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Player Features and Ideas Discussion

 
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NPE: Provide Protected Newbie "Zone" similar to WoW's

First post
Author
Anthar Thebess
#101 - 2014-07-14 08:22:01 UTC
It is called higsec.
Rumtin
Imperium Technologies
Sigma Grindset
#102 - 2014-07-14 08:47:49 UTC
Safe Zones, even for NPE shouldnt happen as there is no place in EVE that is safe. Sheltering new players isn't going to retain their subscription anymore than what we already have. In fact it would in all likelihood have the reverse effect. Ganking and scamming are a part of eve, how are new players supposed to learn from their experiences if you take away the opportunity for them to experience it?

Also we have to remember that this game (like others) has a learning curve, some things can't be taught and need to be experienced first hand. Although I admit the tutorials do need to be revamped, but damn it, let them play the game and experience it for all it has to offer, that's what makes games fun in the first place. Take away all the risk, and they'll loose interest.
Kagura Nikon
Native Freshfood
Minmatar Republic
#103 - 2014-07-14 10:03:31 UTC  |  Edited by: Kagura Nikon
Will make zero difference. Rarely a new player lose a ship on its first day or 2 in eve.

And when they do its an irrelevantly cheap ship that they can re buy within 1 hour.

The problem right now is people staying TOO LONG on the noob corp channels where lots of snakes keep poisoning thei rminds with lies that scare them to even try real eve. Then they get stuck in their little world of solo game in a pirate battleship runnign missions until they day they are eventually ganked and elave game. LEave game because they learned NOTHIGN in several months because they kept listening to the poisoners in noobcorp chat.


The secret to get used to eve fast is the opposite. Is to be thrown immediately at low sec and lose ships! If you lose several ships on the first week you are not going to quit the game because something bad happened. Also when a character under a few weeks die it should be directed to a WELL MADE page explaining the basics of combat (how ccp can pass 10 years and never ever done a page explaining the basics of combat is beyond me)


Over protecting players lead to dumb scenarios like yesterday, when we killed a rattlesnake with over 2 bil in fittings from a character 2,5 months old. HOW IN HELL no one told that guy that was an stupid idea? If he had been in a decent corp (not a corp just created to avoid the 11% tax and composed of people that do not communicate with each other), he would have been warned how bad an idea that was, if he had experimented low sec, he would be WISE enough to not be on anythign larger than a T1 Battlecruiser at that age!

"If brute force does not solve your problem....  then you are  surely not using enough!"

afkalt
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#104 - 2014-07-14 10:11:03 UTC
Is it really occuring to so few that they don't quit because they lose ships but more likely the fact they lose ships and have NO IDEA why or what they could do about it?

There's nothing wrong with dying - dying and not knowing why, or not understanding the game enough to defend yourself is quite different. I'm sure someone will be along to point out that is their responsibility etc however it's the COMMUNITY responsibility to give them the best shot at it. This is kind of compounded by death being meaningful in eve, it hurts (to a greater or lesser degree). Something with lasting consequences I feel we owe it to players to arm them wih the information they need.

I don't want a safer eve, I want a bigger, better longer lasting eve.
Kagura Nikon
Native Freshfood
Minmatar Republic
#105 - 2014-07-14 10:11:22 UTC
Just a late addition. You are forever a noob, until you have lost a ship and not panicked while doing so. That may take 1,2 or 10 or god knows how many losses. But you are a NOOB still if you cannot take a loss and not panic.

"If brute force does not solve your problem....  then you are  surely not using enough!"

Corraidhin Farsaidh
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#106 - 2014-07-14 11:45:01 UTC
Kagura Nikon wrote:
Just a late addition. You are forever a noob, until you have lost a ship and not panicked while doing so. That may take 1,2 or 10 or god knows how many losses. But you are a NOOB still if you cannot take a loss and not panic.


All noobs should be given a copy of the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy in tutorial 1, the front cover would help immensely...
Hiply Rustic
Aliastra
Gallente Federation
#107 - 2014-07-14 12:44:19 UTC
It's pretty funny...might have been hilarious but my coffee is still working on getting me going...to see all the "wtf? No you can't do that, you don't know ****-all about what made EvE great or what makes it tick!" replies to an idea from Mittens and placed here without his name deliberately.

Ralph King-Griffin wrote: "Eve deliberately excludes the stupid and the weak willied." EvE: Only the strong-willied need apply.

Jenn aSide
Worthless Carebears
The Initiative.
#108 - 2014-07-14 13:15:22 UTC
Rumtin wrote:
Safe Zones, even for NPE shouldnt happen as there is no place in EVE that is safe. Sheltering new players isn't going to retain their subscription anymore than what we already have. In fact it would in all likelihood have the reverse effect.


Well said there. Ideas like this don't take into account those pesky unintended consequences.

