Post-NSF Op Rehash: Discussion

[Incognito]

Step 1: Change how fed works or remove it. right now people can get blanket protection. Change it so that You're only protected if you are federal player, in a federal ship.

By fed ships, do you mean only the FD/FW/FU or racial/good ships? If only the good ships were protected, the start of the game would make it nearly impossible for any alliance to make money. Some sort of delay would need to be implemented. In this case, it would be better to just restrict players to their own races fed, no matter what their relations with another race are.

Step 2: Lower the penalty for deaths. Right now the biggest reward for killing someone in most cases is the grief factor of knowing you just ruined their day and wiped out days worth of effort, Change the penalty for dying to promote more interaction. increase insurance reimbursement on ships, lower the exp loss.

Dying should hurt. Weakening it any further takes away an aspect of the game, in my opinion. By weakening deaths, it just encourages players to fly around recklessly, which removes some of the strategy to the game. The exp loss has been lowered enough already.

Step 3: remove planet galaxies and have planets scattered randomly in one large neutral galaxy

Interesting idea. Not sure how I feel about this yet.

step 4: remove mines. Mines are ANTI fun. The only thing mines do is prevent players from interacting with each other, oh you want to actually fight other players? well you better spend 5 days saving turns to clear a single path through thousands of mines, and then another 5 days saving turns to see if they refilled that path, and in the slim chance they didn't you can try and attack a planet, but in all likelyhood you are going to just clear mines again.

I am against removing mines, especially if you want 1 neutral with all the planets. The function of a minefield is alliance dependent. For an alliance that isn't active, mines act as the bulk of the planet defense, primarily killing opponent turns and protecting traders from enemy hunters. On the other hand, an active alliance might use mines more a a delay tactic until they can get people on to counter-op. I don't think removing mines would help the game. I can only see it helping solo players that want a free pass to explore an alliances territory.

Step 5: combine all of the steps above to make it so that players are more likely to engage in combat with each other, they wont hide in fed, and planets will be easier to find, easier to attempt to bust, and in the event people die, it wont set them back days.

The problem isn't exactly access to the planets right now. Instead, it is getting enough people on at once to attack a planet with any decent return for the turns/cash spent. And for people to be more likely to engage in combat, you first need people to play. Look at the FFA rounds. Let's be honest, they haven't been insanely active. Sure, there have been moments of intense activity, but they are few and spread out. Most people would agree with me on that.

[silverx2]

Yes, just the 3 federal ships. On a deeper outside the box thought: Maybe create a way so that HQ's are actually Large carrier ships, think SMS's or maybe the power equal to a level 70 planet good aligned players can dock, but the HQ's are also able to be attacked by anyone not of that race unless they are evil. Maybe make it so once that HQ is wiped out its gone for the rest of the game. early game it gives "good" players a safe place to park, but end game its just as vulnerable as planets.

Dying should hurt, but not at the expense of lowering activity. If people are less likely to stop after getting podded its a good thing. the loss of EXP, the Loss of the ship, the loss of any money you had on you, the loss of turns getting a new ship and weapons. a single death later in the game can ruin a week worth of turns and credits, a death early on for solo players can end their game. this is a game, a game with a shrinking player base. Make it more fun.

I will always be an Avid hater of mines so this is something we will have to agree to disagree on. Mines are the single biggest time sink in the game both in creating the field, and clearing it. all that time would be better suited to having players interact with each other instead of mines. Regarding activity do you think people are more likely or less likely to join in on an op if they know that instead of 3 hours of coordinated mine clearing, the plan is Log in, meet in sector X, and then go directly to the enemy planets and start fighting. I know for me its all about the fighting, sure ill clear those fricking mines, but ill be bored the entire time, give me someone living to shoot at. Mines are all time consuming, Zero reward.

[JettJackson]

Step 1: Change how fed works or remove it. right now people can get blanket protection. Change it so that You're only protected if you are federal player, in a federal ship.

Step 2: Lower the penalty for deaths. Right now the biggest reward for killing someone in most cases is the grief factor of knowing you just ruined their day and wiped out days worth of effort, Change the penalty for dying to promote more interaction. increase insurance reimbursement on ships, lower the exp loss.

