Wyndle

Player retention RULE #1:  Don't lie to your customers.  Keeping certain things close to the chest is risky but that isn't what we've seen here.  Even though NQ's motives and intentions were plainly obvious for several community members, when pressed for comment NQ chose to mislead and in a couple of cases outright contradicting what was obvious (and later confirmed).
 
Securing funding?  I find it hard to swallow that NQ is making choices based on what will bring in more funding.  If funding were the goal then why don't we have at least the skeleton of a cosmetic cash shop?  The cosmetic cash shop has been the primary profit source for the vast majority of online games and MMOs for well over a decade.  This being a game with an incredible building system; a cosmetic cash shop should have been the number one development priority in early Beta if not sooner.  Combining this glaring omission with the repeated violations of trust I have to wonder if there may be a darker, more sinister reason behind DU not falling apart after JC left.

And this (PvP imbalance) will continue to drive off anyone that is a solo player or doesn't want to join a big group.  No new players coming to the rescue.  And participation falls until the economy can no longer be sustained. 

You put a lot of thought into this and, for today at least, I don't want to be the grouchy old guy pointing out the nit-picks.  So, thank you for your contribution.

IMO, NQ (the company) is behaving like an abusive person.  Constant lies and manipulation with barely enough apologies and truth to keep the cycle of abuse going in their favor.  More than enough of the signs are there to fit diagnosis for several personality disorders under the DSM-V (the relevant official medical guide in the U.S.), so I am not exaggerating when I say their actions are causing harm.
 
Again, if NQ is actually trying to get as much out of it before collapse then why no cosmetic cash shop?  If one were to apply Elon Musk's version of Occom's Razor and financial profit doesn't appear to be the driving force then what are NQ's investors really after?

As a player with years of experience having these issues, what do you think the new player experience would be?  Would someone new to DU today even consider a resub?
 
AFAIK, the only people having any fun in this game at the moment are the ones who just want to blow up other people's hard work.  I fell in love with the old mining system and the building.  There was a glimmer of hope for asteroids but the current implementation started as a really bad joke and has only soured from there.  I have spent more time looking at the MU mini-game since launch than most of my ships existed before being rebuilt in Beta yet I have spent less time in build mode since launch than I spent looking at the logon screen during Beta.  I can see the remnants of the original vision at the heart of what DU is today but it is now devoid of all passion and fun, IMO.

It sounded more to me like this was the plan from the start.  If they had told us that plan up front I would have applauded and probably championed the decision (and probably have previously).  To hide the plan in case it didn't work only harms trust between NQ and the community.  

I second this.  I would add that a number of the community members have made amazing suggestions that would all be possible with UE5.1.  You built it and we came.  Rebuild it with the help of your community and many, many, many more will come.  Or keep us in the dark while DU dries up.

If you want to get a head in DU then build a guillotine?  DU is classified as a game, not a job.  If NQ wants players to build their game world then we need to be able to PLAY and time gated chores don't count.  

As a player with years of experience having these issues, what do you think the new player experience would be?  Would someone new to DU today even consider a resub?
 
AFAIK, the only people having any fun in this game at the moment are the ones who just want to blow up other people's hard work.  I fell in love with the old mining system and the building.  There was a glimmer of hope for asteroids but the current implementation started as a really bad joke and has only soured from there.  I have spent more time looking at the MU mini-game since launch than most of my ships existed before being rebuilt in Beta yet I have spent less time in build mode since launch than I spent looking at the logon screen during Beta.  I can see the remnants of the original vision at the heart of what DU is today but it is now devoid of all passion and fun, IMO.

Just because it is an MMO, doesn't mean that everyone should magically HAVE to play with others. 
 
The game was always designed around the fact that a solo or small group will never be able to compete to larger groups or orgs (which is fine). However, in recent times, the facilitation and mechanics revolving around solo play meant that playing this way has become almost impossible to make any headway at all. A solo player should always be able to make progress albeit at a slower pace than larger more organised groups.
 
That is the problem. 
 
