to continuing to think of BPO research as *the* thing), I'm still sad to see the blueprint copy market niche get crushed. Accordingly, I'll again toss the same challenge out to the blueprint copiers, "Can you think of a way to save your niche that isn’t based on nearly unassailable (though hard won) time already played advantage?” If you can’t, your future prospects look rather dim because a market that never ever lets players younger than you compete is suicidal game design and probably won’t get much ongoing support from CCP.
Seith Kali
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#728 - 2014-05-08 18:46:46 UTC  |  Edited by: Seith Kali
You can save BPC copying as a profession by introducing copy-speed research and re-scaling TE to make it far more relevant.

Maintain the base copy-speed on everything as it is, and have it reach the desired value at Copy Level 10.

Apprentice Goonswarm Economic Warfare Consultant - Drowning in entitlement and privilege. 
Ronny Hugo
KarmaFleet
Goonswarm Federation
#729 - 2014-05-08 18:47:53 UTC  |  Edited by: Ronny Hugo
I welcome this change with open arms. Even though I have quite a number of BPOs with high levels and have spent ages researching.

To anyone who don't want this change because they have invested so much time and effort into researching into insane levels:
Read about the sunk-cost fallacy. We are not going to invest millions of hours into the old system just because we've invested millions of hours into it already.

Seith Kali wrote:
You can save BPC copying as a profession by introducing copy-speed research and re-scaling TE to make it far more relevant.

Maintain the base copy-speed on everything as it is, and have it reach the desired value at Copy Level 10.

What do you mean by saving copying as a profession? Everyone will be using copies! Even the ones who own the BPOs will use BPCs. This will only increase the BPC market size. While prices will go down for individual copies, the total amount of copies traded multiplied by price will be larger. Its like comparing aluminium prices in 1850-1900 with aluminium prices today. While the prices was so high in 1850-1900 that Napoleon supposedly ate off aluminium plates, people earn way more from aluminium today than back then, because we now deal with millions of tons instead of grams.
Seith Kali
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#730 - 2014-05-08 19:28:15 UTC
Ronny Hugo wrote:

What do you mean by saving copying as a profession? Everyone will be using copies! Even the ones who own the BPOs will use BPCs.


The only way everyone will use BPCs is if the max runs is increased dramatically where it is important (component bpos, many many ships). Copying titans and stuff could still be viable if the base rate of copy speed is left untouched. People wishing to persue copying as a profession will have the option to research copy speed maintaining the niche profession to the few that wish to do it.

Apprentice Goonswarm Economic Warfare Consultant - Drowning in entitlement and privilege. 
MailDeadDrop
Archon Industries
#731 - 2014-05-08 19:38:31 UTC  |  Edited by: MailDeadDrop
CCP Greyscale wrote:
The goal is that all blueprints have the same or less waste after the change.

If that is the goal, or even "a goal among several," then I have to say you are missing it massively when it comes to "extra materials" on invented BPCs.

Can you make it so that the current mechanic's quantity of extra materials matches the quantity required at ME -40% (I think that's the proposed mechanic's label)? Otherwise you're going to nerf the heck out of every invented BPC in the game which has "extra materials" presently (all of them?), which is just an indirect buff to T2 BPOs. I think we all know that's a bad thing.

Edit: the above change only reduces the differential between invented BPCs and T2 BPOs, while hopefully eliminating patch day "WTF?! My BPCs!!" cries. Adding extra materials into base materials is an across-the-board nerf to invented BPCs relative to BPOs, and I don't see any way to mitigate that. Damn you CCP! /me shakes fist

MDD
Shoogie
Serious Pixels
#732 - 2014-05-08 19:51:04 UTC
Darin Vanar wrote:
I bet Shoogie could have taken on the entire CCP team and won. Rollaz too. They don't need Gunni Nelson at this point. They dropped these blogs and left off for Fanfest. If they wanted a cage match, they should stayed to brave the Pandora's box they unleashed on the forums.

Like I said, my money's on Shoogie but I think I could have bested a few CCP team members myself!


Hah, funny. I do wish I could put Greyscale in a headlock and ask him what he is trying to do to the game. The new facility costs and the work teams are huge changes by themselves which will make industry much more interesting, and hopefully profitable. They don't need to screw up the research system at the same time.

For what it is worth, here is my ideal research system which will never be implemented:


Changing research to increase efficiency instead of reduce waste is a good change. Keep the proposal to multiply the base material cost of everything by 1.111... and then use research to reduce that by up to 10% to end at the same place.

Keep the existing ME levels and research times. Use the UI to distract people from the ME number.

Currently, when you show info on a blueprint there is a "Waste" line. That line is directly calculated from the ME level of that blueprint. It goes from 10% on a ME 0 blueprint to 0.0% on a rediculous blueprint. You don't need waste anymore, you need savings. So you subtract the current waste number from 10% and there you go. Make this the prominent number that is the first thing you see when you open a blueprint, or when you are looking at blueprints on contracts. Limit the displays to only one digit after the decimal point. The actual ME level is still visible near the bottom of the blueprint somewhere so a potential buyer can compare two blueprints which both show savings of 9.8%.

