Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Operating on the principle that Local Is The Problem™, I thought I'd brainstorm some Dscan ideas.

Local in Null currently provides the following information:
1. Number of pilots in system.
2. Name, Corp, etc, of all pilots in system.

#1 is essential to pvp and pve in all forms. If you don't know whether there are targets in system or not, you can't roam for targets. So this is something we need to keep. #2 IMO goes too far, and makes identifying those targets trivially easy. However, identifying targets DOES need to be done, but it should take some effort. Keep in mind this goes both ways, for pvp and pvp avoidance; that's how the cat and mouse game works. It wouldn't be a game worth playing otherwise.

So on these principles, I suggest that a dscan overhaul include the following features:

1. A "ping" that identifies the number of active pilots in system.
-Lore: Ships with an active warp core have an easily identifiable scan signature. Shut down or unoccupied ships do not. Does not function in wormholes due to "interference" (yay technobabble)
-Required to preserve roaming small gang gameplay, and to separate Null from WH.

2. Range dependent intel gathering.
-At long range it only reports number of ships in radius, and number of those ships that are active.
-At medium range it also reports the name and type of ship. (this is what Dscan does now)
-At close range it also reports the Corp/Ticker, and exactly which ships are currently piloted.
-Identifying pilots by name is not possible until you see them on grid.

3. Alter range with the angle function.
-A 5 degree scan may have a max range of 64 AU; a 360 degree scan will be limited to more like 20 AU. "Medium Range" represents the current function of Dscan, so we can set that to match the current 14 AU at 360 degrees.
-This allows active scouts to quickly recon a system, but limits the value of sitting in one spot spamming the scan button.
-It makes dscan/recon a valuable RL skill, similar to probing.
-It makes scouting a more important fleet role and gameplay function.
-It gives a hunter an intel advantage vs prey, but still allows prey a margin of defense.

4. Cloaking: While on grid with a cloaker, allow Dscan to provide a vector to the cloaked target.
-This makes hunting cloakers possible under limited circumstances, but preserves the "safe while in deep space" function.
-It prevents cloakers/cyno droppers from sitting on grid waiting and forces them to move aggressively at the right moment.

5. Cloaking: At close range report the number of cloaked ships within radius.
-This would allow hunting cloakers that sit on celestials, but would also give more warning to prey that's using their dscan properly. You bloodthirsty types want to hunt cloakers? Give us some ground in exchange.
-It directly addresses the AFK Cloaking problem by giving you intel on when a cloaker is moving into a position to become a threat.


Lastly, integrate these new features into the UI somehow. Either on the new map or on the sensor overlay. Lists in windows are important, but they are very "Spreadsheets in Space"-ey. Showing the Dscan cone in space, or in the new map window would be awesome. Actually, this feature currently exists in a limited form on the f11 map, but the f11 map sucks, so yeah. Improve on that.

When responding to this post, remember this is just a brainstorm.

When all this, or something like it, is done, the cloak/afk problem will be mitigated. The hunter/prey gameplay will be redone and null will much more exciting. Then we can move Nullsec Local to the Delayed system. I suggest overhauling Dscan in one release, and removing "Always On" local in Nullsec in the following release. Lowsec can be unchanged to preserve current gameplay.

edit: Updated with some minor cloaking detection ideas, formatting.

The easiest way to understand something is to break it down into its component uses.

Cloaking..
-Removes us from d-scan.
-Allows us to be on the same grid as another player without their knowing.
-Does nothing for information from local or watchlists.


Separate or distinguish these function, and you narrow the problem.

For example, we could have a device which makes one invisible on the same grid, but visible on d-scan.

Alternately, we could have a device which obfuscates d-scan, but doesn't make one invisible on the same grid.

In the further extreme, we could have a device which neither removes one from d-scan, nor from being visible, but removes one from local chat.

Naturally, it would make sense that these systems not be able to be used simultaneously, and in most cases not be used perpetually.

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In general, I am strongly in favor of a broad diminution of the capabilities of d-scan. It's a major impediment to other areas of game development. For a large number of players, it has no real abiding use except to hurl insults at one another. For some that may be as important as the ship spin counter, but we could get on fine without it. All d-scan signals should really be reduced to 1, 10, 100 or 1000MN signals, distinguished by the four main signal types. Only the ship/core scanner should distinguish these signals by an ID code. It should also lose precise range finding, eliminating the advantages of spamming it for targets on one's own grid. Instead, just round to the nearest AU, with "<1AU" as the smallest increment.

A further nerf could be to make d-scanning yield no valuable results within or towards any belt or within 1M km of any planetary system or major solar body. Perhaps even different groups of ships could have more restricted d-scan range, with pods and free ships having the most awful scanning capabilities and update frequencies.

Another area of consideration could be grid sizes. They don't seem to have changed more than once or twice in the past decade. Is it possible that the hardware is in a place where increasing their volume can be considered? Could greater engagement ranges come with new mechanics, like a cloak that only works based on signature ratios? Could we have dynamic signatures based on the current range between target and targeter? Is it possible to have a sufficiently compromised cloaking system that a "silent running" mode could be added to most hulls by default, and that stealth modules would simply amplify this innate ability?

