I'd like to create a discussion about how it currently feels to be a brand new player to this game. Now before I start I'd like to admit that I am a complete and total noobie and this is just my opinion.
I'm quite new to using video games as a tool to roleplay with. However I am not new to roleplay as a whole as I have been a dungeons and dragons player. I have only attempted role playing in 3 games:
Vanilla world of Warcraft years and years ago on the official server long before even the first expansion. Roleplay was non existent back then. It was all about progressing in game rather than character. Perhaps the roleplay servers have matured a lot since then but that's how it is.
A private wow roleplay server. Progression was completely non existent here. Every character started at max level with infinite gold and server commands, the roleplay was unbelievably strict, there was no PvP, fights were solved rock paper scissors style. However the server probably had an entire population of 50 people and I never saw double digits online.
Discovery is my third...And as progression goes it kinda feels like it's in the middle. There is a lot of very strong roleplay and there is a sense of progression. I honestly really enjoy this balance it keeps things interesting when you log on and see that you are the "only person" (not that that has ever happened) there is still a little bit of pve to do.
The observation I have though is that as a new player you kinda have the progression idea drilled into your head especially if you have come from other RPGs and exponentially more if mmos. I have heard both in and out of roleplay that the starting ship is worthless and should be replaced as soon as possible (as a side note here probably the most glorious thing I have seen so far is a sunburst go 3 against 1 and somehow win, which is the motivation to me making this post, teaching me that no ship is awful if your skill is high enough, a lesson I learned coincidentally being in the right place at time) and where you start really doesn't help with that...
So everyone spawns at Pennsylvania.
I think that this is a good and a bad thing although mostly good.
I like that it has the helium cloud although I will touch on this again later.
I like that it's very very close to the centre of the map, new York where a large amount of the roleplay happens.
I like the fact that it isn't in the path of a mega trade lane which keeps it mostly being a place for new players and only new players as the potentially high standard of RP not to mention unlawful activity which may be seen as greifing for a new player finding their feet. (Quick question actually is there some unwritten rule about not pirating there because of the newbies?).
However there's potentially a little bit of a downside here:
I've spent a bit of time reading the forums about trading and I have noticed that there is a little bit of a hostility towards new players who decide to start trading. I see derogatory terms thrown about such as: powertrading, lolcaps, silent trader, lolberty etc etc.
However are we sending new players mixed messages a little?
When I started I flew around a little bit and I saw the liberty navy and I made an assumption that I'm sure a lot of other green players make and that is ooh look at the end game. Indeed this is the criticism I see thrown at traders, after all the only reason anyone trades is to fly a cap right? Was I wrong to assume that? Well I'd argue no...
Undock from planet Erie and immediately in your face is battleship Gettysburg. Now even if I've never met a navy character the very first thing this game has taught me is that battleships exsist. It may sound silly but video games design often has an element of player training and there are lots and lots of games that show you early on what you may become as motivation and framing to the theme of the game. This idea of progression is unfortunately now amplified by the new player guide and the concept of being a helium miner.
When I started mining helium I didn't get have the concept of the ship and the character being one and the same like I do now. No it felt a lot more like leveling up and swapping ship as soon as possible. First 4 million? Great! Immediately buy a Gull! 10 million? Thank goodness you don't have to fly that useless thing anymore get a mammoth. Every time I bought a ship I was looking at 1 thing and 1 thing only, cargo space. I didn't understand most of the other stats (and to be honest still even now I probably don't know what everyone means) but it felt very much like a vertical progression system.
If you are a completely new player you won't have a credit to your name and you will most likely start trading because it's the simplest thing to get your head around.
I have spent a little bit of time as a trader and I'm currently flying a 3600 ship. It was expensive! In fact I think I could probably reasonably outfit 10 other ships for the same price (another potentially missed lesson, ships are generally a lot cheaper than transports but it takes a conceted effort to notice this as a new player if you are just trying to get those first few million credits). I completely understand why, it's supposed to be an investment and it effectively generates money for you outside of a player economy. However because it's such an expensive investment I found myself in an (arguably) incorrect mind set where I had to "power trade" to at least get this investment back and during that time I realised that the best way of doing that was to never get robbed and I caught myself pressing "y" a lot and looking up tags to see if I needed to go around or not use the lanes... I don't think that this is strictly against the rules as some people would say it's meta gaming and others would say it's smart trading, it's a bit of a scummy grey area... But in any case it's avoiding RP and that really feels against the overall spirit. Although you have to admit as a trader the best way of surving a pirate is to never bump into them. Is this me being a "power trader" or is it part of the way that the design of the game teaches new players subliminally? Being charged 2 million on my empty Camara stang a hell of a lot at the time perhaps if I had let them shoot me instead I would have felt better about it.