It's bad enough that highsec gives the illusion of safety, so that many players feel 'betrayed' when something bad happens to them when they are still fairly new. Mittens idea is to let these same kinds of folks (most of whom have no clue about what a sandbox game is) have an actual mechanically safe place to start in then throw them out into the world of EVE (never letting them back in to toaly safety) and he expects that this will help player retention.

I'd bet real money that it would HURT player retention, because you gave them a taste of a forbidden fruit (total safety in EVE) then tell them they can never have it again and 'now' they need to htfu.

No, tell them to htfu up front and let the chips fall where they may.
afkalt
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#109 - 2014-07-14 13:21:32 UTC
Jenn aSide wrote:
No, tell them to htfu up front and let the chips fall where they may.



Trouble is, we dont even do that today.
Nariya Kentaya
Ministry of War
Amarr Empire
#110 - 2014-07-14 13:30:15 UTC
Kagura Nikon wrote:
Just a late addition. You are forever a noob, until you have lost a ship and not panicked while doing so. That may take 1,2 or 10 or god knows how many losses. But you are a NOOB still if you cannot take a loss and not panic.

Ive never panicked at a ship loss.

Now, screaming obscenities in 4 languages as I die because our Aussie scout who was supposed to be watching the wormhole got completely wasted and passed out, yes.
epicurus ataraxia
Illusion of Solitude.
Illusion of Solitude
#111 - 2014-07-14 15:51:38 UTC  |  Edited by: epicurus ataraxia
The original idea behind the concept is valid and I support it, but a better solution needs to be in place in addition.
We are not going to change the players we currently have, and some take great delight in killing noobs, after all it's only a cheap frigate or destroyer? Right?

The problem is when you are new, you have NOTHING, and in the tutorials you get a few things.
To us it's pretty cheap and worthless, but to a noob It is everything! Such tears, such wailing such fun for the griefer, he gets more tears from a noob than anyone.

So here's the suggestion, make the starter frigates and destroyers free, when podded, pick up a destroyer or frigate, fitted, but something that is actually useful, not great, useful. Ie tristan or algos type of ship, NOT noob useless frigate with guns that may as well be firework launchers.
This also gives tham an example of how a ship should be fitted (base T1 naturally)
Let the newbie get podded and learn, it will cost him nothing, a few hundred k to a ganker alt is no gain, so it won't affect that, it will make the newbie, braver, less initially risk averse, and he can learn to deal with loss.
Once he is more confident, he can fit meta, buy more powerful ships etc, and will probably have died quite a few times by then and aware of the risks of the space he is in and just how treacherous people can be.

Advantages, zero cost to CCP, minimal effect to Market, better retention, prevents risk averse behaviour, encourages widening horizons.

Disadvantages? Fewer tears for griefers to harvest.

Seems fair.

There is one EvE. Many people. Many lifestyles. WE are EvE

Kagura Nikon
Native Freshfood
Minmatar Republic
#112 - 2014-07-14 16:09:26 UTC
epicurus ataraxia wrote:
The original idea behind the concept is valid and I support it, but a better solution needs to be in place in addition.
We are not going to change the players we currently have, and some take great delight in killing noobs, after all it's only a cheap frigate or destroyer? Right?

The problem is when you are new, you have NOTHING, and in the tutorials you get a few things.
To us it's pretty cheap and worthless, but to a noob It is everything! Such tears, such wailing such fun for the griefer, he gets more tears from a noob than anyone.

So here's the suggestion, make the starter frigates and destroyers free, when podded, pick up a destroyer or frigate, fitted, but something that is actually useful, not great, useful. Ie tristan or algos NOT noob useless frigate.

Let the newbie get podded and learn, it will cost him nothing, a few hundred k to a ganker alt is no gain, so it won't affect that, it will make the newbie, braver, less initially risk averse, and he can learn to deal with loss.

Advantages, zero cost to CCP, minimal effect to Market, better retention, prevents risk averse behaviour, encourages widening horizons.

Disadvantages? Fewer tears for griefers to harvest.

Seems fair.



The starter frigate is free. That is why its called noobship.



They NEED to die to learn that they will die . That willa void them spendign everythign they have on a faction Battleship that they will surely lose someday.

"If brute force does not solve your problem....  then you are  surely not using enough!"

epicurus ataraxia
Illusion of Solitude.
Illusion of Solitude
#113 - 2014-07-14 16:15:35 UTC  |  Edited by: epicurus ataraxia
Kagura Nikon wrote:
epicurus ataraxia wrote:
The original idea behind the concept is valid and I support it, but a better solution needs to be in place in addition.
We are not going to change the players we currently have, and some take great delight in killing noobs, after all it's only a cheap frigate or destroyer? Right?

The problem is when you are new, you have NOTHING, and in the tutorials you get a few things.
To us it's pretty cheap and worthless, but to a noob It is everything! Such tears, such wailing such fun for the griefer, he gets more tears from a noob than anyone.

