Manfredjinsinjin

Pardon, but you're completely wrong. I don't know if you've ever done content management administration before, but I assure you that the first thing you do to ensure constructive discourse is to deliver swift justice to destructive criticism. There can be no "debate" when people are not addressing the point of the poster in a constructive manner, there can only be argument, and that serves only people who want to argue.     If you don't have the manpower, that's one thing. But re the "mob rules" mentality practiced on unmoderated internet forums set up for freehand "whatever" discussions, that's completely different from one specifically targeted at suggestions for a product. Good, bad or completely stupid, those suggestions are both free IP for your effort and give you insight into the perspective of players who care enough to post them. If you can't or don't want to protect them from people who can't post constructively, then that well gets poisoned.    /off soapbox, gluck with it

Kyp, I'm not sure if you read the suggestions forum, but if anyone actually acts on what you said - describes something they see as broken / inadequate and offers an idea of their own - they basically get climbed on by people who seem to live for defending the status quo on the forums. There's very little point in trying what you say if the place where it's supposed to happen is frequented by people who are anywhere from reactionary against to dismissive of the problem you perceive.    I suggested in the Meet the Devs channel making the Suggestions forum a truly moderated forum so that problems and ideas could actually be discussed. The dev's response was "we don't want to moderate as a solution". That's up to you, but if you don't provide a means to do what you are saying we should do, we can't be expected to do it.

Does that strategy fill a gameplay hole that content is supposed to? Yes. Should you have to metagame to fill that hole? No. Is there a content plan to fix that? ... I dunno.   However...   Would having missions that granted basic nav paths with bonus explore exps for finding the mission objective at the end help new people? Yes. Would raising the exps for all the non-mission navs that tour guides would show you help both them and you? Yes.    Would my proposal replace tours? No, for all the reasons I stated above. You'll get the main paths and a couple story or class mission spots in each area from missions, and get bonus exps for success to help you level. Tour guides will show you the cool and dangerous spots, and you can  modify the bonus exps for them to make everything square with the tour group.    I actually think this would be more popular with tour guides, 'cause they wouldn't have to run the group through all the main nav spots. The boredom level would drop by a ton. 

I don't mean to be argumentative, but any example that relies on devices from another race - not just weapons - is kind of proving my point, as is anything that relies on a class-specific skill. The problem I'm trying to address is the number of weapons per race that go unused because the built-in debuffs to their damage type causes an immediate rush to another race's gear.   Progens may have the most ability to use their own races' gear, but if you look at exactly what is most popular for each stage of the character's development, you're going to find few to no examples of Progen-only weaps and debuff because of the size of the DPS difference. And the other races are worse off.   And everyone, everyone harps on getting Plasma weaps + debuff, when there's 5 damage types in game. I can't name any other game I've ever played which would allow a single damage type to rule gear choices like this.    Thought experiment - suppose instead of you getting the Jenq Plasma beams you want, instead having an all-Jenq energy beam lineup caused their damage to be buffed to near enough the DPS of Plasma + Rada / Chim that choosing an all-Jenq lineup for their race-specific buffs was a real option for you? And please remember, if you don't exceed the DPS of the gear everyone is already using or confer some other combat-affecting ability, you're not unbalancing anything. 

I don't understand why everyone is quoting the long list of exceptions as if that's a reason a rule which in any other game would be considered to be wreaking havoc shouldn't be changed. The very fact that there are dozens of racial weapons which nobody of the same race ever bothers with should be a huge neon sign that there's something wrong. Except for some very specific exceptions (ex. my Jenq uses a Purple Dragon with the de riguer Mastiffs + Rada for the crit bonus) most of your own race's gear goes unused because import gear + buffer is just so much better.   The proposed change doesn't allow anyone to do more DPS than they can by using the import gear. Because of this fact, there's neither a nerf nor a buff happening. You can't have a balance change if the proposed change doesn't actually confer an advantage over what you can achieve otherwise without undue effort. For "serious" play, everyone's going to outfit with the best possible gear anyways, and that's the import gear.   But loosening things up like this means that people don't HAVE to have the import gear to avoid unnecessary penalties. PROVIDED they run matched sets of their races' gear, or maybe just all their races' gear? TBD.   To open the subject up further, I'd suggest additional matched set buffs be considered, like engine + reactor + shield buffs of some appropriate type. Devices I dunno about. It's possible I guess.