I'm sure this is something that will change as I get a little bit more experienced. Something space games have in common is a steep learning curve which is always going to be steeper when there are RP restrictions that you have to remember to enforce as the programming can't do it. All in all I've really enjoyed my time as a new player and I really really hope this doesn't come off as whiney! I'd be really interested in hearing your thoughts!
Casey x
tl;dr great game, mind blowing good mod but steep learning curve!
First, it's a reality that we have two main types of players on the server. Those from video games and those from face-to-face roleplaying games. As I see it, they don't have the same idea of what means roleplay. They don't have the same expectations and it causes some frustration from time to time. Like you I am also coming from the face-to-face RPG and I am looking for those type of players. I am not really interested in PVP (not good at that, have a ping > 100, and more important most of my ships don't have guns)
Second, it's true that new players are usually in deep need of credits to buy new equipment. For that reason, they may powertrade and neglect roleplay. However, I've seen some new players mining/trading in groups in Pennsylvania. It's probably more efficient and certainly more pleasant since you can roleplay at the same time. One suggestion, check call for traders regularly posted on the forums because this might be a significant source of credits (you get the credits from trading + a reward specified in the contract) and also the opportunity to meet older players (while flying with them you can have some great roleplay interactions). If you are doing good in these trade convoys, you might receive an extra reward from these players (1 or 2 million credits is nothing for them).
For your info, there are actually some trade convoys to Planet Gran Canaria (contact OSI, a zoner faction, for more info) and Freeport 11 (contact The Seraphim, another zoner group, or IMG, for more info).
Like moebus said we're a fairly mixed community. Some of us like the pvp aspect of the game, some prefer to stick mostly to words. Sometimes that causes some turbulence in the community when different views of the game clash. We've had pirates complain traders only care for the $$$ and would do all they can to have minimal interaction with pirates or even silently drift to secure better chances to escape, the dreaded "just kill me, faster for me that way" and so on. We've also heard traders complain about pirates being "2mil or die" or demanding unjust sums to force pvp on traders for easy kills. While both sides can be blamed for this separation of camps the only sensible thing we can do is remember the other side is a human being.
As for the Penny system - there's no rule that you can't shoot or pirate people in there but due to the fact it's mostly newbies who are still learning about the game most pirates just tend to let them be as not to be too cruel to the ones starting their adventure in Discovery.
This is a very well written, levelheaded assessment and is just the sort of thing that I as a developer love to hear. Some of your gripes can't be handled with a simple change of game mechanics and a lot of it comes down to attitude, but there are other things here which are extremely useful to see.
The idea that bigger = better and that capital ships are an endgame is completely false. Every class in Discovery is balanced against each other and even some well coordinated fighters can take down a much larger foe (at the cost of being slower at it than bombers).
The reason that Discovery is a game of progression is largely due to limitations in game mechanics and simply the age of the game itself. It can't keep itself alive on pure roleplay like WoW can - it simply isn't large enough - and due to the mechanics there isn't much to work towards aside from larger ships, which aren't quantifiably better.
Once you start getting into the realm of the quantifiable, the progression suddenly becomes real rather than imagined. We don't want veterans with billions of cash running around in ships that are objectively better than anything a new player can get, that becomes EVE, and much like the WoW analogy, we simply don't have the player base to support that type of meta.
So there is a progression there, and there are certain things to work towards such as POBs and the equipment they can make, as well as Spazzy's event commodities - more on that in this thread - but for the most part it's all a show, at least as far as ships are concerned.
I've always worked towards progressing my characters and their stories as well as my skill at the game as a player rather than anything purchasable with money. I've found it to be much more rewarding, and I'd argue that I'm one of the few players here who is just as interested in FL's old, janky combat mechanics as they are at roleplaying in the (I'd like to believe) intriguing universe that we (both developers and community) as well as those before us have given us the joy of experiencing.
All in all, I'd love to see more unbiased, objective views like this, and I'd also be very interested in just sitting down and roleplaying with you some time, or hitting up connecticut to get some training on. You seem like a very bright person, and those come along rarely no matter where you are.