How do we reduce player apathy/Leaving rates?

[Thexare]

We probably also need money sinks that aren't PoBs to spark some life into money-making activities like mining, which in turn would hopefully bring piracy back,

Step back, look at POBs again. I rambled about this before. Less cargo, higher price - less tedium in base maintenance, more money sink. But with fewer trips needed to supply the base, people are free to get that money in whatever way they might prefer.

I wasn't saying PoBs are, by definition, a "bad" money sink. Just that I feel there should be different ones to ensure players will rarely if ever feel like they have "enough money to last a lifetime".

Oh I agree, I just wanted to make sure any potential solutions didn't skip over existing systems and the problemes therein.

[Ryummel]

I guess I'm a victim to my own theory, but, damn.


No, I'm not coming back here.

What a backfire, indeed.

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[Lonely_Ghost]

Blame Gauss, it's his fault!

So, it's easy to understand, that 4.85, with 200 ppl was a pike on that line.....


About, how to reduce leaving rate.

Hastle has a point here. We need a money sink here, and it would be greate, if it would be nice, shiny and jucy. Like a new car, in BMW, Mercedes, Audi, VW dealers. So new players, would see something, what could attrackt him in this game, and make him actualy stay here for a period of time.

For example- put cap selling station near Erie. No need to sell Lib Dread there, no, just a Liberty siedge Cruiser, Prison Liner, and civilian gunboat. And give those station dry docks, where you can put those ships, like at Norfolk.

Also, you can put some kind of a ship advertisment into players hold, like- Every ship you see in game can be flown. From fighter, to battleship.


Make more PVE! Player should know, that with his cruiser or dread, he can be easely killed, but also, he can make some cool missions. Not a bad feature- missions in Alaska gainst the Order. Make same same missions against Nomads! Not just NPC's hunting! Missions for Nomads, against Order or Core, for OCs, in Omi 9X, Missions against Wilde, and so on. More cap missions for cap players. But don't make those missions pain in the ass. Very nice exaple was in 85- Missions against BHG destoyers, or Corsairs Osirises. Don't make those missions 12-15 mils worth, but very hard to. Make them 2-6 millions.

Stop ruining Sirius! No need to blow up gates, change well known routes and so on. No need to add buffer systems, especialy, pointless, like Lambda. Would be nice, to have clouse to Vanila FL system's geography.

Mining.... dunno how, but remove NPC's ability to tract cargo in space. Let them trackt amo, b/b, but not goods. So, we would have solo mining. You mine, fill your Heggy, move to base, drop cargo, dock, change char, undock, pick up. Yes, it worked! Remember Dublin, Omega 7.

Balancing capital ships, especialy, cruisers and battleships. Decreas cruiser's weapon range, and speed. Balancing heavy BS against medium and so one-next step.


Players need to see, how cool there is! Fighters, caps, missions, even some mystery could be added. Srsly, noone thought about some Marketing's moves?

[Zed26]

Make more PVE! Player should know, that with his cruiser or dread, he can be easely killed, but also, he can make some cool missions. Not a bad feature- missions in Alaska gainst the Order. Make same same missions against Nomads! Not just NPC's hunting! Missions for Nomads, against Order or Core, for OCs, in Omi 9X, Missions against Wilde, and so on. More cap missions for cap players. But don't make those missions pain in the ass. Very nice exaple was in 85- Missions against BHG destoyers, or Corsairs Osirises. Don't make those missions 12-15 mils worth, but very hard to. Make them 2-6 millions.

Actually, if you check out a lot of bases they now have 2mil+ missions that involve gunboats and up. I think they went ahead and removed the cap/put the reward value very close to the max. Trying to fly a Ranseur through the ice field around Mactan to shoot Orcas and Bottlenoses is quite an experience. I've also seen a Zoner dreadnought cruising through California late at night shooting Rogues gunships.

[Pinko]

How do you reverse entropy? That's basically the question op has....decay happens to all things.

Someone mentioned entropy?

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I want to get off Mr. Igiss' wild ride.

[t0l]

Contract with Disco?

Does that mean I get to be a magical girl?

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[Pinko]

Contract with Disco?

Does that mean I get to be a magical girl?

Become Golden Crysanthenum!

