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Eve Vegas 2014 - General Game Design

This was a bit boarder in topic but it was very much ask questions about Eve. This topic also had some longer discussion that I often did not include. One of those was in the realms of AFK cloaking. That had a long discussion attached to it and I wrote very little because it is the same arguments that have been going on for years.

There has been talk to censor these questions to 'good' questions. People ask what they want to ask. It is why they come. So enjoy both good and bad questions and know no one would censor you and tell you how to ask questions the right way.

Q: There have been a lot of changes to blueprints. Some people have invested what equals centuries of time into researching blueprints. There was no type of compensation when the blueprint research was changed and that time was lost where skills are at least reimbursed or something is given for other things that change.
A: We know that people have a lot of time invested into some things. But we are trying not to be afraid of changing things that need to be changed because of it. Industry was changed to improve things in a larger way in the game.

Q: How about giving us some free skill points to help when we lose things like research time that we've been heavily invested in?
A: Unallocated skill points are one of the most powerful things in the game. We have to be careful when we had them out.

Q: This was a longer question and commentary that wrapped up into the fact that there will be some major combat changes after Phoebe. What does CCP see in the future of this?
A: We have been trying things to create different types of combat situations. The ESS are an example of something we tried to experiment with that did not do as well as we hoped. We've had ideas for taking the asteroid belts and turning them into a super belt where people interacted across that belt and they'd be there doing many different things. We want more reasons for people to cross each other in space while just playing.

Q: How do you feel about the current T3 meta?
A: They are very strong. e will be passing over them. Some subsystems are used some are never used. We'd like there to be interesting choice with the usage.
A: I feel we have been trying to find a way to put a more mechanical pressure on logistics. Some idea will come to us that will achieve this.

Q: Ship Skins. A demo was shown that would give more options in the future?
A: Some of that is art and some of that is us deciding how extreme we want it to go. Do we just release faction skins? Do players submit skins? Do we just let you do whatever you want with everything
(Note: There were some general requests here for the ability to color ships to ones hearts content and promise/threats that they will make pink ships if CCP lets them.)

Q: In game EFT type tool
A: Tuxford wants to have a fitting tool in the game. We'd like to add them. We're not fully sure what we would do. If we'd try to fully replace a player built tool like EFT and Pfya or if we'd just try to give some of the stats and information. Things like importing from these player built projects is a good step and CCP Seagull is passionate about supporting that type of interfacing.

Q: You discussed using frigates to get to places. How we can just jump into an interceptor or assault frigate and go twenty jumps. How about reducing clone costs for vets if you expect us to get into these ships. And what content for veteran players have you looked at making and what type of progress goals do you have for those of us who don't have anything left to learn.
A: CCP Foxfour discussed his presentation.
A: The clone upgrade system is a weak system. Clones however are tightly tied to lore and the game itself. They are learning towards removal but its something they want to adjust down in general. The 30% reduction showed absolutely no change in clone costs. They don't know if that's just because of what clone usage is like or if it is just because 30% was not enough of a decrease to matter to people.
Q: If they remove clone costs would there be a SP loss mechanic still?
A: No. The entire mechanic would be scrapped for something better. People are still having loss on death and they don't want to discourage people from undocking. Ship loss is already a penalty that people get. Clone loss is another penalty on top of that.

Q: Suggesting of an implant insurance scheme to give implants an insurance level of some type.
A: Insurance is an ISK faucet not a sink. To make the insurance worth it they have to open another faucet. They are careful wit that.
A: It is easy to look at the bad medical clone system on its own. Then an implant system is another thing to look at on its own.

Q: Do you plant o release more genolution implants?
A; We always reserve the right to rerelease them when we want to.

A discussion on how logistics and ewar do not scale well.

Q: Now that we have multi sell can we have multi buy?
A: Hopefully

Q: How about clone fatigue for jumping? After so many deaths skill loss starts?
A by Fozzie: That's a very harsh penalty for undocking. Skill loss is very delicate and one of the harshest penalties in Eve.
A by Rise: Id prefer that if we have loss there was more reward or more choice. Not a pure penalty. That makes people not want to play.