So here's the suggestion, make the starter frigates and destroyers free, when podded, pick up a destroyer or frigate, fitted, but something that is actually useful, not great, useful. Ie tristan or algos NOT noob useless frigate.

Let the newbie get podded and learn, it will cost him nothing, a few hundred k to a ganker alt is no gain, so it won't affect that, it will make the newbie, braver, less initially risk averse, and he can learn to deal with loss.

Advantages, zero cost to CCP, minimal effect to Market, better retention, prevents risk averse behaviour, encourages widening horizons.

Disadvantages? Fewer tears for griefers to harvest.

Seems fair.



The starter frigate is free. That is why its called noobship.



They NEED to die to learn that they will die . That willa void them spendign everythign they have on a faction Battleship that they will surely lose someday.



The noobship is literally useless. The idea is to give them a ship they can at least shoot stuff with and survive a bit. Comparable to the tutorial class ships given, with t1 fittings. What on earth is the current point of the present noob ship? You may as well give them a shuttle that shoots snowballs.

And yes the whole point is that they will die! Lots! And not be financially broken each time.

You do not teach people to manage their finances by bankrupting them the first week they leave school.

We want noobs to take risks, to discover, not hide because they are afraid of losing everything or even worse leave.

And lets be clear a noob losing his first t1 destroyer IS bankrupt and may take him days or weeks of mining to replace. Is THAT the behaviour we want to encourage? Or do we want to encourage him to explore, to fight, to take risks and pick himself up and start again?

There is one EvE. Many people. Many lifestyles. WE are EvE

Arya Regnar
Darwins Right Hand
#114 - 2014-07-14 16:27:20 UTC
No. Learning how eve works should include getting ganked and scammed on day one to begin with.

Definitely not supported.

Eve is a sandbox not kindergarten.

EvE-Mail me if you need anything.

afkalt
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#115 - 2014-07-14 16:29:21 UTC
Arya Regnar wrote:
No. Learning how eve works should include getting ganked and scammed on day one to begin with.

Definitely not supported.

Eve is a sandbox not kindergarten.



And war is hell, but we still train the troops before deployment.
Daichi Yamato
Jabbersnarks and Wonderglass
#116 - 2014-07-14 16:30:44 UTC
The noob ship is hella good in tutorials and level 1 missions.

Noobs already get several free frigates and a free dessie from tutorials. do u really want to give gankers easier access to free destroyers?

EVE FAQ "7.2 CAN I AVOID PVP COMPLETELY? No; there are no systems or locations in New Eden where PvP may be completely avoided"

Daichi Yamato's version of structure based decs

Zaxix
State War Academy
Caldari State
#117 - 2014-07-14 16:35:58 UTC
No amount of splashing around in the kiddie pool will prepare someone for EVE. What they need is a flight/combat simulator similar to Tie Fighter. People need to be able to train to actually fly ships, not just learn what the buttons do. The trial and error method of combat training in this game is one of it's biggest faults. Noobs spend all that energy earning ISK for their ships and then lose them in seconds for reasons they can't comprehend with so little time to analyze before they wake up in a med clone. They lose that hard won ISK, the ship, and the lesson, all in one explosion. It's a trifecta of reasons to quit before the trial expires.

Bokononist

 

Daichi Yamato
Jabbersnarks and Wonderglass
#118 - 2014-07-14 16:42:09 UTC
Zaxix wrote:
No amount of splashing around in the kiddie pool will prepare someone for EVE. What they need is a flight/combat simulator similar to Tie Fighter. People need to be able to train to actually fly ships, not just learn what the buttons do. The trial and error method of combat training in this game is one of it's biggest faults. Noobs spend all that energy earning ISK for their ships and then lose them in seconds for reasons they can't comprehend with so little time to analyze before they wake up in a med clone. They lose that hard won ISK, the ship, and the lesson, all in one explosion. It's a trifecta of reasons to quit before the trial expires.


SiSi?

EVE FAQ "7.2 CAN I AVOID PVP COMPLETELY? No; there are no systems or locations in New Eden where PvP may be completely avoided"

Daichi Yamato's version of structure based decs

epicurus ataraxia
Illusion of Solitude.
Illusion of Solitude
#119 - 2014-07-14 18:40:10 UTC  |  Edited by: epicurus ataraxia
Daichi Yamato wrote:
The noob ship is hella good in tutorials and level 1 missions.

Noobs already get several free frigates and a free dessie from tutorials. do u really want to give gankers easier access to free destroyers?



And when they have lost them they are effectively bankrupt.
So is it better to have them mining in their venture for a week to buy a new t1 destroyer, or to get out there and do stuff? You know, fight, explore, fight? And die repeatedly and have fun, but hey, unsubbing is always an option.
Theres plenty of time if they stick with it for them to get into better and more expensive ships, once they have died a few times and know who is an arse and who is not and how to avoid being podded all the time, because they have been through it, and are still playing.

