Player Features and Ideas Discussion

As a bitter vet, owner of ~244mil sp on main char and probably ~1bil on all chars i think this is great idea. CCP please read carefully to understand why:


1. For 12 years I have been playing this game, did plenty of mistakes with missed training, getting podded without clone and losing BS 5, training without implants. Even had some inactivity periods. But for all those 12 years I have been looking at Dr Caymus being the guy with the most sp in the game. Wishing to take his place...

He had trained every day for 12 years, to his optimized attributes, with implants, without doing any (at least visible) mistakes to be on the top for all these years. Now with this new option I will simply use my inactive accounts (you can check their sp) and spend cash to take him over. I mean F*CK his 12 years of efforts I will give you money!!! (And that`s what this is about right?)


2. People will focus even more in ISK grinding, in order to buy chars, get the sp. I mean you can never have enough sp, right? You can hope it will not happen, but I assure it will. That means that less people will PVP and we (bitter vets) will enjoy pvp like in good old games with much smaller numbers. Get rid of the blobs \o/


3. As people focus on grinding, game will become more boring to them and during the time they will simply quit. Not everyone has persistence to train and pay for 12 years eh? So the player base will shrink and there will be less lag.


4. As more and more people "pay to win" and speed up with getting wanted sp to be able to fly the ships they dream about, they will sooner make their dreams come true and get bored. Easier the game is - faster it gets boring. More players quitting - hurrah!


5. People who like fair chances in games will quit as well. But who cares, **** on the poor people, just grinding isk is not enough. If they cannot spend the money in your game you do not need them anyway. Why should EVE be different from other p2w games. Why should it be niche game better be classic mediocre game but get the masses and the money eh?


6. As more and more people are quitting, some of my bitter vet friends will do as well. I am sure decent amount will quit due to this change as well, no one likes to see their efforts and money treated like sh*t.As in past, most of them will give me their assets and characters and by taking their sp i can be sure to remain top 1. And that is lot of isk and sp to get!


7. In the end when everyone quits out of boredom, I will be the real winner.Thank you CCP, sorry for your game that will die btw. Until then, my credit card is ready for this brilliant idea.



Now off with sarcasm. For those commenting that bazaar is already p2w: it does improve your "winning" a bit, by speeding some things up, but you can never take over people who invested years of efforts and subscription to be where they are. And that should be honored by CCP if they do not want to lose their face in greed for some more money. Because if you do not honor your vets today, players who are new now will know you will not honor them in couple of years either. And no one sticks long in such "relationships". Maybe some pathological cases, but they are not so common :)

And yes, as you probably already know there are people who will spend thousands of bucks on this game in order to accomplish what they want. So you will make some money, though it will be short term only. In the long run you are continuing to kill this pearl among the games...

I am not sure who came up with such "brilliant" idea without taking side effects in the consideration. I agree there should be ways to help new players. But not by killing the one of the essences of the game. Get advisers not just from CSM, most of them is there just because they have large alliances behind them, it is more of e-peen measuring (or at least it was in past, while I still hoped they would come up with some good ideas).

People who already have more than 20/30/50? mil sp will probably stick to the game anyway, they have already invested time and learned a lot about the game. You need to help just the focus group. I am sure you can run data analysis and check when the most of people quits and make separate strategies to try to keep them. I think the most quits with less than 10mil sp, but do your work and find it out yourself.

What made this game was its toughness, nowadays 1 month char can make isk easier than 10-20mil sp ones could do in past. They get skills boost, they do not have to train learning skills, etc. It is already MUCH easier. And you keep failing to keep them with all those new ideas? Then you need to find some other approach to get/keep them into the game, get new people involved.

Decade ago, EVE was elitist game, we laughed to other grinding MMORPGs. Now, EVE is slowly turning in one of them. Everyone wanted to PVP back then, even though it was much tougher to make isk for lost ships. Nowadays the most of the players are "scared" to do so as someone might see their losses and make fun of them. Or simply because they do not want their "losing" to be public, if there is no API they can always deny it :) They will rather wait for certain win scenarios so they can boost their kb stats. Which are rarely related to their skills... And meanwhile just grind isk for bigger ships, not realizing that "you are not your ship" rule :). Same will be with sp, they will rush to get more and more, without knowing that sp do not equal skills.


EVE has changed a lot over time, from taking pride in being different game among plenty of MMORPGs, harder and tougher, being unique, joy of our community compared to games dominated by 13 years old players etc. For some time it is taking direction to even with them and this seems like one of the final nails in the coffin. I am sorry for that :(

TL; DR

NO

Get better advisers.

I believe this function would empower the rich and weaker the poor.

We can see this today in the market. Those people with massive amount of isk are controlling the prices as if it was their ISK printing machine.

The goal of this is as i have understood it to give players the chance to switch "specialties" and that goal is valid, but the restrictions set does not reflect that at all.

The rules of the Transneural Skill Packet should be the opposite. That means if you have allot of skill points then you should NOT be able to buy these packs. Those people that have low skills and that have come to understand the game better and want to take another approach in their long term goals should have the opportunity to do so.

Instead you want those that have massive amount of ISK to be able to use these packs to empower them even more.

I dont know if you can see individual wallet transactions or not and how the transactions of one account effect certain items in market, but we do see it all the time. The price manipulation is real and people are using their massive wealth to adjust prices for their benefits.

I also understand that this is part of the game and i am ok with it, what i am saying is to not give these people more tools that they can use to get even more wealth.