Step 3: remove planet galaxies and have planets scattered randomly in one large neutral galaxy

step 4: remove mines. Mines are ANTI fun. The only thing mines do is prevent players from interacting with each other, oh you want to actually fight other players? well you better spend 5 days saving turns to clear a single path through thousands of mines, and then another 5 days saving turns to see if they refilled that path, and in the slim chance they didn't you can try and attack a planet, but in all likelyhood you are going to just clear mines again.

Step 5: combine all of the steps above to make it so that players are more likely to engage in combat with each other, they wont hide in fed, and planets will be easier to find, easier to attempt to bust, and in the event people die, it wont set them back days.

1. Doesn't work for solo players or at the beginning of the game
2. This was done just recently so there is not a reason to lower the penalties again.
3. Has been done before with very little to no success.
4. Mines serve many purposes besides a defense of planets, they slow traders you are trying to actively hunt plus they are a factor in fights
5. Combining all these things would only feed into the best players and widen a gap between those who are good and those who aren't.

[silverx2]

1. Doesn't work for solo players or at the beginning of the game
2. This was done just recently so there is not a reason to lower the penalties again.
3. Has been done before with very little to no success.
4. Mines serve many purposes besides a defense of planets, they slow traders you are trying to actively hunt plus they are a factor in fights
5. Combining all these things would only feed into the best players and widen a gap between those who are good and those who aren't.

1.) see my addendum in response to incognito,
2.) I don't die often enough to really notice, how far back were the changes made?
3.) When?
4.) Create better ways of doing it, and an emp weapon that gives the same effect as hitting a mine. Remove things that stagnate the game and innovate a bit.
5.) This is really something that we can just guess on. I don't have the numbers but i'm sure someone who does could whip up a chart that shows a steady decline in players, Maybe this widens the gap between good and not good, or maybe it creates ways where players are able to do more with less by removing the things that prevent them from being able to excel(mines blocking galaxies, locations, planets)

[JettJackson]

1. Doesn't work for solo players or at the beginning of the game
2. This was done just recently so there is not a reason to lower the penalties again.
3. Has been done before with very little to no success.
4. Mines serve many purposes besides a defense of planets, they slow traders you are trying to actively hunt plus they are a factor in fights
5. Combining all these things would only feed into the best players and widen a gap between those who are good and those who aren't.

1.) see my addendum in response to incognito,
2.) I don't die often enough to really notice, how far back were the changes made?
3.) When?
4.) Create better ways of doing it, and an emp weapon that gives the same effect as hitting a mine. Remove things that stagnate the game and innovate a bit.
5.) This is really something that we can just guess on. I don't have the numbers but i'm sure someone who does could whip up a chart that shows a steady decline in players, Maybe this widens the gap between good and not good, or maybe it creates ways where players are able to do more with less by removing the things that prevent them from being able to excel(mines blocking galaxies, locations, planets)

1. I see, that is a huge code change and still I don't think that is the best idea because it is limiting to many players

2 in 2011, from the change log

Experience Loss
Experience lost for dying to other players increased by a flat 2% at all levels.
Experience lost to planets is now (27 - PlanetLevel/10)% down from 33%. This means you lose 20% when dying to a level 70.
Experience lost to ports is now (31 - PortLevel)% down from 33%. This means you lose 30% when dying to a level 1 but only 21% to a level 9.
Experience lost to forces has been reduced to 30% from 33%.

3. 2010 and 2011 I believe, they were on a couple of maps beausoleil made.

4. This boils down to coding issues, if we can get a coder to do all of this it would maybe be feasible.

5. you don't need a chart to know this, all you need to know is the premise of this thread, the fact that 3 teams are teaming to hit one, that is evidence enough to know the player gap is widening.

[jouldax]

I would love to implement a way to attack fed later in the game, but that would require coding, and I can't just remove it, because that would be unfair to newbies. I think I may at least push, for now, for a turn generation penalty for parking in fed (maybe gain turns at 75% of max speed) so there is SOME downside to sitting there all game. Anyhow, based on all your feedback, there are really two options:

Go the Hugh/Greydeath way and shrink alliances and allow NAPs/treaties. I'm not sure the code for all of this works/is still in place

or

Raise the vet cap to 11 or 12 and the newb cap to 4, implement a 24 hour alliance switching penalty, and figure out what the hell to do with planets beyond my earlier suggestions (deadlier but fewer gens).

