Player Features and Ideas Discussion

1. Provided the access in F2P is reasonably good, with the ability to view the Subscriber market, and interact with portions of it; and provided F2P content was interesting and interactive, while being primarily player interaction, I think it would be good.

Another idea, (detracting from my earlier idea of F2P ships), is that F2P players in trasnport aboard a subscriber ship, could actually see outside that ship, and watch as they journied from one place to another. Slaves should of course end up in the cargohold in a nasty container.

They could also have limited interaction, in that they would be able to use ejection features if they determined that things were'nt going so well. This would be a simple interface, and their view could be explained by a VR interface inside their transport capsule. Ejecting from the ship wouldn't of course occur until the ship was on the brink of destruction.

These capsules could be picked up and ransomed, or dropped at a nearby station, or the players could be sold into slavery. Slavery would of course have real consequences outside the Amarr Territories in highsec systems. Slave transport containers could be shielded from ship destruction as well; though, they may be capable of being destroyed.

This could result in F2P players having some very interesting experiences. Slavery could consist of being trapped on board Low and Nullsec, or Amarr stations, and having to find a way to escape and get a free ride out of there.

Would also be an interesting RP aspect for FiS players. Perhaps Null Alliances could give them an option: "Join us, or remain here; it's your choice ultimately." So now they have to Sub and join the Aliance, or stay in some remote locked down station, with little possibility of escape. There might be a way of course; but it shouldn't be easy.

2. I'd randomize it to virtually any Highsec station of 0.6 or higher. Dependent on Faction, and various other factors, this could be anywhere. Also, it might be interesting to introduce options to be of Pirate Factions at this point, with a potential to start off in these stations.

Minimal difficulty there. Some basic changes to clothing options, tattoos, and and jewelry; maybe even some alternative hairstyles, but the base Faction Races will all remain the same. This could be cool, and would give a reason for F2P players to begin in NPC Nullsec.

Perhaps you can even choose your Security level, and it may influence your starting ISK, Secuity status, etc..

3. Stepping out into the station, (as I mentioned earlier), would be most practically done through an Elevator or personnel transport system. Stations could have 'mini-subways' and elevators, as well as various other means of transportation. Elevators could hold 4-5 people, and if you had standings and shared contact info with someone, you could get a direct line to their intermediate or advanced housing, or even luxury accomodations to visit.

Basic menu options when you enter the Elevator could give you these options, provided that person was available and wanted visitors. Elevators would have to be the primary means of reaching personal quarters I think; as multiple rooms off hallways would require multiple instances of hallways just for access to rooms. Lots of walking and stuff most people would get bored of. Also, more architecture in the stations than you really should need.

Subways or Automated Station Transport , could actually have viewable transport using basic textures for transport tube walls visible through the windows; with higher definition textures as you start and stop, and they could have waiting times and scheduled routes.

That would actually be cool, although perhaps not most peoples ideal means of transportation.

CQ could have no more than a Elevator accessing a Central area, (maybe a pilots district), which just shuttles you straight up and down. Quick and Easy, access to trade hubs, bars, and tattoo shops.

Incorporating NeX into station services for specific items would be ideal. Obviously, for things like tattoos, nobody is actually going to want to run a shop, unless thay can actually do the tattoo themselves, which is unreasonable as an expectation. Certain services should be automated in this fashion, though a player might be responsible for providing that automated service.

4. Starcharts available in a tourism kiosk?

Some nice written and well-thought text there *thumbs*

Will try to give my opinions on some of the passages, this time going up the list:

Merging the two games on WiS was what I initially also had and still have in mind. Absolutely agree on that. Stations could and should be the connection between the two environments thus creating a whole community in the end.
It shouldn't fully depend on Dust being ported to PC later as there's enough options to merge PC and PS3 on Stations later if WiS is designed a way that works for both platforms.