+1 for the convenience change. Add more reactor cost if you need to.

While many have pointed out what happens at higher levels, at lower levels you do indeed need a good shield, b/c you don't have Combat Cloak. This game is weird in that equipment from other races isn't just better for specific circumstances, it's way better than your own races' stuff. So the trick becomes finding someone else's shield that will do you.    I find that the Terran Model X and Model Y shields are very good for Jenqs who can't get a Scale or Dragonplate at lower levels. They don't have specific buffs for Jenqs, but they are readily available, have very good capacity, fast recharge and Equipment Engineering (activated, put the shield on a hotkey) so you can swap gear quickly while your fighting reactor is in.   I honestly don't know anyone who even uses Jenq shields at lower levels. which is probably why nobody really has a problem with the way they are.

Right so all you all are saying is "using my race's native weapons will always put me behind people using other races weapons + debuffers".   Oh, except when we get to the L9 end game, THEN everything's fine. Everyone powerlevels right up there immediately so what's this guy's problem (:rolleyes:)   Note that unlike some overly entitled people, I'm not crying about a reduction in something that's pretty awesome anyways. I'm saying that when we put effort into using weapons from our own race, we at least get a little something, like zeroing out the damage resists so at least you get BASE damage from them. This is still lower than the imports + debuffer, and the Trader buff devices will still buff (not that I ever see anyone grouping vs multiboxing anyways) so nobody else's applecart is getting upset by the suggestion.   What it will do is allow us to use weapons which have buffs made specifically for our race, and that's a good thing.

Then the question arises, how many jobs are in the job system now? It seems to me that your theoretical maximum load situation can occur right now - you have the same number of people and the same job limit per person.   What we're really talking about is two things - putting a mission NPC in between the player and the job term so it's possible to filter the job list down to just the ones you qualify for based on your faction and level, and opening up the job list to all stations at once. When a player accepts the job, the same process happens as does now.   If we have limits on the number of jobs we can put out there, then there's limits. But we should at least look at those limits and what we can do within them.

We sadly pretty much have an "optimum" build thing going on, with every class at any level pretty much having the same "best" build. And because no race can debuff its own primary damage type, the weapons are just about always of another race's tech, because you can use debuff devices or ammo with better damage types.   To mix things up a bit, I'd like to suggest bonuses for using full sets of matched weapons from your own race. The bonuses would be something like reduction or elimination of resists to the damage type, crit damage bonuses or other meaningful bonuses like raising weapon handling level, energy conservation, etc.    I would suggest that the bonuses make using your own races' weapons more attractive for general situations than the current scenario of other races' weapons always being more attractive. Other race's gear should be more useful for specialized scenarios, such as enemies that have special resists and such.

Well let's remember, not all tour guides are equal. I've had some terrible tours. Some are just straight nav paths out to Fenris and then you fly your own way back. Not at all like the kind of tour experience that popularized the practice. I'm just a frequent player and I've had to step in and help people get a decent tour.   That combined with the lack of availability of tour guides means the experience has pretty much sucked for a long time now, so the holy reverence about tours isn't deserved anymore.   I also feel the need to point out that tours are a player-driven way of filling a huge hole in the game mechanics (let's remember, game shipped 2/3 finished), so something like this is not out of the blue for games. It's pretty standard to have missions as a way for new players to get out and explore.   Also, there's no reason you can't have missions and tours too. A good tour guide would offer a top-quality experience, finding the hidden navs and pointing out spots players need to know about. I would think missions would mainly be about main nav paths (which many tour takers have) and specific points of interest, just because of the sheer amount of new content that would be needed. So the "good stuff" would be left for exploration, class missions, and tours.   I would favor bumping up the exps for hidden navs and lowering the exps for main navs anyways, it just seems righter to me that way.

It's pretty official, the tradition of touring new players just isn't supportable with this player base. There just aren't enough new players at any one time to get veterans touring on a regular basis, which is necessary for new people to get on the tour bus. It's a cycle and there's just not enough pop to support it.   To compensate, I'd like to suggest missions to do this or that which give you the ? navs to locations / for entire systems. So basically a content-driven way for new players to learn where things are and get their early explore xps. I'd think this would come in two flavors - vanilla "you're useless without the main navs, go get them" and "we need something / to know something  / to kill something out at this point, here's the navs to it". So the vanilla ones could be set up on a rep at each station, and the objective ones done however they would work best.   I hear the content system is tough to work with so I've no idea of feasibility, but something like this would help fill the hold that the tour tradition was filling in Live / STs.