Math: Savings = 0.1-0.1/(1+ME)

The multiplier value is 1-savings. This number doesn't need to be shown to the users. On an ME0 blueprint with 0 savings, you will require the full cost. On an ME4 blueprint with 8% savings, the material requirements are multiplied by 0.92000. So we are back to every blueprint both before and after the patch have the same bill of materials for each ME level.

Examples:
So an ME0 blueprint displays Savings = 0.0%. Multiplier = 1.000000. An ME1 blueprint displays 5%. Multiplier = 0.950000. An ME9 blueprint displays 9.0%. Multiplier = 0.910000. An ME20 blueprint displays 9.5%, but the multiplier = 0.904762. All blueprints between ME66 and ME198 display 9.9%, but the ME66 one has a multiplier of 0.901493 and the ME 198 one has a multiplier of 0.900503. All blueprints ME199 and over display 10%, and as the ME level increases the multiplier gets diminishingly closer to 0.9, but never reaches it.

When considering whether to do ME research or not, rather than enter a number for ME levels you want to research, the UI has a slider that goes from 0 to one month (or one job for jobs lasting more than a month.) Each increment be the length of one ME level, but that is not obviously displayed. On the left side of the screen show the current savings percentage and bill of materials. Add up the cost to manufacture one run. On the right side of the screen show the new savings percentage, new bill of materials, cost of one run, and cost to install the job. Under that is the "Accept" button.

Benefits:
* This system is intuitive to players because it is similar to the resistance system and the standings system in which you can get close to perfect but never really there.

* The UI shows you a number that is relevant similar to the CCP suggested system.

* The UI showing you the results of the research mean that newbies who don't understand the system can learn it in game and are not likely to over-research something.

* On patch day, there is no need to go and touch every blueprint in every job installed and player's hangar everywhere. Simplified patch -> less chance for something to go wrong.

* The material requirements for building something pre-patch will be the same as building that something post patch.

* People who have stupidly over-researched blueprints with high sentimental value, still keep their stupidly high sentimental value blueprints.

* You can still stupidly over-research your blueprints if you really want to. The UI will show you how much you benefit (or don't.) Installation costs will make this rare. If someone wants to be stupid, why should the game stop them?

* People who over-researched a blueprint in order to sell copies still get their blueprints to say 10% SAVINGS! If they are priced the same as the guy with the 9.9% BPC, they will sell first. If they are priced too high, the buyer will think, "for 0.1% I'm not going to pay that."

* With a constant time to research, it does not blow up into the stupid range for capital ships and supers.

* Patch day does not hand out blueprints which would take multiple years of researching to achieve after the patch.

* Whether or not to research, and how high to research your blueprints is actually a meaningful choice again for all levels of blueprints.
.....When it takes 4 days to research a module from 0 to perfect, nobody will NOT do that. Everyone will be building from perfect blueprints. Researching is nothing but a time sink. Why not have NPCs sell the blueprints at perfect already?
.....When researching a Moros blueprint from 7 to 8 locks up one of your science lines for 6 1/2 months and you get an ROI in the 4 year range, nobody will ever do that unless they are taking a leave of absense from the game. Everyone will stop at ME7 except those grandfathered in with better blueprints on patch day. Why not have NPCs sell the blueprints at ME7?
DireNecessity
Mayhem-Industries
#733 - 2014-05-08 20:09:50 UTC
Ronny Hugo wrote:
I welcome this change with open arms. Even though I have quite a number of BPOs with high levels and have spent ages researching.

To anyone who don't want this change because they have invested so much time and effort into researching into insane levels:
Read about the sunk-cost fallacy. We are not going to invest millions of hours into the old system just because we've invested millions of hours into it already.

Seith Kali wrote:
You can save BPC copying as a profession by introducing copy-speed research and re-scaling TE to make it far more relevant.

Maintain the base copy-speed on everything as it is, and have it reach the desired value at Copy Level 10.


What do you mean by saving copying as a profession? Everyone will be using copies! Even the ones who own the BPOs will use BPCs. This will only increase the BPC market size. While prices will go down for individual copies, the total amount of copies traded multiplied by price will be larger. Its like comparing aluminium prices in 1850-1900 with aluminium prices today. While the prices was so high in 1850-1900 that Napoleon supposedly ate off aluminium plates, people earn way more from aluminium today than back then, because we now deal with millions of tons instead of grams.


Keep in mind that the old niche being discussed was the ability to polish the ME apple just a tiny bit more thereby giving one's blueprint copies just a tad more curb appeal than the neighboring competition (with my apologies for mixing metaphors). Accordingly, it was an ME quality competition.

With ME research now actually topping out (and assuming I understand Seith Kali correctly), blueprint copy sellers could have two new avenues of competition to pursue:
TE polishing (still a quality competition) and copy speed research (a quantity competition).