What I mean by designed:

My opinion still remains that WiS should be mostly social. With mini-games, Points of Interest that are nice to look at while talking/chatting with your friends and alternatives to all the buttons.
For the Insurance Button on our NeoCom -> Add an NPC in some NPC Office or a terminal that we can use to insure our ships.
Players that don't wish to do so can still use the button. Still it adds some life to the station itself.
Add terminals/agents that are really present as well.
If both games were merged in WiS a EvE player would be able to select space missions while a Dust player would be able to select his ground missions.
This could be achieved relatively simple code-wise just by a query determining what type of account/player the character is that is asking for a mission at that moment.
If there's no combat on stations there's no advantage for one platform over the other thus making it not significant what controller is actually steering your character running around.



The idea of multiple trials to give people a longer look on FiS, well, not a bad idea. Could work as it may be very hard to have giving up training a FiS skill for three times and thus leading to a subscription. :)

Still I would deny F2Pers any access to the market. They should stay and remain unlicensed capsuleers with no access to their own ships and being tied to the stations.
WiS should be designed in a way that gives them enough to on those stations.
This leads to them having no need for any of the goods provided on the FiS market as long as those stay at the functionallity they currently have.
When you're flying no ship you have no need for guns or any other modules so you should be good with the goods provided by players on the stations, designed for being used in that environment.
Provide system goods that are sold by NPC like the basic ones nowdays. Something like PDAs, circuits, would have to think a bit further for some more, that are bought and sold by NPCs of different corps for different prices which would enable a player to buy them at X and sell them at Y.


Player transporting and slavery:

I know how good that might look but still it's a total loss of control for the one being transported or enslaved. You have absolutely NO control over what is happening. You have no chance to do anything against being dropped somewhere else or being jettisoned. That's an absolute no-go in game designing.
Slavery as well -> this is up to a Single Player RPG. In MMOs there mustn't be any form of loss of control for any player at any given time. A player wants to do what he is up to do. If he is able to complete what he wants to achieve is another side of the medal but outcome can still be controlled.
Although I might not be able to kill that faction spawn I could still try to make up with my own skill for lacking game/system-skills. Being a slave or transported without any form of own sov leaves me no option than to watch my monitor, waiting and hoping. Just no.



Personally I would limit F2Pers to a few high-sec stations (the hubs, they are crowded anyway and they provide those free players with a full and ready environment) which all are fully explorable.
In limiting free players to certain stations/systems (the hubs) you have control over the load they produce on the certain nodes.
As I tried to explain not everyone will be paying although I can think of a lot of things that could be sold in the NEX-Store to make it very attractive and having them spread all over New Eden is not a good idea.
You have to give them enough reasons to consider subscribing or using money on the NEX/Shop without making them think that they were fifth-class customers which would happen if they were only able to visit certain areas of all stations.

It's still possible to create areas for paying customers by adding some nice to have things to corp offices. Areas that are only accessable by corp members while denying F2Pers membership in corps as they provide nothing of interest for those.


Quarters / Appartments:

Capsuleers always receive a CQ everywhere. Was the issue with being demigods.
Capsuleers still have the option to buy/rent an appartment on one station at a time granting resident status as F2Pers should have as well.
Mini-Games and station activities should grant the ability to generate enough money to fund such an appartment without the need for anyone to grind.

Great thread!

My input for the capsuleers the subscribers though, would be to also get special story driven missions kinda like the current epic missions, and the cosmos sites, But these are just less rewarding actually, Yes your read it right LESS rewarding ISK/module wise.

My motivation for this is the basic complaint that people always complain about there fear of being mandatory to do WiS.
But if the rewards are less then the normal station missions this feeling wont happen.

The only real reward is to find more story and lore. (RPers)

Greetings

Jessy

I think CCP has made it clear that "Mini-games to do stuff" isn't really what they want to do as a whole.


PI is kind of like a mini-game, but it's really not in the long term - after you set things up production keeps going.


Creating content that pushes people to interact is the bigger mode of operation, rather than mini-games where people get lost and play alone indefinitely. The mini-game idea has been presented many times over the years and we pretty much get the same response. I'd say the primary thing is mini-games are for interactive fun (poker, strategy board game table, etc) that they've shown in the past.

The idea of employing WiSers would be more functional along the lines of "Bartender", "Recruiter", "Community Manager" - stuff where people actually create social things for their corp members.


