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Picking device for pickers ...ummmm errr Miners...yea that's the ticket


Mimir

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======= Stupid Bad idea for a problem that seems not to exist, please ignore =========================

I have been giving the problem (?) of pickers some thought and I think I may have come up with a possible solution. Let me digress a little to live when a bunch of us miners were doing the “wouldn’t it be cool if” thing. Back then we came up with an idea for a device for miners that with varying quality and level allow the miner to input (or select from a drop down list) a particular ore, this device depending on the attributes stated above would do an auto target in a large ore field on the most likely asteroid that contained the desired ore.

Well this sort of is a picker’s dream device but… what if the ability to see what is in an asteroid/hulk is skill and level based?

It could be a device that is a.) Hard to come by i.e. a multi multi step mission b:oByakhee :) and b.) Has to be assembled with hard to come by components, and crafted by a master crafter.

To gain levels (to use the higher level devices) the miner will only gain SP for that skill by using the devices. So a miner that wants to “pick” has to do the Byakhee mission(s), find a crafter, get the parts and use the lowest level device to start his/her leveling of skill points for that skill.

With a level 9 device there will always be a chance that the device will a.) Fail, b.) Read the asteroid/hulk, or c.) Destroy the asteroid/hulk.

This would only make picking a skill that would be used sparingly.

Oh the higher the level device/skill the lower the % of fail/destroy, but it always has that possibility that you could really loose on something good.

Comments? Modifications?

Ok…I give up. Not sure why there is so much grumbling, moaning, and whining in chat about Cherry picking. I must have misunderstood. Have modified original post.

Edited by Mimir
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If it's a device, explorers should be able to build it themselves, all explorers have the Build Devices skill. They may need a builder for it's comps, but final assembly of the device the explorer should have to do himself. (more reason for PEs & JEs to put points into Build Devices)

Don't know about a device to aid cherry picking, but Byakhee style missions that have equipment print rewards sounds good to me. Such missions designed for Traders or Warriors with comparable rewards sounds cool too. How good the equipment is should be based on the mission's difficulty. Then again, I like doing missions.

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With all due respect Mimir, isn't this just perpetuating the core problem? That there's a reason for folks to cherry pick, and that for some reason that behavior affects the gameplay for others? Removing the ability to inspect a roid doesn't fix the core problem. Cherry-pickers will simply go to the field, open a roid and then close it.

I know it sucks after having gotten ready to mine, only to arrive and find fields empty of anything "good." Or just plain empty. My question is, why is this strictly the work of cherry pickers? Why can't it be a more reasonable answer? That someone's cleared the fields (a good miner mind you), but the fields aren't instantly respawning at the same time? Do we know if they fully respawn at once, or if it's staggered? Do we know if the percentage of "good" is so low now that it may be virtually impossible to find anything "good" even when everyone fully clears out fields?

Another question is, why does the community believe cherry-picking as a play style impinges on their own game play? Is there something fundamentally wrong with the mechanics of it that's causing the problem? Most everything is hearsay unless a Dev pipes up and tells us what the mechanics are, and are able to confirm that some type of activity affects things for others. Folks need to be careful about asking for things that remove the competitiveness of the game and replaces it with pure carebear-ism.

Like mob spawns, roid fields are first come, first serve. Folks will cherry pick mobs all the time, why hasn't that caused a ruckus?

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With all due respect Mimir, isn't this just perpetuating the core problem? That there's a reason for folks to cherry pick, and that for some reason that behavior affects the gameplay for others? Removing the ability to inspect a roid doesn't fix the core problem. Cherry-pickers will simply go to the field, open a roid and then close it.

I know it sucks after having gotten ready to mine, only to arrive and find fields empty of anything "good." Or just plain empty. My question is, why is this strictly the work of cherry pickers? Why can't it be a more reasonable answer? That someone's cleared the fields (a good miner mind you), but the fields aren't instantly respawning at the same time? Do we know if they fully respawn at once, or if it's staggered? Do we know if the percentage of "good" is so low now that it may be virtually impossible to find anything "good" even when everyone fully clears out fields?

Another question is, why does the community believe cherry-picking as a play style impinges on their own game play? Is there something fundamentally wrong with the mechanics of it that's causing the problem? Most everything is hearsay unless a Dev pipes up and tells us what the mechanics are, and are able to confirm that some type of activity affects things for others. Folks need to be careful about asking for things that remove the competitiveness of the game and replaces it with pure carebear-ism.

