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Is solo play practical


Pleione

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Just curious if solo play is going to be practical?  I'd love to build a SE Rescue type ship (working within the community of course to do so), then head out for a month of travel to some unknown corner of the Universe where I can continue building in peace.  

 

Just curious if this is likely to work without getting ganked after 6 months of work.

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If we compare to the only game similar in scope and game-play currently, Eve Online, and this is entirely subject to Lead Game Design at NQ, solo-play will be viable to some extent, but playing with other people is to be vastly more effective than going solo.

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Solo play is plausible. It wont be as easy and you would still have to interact with other for sure. especially at the start. but if you have a ship set up to be flown solo then you can easily go out and do what ever. there is also the moon sanctuaries that can be used to build in peace if you are too worried. I dont think you will see as many gankers as you would in games like eve and ark survival

 

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Depends on what you mean, and the defenses you incorporate.  If you’re not in a safezone, you’re fair game. 

 

There’s been a few large threads on this, if I have time I’ll link you to them... but I’d go search for them if I were you :)

 

Most importantly they have snippets from NQ

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@Pleione

 

From what we know right now playing solo will be tough unless you basically live out of your ship and then it may still be tricky. It's very possible to operate solo while having an alliance with a larger group for support. Needles to say you would be expected to pay for that support somehow so in principle you'll never be truly 'solo'. Some orgs, such as Signal Cartel, will actually accommodate pretty much what you are looking to do if I read it correctly. We will likely not have a land based 'office' but be roaming while living and operating out of our main starship which houses several smaller exploratory and investigation vessels. 

 

Ganking as we know it from EVE and similar concepts will be less likely in DU due to the cost and effort needed to build ships. Without defenses though you always run a risk and outside the safe zone and areas where a Sanctuary Territory Unit is deployed (which Signal Cartel intends to deploy several of for operations where needed).

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11 minutes ago, Pleione said:

Hmmm.   OK.  I understand this isn't Eve, and isn't Space Engineers.  I love that its single shard, and REALLY love that there is no limit on construct size (unlike SE).  Guess I will have to play it and find out!

Precisely.  There’s nothing stopping you from playing solo and seeing how it turns out.  I’d imagine it’s easier to be on the down low while solo, so hiding your bases and assets might be easier.  Not to mention safezones, where you can own land 

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I've played with the concept of self-contained ships a lot on SE, think "Borg", often going a bit past the practical max in that game (had one large ship that I often flew around in with a small ship).  I hope something like that will be possible here.

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Given that space is procedurally generated, I would hope that if I was far enough out I would be invisible.  E.g.  a player can not detect and pinpoint bases from light years away. 

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The problem with that is that you have to get there first.. And if someone decides to follow you and locate your base, they can.

 

At least initially there will not be any space highways/jump gates/whatever you want to think up to get you from A to B quickly/quicker

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23 minutes ago, blazemonger said:

The problem with that is that you have to get there first.. And if someone decides to follow you and locate your base, they can.

 

At least initially there will not be any space highways/jump gates/whatever you want to think up to get you from A to B quickly/quicker

I’m not sure an attacker would follow someone for hours on end just on the off-chance they MIGHT have something worthwhile.  If an attacker doesn’t catch up to you in 10-20 minutes, I imagine they will branch off.

 

If the universe is truly vast, I think it will be fairly simple to slice out your own stakes far off the beaten path.  Meanwhile conflict would be occurring at points of high interest.

 

But yeah, it IS possible for that attacker to follow you.  And that’s something you always have to keep in mind.  DU isn’t inherently safe.

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Thats fair, which is why I:

 

1)  Wanted something like the self contained rescue ship of SE lore

2)  Was willing to travel a month (after the final wipe of course!) to get off the beaten track

2a)  Will use the time to train appropriate skills, so its not wasted (I've played Eve for more years than I care to admit)

2b)  Will need to load up on "solo survival" mining/construction skills prior to leaving known space

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@Pleione

Problem with 2 and 2b, if you leave 'known space' too soon, everyone else will have arrived at their destination before you are close, due to the advancements made. Also, you cabtbjust go traveling solo straight away, as it could take the large groups around a day to get off planet, let alone a solo playerm

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56 minutes ago, Pleione said:

Ah, so timing is everything.  Thanks.

Also, it depends on how the economy is working as well.  Perhaps it will take a day for an org to get off planet on launch day... but months down the road?  I imagine most people won’t want to grind the basic materials for crafting and will pay (or trade) for a large amount of it.  And as such, you may be able to purchase a ship fairly “quickly” depending on the rates and whatnot.  

