Some talk about faction home base invincibility going away at some point in the future. Might be true, it might be regular old Internet rumor mongering. Either way, I felt like laying this out publicly just to be 100% sure it's heard.
If HB invincibility is ever removed, I will drop this game like it was hot.
Let me explain.
I used to be an MMO player, key words there being "used to". I started out back when The Realm Online was hot stuff, that's how long it's been.
I loved the social aspects of online games, but I grew to have a seething hatred of griefers. And over the years, I have watched PvP become virtually synonymous with griefing.
Now, not all PvPers are griefers, there are plenty out there that legitimately enjoy the thrill and the unpredictability of fighting another human instead of a predictable AI. Please note that if you are one of those players, I am not talking to or about you with the rest of this.
Then there are the people that are either in the majority or they just scream the loudest, the "hardcore" PvPers that think attacking lobes on sight with an unstoppable character is fun. The ones who don't want a fair fight, and don't want people to be able to avoid unfair fights.
These are the assholes that give PvP such a terrible name in my book. And they are everywhere. Anything that makes their job easier makes a game worse for everyone.
Real world Starmade example, I have a warp gate at spawn on my server. It has 100k shields and a massive turret on it for defense against the idiots that would attack it just because it's there. I have had to repair our outright replace the gate and the turret at least once a week from people who were witnessed doing nothing but logging in, making a gunship, and attacking it.
I routinely have to go to spawn specifically to stop people shooting the place up because apparently they think the best way to play the game is to kill as many noobs as they possibly can before moving to the next server.
These types are not an exception, they are a daily occurrence. And frankly the fact that we can have an invincible home station to protect us from these people, and protect our ships is the only thing that makes the game playable.
New players should not be forced to join factions and live in some e else's base just to be allowed to play the game. Players should not have to be afraid to find out that everything they've built has been destroyed because some bunch of 4 Chan trolls decided to log in en mass to destroy a server.
And just saying it's okay to remove the invulnrability when X% of people are online doesn't solve the issue, it just makes people afraid to log on if a bigger faction is gunning for them.
At no point, far as I am concerned, is it ever acceptable for someone else to decide when I can or cannot play a game I paid for.
Now, if there is a system where players can agree to death match warfare where their protection is disabled, that's fine. Two consenting players that enjoy that kind of play are more than welcome to do so.
But anything that helps PvP at the expense of PvE, or forces someone into PvP that doesn't want it does nothing but promote griefing and slowly poisons the game.
There are plenty of other places people can go for unrestricted PvP, let's keep Starmade's primary focus on building and creating.
If HB invincibility is ever removed, I will drop this game like it was hot.
Let me explain.
I used to be an MMO player, key words there being "used to". I started out back when The Realm Online was hot stuff, that's how long it's been.
I loved the social aspects of online games, but I grew to have a seething hatred of griefers. And over the years, I have watched PvP become virtually synonymous with griefing.
Now, not all PvPers are griefers, there are plenty out there that legitimately enjoy the thrill and the unpredictability of fighting another human instead of a predictable AI. Please note that if you are one of those players, I am not talking to or about you with the rest of this.
Then there are the people that are either in the majority or they just scream the loudest, the "hardcore" PvPers that think attacking lobes on sight with an unstoppable character is fun. The ones who don't want a fair fight, and don't want people to be able to avoid unfair fights.
These are the assholes that give PvP such a terrible name in my book. And they are everywhere. Anything that makes their job easier makes a game worse for everyone.
Real world Starmade example, I have a warp gate at spawn on my server. It has 100k shields and a massive turret on it for defense against the idiots that would attack it just because it's there. I have had to repair our outright replace the gate and the turret at least once a week from people who were witnessed doing nothing but logging in, making a gunship, and attacking it.
I routinely have to go to spawn specifically to stop people shooting the place up because apparently they think the best way to play the game is to kill as many noobs as they possibly can before moving to the next server.
These types are not an exception, they are a daily occurrence. And frankly the fact that we can have an invincible home station to protect us from these people, and protect our ships is the only thing that makes the game playable.
New players should not be forced to join factions and live in some e else's base just to be allowed to play the game. Players should not have to be afraid to find out that everything they've built has been destroyed because some bunch of 4 Chan trolls decided to log in en mass to destroy a server.
And just saying it's okay to remove the invulnrability when X% of people are online doesn't solve the issue, it just makes people afraid to log on if a bigger faction is gunning for them.
At no point, far as I am concerned, is it ever acceptable for someone else to decide when I can or cannot play a game I paid for.
Now, if there is a system where players can agree to death match warfare where their protection is disabled, that's fine. Two consenting players that enjoy that kind of play are more than welcome to do so.
But anything that helps PvP at the expense of PvE, or forces someone into PvP that doesn't want it does nothing but promote griefing and slowly poisons the game.
There are plenty of other places people can go for unrestricted PvP, let's keep Starmade's primary focus on building and creating.