Right now, I see several big problems with the cosmpiercer system:
Problem 1: If you land on a cosmpiercer and die, your ship is stuck there until the generators respawn. If your side loses, you have to pay ship insurance costs and lose all your cargo. Solution 1A: Allow INSURANCE TOWREQUEST <ship> to function on ships docked at cosmpiercers in addition to ships floating in space. Solution 1B: Remove/reduce cargo loss/insurance fees when a ship is destroyed in an open PvP zone. Solution 1C: Alter ship PvP costs to be less punishing in general, in hopes of encouraging more ship PvP.
Problem 2: Space combat in cosmpiercer fights rarely exists, but when it does exist, it eclipses all other stages of the contest. Solution 2A: Introduce a space combat objective that comes after the the hacking objective is completed. For example, a second set of generators at the end of the hacking which needs to be destroyed to complete the transfer. Solution 2B: Introduce a space combat objective that is simultaneous with the hacking. For example, instead of giving points directly, hacking a terminal spawns a 'communications satellite' aligned with the terminal's prior owner and destroying that in space causes points to start accumulating. Solution 2C: Introduce a 5 minute window at the start of a cosmpiercer attempt during which all players can use SHIP WARP.
Note: Solutions 2A and 2B could both be combined with removing the generators guarding cosmpiercers. This would have a number of possibly desirable effects on the game.
Problem 3: The Engineer skills Heartstart and Wormhole have an outsized effect during cosmpiercers, as these skills allow defeated players to return to the fight much quicker than they can otherwise. Solution 3A: Change wormholes not to work on cosmpiercers or ships docked at cosmpiercers; likewise cause death onboard a cosmpiercer to destroy corpses and leave only INRs. Solution 3B: Introduce a 5 minute cooldown, starting upon revival by any means (cloning, heartstart, timeline revert, etc.) during which heartstart fails to revive them and wormholes cannot be used. Solution 3C: Give anyone who's faction controls at least one terminal the ability to wormhole onto a cosmpiercer without using a ship.
Problem 4: Best play for the defensive team requires constant hypervigilance and a willingness to drop everything in order to defend on zero notice. This makes it difficult to make time for in depth roleplay events, incursions, space mining, bashing or anything else that requires considerable uninterrupted periods of online time. Solution 4A: Change cosmpiercer openings to have considerable overlap, but be less frequent. Having 6 cosmpiercers open up every 5 hours has desirable traits here, as it provides a good spread of possible targets while giving a minimum of 3 hours of down time for hunting, mining and RP between possible defenses. Also, it causes the timing of openings to gradually drift across timezones, ensuring opportunities for non-peak players. Solution 4B: Require that cosmpiercer attempts be declared in advance somehow.
Solution 4C: Allow factions to declare their cosmpiercers off limits for a small fraction of each day, I guess?
I like both 1A and 1B. 1C might be too much. 1B also creates potential problems with resource farms, but resource farms are a problem to begin with and obviously not how the game was meant to be played.
2C is a good idea. I'd even expand it and just make SHIP WARP available for everyone as soon as any given cosmpiercer is open or under attack. Getting there was always the biggest hassle and this would handily eliminate the problem.
The ship warp change also eliminates problems with Wormhole. Heartstart is too powerful but it's solved by giving it a cooldown, so 3B.
I already said we are having too many cosmpiercers per day, so something like 4A is just me restating my earlier preferences.
Coming from the standpoint of a casual player (I probably spend 1-2 hours a day grinding at something before I either log off or seek out RP), my marks account has never dipped above 100k, I hover somewhere between 50-80k. My point being I am reluctant to engage with the cosmpiercer model in its current form because it's way too expensive. I could take 1 really bad hit and then basically spend the next week or so casually grinding up and earning enough marks to go back and try it again. Ideally there would be a large enough player population to support the factional reimbursements, but from what I see that's not the case. And if there is factional reimbursement, it's carried on the back of 1-2 players-- this isn't sustainable.
Personally I'd be in favor of leaving everything the way it is if only to give time for more people to get their feet with and get some sort of idea on how to interact with this system but putting a temporary system, maybe something similar to the current insurance system but have the insurance companies also include a marks transfer of the estimated costs for refitting your ship (I dunno how to calculate this, perhaps taking an average value currently on the market?). Either way, you won't really catch me volunteering to fly out to a Cosmpiercer right now given the risk doesn't seem to come with a reward that I can personally profit from, and I'll probably bow out when I've given HETE about 5k.
@Cubey -- I am just realizing who you played and wanted to reach out to say I'm sorry you've had a bad experience. While our characters didn't interact a ton, you definitely brightened my experience in Celestine..
On the other hand the faction reimbursements sustained pretty well so far, that is without even placing taxes! But then all IRE organizations by nature are tax heavens. And it is really not only on the back of 1-2 players. Some people support far more then others yes but then it is part of the RP in a sense.
The reward comes after you capture enough of the cosmpiercers and then a time of relative peace strikes. That is a long term investment but some people seem to desire either minimal losses or great gains in short time. And along the stacking captures and cosmpiercer benefits, factions offer their own rewards to promote one activity or another. Clone and insurance costs are pretty low, and the most hit you could get is that your ship could be overloaded with cargo and destroyed in a PvP zone. Those who lose large ships can put those marks back fast enough.