What kind of modules and modes are needed is really shaped by the environments in which players are asked to operate. If you aren't pondering the implementation of new environments, such as perhaps asteroid fields whose only descriptors could include immensity or other superlatives, then perhaps we don't need very much in the way of new things. Most player engagement currently occur at chokepoints and load-in zones anyhow, and most solar systems tend to feel very small.

^ this

So lI live in a glorious future world with faster than light travel, weapons or awesome destructive capability and immortaily (so long as you pay your subscription ). All of this and I can't get a computer system that knows to restart a scan cycle wihtout me pushing a button?

Support this idea but only if combined with the elimination of local at the same time. Nice work on the dscan overhaul btw

So let's make some obvious statements (give me a minute hey?)

1. We are playing a game. This is to be fun otherwise you are no longer playing a game.
2. Different players find fun in different ways
3. In the forum "features and Ideas discussion" the primary and ultimate factor for any post is logical gameplay design.
4. The gameplay design must create more fun in an equal embrace of all (or as many possible) gameplay styles (balance)
Removing annoyances = more fun. Removing bad design, altering factors that are not working as intended and rebalancing elements of gameplay are done to increase fun.

Eve has been designed with some founding principles that include:

1. The loss of your ship has a consequence (sometimes large) and this means all players have to make a risk assessment upon each and every undock
2. Travel to far off places takes an investment of proportional time
3. Harvesting of resources, in game, is directly proportional to the amount of risk you take (well perhaps not always but am I wrong that this should be?)
3a. Resources include: anything that can be manufactured, anything that results in an increase to your wallet balance, anything that improves (in your own eyes) your reputation (apparently some players have ego's), anything that can be used to an advantage over your opponent (eg: intel) and anything that rewards the players game style choice (fun again).
4. By joining with like minded players you can increase your effectiveness by a degree greater than 1 (MMO)

Ask yourself when posting what your motivations are and be honest with yourself before you just blurt out a bunch of frustrations without consideration of these factors.

So AFK Cloaking in null sec:

Part of the reason cyno bridge jumping was brought into game was because it is too easy to lock down a system at the jump gate entry points.

Because of the ship loss consequence (loss of isk and time), choke points had to be implemented into the game as drivers of conflict. The working of Jump gates could be considered to be a conflict driver but could also be considered antiquated and outdated in design (Something that could be changed for all or a portion of ship types but at the risk of possible far reaching unwelcome changes - why do we enter at 20km from the out gate? ).

Eve is constantly in need of conflict drivers because of the risk of loss. Not everyone is risk averse but, because of this cost of loss and allowance of non consensual PvP there needs to be means to generate fights when one party does not necessarily agree. Particularly when they are trying to harvest a lucrative resource to their advantage (over another).

Cloak parking in a null sec or low sec system could be considered (it's arguable) no worse than a null sec insta-lock multi-bubble gate camp. They are both mechanisms of "the Gank" not often creating interactive PVP.

Yet, it is easy to understand the frustration of members of a massive organisation that has taken efforts to secure up the systems they "control" when they find they cannot actively attempt to make their home safe (by removing a threat), because they are cloaked and effectively invulnerable.

However, suggestions to nerf cloak parking without other measures are totally unbalanced, as there must be a greater risk in null sec to match the greater reward of null sec. Where is the conflict driver? Where is the risk?

There must be means on which an active force has a chance to intercept an unwilling target in a system located behind a system or number of systems that are covered by the same collective force with intelligence on tap (local & standings).

Therefore in conclusion:
There can be no quick fix to this problem without also taking action on the ability of a collective to secure (region wide) intel and system control

LOL

Is it deliberate that this thread was started by ISD "Loss of Faith"? (my bad)

Thank you for this containment sticky.

Contrary to your opinion, everyone disagreeing with you does not make your idea good.

If one group says "paint the wall blue" and another group says "paint the wall green" then "Burn the house down" does not magically become a good idea, even though everyone disagrees with it.

As I mentioned in the last thread involving sound feedback, it is a terrible idea because the majority of players, and the vast vast majority of social players play with the sound off in order to play with friends, or watch movies, or listen to music, etc etc.


No to any proposal involving forced use of in game sound as a central game mechanic.

No the ideas themselves are pretty good, not just because people don't like them. Generally when you have an impasse, suggestions that irritate both sides are the ones that will work.

As for your problem with sound feedback, you get tons of sound feedback from the game. If you turn it off, that's your business, but it might get you killed. Nobody is forcing you to hear your free warning, go ahead, stick your head in the sand.

Simple solution, add a visual as well. I never said anything about it being entirely auditory. Certainly you should be able to see something. For example, that the applicable ship is on scan, or that the applicable probes are on scan. Maybe a pulse of light. Could be a lot of things.

I think you jumped to conclusions about what I've said. I never took any stand on an entirely auditory mechanic. There could certainly be a visual to go with the effect and indeed there should be. Now, that said, if you are alt-tabbed you won't see the visuals, and if you also choose to have the sound turned off, that's your business, but it might get you killed.