(12-20-2016, 11:03 AM)Laura C. Wrote: Nothing is more fun than flying around on "patrol" for hour with no encounters, that´s what everybody wants to do on multiplayer server. It´s definitely going to "help" activity in areas like Omicrons or Omegas where player movement is not streamlined at least little by trade lanes and jumpgates like in houses (and which can also be scouted in more reasonable time thanks to trade lanes). I stand by my point that this change will hurt activity in non-house space in major way. Good luck finding anyone in open space with 15K scanner (and range is even reduced in some areas).
The list still wouldn't help you find players within the system, it would only tell you that there are players in it, something that is done by the ingame list at any rate.
Oddly enough Disco's "golden years" were populated by people doing exactly what Petitioner mentioned, literally flying around just to see who would pop up. It'll be a refreshing change to see that again and anything that steers us away from the current "lobby" way of doing things is all the better in my humble opinion.
I would like to remind you that in those golden years, usual server population was 3-4 times higher than now, so just randomly flying around was enough to get encounters. These days you may spend hours alone in some areas if you will be just randomly flying around.
Anyway, I thought that the ingame playerlist is affected too. Since it seems it´s not, then okay, web player list with just regions should be okay (well, after systems will be sorted properly and the best thing would be public list, because not everyone knows which systems belong to which category).
I actually have enough random encounters while blindly flying around. I just don't fly around in Rheinland, as nobody goes there. It's more probable to have random encounters in Gamma, Delta, Bretonia and Liberty than in Gallia, Rheinland and Kusari. Like, Delta is usually the point where people hunt nomad remains or try their luck and get Iridium Ore from Lost, or they hang just out at Freeport 11. Bretonia is the best spot for PoBs and Liberty the best spot for random fights. Gamma is a bottleneck to the Nomicrons. Rheinland, Kusari and Gallia have nothing in long-term to offer. That's more of a problem than the low player counts.
Well, it´s not long time ago when Rheinland was what Bretonia is today. Lot of POBs which were attracting players and helped to create stable activity. But then, local unlawful faction went on killing spree, almost all bases were killed/died and players stopped playing or went to play elsewhere, including Bretonia. Sometimes players´ interest shifts naturally, sometimes it´s consequence of players´ behaviour.
