Topic: Take this PP and shove it. I ain't farming here no more!

[KAT J'inn]

The PP system sucks.

That?s right!   I said it!   Here?s why.

If you have an OoB that restricts the big guns then the whole purpose of having PP prices to keep big ships rare and expensive to lose is meaningless.   Therefore, PP only applies with any meaning to non-OoB ships.

Now non-OoB ships are usually going to be cruisers on down.   Let?s face it.  80% of the current player base will play enough that the loss and/or price of a heavy cruiser is meaningless.  If you have 50,000 PP in the bank PP doesn?t mean a damn for a ship that costs 7000 PP or even 15000 PP.

So who gets screwed?  Well I do!!  I can only play about 6 - 10 hours a week.  Often less.   This means that I usually have only about 10,000 PP in the bank.  As a result, there are servers on which I can never even purchase anything bigger than a light UGH cruiser.  I just don?t have the time to rack up the PP.  Note: This only happens to the casual player.

Now it get?s worse.   Here I am in a DD facing an entire board of people in far superior ships.   Now add in the disengagement rule and you quickly have a scenario where I basically can?t even play in a PvP environment and I am regulated to the backfield.

It sucks.

Now this all assumes a disengagement erule and an OoB set up that restricts bigger ships.  Given that, my question is this.   Why can?t all ships on such a server be dirt cheap?   The net effect on the regular to nutter player will be zero as, as discussed above, PP prices are really meaningless to them anyways.   Therefore, the only people aided are the casual players.  Is there are real problem with that?

[FPF-DieHard]

We started everybody in a Command Cruiser. 

An F-CLC is about 2500.  That's what, 10 missions after supplies? 

[Soreyes]

I think you have a valid point about the PP not affecting the "Nutters" Heck I only fly small to mid sized ships. On GW3 i have lost over 20 ships and I still have over 250,000 pp in the bank.

[KAT J'inn]

We started everybody in a Command Cruiser. 

An F-CLC is about 2500.  That's what, 10 missions after supplies? 

True, but many nights I have only about 30 minutes to play.  Tops.  By the time I've logged on and all I might have time for just a mission or two.   It's seriously that tight for serveral casual players.

Also, you are forgetting my sucky factor.   I usually die at least once to twice a night within one hour.  So it kinda hurts.

Basically,  I'm just bored with PP farming.   

[Kroma BaSyl]

Actually, that is a very good point Jinn, but I would still make some ships like Carriers expensive at the same levels you have on GW3. I know this caused me to think twice several times about risking a cheesy Z-CVD, even thought I had 80K in the bank. You just can't lose to many of those. I would also raise escorts to that level if we are to keep them in the game, not sure about other specialty ships though, but maybe for Fast Cruisers and Bombardment ships as well. Make everything else dirt cheap though.

[KAT J'inn]

Actually, that is a very good point Jinn, but I would still make some ships like Carriers expensive at the same levels you have on GW3. I know this caused me to think twice several times about risking a cheesy Z-CVD, even thought I had 80K in the bank. You just can't lose to many of those. I would also raise escorts to that level if we are to keep them in the game, not sure about other specialty ships though, but maybe for Fast Cruisers and Bombardment ships as well. Make everything else dirt cheap though.

I agree 100%.    Basically three tiers of ships.

1) OoB
2) Pricey ships (non-vanilla mainly).  The price facor could be moved up and down depending on what level of quasi OoB the Admin wanted to put on certain ships.
3) Cheap vanilla ships

[FPF-DieHard]

How pricey should specialty ships be?   I remember we agreed to raise Strike Carriers prices to about 3 times that of a CC.  I think this is reasonable as their is an imbalance with the Klink Strike carriers still being a littl p00py compared to the Feds and Kzin.

[KAT J'inn]

How pricey should specialty ships be?   I remember we agreed to raise Strike Carriers prices to about 3 times that of a CC.  I think this is reasonable as their is an imbalance with the Klink Strike carriers still being a littl p00py compared to the Feds and Kzin.

I propose that any pilot on the "Daddy List" be charged 100000000000 PP for his ship.

It seems fair to me.

Seriously though, I think it depends on the type of campaign the Admin wants.