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I want to get off Mr. Igiss' wild ride.

[iCon3q7]

Add to the FAQ and UAQ and make them sticky? At least the FAQ.

Edit: No need for sig here..

[Croft]

It would probably help if we start re-establishing the old RP atmosphere on the server, starting with official factions. These factions are the pillars of our community, they are held to higher standards and greater responsibility then most and as such should be rewarded for their efforts. Giving them a base was a nice guesture but it doesn't give much to the pilots and lets face it the only thing people truly want from Disco is the caps, give them to the official factions and make any indie cap SRP for the ship.

Now before anyone goes nuts, allow me to explain my reasoning. By giving official factions the most desired ships it instantly requires those who want the big ships to A. Put effort into getting it beyond grinding credits and B. Forces them to be better people for fear of losing it. Same effect with the SRP's. Those who already own caps should be given three options, refund, SRP attempt or join the official faction. It's a hardline to take but we've tried giving players the benefit of the doubt and all we've got are dying factions and an empty, mostly silent server.

Factions themselves need an audit, their lore and shiplines should updated so that they complement each other rather than being at odds. For example:
Outcasts are supposed to be small in number yet we frequently see their caps down in Liberty.
Corsairs are meant to be starving to death but have food enough to stock battleships and dreadnaughts.
The Order, a small faction that keeps tabs on the Nomads but somehow has the resources to build three different kinds of capital ships.
Zoners, basically space hobos yet somehow have become explorers with colony ships.
And so on.

These are just a handful of the mass contradictions that exist within Disco, it's almost like three different versions of lore. Vanilla, the Dev's and the factions. It's a mess and we wonder why new players find it hard to fit in. If we can get everything merged down into something solid and understandable we might be able to get somewhere.

That's just the tip of the iceberg.

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

[lIceColon]

Simple. Decide whether it wants to be a PVP or RP server. This dinky middle ground is probably not the best place ever.

If RP, then:
Everything should be balanced according to logic and realism, NOT gameplay reasons. Cool features shouldn't be nerfed to hell just because of a fear of abuse. Ships should also cost their value, and at least some kind of death system should be implemented to encourage people to be less suicidal (eg. 1 on 1 duels when your faction clearly has the upper hand, unless it's your RP and you don't mind losing your ship). Transactions should only be conducted in-RP, all oorp actions must have rp justification. OP weapon combinations should be allowed, but would be few in numbers because not everyone has a magical engineer contact who can hook up alien nipples to your ship's generator. Piracy should be much more difficult, but the pay-off should be much, much higher (ideally the value of the trade ship). Rules should be relaxed to allow greater freedom in roleplaying, and all players should be screened to make sure they genuinely fit into the community (eg. I have never seen anti-cheat software in flight simulator games because the players there simply aren't out to troll). The skill factor should be reduced to allow everyone to RP what they want to RP without having to be limited as much by how much they practice or reaction times etc. The scale of the universe should be explained as a visual representation, and distance measuring should be in much greater units than m's and km's. Engagement rules should be changed to allow for inRP actions such as sneak attacks etc, but of course such actions should have much more severe consequences- reputation with factions should be easy to lose and difficult to gain.

If PVP, then:
The game should be made much, much more arcadey, with systems and ships and regions built for the purpose of facilitating large scale battles. Rules protecting players from getting trolled should be increase, and the skill factor should be increased as well. Things such as trade routes should allow encounters to happen more frequently, and everything should have better firepower. More combat ships and features should be implemented, such as a weak point on a ship for actual snipers, EVA combat suits, meelee, etc. Every faction would be different in lore but similar in units with minor differences in bonuses and weaknesses a la RTS games, and players should be limited to a faction so that the antagonism could spark more space battles. Ships should be easier to obtain, and skill should always be able to make up for a poorly armed ship - a skilled EVA suit should be able to dodge flak, fly up to a battleship, drop mines in or shoot its weak points and then run away as the battleship explodes. Systems should be designed for different styles of combat, such as a snub battlefield in asteroid fields, or capital ship battlefield in a high radiation region, or a battlefield that requires team work and strategic positioning of units etc. And PVP functions should be implemented such as the maximum amount of players in a region so as to reduce ganks. Rules in general should be simplified to allow better accessibility.