Thank you

Lookss like this topic is dead now that ccp is doing it now :).... good luck

https://community.eveonline.com/news/dev-blogs/exploring-the-character-bazaar-skill-trading/

Read my both posts on it. P2W is not the main issue. As more sp does not mean win of course. But there are plenty of other issues connected to this, main one being inconsistency.

And I think you have totally missed the motivation part or you have missed the point of EVE. If it was like that then just give all sp and isk to anyone and they can do whatever they have fantasized. Dreams come true by efforts, dedication, sometimes even luck. EVE is tough game and that`s what made it different from others. While there is no clear "end game" in EVE, you still have to put effort to get in some form of it and then do what you have fantasized. And there is no best player in any segment, as long as CCP does not make official competitions for such titles.

SP is entry barrier for lazy, non persistent players. What EVE "was" is not the game for them. Because even if you make start easier, as soon as it gets bit harder they will quit. CCP needs to address their marketing different way. Not just by showing nice graphic, stories and explosions but with challenging potential new players with asking them in advance "Do you have what it takes? Are you ready to give your blood and your sweat to make in impact in this space" etc.

I can tell you that most of older players, vets, have actually enjoyed that barrier and the amount of effort EVE demands. That differentiated us from WoW like MMORPGs where kids would just grind until they get bored. In EVE you needed brains + effort to be able to play. In most of other MMORPGS usually only top players have both :)

So, in the conclusion, entry barrier and toughness of the game was in the great part one of the keys to success. And we can actually see that the game is going downhill since they have started to make it easier and easier. People who do not put lot of efforts will quit much easier than those who committed themselves. I agree it is niche market of gamers and that EVE can never have player base like WoW and similar. Which does not mean that it cannot have healthy and growing player base, just need to be aware of fundamentals and direct message to the right markets.

Also the consistency meant that even though you had to put lot of efforts, you knew what you will gain. Without consistency there will be no long term commitment by players. If you had asked players 5 or 10 or 12 years ago will they stay and they were aware of such inconsistent moves, I am sure the game would be already dead. Loyalty and respect are earned and you do not earn them with such manners.

Hence, that's why there's more to that post.


Exactly -- just give all SP to all characters.. Then, the game is based on skillfulness, starter corps can be competitive and infiltrate sov if that seems entertaining, newbies can save up for and learn any ship or playstyle they fantasize about, the average cost and size of flown ships increases, KMs abound, and (quite plausibly, with the design of JF) little skirmishes fill systems as if there are a hundred Brave corporations.


If it's so simple to quit just because the game is "easier", are you saying you're quitting? Because, unless so, that's obviously incongruent. The game has depth, which is why subs come. If they show up and their characters are limited, and the game seems shallow because of it, why would they stay? Why would they recruit for a sandbox that gates them out of interesting content? Maybe you're saying that just fresh subs would quit if they found the game easier, but again -- prove it. Show (even slightly-relevant) studies. In fact, the whole idea of the game having better gameplay, or so, because of SP is completely fabricated. It's like saying that subs would come because they don't have to grind for XP. Yet, XP is completely unnecessary -- there's already a grind for, and loss of, ships and items. SP is no attracting feature for some 99% of the gaming demographic, the sandbox is. "Let the boys play."

A hundred Brave corporations isn't what EVE is about!?

Yet, Brave got burnt out -- before the SP announcement. What's the reasoning, then? ..That they got bored of being ineffective and stuck with static progression, or can you really make this not about motivation? Can you really evidence that limiting content is effective for increasing it?

Now you're just making generalizations -- yet deflecting and avoiding the question. What if sov only found frigate-level play coming at them? Would they get bored? I'm not asking if subs can get bored, I'm asking why. I can find logic with it: would you play Freelancer if it was as gated as this game? Of course, you wouldn't. Why suggest that they should here?

Yes, I obviously can evidence that arbitrarily limiting resources reduces motivation, from everything that discusses it:


How would you criticize links but support SP? It's the same type of power projection.

The question is, "What if sov was only challenged by frigate-level play?", even if they still have the option of advanced ships, capitals, etc. The point is that they would get bored because that's no challenge.

Without SP, ships wouldn't just appear from nowhere -- they'd have to be produced and earned the same. They still have to be flown well and strategically.


Then why can't a corp like Brave, even if with the help of others, take the sov from Goons or similar? There's a power level for each class of ship, and that's effectiveness. Why would a sandbox game seem interesting if everything from ship progression through industrialization was limited? That's the content: gameplay.. strategy. That's the feature list -- that's why subs come.

Links? Increasing power through SP availability? ..Increased speed, tank, and efficiency? That's what SP does ordinarily, and it undermines player skillfulness by making ships perform worse and by limiting industrialization. It's obvious that more options lead to more counters (which is undock potential). More to learn is more to play. More to play is more to be competitive with..


In their videos, CCP states that intrinsic motivation is much more helpful for creativity and engagement, and this is researched abundantly. Intrinsic motivation is the will to mastery, from freedom of choice, and for the socialization that the game promotes through its economy and its strategy. Extrinsic motivation is of an external reward, playing the game to get a ship or to find esteem. The problem with SP is that it doesn't inherently provide either. In fact, it removes options for both. The point is that limiting the mastery and depth of the game because YOU imply the game isn't interesting enough to hold players is completely ludicrous, and it's based on nothing.

How about they just limit the SP transfers to pilot that has 20m or below SP.