Like mob spawns, roid fields are first come, first serve. Folks will cherry pick mobs all the time, why hasn't that caused a ruckus?

There is a problem... it bothers me less and less as I spend less and less time in game. But to say that Cherry picking is not a problem or not as big an issue as it seems to be is sort of like hiding one's head in the sand...No? The fields spawn slowly, the hulks only have debris in them... easy to say, but I have been the first to some of these fields and YES there really are bonuses to get for clearing a field, and the hulks really do have more than just lvl 1 debris.

Personally I am tired of clearing picked fields of garbage just so they will re-spawn. Maybe others are as well… But perhaps I am the only one bothered by it? I think I may just start to Cherry pick just to be an ass... hit every field I pass and only pull one or two roids out of them all.

In fact as you say this is a play style, my new non care bear play style.

Oh...I don't mind getting to an empty field at all, that just means that someone had the decency to clear the field and NOT just take the choice mats.

Edited by Mimir
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I think you misunderstand... What I'm trying to point out is that your frustration is due to the after-effect of a partially picked field. This is a game mechanic issue, not a behavior one. It's unreasonable to dictate that anyone interested in mining should forever and always clear a field, just like it's unreasonable to dictate that anyone going out to do some combat should forever and always clear all side mobs in addition to the named spawns. That's just never going to happen.

My point is really that, if there's a side effect to partially mined fields, then THAT's the thing that needs to be addressed, not things that are meant to change how people play. Forcing people to play a certain way isn't fun for them, and is a slippery slope for if/when it happens to you. Fixing the mechanics that allow a partially cleared field to affect the fun for others IS something that should be addressed. It's a fine distinction, but there is one nonetheless.

I'm not dismissing that there's a problem when there's cherry-picking. I just disagree that the fix is to punish/remove gameplay options from the cherry-pickers. Instead, I believe what's needed is to fix/modify the game mechanics so that once they leave, whoever comes after doesn't have to deal with poor left-behinds. Does that convey better what I'm asking?

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The best way to fix cherry picking, is to have any prospectable that has things removed from it automatically despawn if it's not emptied within 10 minutes of the first thing being taken. If that's done this would cease to be an issue, for any miners. If such a roid/hulk/cloud is re-opened, then the countdown should pause, and resume if it's closed.

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Terrell,

Reasonable solution, but here's where economy T-bones your idea in the intersection...

The respawns have to be controlled in such a way as to prevent the "good" spawns from coming back repeatedly, thus allowing someone to find a way to run around yanking nothing but good ore without having to actually look for it. I don't think it would be a problem to do, we just have to lower the chances of whatever has been picked from being in the next spawn somehow, thereby reducing both the risk to the economy, and the risk of cherry picking.

Interesting solution, one that I will bring up the next time we have a discussion on the subject.

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The best way to fix cherry picking, is to have any prospectable that has things removed from it automatically despawn if it's not emptied within 10 minutes of the first thing being taken. If that's done this would cease to be an issue, for any miners. If such a roid/hulk/cloud is re-opened, then the countdown should pause, and resume if it's closed.

Wouldn't this potentially have the (I assume) unintended consequence of creating the opportunity to "speed clear" a field just for the field-clearing bonus? Flit about from roid/cloud to roid/cloud grabbing one item from each to start the countdown timer.

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So if I understand this correctly… “if my motives for picking a field is pure”, and I am cherry picking to play the game the way I want to play then those who disagree and would prefer that I not pick the choice of the choice mats and leave the crap, should just get over it? And those that run around after I cherry pick the fields empty them for me to play the game my way have nothing to complain about?

Is that what a care bear is in game? Damn care bears!! I’ll play how I want!

Is that it?

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In a word, yes the one's that come after have nothing to complain about as they have as much choice/freedom to play the game however they want as the alleged cherry-picker. I'm not saying the cherry-picker is a model citizen in the community. I'm just saying that the issue the "come-afters" have is really a non-issue if the game mechanics were fixed to take into account some of this behavior.

What Terrell suggested with a per roid despawn timer is a good solution, as long as you take into account Kyp's concerns about maintaining rarity. There's also potential for abuse which needs to be addressed. But in general terms this seems like the type of solution folks should be discussing. Not individual ways to reward YOUR play style and punish someone else's. In a perfect world, both your playstyle and their's would be just as rewarding/or not, and neither would affect the other.

Example...