Many nice ones. I support any that make the mechanics of gameplay easier. About prototypes, I had a somewhat similar thought, only instead of them being actually manufacturable, I thought you could just be able to break them down for a chance of a non-manufacturable part usable in the same type, but higher level of PM equipment (ex. a L5 proto engine might yield a cyclo power binder or something).   Mainly it's just a way to avoid vendoring prototypes that aren't of high enough quality to keep around. Kind of ruins the "specialness" of finding one when it sucks and you vendor it to get back the vault space :) 

Kaboom - server appears down as of now.

Wanted to post a different way to get jobs that I think would be more in line with how RPG games work, and also solve some of the problems. This would require additional content for NPCs so I don't anticipate it would be a quick change, but I can definitely see it as a destination on the roadmap.   The idea is to open up all levels of jobs at any station, but restrict the ones your character can access by character level and faction with the station / NPCs. In addition, all the jobs you see will be "yours", ending the clickfest competition for jobs (and ending the battle of the scrolling job list).   In execution, your character would go to NPCs in stations and go through dialogue options to get missions. The missions are actually jobs (or access to sets of jobs, depending on how you want to play it) that show up in the job terminal, and you take and execute them as normal.    The faction of the jobs is set by the faction of the NPC you got the mission from, and the job levels are scaled not just by level cap, but by your faction with them, so low faction = low reward jobs, etc. This provides the path for a character to work their way up in any faction on any station they can dock at.   However - and this is the big change - those are the ONLY jobs you see in the terminal. If you have no missions, you'll only see "help wanted" text in the terminals directing you to NPCs in station and similar faction stations who are looking for assistance.    This brings the jobs and mission system to the way most RPG games play it and imo would be a great next step from the starter version we have in place now to fill in content holes.   Possible enhancements: For mixing help wanted and jobs, I'd suggest another tab with the help wanted listings. For help wanted listings, maybe they could be jobs in themselves and provide "?" nav paths to other stations to help new players explore.     *Disclaimer - I don't exactly recall how things were in EA Live, but I think I recall seeing the NPCs listed in the job term, so if anything here sounds like the EA Live system, then it's probably subconscious recolletion from the few weeks I spent playing EA Live.   All constructive comments and discussions are welcome!    

That's because EA now has a game model that perfectly suits their management style - "nickel and dime them to death". They can do that all day long. What they can't ever do is create a shared-experience product someone will pay for up front.   I believe that's because of the kind of people their management are. They literally cannot understand why anyone would want to go somewhere and do something without a profit motive in mind, let alone do it en masse just for the fun and shared experience.

err. why would you want insta-death any time someone either failed sight recognition, or your code didn't work as advertised for some reason? We are on an emulator so glitches happen.     Full disclosure, I am in complete opposition to poprocks as implemented and have suggestions out for changes, so please take that into that into consideration. I'm not trying to start arguments, I just think they're horribad as is.

My .02, the EMU has a very difficult situation to deal with, imo beginning with overly entitled players. Huge accommodations were made for the lack of content and lack of a playerbase to keep people playing in the stress tests. However, those entitlements have been in place so long that they are now considered the norm.    This means that every change that impinges on those ST-induced entitlements causes a huge uproar in people who think that something is being taken away from them. Well, it's true. Something that was put in to plug a huge hole in gameplay is being taken away and replaced with the normal mechanic.    But that's like having someone give you 20,000 dollars every year for 5 years while you get a business started and then complaining when they tell you the 5 years is up and there won't be any more free money. Instead, your job will have to pay your way from now on.    Yes, it's a change, but its one you knew was coming and were supposed to be prepared for, and it returns you to a normal status instead of the privileged one you've had all this time.      If I have any complaints about the development side, it would only be that when an entitlement is taken away, a reward-based method of filling the gap should be put in its place. The entitlement was there for a reason, it needs to be replaced with something players can earn, not just removed for technical balance. If you fail to do that, then the screaming you hear actually has justification, and you shouldn't be dismissing it out of hand.

