For those who do not know, NQ-Sophon is the staff account of our CEO and Creative Director JC Baillie. Tiles that are claimed by staff accounts will be used to house community builds for events, cool unique structures, features, secrets, demos, testing and more. We may claim and reclaim unused tiles as needed for events.
For clarification purposes, NQ staff are not permitted to play Dual Universe from their staff account (“NQ-” account). This is to prevent confusion between interacting with us as administrators and staff of the game vs as a player, and prevent favoritism or abuse from admin accounts. We may take part in player functions (testing a ship/building/mining, etc) but never with the intention of personal gains.
1. Someone who is changing the course of his whole life from robotic science stuff towards making a game and launches a kickstarter campaign to look for people to back his idea, then creates a company, hires people, sets up hardware and offices on a global scale, already invested 4 years building the product while dealing with a whole planet's internet crowd of which a good part didn't even believe it's possible to do... I don't think that someone like that would do anything that puts his dream in jeopardy by "banning people on a whim" or "kicking players out of their territory just for fun". Especially since just recently I heard this person on an interview saying that the Alioth revamp probably isn't gonna happen after all, because many players already put so much effort into it which they don't want to touch. (Sorry, bit off topic: I don't agree with the last part, because: what about players like me, who based their decision to not yet get a tile on Alioth because of the expected wipe and changes in terrain? Now I'm kinda late to the party. I was really looking forward to the revamped Alioth, but it's ok.. just a minor disappointment. And completely beside the point here, sorry again.)
I trust NQ and especially JC (NQ-Sophon, the person that the above paragraph is about) the same way as a customer buying a car trusts that the inventor of that vehicle wouldn't implement anything that will steer it into a wall once it reaches 200kmh. If that inventor drives his own car too, to me that just adds more trust - even if he removes the constraints from the engine's ECU that would void my own warranty if I did it. I know this is not the perfect analogy, but still.
2. Since as far as I can remember back JC was talking about "Ready Player One" and the huge impact it had on the vision. Even in that interview Lacobus and DU secrets are mentioned at 33:25 and it takes JC like 58 seconds to jump to "that was straight out of Ready Player One", so I presume it's still big on his mind, being a repetitive pattern. If you haven't read the book or seen the movie, I suggest to do that to get an idea of what he's talking about. Minor spoiler alert: Ready Player One is about a virtual world where the creator hid eastereggs all around and players hunt for them to reach some ultimate goal - during this hunt the creator appears like a godlike figure with ultimate wisdom or something (sorry I'm probably not very precise here). So if I'd have to guess what kind of in-game stuff JC does with his power, my bets are on: a) looking around what people do in this sandbox, hoping to find things he didn't expect to come out from his seed of basic tools and elements and b) create that hidden treasure hunt for us to figure out. B only actually matters to those "few" who pursue solving the riddle, while a huge portion of the playerbase couldn't care less and just enjoy DU the way they DU.
Btw: I think that castle shown in that interview might be located on these 37 tiles you care about. So if you listen to that you might get an impression about what he uses it for - but that's just some wild guess by me
3. I've played other games where GMs and special people received or built something out of the ordinary. Some kickstarter pledges contained the priviledge to help develop a DU secret - and IIRC one of them even let the backer design his very own secret. There's lore in DU as well and Aphelia owns huge portions of land and structures that just popped into appearance and contain elements that we don't have access to. That's exactly the same "godlike influence" way out of the scope of any player as the thing complained about here. The only difference is the name on the door - Aphelia is not an active character running around, but if you're scared that the name "NQ-Sophon" might influence the game world, you should just as well be concerned about JC (who is the same guy as NQ-Sophon) inventing a story where Aphelia starts to expand and yank people off their territory. The name on the door doesn't change the fact that this will always be in their power - as devs they could even decide to blow up the whole Alioth system if they think they want to get rid of old tech in 2027. I assume you trust they won't use Aphelia for that - an AI going rogue, eliminating a whole system? So why would the same people act vicious or untrustworthy when they're even more exposed by running around with their name above their head
DU is more than a sandbox. It is not limited to only emergent gameplay where everything in existence is build and owned by players and only players. Arkship, Markets, Shuttles, Arkshops, Artifacts, Market-Bots and GMs are evidence for that. I'm saying this because I'm under the impression that you try to nail DU down to the floor of being exclusively player driven, but this is not the case, has never been the case and probably will never be the case, because NQ needs to make adjustments and continue development so we can all enjoy this game for years to come. As said above I've played games where GMs and even "special players" owned things nobody else could dream to achieve or had access to locations that nobody else had. Examples include Ultima Online, where GMs build really nice things in their spare time using their enhanced abilities. I considered those always a nice place to visit and draw inspiration from or just chill out. Or Elite Dangerous which I believe to have systems that are exclusive to some founders, if I remember this correct?