So a new challenge to the blueprint copiers, “Any suggestions on how to transfer old BPOs hard won (but now superfluous) ME polishing to the new avenues of competition that still retain a modicum of your hard work without forever preventing newer players from competing?”
Seith Kali
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#734 - 2014-05-08 20:21:56 UTC
DireNecessity wrote:

With ME research now actually topping out (and assuming I understand Seith Kali correctly), blueprint copy sellers could have two new avenues of competition to pursue:
TE polishing (still a quality competition) and copy speed research (a quantity competition).


Yeah, close. TE needs a buff though in my opinion. I've posted about that in this thread too.

Apprentice Goonswarm Economic Warfare Consultant - Drowning in entitlement and privilege. 
MailDeadDrop
Archon Industries
#735 - 2014-05-08 20:29:39 UTC
Anyone know the whereabouts of CCP Nullarbor and CCP Greyscale? It's been over a week since they've posted anything in this thread. Did they suffer some unfortunate demise at Fanfest 2014?

MDD
LHA Tarawa
Pator Tech School
Minmatar Republic
#736 - 2014-05-08 20:31:53 UTC
MailDeadDrop wrote:
Anyone know the whereabouts of CCP Nullarbor and CCP Greyscale? It's been over a week since they've posted anything in this thread. Did they suffer some unfortunate demise at Fanfest 2014?

MDD


My guess is that they didn't like the feedback.
ISD Ezwal
ISD Community Communications Liaisons
ISD Alliance
#737 - 2014-05-08 21:53:28 UTC  |  Edited by: ISD Ezwal
I have removed some rule breaking posts and those quoting them. As always I let some edge cases stay.
Please people, keep it on topic and above all civil!

The Rules:
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Thread reopened.

ISD Ezwal Community Communication Liaisons (CCLs)
LHA Tarawa
Pator Tech School
Minmatar Republic
#738 - 2014-05-08 23:50:55 UTC
Quintessen wrote:

But coming in at the end not knowing all the considerations they're making and the hard trade-off and stating that their thing is crap, they should throw it all away, and instead use your thing reeks of arrogance


Guilty as charged. It comes from a lifetime of frequently being the smartest guy in the room.

However, in this case, the stated goal and initial design indicated they really did not understand the issue.

The complexity of ME research did not come from understanding 10% * 1/2, 10% * 1/3, 10% * 1/4...

The complexity is, was, and will be, in the rounding that multiplying the % by the items needed. Since their initial design did not in any way alter or remover the complexity, I have to assume they simply misunderstood the source of the complexity.


From the obvious misunderstanding of the source of the complexity regarding research, a large set of bad design decisions flowed.

- Rounding months of research to be equal to years of research.
- Taking away the ability to partially research between whole %s of extra mats.
- Making newer players have to research for 4-5x as long to get perfect research as those that are getiing the big round-up will get.

It seems that when they finally did begin to understand the source of the complexity (the rounding, and points of inflection), the decision was made to just alter the round to the job level to the run level, but really that moves the complexity to selecting a number of runs in a job for optimal round rather than researching a BPO for optimal round.


So, the source of my comments that the design is **** and should be thrown out, is not ONLY my arrogance, which I readily admit to, but also the fact that the design did not meet the stated goal and caused has many negative side-effects that were not even necessary. There were other options that could have had similar effect on playability and understandability, that did not require such radical effects as rounding off all current research and drastically increasing future research times.



Quintessen wrote:

and you're not likely to be heard. You can chalk that up to them not wanting to eat crow, but it's more likely you've missed some critical pieces as to why they decided to do it the way they decided to, and they don't owe it to you to bring you in on that discussion.

And before you think I'm just trying to ad hominem my way out, none of what I just said means your idea is good or bad. Your argument should be evaluated on the merits. And, with respect to that, I feel it still lacks for reasons I've previously stated.

I think we'll all get a lot farther simply communicating the two things being said over and over again:

* 4-5x research times post-Kronos are unacceptable;
* not allowing partial research (both initially and in the future) is a problem

That's the kind of feedback I believe is most useful to them. They can work with that and address it accordingly.


I think the rounding is huge, and should not be done. Once done, can not be undone. This is why I am so adamant the they should delay the release of these changes.

The two points that you are focusing would require an implementation of something similar to what I'm suggesting. The only way to allow research to sub-1% in less time, without making it too easy to get to perfect... as well as giving partial credit and making that partial credit meaningful, is to return to some sort of RP similar to SP..... which would be exactly like ME * 100.
Promiscuous Female
GBS Logistics and Fives Support
#739 - 2014-05-09 00:00:15 UTC
LHA Tarawa wrote:

Guilty as charged. It comes from a lifetime of frequently being the smartest guy in the room.

have you considered leaving the house once in a while
Colonel Rhombus
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#740 - 2014-05-09 00:05:57 UTC
LHA Tarawa wrote:

It comes from a lifetime of frequently being the smartest guy in the room.


How smart are we talking here? What evidence can you show to substantiate your claims?