I feel like the barge, at it's current state, is kind of a "Congratulations, you made it!" as a power trader. It wasn't until I put in considerable efforts with no spending to afford my barge. However, the barge is not as overpowered as it may seem. To St.Denis's point, there are many flaws and obstacles that come with piloting the barge. For longer routes, I'd say 3-4+ systems, 5Ks are still king. Anything less than that, depending on the number of trade lanes, the barge is more efficient. Anything above 3-4 systems the rate at which things happen to send the barge 1000K/s flying upward or downward increase.
Edit: My point about distance for the barge - I mostly use the barge for short distance POB materials. Unless I'm repositioning, I never do long haul freight deliveries
To Xenon's point, it's all about supply and demand. The demand for ores are high with limited suppliers (miners, transports to bring the ores etc). To your point, mining has become too complicated and irritating especially when the shadow loggers show up and "gib moneyz or die" with no RP. I'd rather play Eve. A lot of other players have followed suit which is why we are where we are with limited suppliers and high demand. I'm not so sure it's a barge problem - it's a market and player base problem.
Or just follow US| route and multibox until you're caught
It ain't about what you are capable of, it's about what you're willing to do.
(05-31-2023, 05:58 AM)Front de Libération de Gallia Wrote: From our perspective, the state of the Barge is now ideal.
This is a good point, from the POV of stimulating activity on the server (or keeping current pirates active).
To state the obvious: Mining areas and trade lanes are two of the main areas for lawful/ unlawful interaction and they should be designed with that in mind. Both lead to jump gates and jump holes whose locations become very important in attack/ escape strategies. It all has to do with predicting in-game behavior and being able to create encounters.
When we create a system that works "too well" we often lose out on a bunch of imperfect things that actually make the game more engaging.
(05-31-2023, 09:55 AM)St.Denis Wrote: The biggest problem with keeping Bases stocked with ores is there is a lack of people willing to mine.
IMHO we need to think creatively about how to both stimulate mining activity and simultaneously create impediments to that mining activity. Every improvement should ideally create economic and RP opportunities for both lawful and unlawful.
To go out on a limb, I would even say that improvements in POBs should go hand-in-hand with innovations in pirate technology (tracers and surveillance tech available only to unlawful IDs, for example). Rather than giving pirates caps, they should be able to commandeer lawful caps and change their IDs. I understand that few will agree with these ideas.
An example from the original FL is trade lanes are created and Lane Hackers learn to hack them. In RL we have AI being developed by all the big names and simultaneously all kinds of bad actors are adapting AI to their own purposes.
Thinking deeply about Barges is great, but sometimes problems are actually a feature, not a bug.
(05-31-2023, 05:58 AM)Front de Libération de Gallia Wrote: From our perspective, the state of the Barge is now ideal.
This is a good point, from the POV of stimulating activity on the server (or keeping current pirates active).
To state the obvious: Mining areas and trade lanes are two of the main areas for lawful/ unlawful interaction and they should be designed with that in mind. Both lead to jump gates and jump holes whose locations become very important in attack/ escape strategies. It all has to do with predicting in-game behavior and being able to create encounters.
When we create a system that works "too well" we often lose out on a bunch of imperfect things that actually make the game more engaging.
(05-31-2023, 09:55 AM)St.Denis Wrote: The biggest problem with keeping Bases stocked with ores is there is a lack of people willing to mine.
IMHO we need to think creatively about how to both stimulate mining activity and simultaneously create impediments to that mining activity. Every improvement should ideally create economic and RP opportunities for both lawful and unlawful.
To go out on a limb, I would even say that improvements in POBs should go hand-in-hand with innovations in pirate technology (tracers and surveillance tech available only to unlawful IDs, for example). Rather than giving pirates caps, they should be able to commandeer lawful caps and change their IDs. I understand that few will agree with these ideas.
An example from the original FL is trade lanes are created and Lane Hackers learn to hack them. In RL we have AI being developed by all the big names and simultaneously all kinds of bad actors are adapting AI to their own purposes.
Thinking deeply about Barges is great, but sometimes problems are actually a feature, not a bug.
Also, before any nerfing of Barges, the only reliable source of cargo piracy, you will have to think of other ways to make cargo piracy easier in the first place.
(05-31-2023, 02:24 PM)Darius Wrote: With all due respect and considerations, how the heck does one complain about no RP traders (I said pirates but I'm not negating the problem being two sided) then goes on to mention that Eve is a better choice?
(05-31-2023, 05:02 PM)Czechmate Wrote: Sorry for detail, but to that point it always baffled be lane hackers with spyglass scanner haven't hacked lanes to have /net.
I was actually surprised I didn't gain it when I bough the scanner!
That's an interesting track to follow. LPI has the /police or /siren command (can't remember) to make an audible police siren noise, why not more 'toys' to unlawfuls such as remote trade land disruptions, trade lane disrupting mines etc? Imagine going down a trade lane, an explosion happens, trade lane pops, and there's 3 Lane Hackers uncloaking with a mule 10K away to steal your loot. That would be one patch update that would be fun to keep hidden and to tell only unlawful OFs as to surprise traders.
It ain't about what you are capable of, it's about what you're willing to do.
Barge is Utterly shit because it doesn't drop any stuff from it + it is slow + barge players usually retards. Like I had to kill a barge 3 times in a row to finally get some money from piracy, otherwise I waste my time and resources on empty junk.
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