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Player Features and Ideas Discussion

 
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Odyssey: The Big Lie - Let's bring back exploration in exploration.

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Antangil
Stranger Skies Collective
#61 - 2013-05-31 02:36:27 UTC
Little Dragon Khamez wrote:
Antangil wrote:
...


You no likey? I would allow pos's that can be anchored anywhere in the game for all of the above reasons, not withstanding server problems of course. New eden is not a nice place to live. The ideas can be finessed to prevent abuses and can be used to drive conflict or encourage cooperation.


Nope, being able to lock down the incoming side of a wormhole and then log off makes the entire concept of wormhole living untenable, especially for higher-class wormholes that typically require long chains to reach k-space. Unless the stations were so laughably easy to kill that a crashing crew could pull it off (read a single Moros and maybe a couple T3s), you've just hugely nerfed the (as I've mentioned previously) end-state for many exploration-minded pilots. Logistics (not Guardians, Obelisks) becomes nearly impossible, since the mass needed to transit a POS-bashing fleet will crit the hole and keep the freighters from making complete trips.

POS-supported HIC drag bubbles would simply lead to a proliferation of blockade runners and nullified T3s; null is already full of people complaining about cloakies. I don't have as big a problem with this because I tend to travel in nullified T3s, but the supply chain geniuses that keep the big null alliances working would (likely) have a complete meltdown. You could fix both of these problems by prohibiting defensive emplacements, I suppose, but then you'll lose the damn thing every time you fall asleep.

Proliferation of market scams like the ones I mentioned would drive people to simply not use POS market hubs for safety reasons. Whee, another shiny thing with exceptionally limited utility that clutters up my market window. If this functionality is really necessary, make player-owned market hubs act like POCOs; anchored around a planet, not defensible but definitely destructable, available to anyone willing to pay the taxes; they shouldn't be built into POSes (which are specifically designed to be restricted-access).
Cailais
The Red Pill Taker Group
#62 - 2013-05-31 15:42:49 UTC
CCP Bayesian wrote:
Cailais, that's the sort of thing I mean. By more dynamic I also mean how the Universe works should be more dynamic, rather than static mission data we should allow for some procedural variation, likewise exploration and other content. This is the sort of stuff people are talking about here really.

Further the spawning of these things could change over time both as a 'natural' process of the Universe (think seasons) and based on player actions (think creating a crazy "weather controlling" laser).

Then we have the true Universe shaping things where players can actually build and blow up things in space in a more vibrant manner than they can currently.

I'm just shooting from the hip with ideas but ultimately I don't think exploration is ever a game system but the result of curiosity about something unknown. This generation of 'the unknown' occurs as a result of the emergent interaction between systems.

I also think just sneaking things in would be lovely but we need to work out ways of doing that without it being far too easy to discover. People already data mine everything that is publically accessible. But that is a different technical problem.


'Seasonal' variation might work - depending upon if you have extreme and 'temperate' conditions (to expand upon the analogy). The Incursions mechanics are the closest example seen within EVE to date. The risk of course is that once you've experience 'weather' in one place, you've experienced it everywhere.

Player universe shaping appeals, to me at least, because it is predictable (to a degree) but not 'seasonal'. An example might be inhabitants of a certain area constructing 'stuff'.

Exploration then might be delivered as content through a layered approach of both 'seasonal' or natural universe changes and player shaping.

Example: 'Seasonal' change in a system, players inhabit that system to establish structures to plunder new resources, further seasonal change (or player actions) deplete those resources, players abandon system. Some time later an explorer finds these long abandoned structures (and plunders through hacking/archeo/salvaging).

Of course we shouldn't be limited here to *just* structures - but also routes and pathways. Most of the building blocks exist ("incursion" spawn mechanism, worm holes, player built structures, basic exploration system and resource gathering tools).

All that is really needed are "triggering effects" - an abandoned POS implodes, creating a debris field and gas cloud (a poor example but given for illustration purposes). Linking these elements together might be a good way of creating explorable chains of content through emergent interaction.

C.