I've been teleported to GM places and seen what they do in other games. When they compensate a player's losses - aren't they using their power to influence the game world and it's balance? Maybe one could say "Yes, but only if there has been a bug!", but then we'd argue about those who experienced the same bug and just sucked it up, not getting compensated, so helping only some players creates an imbalance and we should abolish all in-game support...? Naaaah I'm just fooling around.
4. As has been said here already: the "NQ-" prefix in front of the character's name makes it clear that this is (at least) a GM account and not a normal player, so I think your whole argument about "playing as a player with more power" falls to pieces. It only hinges on the opinion about the question if a GM should be allowed to build or own anything in the game or not. If you think it's an issue they claim territory and reduce the available space for the "actual players" - just consider that they have the power to add more territory just as well.
In my opinion the rules that apply to GMs (that are employees of the service provider) can be more refined than just by 1 and 0. If owning a tile and building a support shop on it helps them to do their job helping players, then that's fine by me and would not automatically exclude other rules that forbid them to influence in-game politics etc. If we can agree on this basic concept we could further argue about the question if these tiles should be on some kind of "GM-Planet". Pro: that would be outside the regular player driven world and have no impact whatsoever. Contra: apart from devs having to develop this first it would mean regular players can't visit those places for sight-seeing (something I enjoyed doing in UO as said above).
So we can continue to argue about how we feel about it, but I think it's pretty clear that many people in this thread either don't care at all, or trust NQ enough to agree to whatever they like to do without fear of being at a disadvantage, influenced too much or even opressed. So sure, I always like to see NQ giving an official statement and if they decide to do it on this topic, I'll be happy to read their thoughts - but I don't really need them to. Still I'm fine with you waiting for an answer here. Tho it looks like a minority request and in your stead I wouldn't get my hopes up too much, but try to get familiar with the idea that this part of the game might not be 100% exactly as you understood or want it to be.
As for me: I actually love that JC owns those tiles. It adds a bit of excitement and anticipation and represents a place that I wanted to visit ever since I heard it exists. I encountered NQ-Blacksun in game when he helped me out and it was an awesome experience. I like having GMs close by and in touch with the players - feeling like real people, wandering the world, visiting us and looking at what we made. Once a GM was around by chance and out of the blue commented on my ship sitting there - something like "that looks like an efficient little thing" - one of the best moments in my time playing this game. Not just because of the compliment, but it made the GM look human and connected with us. Not just a number on some random service center employee that follows a basic script causing me a headache because my problem doesn't fit into their pre-made scenario where it takes me 10 minutes to listen to unrelated answers and explain the issue until they realize they don't have a script for this and forward me to the next service level to which I have to explain everything all over again etcpp. As a player I love the idea of GMs having their homes in our system, where they're tinkering with stuff, reproducing issues, trying to solve some gameplay related issue a player might have asked about once, or just chilling on the porch, watching the sun set after work.
Conclusion: Even if what you're concerned about is true, it's still the way I prefer it and I would vote against suggestions that drive the staff away from the community. I want them to work with us, not on us or even against us. To clarify how the "against" is meant: when I read stuff like "totally player created" with an implicated "exclusion of anything else" or even stuff like "abusing power" (of which I'm certain they don't) it feels like taking opposition to the ones who make this all happen and I don't want a "them against us" scenario
No we don't agree at all and you are just trying to spin my answer to suit your "issue". You are not entitled to "an answer" here and I frankly hope NQ does not respond to this as it's a non issue and they have better things to do that waste time on this.
You imply you do not trust JC is able to realize that having his NQ account own tiles needs to remain isolated and not impact he game world and that you need to get confirmation from NQ that this will not happen. I say, JC is sensible enough to understand that going in and owes you nothing at all in the form of an explanation or confirmation.
Heidenherz reacted to NQ-Naerais in Why does NQ-Sophon own 37 Tiles on Alioth?