What if almost all non-planetary bases were "POBs"?

[Pel]

... we'd end up with having no bases anymore, as PoBs can be easier destroyed than maintained. Plus people enjoy the former more.

In an environment with few systems and few bases it'd work (e.g. vanilla). Disco? No way.

I believe you are correct... in a worse case scenario.

Running things this way would be a legitimate reason to shrink Disco and concentrate things back toward the core.

I believe that the sprawling systems and sprawling storylines do more to sap the strength away from Disco than anything.

The focus on destroying PoBs right now is because they are seen more as a money sink or a "conspicuous consumption" purchase. They are also often created for offensive or defensive purposes and positioned to cause interference with whomever they dislike. This is not the way to run commerce.

Examples like Oceana and some mining bases show that a different model can be followed, one where no one wants to destroy the base because it serves a commercial purpose and is positioned and run in a way that helps rather than hinders.

I am talking about PoBs, but I am also talking about a shift in mindset-- one where the players are less interested in their ego and more interested in creating a economic synergy. One where factions are less defined by NPCs and more defined by actual players.

This is a system that could shrink or grow to match the player base and activity levels and would provide endless opportunities to recruit newbies to helpful duties that make them feel useful and included while they are learning the ropes and eventually graduating (in many cases) to other activities.

I believe that without the Bass Hunter mentality we could rejigger the bases to be a bit easier to maintain and less offensive without any negative consequences. After all, these values have been coded to guard against massive battleship assaults and also to discourage the wanton proliferation of POBs.

In actuality, the solution might be the opposite, but the POB code would have to be streamlined to place a lighter load on the server. I.e. reduce or eliminate base consumption and focus on individuals "crafting" saleable commodities that are representative of their faction and benefit their faction's activity.

[Pel]

I think it's a solid idea, but it's not possible with Discovery as it is. It'd break immersion to no end, even if the entire community was up to this, how many people would want to help support 5 bases as most people are in more than one faction. Even if they had barges and such it'd be such a huge issue.

Rules would have to be changed so that bases can't be hostile to their factions friendlies, to an extreme. It'd seriously be exactly like the normal bases but a pain in the ass. What I'd rather see is if an NPC base doesn't get food, the prices it'll pay for food goes up. If maybe people are buying lots of weapons they need more supplies to make said weapons. So on so forth. It'd have a slight random factor to it, but I don't see why this couldn't work. It'd take time to develop this script ofc though, and as far as I know would cause too much strain on the server. It could be set to edit prices after every restart or something. Small adjustments until people are like, OH SNAP, well worth the trip!

I think you've got the idea. Well done.

It's pretty hard to code NPC bases to change prices in response to shortages (you have to go in and change a lot of values, by hand-- unless they have some automated script that can do that), which is why I was thinking in terms of majority POBs. The people running the bases could more easily change prices in response to demand.

This would shift the role of someone like Xevious to analyzing the commodity routes and suggesting buy/sell prices to POB owners. The actual economic spreadsheet of NPC bases would be vastly simplified and the info supplied by FLC would be greatly reduced, but the base status page on the forum would get a lot more traffic and people could post their prices and commodities there.

Plus they could have advertising threads on the forums. It could be a thing.

The graphics dudes could have a lot of fun creating ad copy and selling it for credits to POB owners.

As for your first point about supporting five bases/hassle-- I think if POBs are the norm they would just reduce the grinding necessary and focus on bases as economic factories. Think less in terms of the current state of affairs and more "minecraft server" where you can create shops and buy/sell commodities that you either craft on your own or get others to deliver to you.

Honestly, the immersion would entirely depend on our creativity and our willingness to stick to lore. We could recreate all of vanilla if we want, or we could create "Vanilla Plus" with the timelines for our faction moved forward a bit, some changes in commerce that are in keeping with lore, with a much larger presence of one faction in a House than before and a decline in another's role, with the possibility that it would shift back the other way at some point.

What if Ageira went from running lonely Detroit Munitions to constructing a whole planetary ring around Manhattan, complete with armament factories, engineering and fleet design subdivisions, ship component factories, warp and jump technology divisions, communications and scanning labs and also planetary defenses? Would that be so bad?

It all depends on the limits of your imagination, the permission of the devs and the activity of your faction.

Or we could stick with Detroit... and declining activity... and stagnant, non-dynamic storylines... forever.

Try it yourself-- imagine yourself able to build and sell commodities and advance a faction's storyline beyond where it has been (stuck) since pretty much the beginning of Disco.

The creation of new commodities and factories might be the biggest hurdle, but with good RP to support it and patience, I think the struggle would be productive, and move the game forward.

[Pel]

Given the current activity of the server, there won't be many bases, and some factions wont even have a single base, apart from the lone standard base that you suggested ( like Maquis, Brigands, Hogoshas, Unioners, Gallic Junkers...)

I can't see anything short of a disaster if the NPC bases are changed into PoBs. And yet again, there is the base destruction thing. Already there is a lot of QQ on the forums for bases being destroyed. And there are a lot of people who like base seiges <.<

You are correct, and I think that is a point in my favor. If the activity is so low, there shouldn't BE more than one base. The single base would remain as a placeholder until someone comes to resuscitate the faction from the grave.

And as for the QQ and base sieges, I actually think this is a solution. Mentality shift! These aintcho momma's POBs-- what we got here is somethin else entirely. POBs that are actually *necessary* to the economy. POBs that benefit us all.

[Pel]

I was hoping you'd point out some non-vanilla ones.

Cause... there don't seem to be much. Considering how much totally awesome ships and systems and stuff there was added in this mod, the "lore" side of it is somewhat disappointing, considering this being a RP server, and how writing lore into ascii infocards seems potentially much more simpler.

Its just that your point 1 is already quite lacking already, without POBs.

EDIT: To be more precise: a lot of the non vanilla base infocard talking npcs appear to think that they are a vanilla npc from another vanilla system.

Marabu, you're right-- the current way of implementing new infocards and base NPCs sucks. Its too much work for any devs to do it right so we should just scrap it and solve the problem with player-run bases instead. The infocard "lore" should be preserved, but the crappy cut-and-paste NPCs can be tossed in the bin.

Actually that gives me an idea-- these are no longer PoBs folks! they are PRBs, or Player-Run Bases. Not really owned by them, but maintained by them, for their faction. Built not to break immersion, but to create even more immersive immersion. Player driven and in-the-moment interaction immersion, not infocards or NPCs. Real dudes, in ships, in space.