Why is the community population declining?

[nOmnomnOm]

Disco is a relaxed RP server.
Hardcore RP fans we had have left for more RP orientated servers, while the casual crowd cannot be bothered with all of the RP BS.

O.O

First time I heard of this.
No, I've always thought to go hardcore... well maybe not hardcore as in you die you start from the beginning but as in RP RP RP.

I rather enjoy it more than just going around pewing and I often be doing so engage others to RP with me.

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[Croft]

but as it is now there's not much fun in [roleplaying a smuggler].

How come? I do know there is a huge profit margin. Do lawfuls see contraband as an excuse to blow you up? Or do you simply not encounter anybody?

The latter, I don't play a smuggler for the money due to it being far quicker to trade normally though it's equally tedious. The lack of encounters is the issue. I'll rephrase that, the lack of decent encounters is the issue. I've already spoken of my problems with some of the pirates.
It's been my experience that visiting contraband sellers (Gamma, Alpha and so on) doesn't generate much RP aside from a little "Ah bringing more X, good the dockers will be pleased. We'll be sure to load you with as much Y as you can hold." There's nothing more to say, I made it a point to ask anyone flying with the ID for permission to dock just to open up some avenues for RP. You can imagine how boring it is flying between sell points with only 2 mill or die pirates as your interaction.

I have grand ideas about how to change my small bit of space into something I think a lot of people will enjoy. However without the clout of being an official faction or the members to give my voice weight the few suggestions made haven't taken hold. Things like changing jumpholes to force smugglers through gates, altering TLAGS to hide freighter cargo basically pushing us into view of the law which I think should be made our main source of interaction. It really is an uphill struggle, not only because my ideas change gameplay quite significantly it also demands a change in how people view smugglers and that's damned neigh impossible.

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Jimmy The Rat | Croft's Feedback | The Rat Pack

[Tenacity]

In my opinion, it's because Discovery GC is no longer the same beast that drew veteran RPers in years ago.

When I first joined Disco, I was not accustomed to roleplaying in freelancer. I had played on the RAW server, which was a vanilla pvp server. There was some unenforced RP there, but only a few players actually put any effort into the RP - when I met them I had a blast, but that was not the focus of the game for me.

After microsoft shut down support for freelancer's global server, I had to go online to find mods or communities with private servers that I could continue playing on. Discovery is the one I eventually stuck with, for a few basic reasons:
1. The RP here was fun. Simple as that - there were fewer rules back then, everyone RP'd because they -wanted- to, and it was easy to find others to roleplay with.
2. The ships. Most mods were vanilla ships only, or had mixed genres (like the mods that add ships from starwars, bsg, star trek, etc.). Disco gave access to the capital ships and larger transports that made the single player freelancer seem so epic.
3. Population - Disco was big back then.

Over time, discovery has gone through a few distinct phases:
-At first, the trend was to add new ships, new factions, and new weapons, and in general to do things to improve the game-side aspect of the community, which made players spend more time in-game rather than on the forums and created more face to face RP.
-Then disco received an influx of people who didnt follow the simple rules that the community set forth. Because of this, discovery's admins had to become increasingly more strict, and the rules for the community changed from a handful of common-sense restrictions to a plethora of if-this-then-that strictures that sucked the fun out of the game. No longer were players free to create RP that both they and the other gamers mutually enjoyed, now everyone was restricted to doing what everyone else thought they should do. Creativity bombed, and most in-game RP was forsaken for forum RP to avoid sanctions.
-The result was a decline in the population of good roleplayers in-game, which lead to an increase in the poor roleplayers, poor english speakers, and pvp-oriented individuals now that the server's limited slots (which had previously been occupied by those roleplayers) were being freed up.

I like a good story, and that used to be something you could find in-game, but now every single word that people type out in the game runs the risk of insulting someone or being a sanctionable offense. When the game is no longer a good place for your story, you take it elsewhere (which ended up being to the forums in this case, and eventually to other games as those players got bored with freelancer's environment).



Long story short: too many factions, too many conflicting points of interest, and too many rules.

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[Lonely_Ghost]

No offence, but...everything were done to make server as we have it now. Removing rule for GB only to pirate= 2milordienowhascruiser ! Advantage to capital ships made them too popular, so we have 5 cruisers after 2 bombers. Im not talking about averange gaming lvl of cap ships- if they are red, I will kill them. Cloak cap just removes any willing to interact with player.
And thing, I very dislike, it's when I find some adequate player to RP with, but then comes one, or even worse, groupe of lolwuts with cloaked caps and just pew pew pew pew pew pew and hahahahahahahahahaha.
But srsly...we went to it with our own steps.