It's a personal choice to be a lone wolf even in an MMO game. Forcing the solo lone wolves into game mechanics such as PVP or into large orgs to be swallowed into their machine is a one way ticket to players leaving.

I wasn't going to write this post. It was also a post I never actually thought I would have to write, but events since release two months ago led me to this point. 
 
I don't post a great deal on these forums, but I'm an avid reader and professional lurker since joining at the Alpha stage. I try to keep my finger on the community pulse and to keep up to date on updates and the general buzz. I've played since Alpha and mostly enjoyed all the time I've spent. There has been many times when DU has fought against me and attempted to break me down. However I was always sold, like many others, on that potential carrot on a stick of "What if?".
 
Over the DU development since 0.23 and beyond, the community was gutted due to the introduction of schematics. As updates and patches were introduced to the game, I've watched with dismay the amount of players with high standing in the community, slowly turn on NQ and Dual Universe when they get that stark realisation that this game is never going to live up to that perceived potential. Some go quietly into the night, others announce their vitriol for a few weeks before quitting with much fanfare. 

Being a player since Alpha affords me an ability to see the bigger picture of what I perceive has been going on:
 
If you look at all the updates since Beta started and outside of some balancing updates to PVP and visual upgrades, everything else has been implemented to cut costs due to what I believe as woeful inadequacies at the design and concept level. The vision of this game and what was perceived could be done, didn't match the budget available and the technology. In short, the game that NQ wanted to make didn't match what they could afford to do. Hence, I believe, this is why JC was ousted and the company is now ran by the main investment company (who I feel wants their investment back). The game has had its life and soul gutted out of it, and with every "improvement" it takes another little piece of itself away.
 
When the announcement came that this game was going to be released, I'm pretty sure we as the community, were in the unanimous agreement that it was way too soon. The game was undercooked and needed a lot more time before it was ready. Any development company who wanted their undercooked product to survive would of released it as an early access product. However, Novaquark is a business ran by an investment company who wants to recoup. Keeping the game in another few years of beta or early access wasn't going to make them anywhere near the money needed to recoup. With no new investment, there was only one possible course of action, throw it out the door and see if it sinks or swims. Unfortunately they forgot to teach it how to swim or provide any floatation aids.
 
I don't want to be one of those doomsayers who, when they're not happy with the state of the game will immediately declare "zomg, this game is dead!" But It saddens me to say that, that is what I now believe. It died sometime ago when Novaquark realised that under the budget they currently have that there was no way they could afford the server costs to make it work as intended. It just took some of us longer than it should to see it for what it is.
 
So what is the immediate future? If you look at the current lack of content and updates, all that we're really getting is the completion of the supporter goals that should of been ready on release. Beyond that, as of writing this, nothing, no road map, nothing. No enthusiasm from Novaquark, no excitement, nothing. 
 
Can the game be saved? In short, no. To do this, the game would need a large, fresh influx of money, coupled with a long protracted development time to essentially re-release and reinvent itself. We are at the point of no return though. NQ, I think are running on fumes and they know it. Releasing the game, wiping and increasing the subscription prices and then going essentially dark speaks volumes to their future plans. 
 
I do wish it wasn't this way, and I am kicking myself a little for having to write one of these posts, but I felt it needed to be said. I know this game will still have its staunch defenders (I was one of them) who will go down fighting to the very last day. But this week the game broke me. As I logged in and did my busywork and realised I was barely able to cover my costs to keep the lights on with no real goal of progression any more, my love, passion and perceived potential for the game melted away. 
 
I appreciate my rantings here are purely opinion and conjecture, but if you take the time to take a long hard look at the past few years of this games development, the clues are there. Many of us already know it and made their comments known on the various channels. The tone and overall feelings of the community are at an all time low right now and that should tell you everything as to what the community is currently feeling. 
 
I'd love to be proved wrong, I still want the game to succeed, but my joy and passion, like many others past and present in this community, is gone and it would take a truly Herculean effort on the part of NQ to get it back again. However, judging by recent efforts I won't be holding my breath.

This.
 
