(04-09-2022, 10:00 PM)WesternPeregrine Wrote: Dismantle the OF system, reform the of related rights to a more open use for npc related factions.
Convert the forum section to a sirian credit subscription, that will allow any active faction to have their spot on the communications forum wise, if they are willing to deplete their cash reserves, or actively work and farm/grind to keep up the costs of such service.
just charge me real money to be official i'd rather do that
(04-09-2022, 10:00 PM)WesternPeregrine Wrote: Dismantle the OF system, reform the of related rights to a more open use for npc related factions.
Convert the forum section to a sirian credit subscription, that will allow any active faction to have their spot on the communications forum wise, if they are willing to deplete their cash reserves, or actively work and farm/grind to keep up the costs of such service.
There are some good thoughts written here. What you are pointing out, it seems, is a simple access to any ACTIVE faction to be involved in contributing to and supporting the decisions made by the developers, etc. There is a degree of accountability as well, in that to have a say in the decisions to be made, you pay for it.
Would you also say this would require a minimum number of members proving active involvement with a minimum number of personal hours for each individual faction member. This to be tabulated by the faction and SUBMITTED to the scrutiny of the management team?
From what I've seen, most people that come to play here love Freelancer and enjoy the game in general. The problem comes with negative encounters within the playerbase and forced changes that usually drive people away after being left with a feeling of 'why bother even try'.
The game could be popular enough to keep people online again, it just needs some serious development of the mod. As in, set aside stats and changes to star systems, to put some time into developing how the mod is played in general. We could be playing a much more in depth game, a far more open ended version of the mod completely. We're fine on ships, weapons, etc. for a while. Come up with some new things to do! What we need to be able to do, is all that has so far been prohibited.
Without a system to ensure cyclical activity, meaning there can always be goals to work on as groups, there will always be a ceiling for activity here. New players won't notice it until after the 6 month mark, maybe make it to a year. After that, there is one elephant in the room problem: There is not that much to do with all those ships you earn and prepare. Nothing keeps it going, nothing drives consumption and therefore activity. Without that, you can't just log on anymore and find encounters, since no one logs as much in the first place, as there is not that much point. I can't believe how factions can still function at all. I've seen it over and over, yeah it still happens one gets big and built up. Then they hit the ceiling and (like IMG, the Core) it fades away with little to do with your space fleets and reinforced bases. What a waste!
People frown on pixel empires and making the place more like Eve, but still don't have any better solution to put forth themselves. When I say that, opening things up might, at best, double our current population, it's unlikely this place will get that big like Eve. But we could open up the possibilities and take the population boom, regardless of any potential drawbacks. Many have repeatedly said that letting player driven outcomes set changes here would be disastrous, but how can it get any worse than a steady loss of interest? It was never true.
Organization is the key, I say let whatever factions can succeed, build their pixel empires, and use a common system to keep it fair. I guarantee, I'd bet my life, if this place adopted a system that uncaps faction level moves (within a framework of options) we will go back to higher levels of activity on average, and never be shy of community involving events (that also propel story in small ways). Allow that, and factions will be fine again in a couple of months. A lot of people can play here still, they just need to see real change to draw them back.
Instead of writing essays on what needs to change every time, you can also just log in and play the game, interact with people and keep your faction alive.
(04-10-2022, 12:25 AM)Megaera Wrote: Instead of writing essays on what needs to change every time, you can also just log in and play the game, interact with people and keep your faction alive.
(04-10-2022, 12:25 AM)Megaera Wrote: Instead of writing essays on what needs to change every time, you can also just log in and play the game, interact with people and keep your faction alive.
To do what though? No factions can really have active plans to do anything worth working towards at any given time. There are no factions planning to try to capture other faction's bases, moons or planets (routes/systems). No factions planning to try to capture a jump gate from goverment control, etc. Therefore there is little 'necessity' generated for other smaller factions and trades to survive off of. Nothing can develop freely or naturally. I mean, come on, that obviously doesn't cut it for most players except for a once a week thing. We need more than 'just log' for the place to really function.