Q: Instead of losing skill points you can't undock?
A: We always want players to undock

Q: Jump fatigue is going to severely hamper BlOps. Can we warp cloaked now to at least give us something to do while we wait?
A: We are wiling to consider it when we rebalance

Q: Cloaky AFK campers? My people log in, see the cloaky camper and log out. They can't play. This is botting!
A: No it is not botting. They are not killing you while they are afk. We do want interesting game play around cloaking and hunting cloakers. We know that there is a psychological thing going on with people more then anything else. Wormholers function fine with cloaky campers.
(Note: This thing went into a rather long back and forth over cloaky camping)
A: We'd like to replace local with a better set of intel tools for Sov holders.

Q: Can we drop out of local?
A: Its a bit to strong to just cut oneself out in the current method. But it is a possibility when we rebalance.

Q: Can Covert ops can turn their covert ops cloak on under gate cloak?
A: That's a bit strong

Q: Decloak bubbles?
A: That is a big strong. It creates a gate camping tool

Q: Clean up skills like advanced target management where there is no reason to learn it beyond a point because almost no ship can even use it in a reasonable way?
A: We are doing a touch up of skills as we cross them and cleaning up legacy things and old quirks

Q: Fitting ships of many types sucks. Mass fitting and mass price quites to buy a fit. Right now it all sucks.
A: Multisell is a first step in this direction

And that is it for the round table sessions I took notes for!

Comments

  1. Thank you for posting these transcripts. I find the idea of mechanical limitations for logistics very interesting, currently there just is no other practical way to get longevity in a fight. Lots of interesting possibilities here, the obvious being giving all remote reps heat generation or charges like the ancilliary repers. Or maybe a complete rethink and instead of having them cure damage they merely reduce incoming damage by shooting down incoming shells or spoofing targeting systems to lower the quality of the hits by reducing the sig of the ship which is being helped.

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    Replies
    1. Thank you for reading. The round tables are fascinating.

      The mechanical restrictions is def a broad topic. Its not just a matter of more powerful ECM or damps.

      Delete
  2. Overall I thought this was probably the best roundtable -- admittedly I didn't take notes, having come in too late in the game. :-(

    I did like the suggestion (it seemed Fozzie and Rise liked it too) of having more expensive clones have more implant slots.

    Removing the skill-loss mechanic would be a huge boon to nullsec, with its anchored and dictor bubbles, and the fact that if your ship dies inside one, it's virtually guaranteed your pod will too. I think it would encourage people to be more interested in at least visiting/roaming thru null, if not flat out move out there.

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    Replies
    1. More implant slots would be absolutely amazing, something that would make forking out 40mil a clone for would be well justified.

      Delete
  3. Q: If they remove clone costs would there be a SP loss mechanic still?
    A: No. The entire mechanic would be scrapped for something better. People are still having loss on death and they don't want to discourage people from undocking. Ship loss is already a penalty that people get. Clone loss is another penalty on top of that.


    This is idiotic... Loss is REAL in EVE and that is in large part why EVE is the game that it is... What do you want? Die and respawn in the ship you were in without ANY CONSEQUENCES????? Go play WOW FFS.

    Whiny effin children...

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    Replies
    1. I didnt hear anyone suggest that a ship would respawn. The loss of implants and likely trip to home system is a penalty. Clone costs are only one part of the loss.

      Delete
    2. TurAmarth,

      With the exception of finding an opportunity to inject a little HTFU hyperbole, it’s difficult to tell what the import of your comment is.

      Though the question was very specific, kindly allow me to elaborate with even greater precision, “If they remove [medical] clone [upgrade] costs would there [still] be a SP loss mechanic . . . ?”

      Are you arguing that they shouldn’t remove medical clone upgrades with the associated costs or are you arguing that if they do decide to remove medical clone upgrades, they should nonetheless retain skill point loss?

      Though I find it an annoying “gotcha” style game mechanic that dings you for not pausing to undertake proper bookkeeping in the heat of battle, one can still argue that they should keep medical clone upgrade costs in place.