Then and only then will they seek out others to play with. People like brave newbies are the ideal next step, but that first step before they get there currently either breaks most of their necks (fig) or encourages them to do exactly the opposite.

But if CCP believe that making the new player experience is about being butthurt and miserable,but we told you it would be nasty. Then they can keep things exactly as they are.

Telling people that life is going to be crap, but we told you in the tutorial, is not going to help subscriptions.

And if an experienced ganker is worried about a single million, he is doing something very very wrong.

Everyone claims that they want players to get out there and make and discover content, but once ganked, griefed or baited, the new player experience is just a grind, until you have a new ship and avoid content at all costs, because the costs otherwise in time and effort are too damn high.
Have you forgotten how long it takes when new, to earn even a measly couple of million? Try setting up a new toon and pretend you know nothing, and start with absolutely zero and don't give it any, for any reason, then you might get the idea again.

Be risk averse, be careful, talk to no one, trust no one, hide in the cracks. Avoid the new and contact with others at all costs.

^^^^THAT ^^^is the current lession, due to the insane cost of loss in the beginning. is it suprising you breed carebears? The game Trains them that way, why the hell are we suprised at the result.

So TlDr I am not suggesting a safe zone for newbies, I am suggesting to make it possible for them to be recklessly unsafe and learn from mistakes, without it either breeding carebear behaviour or being suicidal to try to dive into the game.

Edit to clarify, this would be a good addition either way, I also see promise in a temporary safe zone, but this idea is about afterwards to keep them flying and fighting as a base for years to come.

There is one EvE. Many people. Many lifestyles. WE are EvE

Kaerakh
Obscure Joke Implied
#120 - 2014-07-14 19:15:01 UTC
epicurus ataraxia wrote:
Daichi Yamato wrote:
The noob ship is hella good in tutorials and level 1 missions.

Noobs already get several free frigates and a free dessie from tutorials. do u really want to give gankers easier access to free destroyers?



And when they have lost them they are effectively bankrupt.
So is it better to have them mining in their venture for a week to buy a new t1 destroyer, or to get out there and do stuff? You know, fight, explore, fight? And die repeatedly and have fun, but hey, unsubbing is always an option.
Theres plenty of time if they stick with it for them to get into better and more expensive ships, once they have died a few times and know who is an arse and who is not and how to avoid being podded all the time, because they have been through it, and are still playing.

Then and only then will they seek out others to play with. People like brave newbies are the ideal next step, but that first step before they get there currently either breaks most of their necks (fig) or encourages them to do exactly the opposite.

But if CCP believe that making the new player experience is about being butthurt and miserable,but we told you it would be nasty. Then they can keep things exactly as they are.

Telling people that life is going to be crap, but we told you in the tutorial, is not going to help subscriptions.

And if an experienced ganker is worried about a single million, he is doing something very very wrong.

Everyone claims that they want players to get out there and make and discover content, but once ganked, griefed or baited, the new player experience is just a grind, until you have a new ship and avoid content at all costs, because the costs otherwise in time and effort are too damn high.
Have you forgotten how long it takes when new, to earn even a measly couple of million? Try setting up a new toon and pretend you know nothing, and start with absolutely zero and don't give it any, for any reason, then you might get the idea again.

Be risk averse, be careful, talk to no one, trust no one, hide in the cracks. Avoid the new and contact with others at all costs.

^^^^THAT ^^^is the current lession, due to the insane cost of loss in the beginning. is it suprising you breed carebears?

So TlDr I am not suggesting a safe zone for newbies, I am suggesting to make it possible for them to be recklessly unsafe without it either breeding carebear behaviour or being suicidal to try to dive into the game.


You're drawing the wrong conclusion from that. Let me put the argument like this. Do you get butt hurt when you die in an FPS? The only reasonable answer is no. EVE is the same way, only that your fielded assets are destructible. The only logical reaction to those observations is that you need to manage your resources according to your circumstances and the level of risk you're willing to accept.

A majority of MMOs will not encourage resource management. In fact you can say that it actively enables behavior that ignores risk. Now, I have nothing other than my own experience to back this up, but I would be willing to bet that it's excessively rare for the average player not to have a previous MMO experience. It's easy to infer rules from other MMOs on EVE and be completely mistaken as to the intent of the game.

Enabling the behavior that promotes the cancerous development of highsec bears is the wrong way to go about it. You don't lull the player into a false sense of security by handling them with kiddie gloves and then suddenly cutting them loose. They will learn the game better if they're not protected under special circumstances, but I'm fully willing to cede the point that newbies upon their first initial foray shouldn't be smart bombed on the undock from Kisogo State War Academy.