[Oorn]

-Then disco received an influx of people who didnt follow the simple rules that the community set forth. Because of this, discovery's admins had to become increasingly more strict, and the rules for the community changed from a handful of common-sense restrictions to a plethora of if-this-then-that strictures that sucked the fun out of the game. No longer were players free to create RP that both they and the other gamers mutually enjoyed, now everyone was restricted to doing what everyone else thought they should do. Creativity bombed, and most in-game RP was forsaken for forum RP to avoid sanctions.

Tell me, back there was it:

You don't, in your RP before PvP requirement, need to actually declare you are attacking the person. Talk about the organisms on Kurile acting like benign chatty researcher and suddenly open up a can of pewpew on your audience out of the blue (or whatever fits your chars role). Just RP some before PvP.

or was there "May treat non Libertonian trade vessels as combat targets. Give them hell, a taste of hell before you send them there. " on Xeno ID?

And yes, latest features discourouged in-game rp. Bases, all what comes from them is basic forum stuff and ingame HATE. Cloaks, be it ultimate /l1 /l2 instrument or invisible liner bumping your BS and feeding bots to fighters. Right now more time you spend talking to someone more you risk being ganked by invisible aproaching fleet. Who would RP in this ?

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When "roleplay" around you seems to be diminishing... all you can do is be a new beacon of roleplay to light up everyone else's interactions.

[Vasuv]

People leave because it takes 2+ years for each update now.
Things are getting old real fast.
The admins/devs ignore experianced players, and cater to the new.
They introduce new items that un-balance game.
They change rep ninja's because "Official factions" say to, and screw all indies.

I can go on and on, but i am sure you get it.

yes many of my friends left because of the time gap it took to build 4.86
I remeber when kusari storyline was launched i started to save for a RM carrier with cap Mk 8 but by the time 4.86 got launched i had buyed 3 BS with all Mk 8 armours

[Alley]

I wouldn't say the population is declining, it's simply changing.

Of course there's going to be less players, that's because the game is starting to be really old and the dev team decided to pull some really funky stuff that drove away a big chunk of the 4.84/4.85 players, but also because we had to wait almost two years for 4.86 that's easily the worst version of the mod.

Gallia was a hell lot of fun in 4.85. Just a few systems, some pvp in the taus etc it was good. It should never have evolved in a house designed like someone was on drugs when he did it. The Omicrons were a better place too, no 300k to fly to have a chance to meet another player.

Oh well.

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Alley was right.

[Chloe Darrieux]

I came here with expectations of good RP. I probably sucked at it at first, and I know I made a lot of mistakes, but at least I tried to get better. I decided to play an LPI indie (go figure). After a while though, I simply got tired of LR people pirating in Gunboats 20k from Manhattan (like that wouldn't attract the attention of the LN?), getting blown up without warning by veteran players in official factions and getting mocked by 2-3 pirates flying around Manhattan killing NPC cap ships like nobodies business.

I have seen tonnes of newbies in and around New York, that really do try to RP and improve, but they are then totally turned off when they ask me "Why don't you kill those rogues, Sarah?", and I am forced to reply that I simply can't. There is no reasonable way for my Liberator to take on 2-3 Gunboats and / or VHF. You might argue that I should throw myself in and die for RP reasons, but why would I? To get a 4-hour lockout? Better to log off for 30min and come back, hoping they are gone.

Seriously, a majority of my best RP encounters have been with total newbs who came in from doing missions, having looted some LR weapons or illegal goods that I promptly asked them to get rid off. There is no GAMEPLAY reason for a LR in a GB to respect an LPI player in a Liberator 20k from Manhattan, but there are RP reasons for doing so, something that is often forgotten. These new players however, tend to play along a lot more, if not for the fact that I am better equipped, but for the fact that they are standing next to a fricking LPI base. After that I tried to go BPA). I really loved the people I met on BPA), but after my first encounter having been the same damn GB (molly official) pirating poor indies 15k away from a BPA planet, I simply rage quit the server.

TLDR; don't put all the blame on the new players, because I have seen veteran players who think they can treat them anyway they want for no good reason at all.

[Anaximander]

Gallia was a hell lot of fun in 4.85. Just a few systems, some pvp in the taus etc it was good.

Nostalgia is one hell of a drug...

Do you remember the bomber NPC's of 4.85 Gallia? The constant complaining about the OP NPC's being the reason why nobody bothered with Gallia back then either?

[Tenacity]

Back in my day, not everyone could be a nomad.

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