  My proposal was a bit more involved than "all roids are poprocks". (I'm explaining in more detail here as I've had time for the idea to percolate). Basically I suggested changing the mining process from open roid / mine ore, to blow roid up with the prospect beam and pick up ore as loot. Roids would have the level against which your prospect is measured, ores would keep the level for refine purposes.   In this model, a roid above your prospect level (regardless of device level) would have a chance of getting away from you and going kaboom to a degree determined by the level difference. Mobs in poprocks would still spawn, but if the roid is your level or less, you wouldn't get any ill effects besides a level-appropriate mob in your face. If you were mining above your level, the effects of the explosion would apply too.   This institutes player-driven choice for the risk of a poprock instead of the (imo) arbitrary deal now. And it keeps everything balanced by default - a player sticking to their prospect level would only ever deal with a level-appropriate baby guardian coming out of the rock they just mined. If they choose to kick it up a notch because they think they can handle the consequences, the risk / reward ratio applies (and more power to them).    (*implementation note - although I seriously favor blind prospecting by type and level of roid, the mechanic could possibly be implemented using the current open rock / select ore to pull system by applying the highest ore's level regardless of which you choose to try to pull, then crushing the roid and dropping all the ores as loot. You wouldn't actually 'pull" anything with the prospect attempt).

ZING! Nice one. The TS especially seems vulnerable to these problems.

I have nothing to contribute but my support for this idea. I'd seriously like to be able to buff group members on the way to the action, and I need to swap devices for that.   I also don't see any downside re balance, and in addition, it would fix the bug where you're on a planet, but can't reconfigure because you get the "can't do this while in warp!" message. At least for most swappables, anyways.

/agree with GB and I'd like to point out to Terrell, guardians are why you have cloak, quick warp via navigate, and guns.    There is no character or ship strength that can be applied against poprocks. At all. This is why it is a horrible and gamebreaking idea. You don't put deadly risks into a core class activity that players can do nothing about but resurrect from.    Lest the criers cry "crybaby" I'll point out I have a PRO-poprock idea posted, one which makes ANY roid a potential popper, but calculates the percentage based on player skill. The higher above your prospect level you are going for, the greater the risk.   While hardly ideal (any player-triggered threat should also be counterable by character abilities, and KABOOMYOU'REDEAD is not something you can apply character abilities against and win), it's better than making people mine in a minefield.

  Number one, your forum troll attitude is not appreciated. I propose a change to make mining less of a cakewalk and you accuse me of wanting free stuff on a silver platter? Lame.   Number two, mining as implemented is broken anyways. That's why people keep trying to "fix" it with poprocks, guardian mobs, etc. I have Prospect L4 and a L7 mining device and can easily pull L8 stuff, or L9 if I choose to work at it a bit. So regardless of what is "intended" for low level miners like myself, that's not what's happening.    However, this post is in no way an attempt to fix it all, it's just a single mechanics change -that I personally find an interesting proposition - to open up the possibility of more changes for the better. If you can't discuss it civilly, I have no interest in responding further to you.

I would add that other methods of dealing with guardians should be effective too, such as scan-blinding. This gives players the option of "clevering" their way to victory, instead of having to have the CL to brute-force it. I have often led mobs away from hulks/loots using cloak / reveal and warped back to get the prize once they are far enough away, but that's pretty time consuming and a basic tactic. I'd like to see more "cool" ways to deal with guardians.

This suggestion is about the mining mechanic itself. Instead of having roids and hulks be containers that stay until emptied, have them destroyed immediately on prospecting and the contents left drifting in space. In other words, the mining beam breaks the roid apart and the prospector can then tractor in the items (or not as they choose).   This solves a number of problems (among them cherry-picking) and also offers new possibilities for pop-rock implementation (I think the current one was a bad idea as implemented in Live and bad as replicated here). Using this model, every roid is a potential pop-rock to a miner, and the skill level of the miner reduces the chance and impact of something bad happening.    In this model, a low-level miner can mine a high-level roid if they're willing to take the chance of getting creamed, and a high level miner still has a chance of getting nicked here and there as they mine.   And regardless of what a miner takes or doesn't take, the roid is cleared, so the issues from cherrypicking go away.