      I *suppose* one could argue that they should dump medical clone upgrades but retain skill point loss. Of course that well nigh guarantees that PvPing inevitably produces a long slow return to noobhood for the pod popped. I've strong suspicion *that* type of mechanic wouldn't generate enthusiasm among PvPers.

      Delete
    3. @Dire you would be correct ^_^

      Also it's a little silly that when I zip around in a frigate in 0.0 and I die my completely blank clone costs more to replace then the ship+fittings+cargo I just lost. One could quit easily argue that it discourages high SP players from PvP'ing in 0.0 in smaller ships.

      Delete
    4. Totally agree with this.

      Delete
    5. For veterian players they should "know better" than to lose their clone. There have been nerf's to the overall cost of the clone upgrade. Should CCP swing the nerf bat again(on the cost)? How cheap should this risk be for veterian player vs. noobs? I believe this is already close to balanced.

      Everytime you undock you are dead, its just a matter of how much risk you are willing to take and how smart your hunter is. :-D

      Delete
    6. Yea..... sorry, I was a wee bit in the bag that night... I just get riled when vets whine and moan about loss... and all most of them want to do is make OTHERS lose their stuff... but Ohhh not ME! I'm a Veteran! I have put YEARS into this game!

      Vet or noob, loss is loss...and all those Vets out there bemoaning the cost of a clone need to stop and remember when they were new... When making 1m ISK onna mission was GOOD ISK... I have put 4 years into this game... and I have a blog of my own which sometimes spend as many hours on as I do playing... and I aint Space Rich by a long shot, got just over 100m ISK in my wallet ATM... but clone costs? potential SP loss? Cost of doing business as far as I am concerned... talk about risk adverse.

      We vets have some seriously real advantages over noobs and younger players... so the cost for loss to us should be commensurately higher, to balance things... the yin and the yang of life.

      Delete
  4. Maybe it is just me but the overall tone of the roundtable seemed decidedly negative. No compensation for time spent on invention. No to this, no to that, this is too strong, that is too strong. Cloaky AFK campers? Don't care. I'm afraid people are going to be unsubscribing at a faster rate. I myself will be transitioning from a paid subscription to PLEX, since I have significant in game ISK that isn't doing anything else at the moment.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Plex you buy for isk is actually more expensive than the subscription (19.95 vs. 14.95), so CCP will be happy you did that.

      Delete
    2. No doubt but when my isk is gone, so am I.

      Delete
    3. We'll all miss you when you finally stop threatening and actually LEAVE.

      Delete
    4. Ah, but when your isk is gone, other players can donate PLEX's to keep you here now :P

      Delete
    5. @wex - Given my current wealth and current and projected isk prices it will be a couple years at least. Do please hold your breathe though. :)

      Delete
  5. "Q: Can Covert ops can turn their covert ops cloak on under gate cloak?
    A: That's a bit strong"

    Then turn down the time that ships are visible after activating a cloak! As it is, you have to make yourself visible for far too long just to activate the cloak, all because you wanted to have another shiny animation without considering its mechanical effects and their repercussions.

    I'm guessing no one at CCP actually plays chess? The ability to think ahead always seems to elude them.

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  6. Someone pointed out that Rise is considering 'Perma-death' characters, so I watched that presentation and thought about what he said. I can honestly see no way that such a feature would not be exploited if they can fly with the 'normal' pilots of new eden...

    However, the one thought that did occur to me was that these characters could be released into the Jovian systems without too much issue, and call it a 'hardcore region' We can even call these guys 'Jovian' capsuleers' and tie the Jove disease into it. These guys have lost their will to live, so they go out in a 'maddened state' and the capsule tech can no longer save them. Perhaps anytime you defeat another player out there you get part of their total wealth as an 'inheritence'. Just add seeded ships and pre-generated skills and it sounds like something a lot of people have wanted over the years.

    Just a thought on this idea.

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    Replies
    1. Perm death would be a great solution if our population were carefree and cavalier about risk. However, sadly we as a population are extraordinarily risk averse in ways that drain the fun from our lives. We need less to fear from death, not more.

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    2. Perma death would be an option.

      Delete

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