 

Once everything is setup and running, people will be trying to spin a profit off of “grunts” on Alioth.  If it costs x to make a ship, someone might sell a ship for 1.5x, allowing you to circumvent the need to have the infrastructure readily available to make the parts.

 

This all depends on how factories work and whether or not you need one to build a basic ship.

 

 

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7 hours ago, Pleione said:

Just curious if solo play is going to be practical?  I'd love to build a SE Rescue type ship (working within the community of course to do so), then head out for a month of travel to some unknown corner of the Universe where I can continue building in peace.  

 

Just curious if this is likely to work without getting ganked after 6 months of work.

Honestly. While Solo means everything will take a longer time for you to achieve and some things will practically be impossible. I for sure think it will be possible for you to fuck off to another corner of the galaxy flying a month straight. And if you were to do so i would seriously doubt anyone would find you or even want to get to where you are within the first year. Even if people were to somehow visit the same planet as you settled on, chances are they wont stay long enough to find you on the planet. If you build underground some may even settle it while never knowing you exist there too. The possibilities are endless but i wouldn't expect you to get ganked that far out. Not on purpose at least.

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As it is in Eve, so no surprises there.  Except in Eve virtually every planet has been checked out.  Can't do that with a procedurally generated universe!

 

Thanks!

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The galaxy in DU is potentially vast, but only in theory.

 

NQ have clearly indicated that they want to limit expansion to a "manageable pace", which could very well imply that there simply won't be any destinations created outside of the Alioth system until such time as NQ want expansion to happen.

 

Each new system that's populated will require additional processing power to support, which brings additional operating costs. Having a 1000 systems active with only 1 player in each is not going to be cost-effective.

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1 hour ago, NanoDot said:

Each new system that's populated will require additional processing power to support, which brings additional operating costs. Having a 1000 systems active with only 1 player in each is not going to be cost-effective.

i thought DU wont have each system as  a Node ?

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10 minutes ago, ShioriStein said:

i thought DU wont have each system as  a Node ?

Regardless of the underlying architecture, I cannot believe that extra systems will not come at an increased operating cost.

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Personally, I don't think solo play is practical. Yes, its *viable*, and you can play by yourself and probably do decently well. But were people are really going to shine, is playing with other people. Even if its just one other person, it could (and most definitely will) make the game easier, safer and faster for you.

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Assuming the game will have a living breathing economy complete with job boards, I don't see why someone couldn't be a freelance, aligning themselves with whoever they choose as it suits their needs for the moment.  Yes, joining an org will make things much easier, but for those who prefer to be the lone wolf, I don't see why it would be impractical at all.  You could start out with odd jobs planetside, such as mining or whatever other manual labor people need, to earn enough credits to build or buy a ship, then do either escort/defense, transport/cargo, or whatever other jobs require a ship of some kind.  Or you could start your own small scale mining/forestry company.  Or you could design some simple ships or bases and earn royalties on their designs as people buy them. Or you could specialize in crafting rare or custom items and selling them on the galactic market.  Then, once you've made enough money to be self sufficient, you could pursue your dream of retiring into solitude in some remote corner of the Galaxy.  

 

So it would certainly be more difficult than aligning with an org, but the way I'm imagining the game, I think it would be perfectly feasible for those who wanted to try it that way.  Who knows, maybe at the end of the day, you'll end up like Han Solo, who clearly preferred to roll alone, but ended up in a loose alliance with the rebels.

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I like it, thanks BlorgonSlayer!

 

My main motivation is, of course, personal play preference.  I want to play when I want to play, for as little or long as I wish, whatever time of the day I wish, without obligations to others to do what they want.  Now the market may define my actions, but that is because I want to maximize my personal profit for what I deem reasonable risk - not because some VP tells me to.  I spent close to 40 years in corporate America - not about to go back into a simulation of that.

 

All that said, an organization of freelance players, who help each other if and only if they feel like it, might fit my style.

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1 minute ago, Pleione said:

I spent close to 40 years in corporate America - not about to go back into a simulation of that.

 

That's entirely understandable. 

 

Sure, playing in a group will get you things faster. But there are multiple ways to be independent and be part of a larger group at the same time. 

 

There are orgs in all sorts of flavors and if you don't even want to do that there will be job boards and multiple discord channels. 

 

You won't have acces to some elements of the game but you will definitely be able to progress in your own way at your own pace. 

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