You spend 3 hours mining, and fill your hold to the gills with ore, every cargo spot topped off as full stacks thru careful management of your stacks. You spent roughly 95% of that 3hrs mining. Can't 100% since you warped around to find your choice spots, etc. Your take at the end of it could be several stacks of really rare level 9 ore, mixed with an entire hold of other stuff.

Your stereo-typical cherry-picker spends 3 hours cherry-picking. They do NOT come back with a full hold, and they do NOT make as much money/xp as you do since they only spent roughly 10% of that 3hrs actually mining. They come back to station with a cargo hold full, every spot taken up with something, but almost nothing is full stacks.

This is the ideal scenario. Nothing the cherry-picker does should affect the dedicated miner, and vice-versa. It should be obvious that a hardcore miner will make more money/xp than the cherry-picker. And, IMHO, this is what the various discussions regarding cherry-picking should be trying to achieve.

While I don't have any strong objections to your suggested device, I just don't see how it would actually fix anything when the issue isn't the playstyles conflicting, but game mechanics causing an impact on the "come-afters."

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Personally Im not understanding the issue here. I have a TS, mind you she isnt that high, but can pull up to L8 roids slowly lol.

From the amount of time ive used her to mine ive found that what you clear generally pops back up in about 5-10min from the time you pick the first one.

What I mean is I usually mine for ammo ores, but I know if i just take one ore out its not gunna spawn back in that particular roid so i mine all the ore out of that type of roid so that same type of roid will respawn.

I personally do not clear the field due to not being fast enough but from what I seen any type of roid that i clear tends to respawn within a few min.

It may not have what I want but ill clear that roid again so that i can possibly get the ore i need.

Why is this a problem? Is this not what others do as well?

I may not clear the field but if anyone is smart they know they have to clear the roid before it respawns to get the desired ore.

I would guess this would be the same for Hulks as well.

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Wouldn't this potentially have the (I assume) unintended consequence of creating the opportunity to "speed clear" a field just for the field-clearing bonus? Flit about from roid/cloud to roid/cloud grabbing one item from each to start the countdown timer.

Not sure, if it would affect field clear bonus as it is now. To counter that, perhaps the field clear bonus could be based on how many asteroids are actually emptied, and despawned asteroids deducted from the bonus.

On the issue of ore rarity, not sure how that's best done. If I clear an asteroid out quickly with a JE, it may respawn faster than if it despawns on it's own. I'm not actually sure of that, I could well be wrong. Probably something that could be worked out when the balancing of the game is implemented.

When Alpha comes along, is that when the bulk of the balancing starts, or is that Beta or is that done across both of them?

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When Alpha comes along, is that when the bulk of the balancing starts, or is that Beta or is that done across both of them?

You'll see them across both, the more sweeping changes throughout Alpha, the fine tuning and fixing during beta.

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You'll see them across both, the more sweeping changes throughout Alpha, the fine tuning and fixing during beta.

Thanks, I was curious about that. Kinda thought that there would be balancing in those phases, but not sure the difference. Thanks for clarifying the difference between the two stages.

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Terrell,

Reasonable solution, but here's where economy T-bones your idea in the intersection...

The respawns have to be controlled in such a way as to prevent the "good" spawns from coming back repeatedly, thus allowing someone to find a way to run around yanking nothing but good ore without having to actually look for it. I don't think it would be a problem to do, we just have to lower the chances of whatever has been picked from being in the next spawn somehow, thereby reducing both the risk to the economy, and the risk of cherry picking.

Interesting solution, one that I will bring up the next time we have a discussion on the subject.

There is just one problem: for some type of asteroids in certain levels are not enough different ores available to choose from.

Hehe, if you don't want cherry pickers just wait 1 minute(ok, maybe 2 minutes for slow miners :)), after that the last opened roid is empty and gone or your picked ores from this roid go poof. :)

I bet, you will see no more cherry pickers. :)

greets

Hexergirl

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There is a problem... it bothers me less and less as I spend less and less time in game. But to say that Cherry picking is not a problem or not as big an issue as it seems to be is sort of like hiding one's head in the sand...No? The fields spawn slowly, the hulks only have debris in them... easy to say, but I have been the first to some of these fields and YES there really are bonuses to get for clearing a field, and the hulks really do have more than just lvl 1 debris.

Personally I am tired of clearing picked fields of garbage just so they will re-spawn. Maybe others are as well… But perhaps I am the only one bothered by it? I think I may just start to Cherry pick just to be an ass... hit every field I pass and only pull one or two roids out of them all.

In fact as you say this is a play style, my new non care bear play style.