[FPF-DieHard]

How pricey should specialty ships be?   I remember we agreed to raise Strike Carriers prices to about 3 times that of a CC.  I think this is reasonable as their is an imbalance with the Klink Strike carriers still being a littl p00py compared to the Feds and Kzin.

I propose that any pilot on the "Daddy List" be charged 100000000000 PP for his ship.

It seems fair to me.

Seriously though, I think it depends on the type of campaign the Admin wants.

Um, J'inn you and I don't have to speak in hypotheticals . . .

We could assign a build cost to ALL specialty ships and use a more F&E like economy program.  Make the non-specialty ships cheap, plentiful, and available to all. 

This could get ubber-complicated without SQL, but since when has that stopped us?

[Dizzy]

Jinn, Ive been saying pp screws the casual player the whole time. SG4 will likely use the 'ship on cheap' price structure. OoB ships will be FM'ed out if Bonk and SGODev crew cant work up an easy DB editing/ship-assigning program. Specialty ships likely will be restricted to x-number online at any one time. Also still thinking that everyone gets 1x BC. Lose it and you never get another...

pp costs dont take into account inflation, casual players or nutters. Useless system all the way around.

What Im planning with the rest of the team for Ship replacement, since there wont be a real pp drop when u die, you end up in a FF. So your penalty will be a 5-minute or less wait to buy a better ship (if you can find one <snicker>). In the meantime wing with someone. Combine that with the disengagement penalty and you truly have a robust strategic element to play out.

PP sucks. Always has always will.

[Dizzy]

Oh, btw, I do have several plans to reward nutters. Gotta cater to them too, ya know... I guess pp isnt totally useless, hehe.

While nutter pp is a reward itself in the number of DV shifts and missions run, another advantage I'd like to see on SG4 is allowing nutters to further contribute wuth base buying power. With bases at 100k+, this lets them lend their pp to the strategic war effort.

Also considering a prestige level or rank at which a nutter is 'awarded' FM status.

Something like that.

[KAT Chuut-Ritt]

Yo J'inn, just assign yourself the only BB on the next one, so far it has kept Sears alive, so you should have no problem......

<Snicker>

[Kroma BaSyl]

Yo J'inn, just assign yourself the only BB on the next one, so far it has kept Sears alive, so you should have no problem......

<Snicker>

Yea, cuz I hear you already have the taco bell thing down pat.

[Hexx]

What about just using pp earned as a VP rather than for buying ships?

I remember on one server not that long ago they kept track of everyone's prestige and missions flown.
Use the average pp/mission flown on some sort of scale to earn VP's.
It would also help with the mission time issue, as it would be better to fly one ten minute mission and get 1000pp rather than 5 2 minute missions getting 200 pp/time.

[el-Karnak]

You just need to add EEK Homeworld Defence mission in the dyna.  That mission will get you 1000 pp for 5 to 8 minutes work.   Stay on your homeworld and within an hour you'll have 10 to 12K in PP.

It's really, really easy too. Even for you, J'inn.  No rocks. Well, there is the homeworld. That's kinda big. Watch out for that M'raa thingie.

[FPF-DieHard]

What about just using pp earned as a VP rather than for buying ships?

I remember on one server not that long ago they kept track of everyone's prestige and missions flown.
Use the average pp/mission flown on some sort of scale to earn VP's.
It would also help with the mission time issue, as it would be better to fly one ten minute mission and get 1000pp rather than 5 2 minute missions getting 200 pp/time.

have you been drinkng again before noon?

[el-Karnak]

You just need to add EEK Homeworld Defence mission in the dyna.  That mission will get you 1000 pp for 5 to 8 minutes work.   Stay on your homeworld and within an hour you'll have 10 to 12K in PP.

It's really, really easy too. Even for you, J'inn.  No rocks. Well, there is the homeworld. That's kinda big. Watch out for that M'raa thingie.

Oh yeah, J'inn. A few things that I forgot. There's a few FRDs in the missions that are kinda close to the homeworld planet. They got DefSat's too. So, if you hide near the FRDs for protection and you see this big planet in your way (BTW, use F3 view, that helps) don't go that way anymore, turn left or right and turn quickly. Don't wait like 20 or 30 klicks, you know. That might hurt the head.

[Vorcha]

I'm with ya Jinn....I felt that exact same way on RDSL and now this campaign.  Nothing against the designers at all...it's my own fault for not finding the time to play.  I currently have I think 45 or 50K, primarily from openning day when I played for 8+ hours.  Since then I've been on an hour here...an hour there etc.