You all do realize that, with option 2, based on current activity, there will be about 3 active alliances at most with a very good chance of it ending up being a 2 on 1 situation, right? Although, with activity lately, it may just end up being a 1 on 1 with a random assortment. I really did like have 4 active alliances this game, and I'm not so sure I want to get away from that, but I don't have any answers unless we keep the game the way it is now, shrink planets a little more, make galaxies slightly more defensible, and maybe shrink the map size...

[JettJackson]

I would love to implement a way to attack fed later in the game, but that would require coding, and I can't just remove it, because that would be unfair to newbies. I think I may at least push, for now, for a turn generation penalty for parking in fed (maybe gain turns at 75% of max speed) so there is SOME downside to sitting there all game. Anyhow, based on all your feedback, there are really two options:

Go the Hugh/Greydeath way and shrink alliances and allow NAPs/treaties. I'm not sure the code for all of this works/is still in place

or

Raise the vet cap to 11 or 12 and the newb cap to 4, implement a 24 hour alliance switching penalty, and figure out what the hell to do with planets beyond my earlier suggestions (deadlier but fewer gens).

You all do realize that, with option 2, based on current activity, there will be about 3 active alliances at most with a very good chance of it ending up being a 2 on 1 situation, right? Although, with activity lately, it may just end up being a 1 on 1 with a random assortment. I really did like have 4 active alliances this game, and I'm not so sure I want to get away from that, but I don't have any answers unless we keep the game the way it is now, shrink planets a little more, make galaxies slightly more defensible, and maybe shrink the map size...

Option 1 would insure the chances of 3 or even 4 vs 1s when that is unneeded, hypothetically what would change from this game if we imposed NAPs? The same people would still be working with each other while you'd limit my alliance specifically by lowering our alliance cap even more and forcing us to either NAP with people or do without. NAPs just won't work at this junction. Making the gals more defensible would be key however, there have been times were we had people to defend but were jailed into our planet gal because there was absolutely no way to defend the rocks. Shrinking the planets would probably be a bad idea, making them more deadly initially but with less gens could be the way to go in reality. Weakening planets would make it pointless to land on them especially if fed is close to the planets. We shouldn't be driving this game to a fed only game because if that happens it might as well just shut down.

[jouldax]

I was never talking about shrinking the planets without some sort of offset, just shrinking the map size and the gen count to make busting easier, but raising deadliness (add hangars and/or turrets).

I'm really glad everyone who cares is participating in this discussion, because this is the kind of discourse we need to improve the game. I hope you all realize that my changes are only being made to try to facilitate as much activity as possible, and that many of these changes involve some trial and error. I thought this round went fairly well, as a whole, minus the ending, and would like to keep tweaking the game to improve upon the experience.

[silverx2]

I would love to implement a way to attack fed later in the game, but that would require coding, and I can't just remove it, because that would be unfair to newbies. I think I may at least push, for now, for a turn generation penalty for parking in fed (maybe gain turns at 75% of max speed) so there is SOME downside to sitting there all game. Anyhow, based on all your feedback, there are really two options:

While that might work i think it would do more harm then good, you will end up with one alliance which has wiped out the opposing enemy galaxy and then from that point forward always has 25% more turns to make a giant mine field/defend/trade/hunt.

Without some major code changes its just going to very hard to make the type of changes needed to really keep things moving at a brisk pace in game.

[JettJackson]

I was never talking about shrinking the planets without some sort of offset, just shrinking the map size and the gen count to make busting easier, but raising deadliness (add hangars and/or turrets).

I'm really glad everyone who cares is participating in this discussion, because this is the kind of discourse we need to improve the game. I hope you all realize that my changes are only being made to try to facilitate as much activity as possible, and that many of these changes involve some trial and error. I thought this round went fairly well, as a whole, minus the ending, and would like to keep tweaking the game to improve upon the experience.

I am not sure about a turn penalty for fed, especially since everyone starts in fed and is there for the most part for the first couple of weeks.