In the end cosmpiercers are a community activity and people should not look from the perspective of individual. Losses and problems cause your governments to be motivated to find solutions as well. Right now dying in a cosmpiercer would only hurt someone's pride, not their accounts. Maybe one can even see it as a time loss, which is why it is a promoted activity.
Alternatively we can follow the path of Aetolia ylem battles where there are no losses, some gains which does nothing to impact economy or RP. Essentially a minigame to keep interested PvPers engage each other which most of the time ends with the numerous party to win if the other side shows at all.
Time and again the old thought that reducing the costs of activities would endorse those activities fails because the activity itself practically becomes desensitized from the world. Let me say this, if there was none or extremely minimal losses then why should one care about developing policies regarding military and economy? Why should one motivate others to do certain activities?
Solid points here Zhulkarn. I was coming from it from a standpoint of 'if I lost 40k worth of things, that'd be about half my marks account' frame of mind. I can appreciate the argument of peace is the reward, time and again I've praised the RP environment and your post is a reminder to me that these community conflict devices are still RP points and makes me remember to include RP rewards too. Thanks!
Comments
Problem 1: If you land on a cosmpiercer and die, your ship is stuck there until the generators respawn. If your side loses, you have to pay ship insurance costs and lose all your cargo.
Solution 1A: Allow INSURANCE TOWREQUEST <ship> to function on ships docked at cosmpiercers in addition to ships floating in space.
Solution 1B: Remove/reduce cargo loss/insurance fees when a ship is destroyed in an open PvP zone.
Solution 1C: Alter ship PvP costs to be less punishing in general, in hopes of encouraging more ship PvP.
Problem 2: Space combat in cosmpiercer fights rarely exists, but when it does exist, it eclipses all other stages of the contest.
Solution 2A: Introduce a space combat objective that comes after the the hacking objective is completed. For example, a second set of generators at the end of the hacking which needs to be destroyed to complete the transfer.
Solution 2B: Introduce a space combat objective that is simultaneous with the hacking. For example, instead of giving points directly, hacking a terminal spawns a 'communications satellite' aligned with the terminal's prior owner and destroying that in space causes points to start accumulating.
Solution 2C: Introduce a 5 minute window at the start of a cosmpiercer attempt during which all players can use SHIP WARP.
Solution 3A: Change wormholes not to work on cosmpiercers or ships docked at cosmpiercers; likewise cause death onboard a cosmpiercer to destroy corpses and leave only INRs.
Solution 3B: Introduce a 5 minute cooldown, starting upon revival by any means (cloning, heartstart, timeline revert, etc.) during which heartstart fails to revive them and wormholes cannot be used.
Solution 3C: Give anyone who's faction controls at least one terminal the ability to wormhole onto a cosmpiercer without using a ship.
Problem 4: Best play for the defensive team requires constant hypervigilance and a willingness to drop everything in order to defend on zero notice. This makes it difficult to make time for in depth roleplay events, incursions, space mining, bashing or anything else that requires considerable uninterrupted periods of online time.
Solution 4A: Change cosmpiercer openings to have considerable overlap, but be less frequent. Having 6 cosmpiercers open up every 5 hours has desirable traits here, as it provides a good spread of possible targets while giving a minimum of 3 hours of down time for hunting, mining and RP between possible defenses. Also, it causes the timing of openings to gradually drift across timezones, ensuring opportunities for non-peak players.
Solution 4B: Require that cosmpiercer attempts be declared in advance somehow.
Personally I'd be in favor of leaving everything the way it is if only to give time for more people to get their feet with and get some sort of idea on how to interact with this system but putting a temporary system, maybe something similar to the current insurance system but have the insurance companies also include a marks transfer of the estimated costs for refitting your ship (I dunno how to calculate this, perhaps taking an average value currently on the market?). Either way, you won't really catch me volunteering to fly out to a Cosmpiercer right now given the risk doesn't seem to come with a reward that I can personally profit from, and I'll probably bow out when I've given HETE about 5k.
@Cubey -- I am just realizing who you played and wanted to reach out to say I'm sorry you've had a bad experience. While our characters didn't interact a ton, you definitely brightened my experience in Celestine..
The reward comes after you capture enough of the cosmpiercers and then a time of relative peace strikes. That is a long term investment but some people seem to desire either minimal losses or great gains in short time. And along the stacking captures and cosmpiercer benefits, factions offer their own rewards to promote one activity or another. Clone and insurance costs are pretty low, and the most hit you could get is that your ship could be overloaded with cargo and destroyed in a PvP zone. Those who lose large ships can put those marks back fast enough.
In the end cosmpiercers are a community activity and people should not look from the perspective of individual. Losses and problems cause your governments to be motivated to find solutions as well. Right now dying in a cosmpiercer would only hurt someone's pride, not their accounts. Maybe one can even see it as a time loss, which is why it is a promoted activity.
Alternatively we can follow the path of Aetolia ylem battles where there are no losses, some gains which does nothing to impact economy or RP. Essentially a minigame to keep interested PvPers engage each other which most of the time ends with the numerous party to win if the other side shows at all.
Time and again the old thought that reducing the costs of activities would endorse those activities fails because the activity itself practically becomes desensitized from the world. Let me say this, if there was none or extremely minimal losses then why should one care about developing policies regarding military and economy? Why should one motivate others to do certain activities?