So, a Recruiter would be someone who gets paid to sit in a station and work on recruiting players that walk by for a corp, capsuleers, etc. Pay them something for their troubles and as long as WiSers don't have aspirations of 100M per hour incomes (nor need it), then it's perfectly plausible.

Incarna HUGZ should be social gameplay in a totally new perspective.

A lot of the goals Incarna has is to fix a lot of the "unreal" parts of MMO games with Avatars and interaction. To take it the step further and make it a tangible social experience. Your characters look each other in the eyes, you're able to feel like the avatar across from you is a real person (lips move when they talk), etc.

These are things other MMOs would never dream of and have no intention of doing because they're trying to just feed the money machine. Incarna living up to these expectations will take it a step above and beyond for the typical experience. It'll take us to the classical days of MMOs before WOW where games were precipitated by doing things with OTHERS. Sure, there's going to be a curve - but the amount of investment and passion CCP puts into the projects is what makes it possible where other places just don't care.

It's clinical to other companies, for CCP it's passion.

I think one of our concerns is rewarding players - players play games to feel "good". But, in EVE that definition is very different. Losing your ship can be rewarding in many cases. It's not just about the bank account, it's also about the experience. Sure, a lot of high-sec carebears really are petrified of losing their ships, but it's because they're experiencing something profound that they may not be able to somewhere else. We provide content for each other.

As a niche game, looking at other Sci Fi intellectual properties for inspiration is critical. A lot of Sci Fi initlaly became successful because of the way it was able to present social inequalities and challenges outside the context of the social times of the day. Aliens could be represented as racial minorities, women could be empowered - the whole of humanity could be examined and allow the human psyche to explore it without being trapped by the limitations of our "shallow" world experiences. Can that be transferred to Incarna?

This wouldn't be to give Incarna an Social Agenda in itself - but to allow those kinds of Social agendas that are natural to the human experience to manifest in themselves separate of our "real" lives. The oppressed become the oppressor when they are empowered. The poor become the rich.

Perhaps Incarna should also have a place to take the experiences from spaceships and turn them into an opportunity for Zen-like wisdom through reflection. Or at least allow some players to create that experience as for themselves. It doesn't all have to be grit and oppression. An open meditation garden would be a unique addition. Based on some cultural derivatives that can be based on each of the races. The Minmatar, Gallente, Caldari and Amarr would all have these cultural focal points. What gameplay purpose does it serve? Well, it serves a social purpose.

I generally describe EVE as a very "natural" game. There are natural consequences to activities. You lose a ship, it's destroyed. You **** someone off, they try and kill you. You get arrogant and someone puts you down. You get lucky and someone takes your money. EVE is Real is a fun slogan, but to me EVE is Natural. That doesn't sound as cool though.

What does the rabbit hole do for you?

After reading some more about DUST lore, I found it interesting that there are no "female dust" bodies.

They all use generic bodies, apparently. Now, maybe they'll get some customization from a lore perspective as the technology advances, but I'm getting the impression body customization in Dust will be pretty limited.

This'd make an interesting experience if we're sharing WIS with Dust players since it'll become blatantly obvious who is the Dust players and who are the EVE players.

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I think there is something to be said about having the full loss concept apply to WIS. Although being "enslaved" doesn't sound like fun, it really is only a step beyond losing everything you have in EVE already. The question is, how can that be fun in itself? It would be pretty crazy game experience that's for sure. And maybe that's what we should be looking for - how can we get these great sandbox experiences out of WIS?


The idea of establishments being the point of generating influence builds into the concept of promoting out of pod activities. However, it puts the weight on the actual establishment owners rather than on CCP to provide gimmick feats for stepping out of a station. An establishment owner has to promote and endorse activities at his establishment, get them to go to his establishment to generate influence for a district.

there are two different bodies in DUST (well, gameplay wise anyway.... lore is probably different).

1. the eunuch "marine" (or whatever) in the armour
2. the player avatar

essentially, the same thing we do right now

1. In WiS, you can be male/female and look however you want.
2. In space, we all look like a 1 meter long egg (though have a portrait for comms and stuff)

Rather than climbing into the armour, the DUST marines will JC into the clone that's suited up in the armour. (whereas we just climb into the pod).