PvP rant

[Keptick]

If this is a rant then I wonder what an actual argument is. Because damn, this could hardly describe the current situation more accurately. People need a good reason to fight, there's none currently.

I'll try to get a dev response on this, because it honestly deserves one.

 

[Lecic]

Nevertheless, once fleets are introduced, things will get very interesting.

Extremely doubtful. It will change the way fights occur, but it will not change WHEN combat appears. That will not occur until we get RTS elements and a need to control more territory.

 

[Bench]

Thanks for discussion on PVP and keptick spamming me to get out of bed and read it, lol.

At the moment in its current state, StarMade isn't all that conducive to PVP interactions. You can't guarantee you'll encounter someone and if you do it's usually whoever has the bigger ship will survive, and regardless there's no real reward other than the destruction of an enemy ship.

These are all issues we've been aware of, and as such already have some plans in place for the game that will make these issues less prevalent. Whilst we won't be able to eliminate the completely, we can certainly add in a number of ways that PVP both on a player and faction level will be encouraged, and with ample reward.

Without being able to go into too much detail, from a faction level there's a lot of changes that will eventually come that will encourage factions to want to fight over the same regions of space, rather than just drifting out into some other place to build up your faction. There will be rewards and benefits that your faction could experience if they pushed another faction out of a region.

Including player vs player as well, missions / objectives that we're working towards at the moment will really encourage that as well. Things like bounties could be placed on each other if you find a certain player keeps harassing you, instantly creating a reward for players to earn by attacking and taking out a specific player. Beyond that missions / objectives as it relates to factions will also help you along the road of expansion and domination, encouraging those PVP encounters where possible, and rewarding you as such.

Things like trade routes which we've hinted to at one point or another are also an example where you would be encouraged to attack or defend for a specific reward. And also represents one way that a player might encounter a crew-driven ship or fleet from a faction rather than one specifically operated by a player. In these cases there's so many different outcomes, from retaliation if you're that player who keeps blowing up another factions trade ships, to them taking matters into their own hands and flying the trade route themselves to ensure cargo gets there in one piece, potentially resulting in another PVP conflict.

Taking it down to basic player vs player we also have some other plans that I can't really talk about just yet, but that'll encourage players to PVP without being completely restricted with the fear that they'll lose all their hard work on their ship.

This is just scratching the surface of what we have planned for the game. We recognise that PVP is an important part of the game, as it influences players to not only build awesome ships, but ones that are combat-ready as well. There will obviously be Player vs NPC and Player vs Fauna situations as well and all will have its place in the game, but in a multi-player environment we want to encourage players to feel like they can PVP with reward in a way that works in the rest of the environment of the game.

Obviously with such a small team some of these plans will take a while to implement. Our main priority is getting the quarters mechanics and then missions mechanics implemented in, and that will take a few months to do to the level we want to do. However once those are in that'll make NPC/crew-operated ships a lot more interactive and dynamic, and allow rewards for encounters as well, starting to encourage more PVP.

 

[Keptick]

Thanks for discussion on PVP and keptick spamming me to get out of bed and read it, lol.

Just doin' my job

Thanks for the reply btw, I'm sure that a lot of people will appreciate it.

 

[ShadowPilot]

Now on a bounty system or PVP for that matter, Bench are you able to hint at how exactly to track players to get those bounties or track enemy faction fleets.

Currently it is near impossible to FIND someone to fight in a procedural universe with nearly 1 billion sectors. Will there be ways to locate your target or even plant beacons or tracers?

 

[Gasboy]

Well, I am on the same server as you, MacThule. Once I get a shipyard up and some ships built, I'll come and fight you.

We can make a game out of it. One of us takes a neutral territory, the other one has to conquer it. Who ever holds it the longest over a month, wins.

And my idea of a decent sized ship seems to line up with yours.

Sound good?

 

[Lecic]

Well, I am on the same server as you, MacThule. Once I get a shipyard up and some ships built, I'll come and fight you.

We can make a game out of it. One of us takes a neutral territory, the other one has to conquer it. Who ever holds it the longest over a month, wins.

And my idea of a decent sized ship seems to line up with yours.

Sound good?

That really only proves his point of PvP not arising naturally.

 

[karkinosz]

Well, I am on the same server as you, MacThule. Once I get a shipyard up and some ships built, I'll come and fight you.

We can make a game out of it. One of us takes a neutral territory, the other one has to conquer it. Who ever holds it the longest over a month, wins.

And my idea of a decent sized ship seems to line up with yours.

Sound good?

But isn't that his entire issue with pvp right now? It all has to be staged, like above.

 

[Gasboy]

But isn't that his entire issue with pvp right now? It all has to be staged, like above.