At any given time, factions could be working towards their next goal, and there could be a lot more stuff to do here 24/7 again. I suggested using Scidata to make moves, but it would also work with things like Ores. For example, instead of needing 3000 units to earn a siege event of a planet/moon, it could be 500 000 units of some kind of industrial grade ore, like Iridium, Nobium, Molybendum, etc. Then any factions wanting to use their moves, would need to get mining, or get paying other mining factions to mine it. Think of what that would do for the mining industry here, and therefore the security aspect (Freelancers?) to help out. It would create a slow moving, long term constant consumption to keep changes ongoing. Every faction wanting to maintain the option to siege or counter siege after being attacked already, would be working to keep their stocks of ores or scidata up to keep their options open. That means on top of a bump in mining and trade, there would be all sorts of other money making trade stimulated for those big factions to pay for their needs. All the while people could happily RP their roles along the way, making deals, contracts and treaties as needed.
Does that sound so bad? After 6 months we might be back in a good place and have a good routine going on, and a happily busy playerbase.
(04-10-2022, 12:25 AM)Megaera Wrote: Instead of writing essays on what needs to change every time, you can also just log in and play the game, interact with people and keep your faction alive.
If people are not happy with how things are they have the right to provide opinions, ideas. Shutting them down with "Stop crying, go play" or "Don't like it, leave" is not productive. And if majority of players like you are bossing others around, silencing them, I doubt Discovery can be thriving community. Or would you rather have unhappy and disgruntled players ingame who are only playing the grind to keep factions alive to appease players like you?
Games are supposed to be fun, enjoyable. Take it away and there is no point in playing games. Especially with community that stomps down on any ideas brought forward in hopes of improvement.
The reason I left this community was because I was denied entry into economy developers for the second time. If I cannot provide my extensive activity to improve this game there was no point in staying around being petty and reflecting that upon innocent players. Keeping OF status just for pixel-power was not my goal, so I just moved onto games that I can enjoy playing. And have not regretted it for a second.
(04-10-2022, 12:25 AM)Megaera Wrote: Instead of writing essays on what needs to change every time, you can also just log in and play the game, interact with people and keep your faction alive.
If people are not happy with how things are they have the right to provide opinions, ideas. Shutting them down with "Stop crying, go play" or "Don't like it, leave" is not productive. And if majority of players like you are bossing others around, silencing them, I doubt Discovery can be thriving community. Or would you rather have unhappy and disgruntled players ingame who are only playing the grind to keep factions alive to appease players like you?
Games are supposed to be fun, enjoyable. Take it away and there is no point in playing games. Especially with community that stomps down on any ideas brought forward in hopes of improvement.
The reason I left this community was because I was denied entry into economy developers for the second time. If I cannot provide my extensive activity to improve this game there was no point in staying around being petty and reflecting that upon innocent players. Keeping OF status just for pixel-power was not my goal, so I just moved onto games that I can enjoy playing. And have not regretted it for a second.
Nowhere am I silencing other players. I can't even do that since I have never been part of staff, nor do I aspire to be. I am entitled to my own opinion like everyone else in this thread. I didn't tell anyone to leave or stop crying. I also dont assume to be a majority. I only speak for myself. Also I doubt anyone here would let me boss them around in the first place.
But the thing is, most of the people who always come to complain on the forum are those who barely play the game in the first place for various reasons. None of the things they brought forwards will fix the low player count, which is the main problem. If people log more, it will encourage others to log more aswell.
Second major issue is the staff, for which there isn't a real solution as long as they plainly ignore anything outside their friend groups.
Leaving the game for not being a part of staff is a potential reason to leave. But that feels more like forcing your ideas on others than the simple sentence I have posted.
I do not see anything bullying in what Magaera wrote.
She is straight-up honest with her opinions.
Snak3, I find is rather disingenuous and I find his comments ironic as he is actually talking about himself. I can recall incidents of shutting people down, and stomping on other people's dreams and ambitions. Deliberately using his influence for the negative.
If you have left this community, as you say, why are you back here stirring up strife, Snick3? Ageira is done, gone, toast because no one wanted to play and/or refused applications of people who wanted to join.