Oh...I don't mind getting to an empty field at all, that just means that someone had the decency to clear the field and NOT just take the choice mats.

well-done-my-young-apprentice.jpg?imageSize=Medium&generatorName=Bitch-Palpatine

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With all due respect Mimir, isn't this just perpetuating the core problem? That there's a reason for folks to cherry pick, and that for some reason that behavior affects the gameplay for others? Removing the ability to inspect a roid doesn't fix the core problem. Cherry-pickers will simply go to the field, open a roid and then close it.

I'm going to have to disagree with your premise here. IMO requiring a roid or hulk to be opened before the contents are known is a huge deterrent to cherrypicking. The rewards from prospecting are that you get both materials and exploration experience for prospecting entire roids/hulks, and you get an additional bonus for clearing fields.

But cherrypicking is only desirable if you can do it in a way that rewards you more than the intended method. If players have to put in the same time and effort to cherrypick as they do to clear the roid and field, I can see them deciding to take the extra experience and creds from doing the job right. Admittedly, just removing the X-Ray Vision from explorers won't automatically even out the time/effort between cherrypicking and mining out, but it will go a very long way towards it.

And I've no doubt some will still cherrypick, even if it's not as beneficial to their chars as clearing. Sometimes you just need a mission or ammo ore to help someone right now. But it certainly won't be like it is now, with people just running routes of roid/hulk fields hitting the Next Object key and grabbing all of the rares/ammo comps/prototypes for themselves/their alts/their buddies, in that order.

The best news is removing the ability to see roid/hulk contents before opening them does not harm prospector play at all. There's no downside for miners who are out to mine out roids and clear fields.

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You spend 3 hours mining, and fill your hold to the gills with ore, every cargo spot topped off as full stacks thru careful management of your stacks. You spent roughly 95% of that 3hrs mining. Can't 100% since you warped around to find your choice spots, etc. Your take at the end of it could be several stacks of really rare level 9 ore, mixed with an entire hold of other stuff.

Your stereo-typical cherry-picker spends 3 hours cherry-picking. They do NOT come back with a full hold, and they do NOT make as much money/xp as you do since they only spent roughly 10% of that 3hrs actually mining. They come back to station with a cargo hold full, every spot taken up with something, but almost nothing is full stacks.

This is the ideal scenario. Nothing the cherry-picker does should affect the dedicated miner, and vice-versa. It should be obvious that a hardcore miner will make more money/xp than the cherry-picker. And, IMHO, this is what the various discussions regarding cherry-picking should be trying to achieve.

I don't think you took into account one factor. The person mining out fields isn't going to come back with stacks of rares, because the cherrypicker has all of the stacks of rares and essentials like ammo comps. The prospector has stacks of vendor ores, but only has the rares and essentials that cherrypickers didn't get to first. And let's remember, it's far faster to zip around cherrypicking, so one picker = many miners as far as the rares and essentials ores go.

And since it takes those rares and essentials to make the best equipment, the honest prospector's gameplay directly suffers from cherrypicking. Their value as a character class is directly related to being able to supply other people with comps they need. They can't supply the builders, their guild, their friends or themselves with the good stuff for items or ammo if cherrypickers got to it first.

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Wootage,

BUt why should we implement a universal law (game mechanic) that FORCES the other playstyle or behavior to stop? This is where he's right, cherrypicking (as its called) is a symptom of some underlying condition. We don't chop off hands because fingers hurt, after all. :unsure:

You're looking at solving a problem between symptoms that can likely be better prevented by finding that underlying cause and making improvements.

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Wootage,

BUt why should we implement a universal law (game mechanic) that FORCES the other playstyle or behavior to stop? This is where he's right, cherrypicking (as its called) is a symptom of some underlying condition. We don't chop off hands because fingers hurt, after all. :)

You're looking at solving a problem between symptoms that can likely be better prevented by finding that underlying cause and making improvements.

Chop off hands? That's a pretty extreme metaphor. Can you help me understand how the ability of explorers to see inside roids and hulks from max scan range and determine their contents is an essential game mechanic to the class, e.g a "hand" that they'd sorely miss if it were chopped off?

I ask this because I've been playing an explorer and only ACCIDENTALLY discovered the left-click on target trick. After playing for a good long time. And yet during that time, I cleared field after field within and above my prospect level, stacking up the ores and racking up the explore exps. It kinda felt like I was doing exactly what the class was designed to do by doing that.

So, what was I missing out on because I wasn't using that particular feature?

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