I've been lurking around for about a week or so, just checking up on Discovery to see what has changed. This is what I've found.
1. Loneliness - Discovery seems to be exceptionally lonely, the unofficial and official groups are fewer and farther than 4.85, for example. People have no incentive to join official factions or hang around with groups, but equally, the official factions can't really be given proper advantages because it's unfair to the indies.
A situation not unlike what I've encountered: What if only the IMG| official faction are really active in the Taus, but I want to play an active Maquis in that region, I'll be hard pressed to find anyone to play with, I'll be even harder pressed to find anyone playing a Maquis.
2. Tediousness - Discovery can be really dragged out and boring. You have to trade to get any money to get any good toys, but on the other hand, making it easier to make money means less traders so the pirates won't pirate and the police and military need not do their jobs so much anymore.
It can take a long time to fly somewhere, and if I wanted to pirate a tradelane, I could find myself waiting for a long time before anyone showed up, why spend my valuable free time sitting around doing nothing?
Combat seems to suffer from this, capital ship fights last minutes, sometimes even seconds, but fighter combat lasts a long time, up to hours. Yes. Hours. A good dogfight can last more than the duration of theatrical movie. The first few minutes are fun, the next few are okay, the next few are sort of lame, and past the half hour mark, it's just a matter of player stamina and patience, less about skill, if both sides last that long. I love fighter combat, but it can get mighty boring.
3. Imbalance - A lot of the ships and guns on Discovery are very imbalanced, this is a roleplaying community, and yet a large portion of the game is PvP based, Sirius is a place ravaged by violence and war. This means that roleplay is heavily influenced by PvP performance. Why would I play a Bundschuh character when I'd be restricting myself to a Sabre and a couple of substandard faction guns?
Sure, It'd be true RP, but there aren't a lot of Bundschuh players about, are there? Why play a Bundschuh when I can play a Red Hessian, with a whole line of ships, including capitals, very good guns, and a wider ZoI?
"Oh, the Bundschuh can use other tech on the chart at yellow and green?" Not good enough, my powerplant would be nerfed, meaning I lose the PvP edge. Why go for 75% or 90% plant when I can go for 100%?
The current tech nerf system, and ship and weapon balance restricts and chokes RP. You pretty much choose if you want RP performance or PvP performance. Which isn't good. It shouldn't be this divided.
4. A Lack of Life - Discovery during 4.85, when I used to play, even towards the end was full of life, Liberty Rogues taunted Outcasts over Comms about stray capital ships, the SCRA was run by a confident Katz, the [LN] and [RM] fought in Texas and Hamburg, the Zoners were in external and internal conflicts, the Outcasts and Corsairs actually fought each other, the Iseijin stalked and the Order hunted. And these are just a few examples of what I remember. Discovery seems to lack this sort of spirit. It's like 4.86 was released and everyone was content with mediocrity.
This is just external observations I've made, from reading the forums and seeing what I have seen in game. Discovery seems to be duller, and less RP-oriented, as stupid as that sounds.
On a brighter note, the Administration team seems to be the best ever, good job on that, and SRP is open again which is awesome.
