[From ChimerA] The "New Player Experience" must come first

[LordZod]

I am a Legate from ChimerA we are an active PVE main org which has no problem messing around in PVP. We also are very open to new players and have many "new borns" in our group. We are not care bears. I only mention this because I have some concerns with the new DevBlog announcements.

 

I am not seeing details on a direct growth tree for new players. This has to be the biggest priority, in its current state new players have an extremely difficult time getting to the point of venturing off into space.

This is the current most effective way for a growth method for new players:
- Grind sanctuary auto miners to sell the ore
- Save enough money to build a small ship mine on asteroids
- Save enough money for a larger ship to run missions
- Build a cheap garbage ship to mine in PVP expecting 50% of the time it will get blown up when mining higher value ore

That's not very good, and that is too big a leap before new players can participate in fun "But resource intensive" PVP

Some suggestions:
- Hold off on changing ship mechanics like brakes, you are going to wipe out a lot of legacy content with no upcoming players waiting to replace it focus on the new players first
- Hold off on territory warfare until the new player process is fixed as well. I am excited for it but its going to further limit new players

- Reduce taxes and increase auto miner charges. We now know the limitation of grabbing territory is how many charges one character can do, taxes only hurt the little guys

- Increase and spread out the spawning of safe zone asteroids. Right now if a new guy can't get to those safe zone asteroids Saturday and Sunday they wont get much

- Create a Blog Section for Orgs. If you want people to team up you need to help them find orgs outside of the game. A place where they can see how active an org is and easily find discord information. The in game method isn't enough. Let orgs make posts to show off their exploits and encourage people to join. It also makes it easier for people to find active orgs

 

Things I like:

- I am not sure if it is just random or official, but it seems PVP asteroids have been spawning closer to planets. That has made Saturday and Sunday a bloodbath. Which I like ?

- Territory warfare... We just need to get the new player experience and org communication stuff improved before implementing it.

 

Also I recommend opening more communication with PVP and PVE orgs, if you are going to lean on us to help new players we are going to need someway to bring up game issues we see. I know you had a lot of communication with content creators, orgs would be a good addition.

 

Obviously there are a million things I could list as improvements but I want to keep the requests simple, and I wish the best for the verse.

P.S. Legion we will see you on the battlefield Saturday! I hope you sprain your ankles on the bodies of the brave ChimerA soldiers who defend the little miners! We will pay the OreBox gods with our blood!

 

 

[Taelessael]

8 hours ago, LordZod said:

...
This is the current most effective way for a growth method for new players:
- Grind sanctuary auto miners to sell the ore
- Save enough money to build a small ship mine on asteroids
- Save enough money for a larger ship to run missions
- Build a cheap garbage ship to mine in PVP expecting 50% of the time it will get blown up when mining higher value ore

That's not very good, and that is too big a leap before new players can participate in fun "But resource intensive" PVP
...

 

I am most definitely not a new player, so I don't exactly have a great perspective on how well the game informs them of its available features for advancement, but I was under the impression that the fastest (solo) method was: 
-Claim a sanct hex and throw down MU and a can bought off the market,
-Run the tutorials for quanta and talent point rewards,
-Run the Air Delivery Challenge in the surrogate stations (accessible at any market) for piloting practice and more quanta,
-Use amassed quanta to buy or build a ship suitable for atmospheric delivery missions (pay isn't amazing, but it is more piloting practice and money),
-Upgrade, build new, or buy a ship suitable for space-travel, and practice such with hauling missions to moons or between SZ planets,
-Save up and obtain via method of preference a ship suitable for asteroid hunting, pvp-space hauling, or whatever other thing the player desires to do.

 

8 hours ago, LordZod said:

...

Some suggestions:
- Hold off on changing ship mechanics like brakes, you are going to wipe out a lot of legacy content with no upcoming players waiting to replace it focus on the new players first...

 

Old players are still here, and they will continue to still be here after brakes are played with. Every time a major mechanic is updated that cripples old designs, people complain, and then they adapt, and relegate said old designs to art and history. The brake mechanic is no different.

 

8 hours ago, LordZod said:

...

- Hold off on territory warfare until the new player process is fixed as well. I am excited for it but its going to further limit new players...

 

Unless I missed a post somewhere, this is still a good ways off. People want it, but NQ still needs to work out atmo-combat before this can be a thing.

 

8 hours ago, LordZod said:

...

- Reduce taxes and increase auto miner charges. We now know the limitation of grabbing territory is how many charges one character can do, taxes only hurt the little guys...

 

Tile-taxes are helping the little guys by keeping the old business-magnates and money-loophole-exploiters from just claiming land to claim land (and subsequently stopping new-guys from having anything decent). The system isn't perfect, and NQ knows and is working on it.

 

8 hours ago, LordZod said:

...

- Increase and spread out the spawning of safe zone asteroids. Right now if a new guy can't get to those safe zone asteroids Saturday and Sunday they wont get much

- Create a Blog Section for Orgs. If you want people to team up you need to help them find orgs outside of the game. A place where they can see how active an org is and easily find discord information. The in game method isn't enough. Let orgs make posts to show off their exploits and encourage people to join. It also makes it easier for people to find active orgs

...

Also I recommend opening more communication with PVP and PVE orgs, if you are going to lean on us to help new players we are going to need someway to bring up game issues we see. I know you had a lot of communication with content creators, orgs would be a good addition.

...

 

Agreed. Asteroids need improvement (more rocks, shorter spawn cycle, search system that isn't just picking off a list of everything in the universe and following the waypoints, ect...), and the old org-site stuff is barely functional on a good day and needs to either be reworked on or shut down so interested players can replace it.

[Megabosslord]

I've always been of the view a player should be able to get 'space-borne' within a few hours of joining the game - even if it's the dinkiest ship possible - like EVERY other space game ever made. 

 

1) It's a space game, right? 

2) Promoting easier access to space, easier travel, auto-docking to a hangar, base-building, all have co-benefits to promoting other gameplay loops like asteroid mining, PvP, hauling... and reduce load on the servers and client by encouraging more time spent in space than terrestrial. 

Edited February 5, 2022 by Megabosslord