Yes, this first time it would be staged.

But some pvp with someone who wants to pvp, who'll bring ships that won't lag the server to death, is worth a bit of staging, perhaps?

He did bring up other issues though. I wouldn't whine to the server admins, for example.

 

[Tchey]

What about a restriction per system controled ?

- If your faction controls one system, you can build up to Na mass combined ships.
- With 2 systems, Nb mass, Na +25%
- With 3 systems, Nc mass, Nb + 25%
- With 4 systems, Nd mass, Nc + 25%
- etc up to maybe a 10 systems growth, then you can still take more systems, but with a much smaller bonus like +5% ?

So the big factions can be pretty powerful but still limited, and the smaller ones have to gather to fight the big One. After the smaller push back the One, they may gain territories, so they may become bigger, and could turn to become the One the others may fight, etc.

 

[Master_Artificer]

Flagship are now visible in maperson view...

 

[Arkazan]

GONE

 

[StormWing0]

Advertising it is.

 

[Arkazan]

GONE

 

[Master_Artificer]

If you had not had the disclaimer of "not an advertisement" you wouldn't of brought attention to that.

Paradoxical it is

 

[Ithirahad]

If you had not had the disclaimer of "not an advertisement" you wouldn't of brought attention to that.

Paradoxical it is

That, and the fact that he has been putting posts for his server everywhere imaginable. If it was just here, that'd be no problem, really...

 

[FlyingDebris]

THIS IS NOT AN ADVERTISEMENT

I have to state that so this does not get immediately deleted. I agree with this issue completely and that is why all the rules around my Elwyn Infinity server where set the way they are.

The server ideas is to push factions into confrontation to maintain and take territory to hold/take the faction point lead. When this was discussed with OAS leaders and Odium. It was mentioned there would be a lot of raiding of sector bases and back/forth in this nature so a good amount of small engagements. Though if 2 factions willing/able to fight meet they will of course raid a bunch to not attack their opponents strengths, but there would still be a possibility where a single raid could escalate to a far larger confrontation if neither side is willing to back down. Now while this may still mean a lot of smaller raiding events with only a few larger engagements happening. This is still far more natural of a war.
Has I pointed out to Zakey during this conversation in Real World generals dont call each other and wait for both sides to be 100% ready, and meet in honorable combat at a preset time. This server is meant to push this current state to a more natural one where factions fight to opponents weaknesses and large engagements would be a lot more spontaneous in nature. Basically we are trying to make a Planetside-ish environment in starmade.


Will this happen hard to say before the server has officially opened, is the goal of the server to fix all the issues stated here on PvP, yes.

That is an advertisement.

 

[Dr. Whammy]

So... We've just had a developer admit that in the game's current state, PVP is essentially jacked up since "who ever has the bigger ship is usually the one who survives."

If this is just going to turn into a "schoolyard bully/my ship is bigger than yours" kind of game, you're going to see a lot of people taper off when they decide they have neither the time on inclination to repeatedly gather materials needed to re-build every time The Enterprise or an Imperial Star Destroyer shows up at their door... Seriously; if you we're just starting out, how would you feel if people camped capital ships just outside your home-base and each repeatedly raided you for kicks and giggles so you could never grow?

My question; When are warheads going to get enough of a buff to give smaller ships the means to fight back against capitals and actually do some damage? Some of us have demanding jobs and don't just sit around all day designing kilometer-long ships then collecting the materials needed to build it. I'm not even talking about killing a capital with warheads. I mean give them enough bite so the attacking capital pilot has to decide whether he really wants that kill or if he should just leave the target alone because (win, lose or draw) a properly equipped 5000 mass frigate will take a sizable chunk out of their 500,000 mass titan.

 

[StormWing0]

The thing I've found for dealing with those bigger ships is having a metric ton of turrets big enough to dent them on the main station. That said we really do need a way to level the playing field a tad bit because of the "My Ship Is Bigger = I Win" issue. Warheads and maybe a few other things could be used to help this out a tad bit. that said I've also found that fleets make it unwise for lone big ships to be wandering around without an exit plan.

 

[Dr. Whammy]

The thing I've found for dealing with those bigger ships is having a metric ton of turrets big enough to dent them on the main station. That said we really do need a way to level the playing field a tad bit because of the "My Ship Is Bigger = I Win" issue. Warheads and maybe a few other things could be used to help this out a tad bit. that said I've also found that fleets make it unwise for lone big ships to be wandering around without an exit plan.

Do these new fleet mechanics actually make that big of a tactical difference in practice or is this just speculation? If so, it might be time for me to do a refit.

I'd absolutely love to fill up my region of space with a bunch of (competent) 3000-5000 mass assault ships specifically designed for combat.