 
 
The available resources in safe space becoming less predictable would immediately kill the last vestiges of non-pvp play.  There would be fuel shortages killing missions and the rest of the economy with it.  Quanta is a unit of trade, not a resource in and of itself.  You can't fill your tanks with an infinite supply of quanta if there's no ore to process.  

If you want to get a head in DU then build a guillotine?  DU is classified as a game, not a job.  If NQ wants players to build their game world then we need to be able to PLAY and time gated chores don't count.  

You need a way for people that didn't get a good tile at launch to be able to mine T2 and better ore. You reset the game at launch to bring balance from a few mega rich players but you fix nothing. If your trying to force PVP to players that don't want to PVP then please refund our money for it was never advertised as a PVP only game.

Because they explicitly stated it wasn't an exploit it is listed as an improvement to clamp down on that faucet.

@NQ - Is UE5 being investigated for an engine swap?  Is this the reason we haven't seen any significant changes other than clamping down on faucets?  If yes then I'm all aboard.  If not then I'm not going to include you on my list of holiday card recipients when I win the lotto.

Wow, reading that suddenly made it feel like an abusive relationship.  

@Aaaron I think the rule is 100m up, 5000m down. 
 
and build is limited to 1000m so several of our megastructure blueprints are no longer buildable. 
 
basically NQ lied to us when they said they would respect our efforts. 

still, I’m used to their lies by now. 

There's no place in this game for solo miners. No way to mine T2 - T5 ores. I tried to get one plot on Madis for 2 long days with no result. All already occupied because they were easy to find at the beginnign as they were one next to others. As a result all Madis is ocupied by only few people and there's nothing left for new gamers. Tried to get more luck on asteroids. Your 120 min free time for digging after long time of asteroid search and reach is a stupid man wish. Your hard earned ship with expensive Asteroid Scanner will be blown some tens of minutes when your cargo is already filled with precious ores. Fun for pvp pirates and easy gain and definetely not for you. Ther's no motivation in the game.

The rate of post release updates is extremely disheartening. We're getting the tiniest of bug fixes trickling out when there should be a flurry of activity... Hello Games releases MASSIVE patches (sometimes weekly after a DLC drop) for NMS fixing dozens of bugs at a time,  with a staff comprising about a dozen coders. And that's on top of constant, quartly MAJOR patches (I believe the latest patch is about the TWENTIETH major patch in six years. So that is between three and four truly major updates per year surrounded by bug fixes as and when needed.
 
Compare that to this game where every time they release a new feature (and by feature, I mean remove a game mechanic), four other features break.

Still, it only took them four years to release XS space fuel tanks, so at least they're on the ball there. LOL.

My thoughts on this topic have been posted a few times so I'll keep it brief this time.  1)  Meteor strikes are a real phenomenon and could be implemented into the lore of why we get surface respawns.  2)  The current grind is too steep for solo players who want to experience anything other than flying other people's ships for NPC missions.

My thoughts on this topic have been posted a few times so I'll keep it brief this time.  1)  Meteor strikes are a real phenomenon and could be implemented into the lore of why we get surface respawns.  2)  The current grind is too steep for solo players who want to experience anything other than flying other people's ships for NPC missions.

No. And you can shoot through asteroids. Line of Sight is not a concept in PvP afaik.

Imho it would be simple. 1 T1 ore is worth 1 token. You give our Great Beneficial AI a liter of T1 ore, she gives you a token. She stores the ore and anyone can buy it back at 1 token per liter T1 ore. No free tokens, no missions for tokens or ore from that bank pool. No taxes needed for tiles, no taxes needed for schematics, no taxes needed for market transactions.
 
You want missions? Sure, the either players run their own or the AI pays you in schematics.
 
Markets? Player run markets. They need to build them, if they want to charge for their use, give them options to charge for it.

This is a great idea!  With part payment in cash but most of it in schematics this would make mission runningna balanced part of the economy. 
 
It would need to be implemented so that schematics are a lot harder to come by without running missions, so that mission running is needed.  If too many people run missions the rewards would be very low but too few missions being run would inflate the rewards.  The problem of mass mission running would solve itself.