I don't qualify for the best ships because I'm a causual player, I have plenty to buy a CA but lets face it....the few that are available are pretty low suck in PvP matches.  I took the middle ground and picked an AD5 which is EXACTLY the same ship I had in RDSL and for exactly the same reason.  The CA's are available to me...but they suck, so I am relagated to a support role in PvP matches. 

Example a D7W is a pretty worthless ship against a Fed CVL w/ Raven 3's...oh sure I can easily kill the fighters, and I would certainly harm the carrier, but it's a lost battle against most guys.  Now a C7 against that ship is a straight up blast though.

Now in a perfect dyna world, I'd be able to select anything I have points for and the shipyards would be wide open based soley on year built variants.....but hey....such is life   If truth be told, I'm not willing to give up my fishing, woodworking, hotrod, wife, dogs, work and other games / hobbies so I can have a C7....so meh...my choice completely.  I had a lot of fun openning day though as everyone was in the same class ships as I.  Heck, I won the 2 pvp battles I had that day......but a week has passed and I'm way behind the curve and outclassed in every pvp I have run across so far.  So I can team up w/ another peep in a bigger ship and help guard him, or I can flip hexes yawn.

I'm not bitching at all mind you...I know it's my fault and blame myself, my job, my boat, my wife, my car, and those damn fish in the lake next to my house that sing to me everynight....."no...don't play D2....come try to catch us." 

V

[kbf-jd]

Actually, Jinn,  I am in the oppsite situation.  I have about 140,000 pp and nothing to spend it on.  And I did not try to farm PP.  I even spent 8 hrs or so assulting a starbase, THAT WAS EXPENSIVE.

After a while the game gets pointless.  Can't buy any thing, have to beg the RMs for a bigger ship(not my style).

Pesonally, I would like to see the OOB ships avaliable for general purchase at insanely high prices.  This could work on a short server, like GW3.  Make them about 200,000 to 300,000(assuming a 2 week server).  This way someone who flys a lot can get a reward, if they choose.

Of course the high paying missions would have to be watched to prevent "homeworld humping."

jd

[Dizzy]

I dunno Vorcha. Just because u are a casual player doesnt mean u wont get a C7. Ummm... how casual are you? Less than 50k for a 3-week server? On upcoming servers look forward to where everyone gets to fly one, cept u lose it, it wont get replaced...

[Green]

So who gets screwed?  Well I do!! 

Mission Accomplished.

GG guys.

[KAT J'inn]

So who gets screwed?  Well I do!! 

Mission Accomplished.

GG guys.

SNARL!!

 

[FPF-DieHard]

Pesonally, I would like to see the OOB ships avaliable for general purchase at insanely high prices.  This could work on a short server, like GW3.  Make them about 200,000 to 300,000(assuming a 2 week server).  This way someone who flys a lot can get a reward, if they choose.

That is not a bad idea, I kinda like it.

[KAT J'inn]

Pesonally, I would like to see the OOB ships avaliable for general purchase at insanely high prices.  This could work on a short server, like GW3.  Make them about 200,000 to 300,000(assuming a 2 week server).  This way someone who flys a lot can get a reward, if they choose.

That is not a bad idea, I kinda like it.

Me too.   Just one problem.   How could the FMs buy it?

We'd have to assign them server side some how.  Or take the server down, round them up like wild cats, and get them to buy them while the settings are different. 

There has to be a way.

[FPF-DieHard]

Pesonally, I would like to see the OOB ships avaliable for general purchase at insanely high prices.  This could work on a short server, like GW3.  Make them about 200,000 to 300,000(assuming a 2 week server).  This way someone who flys a lot can get a reward, if they choose.

That is not a bad idea, I kinda like it.

Me too.   Just one problem.   How could the FMs buy it?

We'd have to assign them server side some how.  Or take the server down, round them up like wild cats, and get them to buy them while the settings are different. 

There has to be a way.

J'inn, I could do this with duplicate entries in the shiplist.   No problem.

[el-Karnak]

Pesonally, I would like to see the OOB ships avaliable for general purchase at insanely high prices.  This could work on a short server, like GW3.  Make them about 200,000 to 300,000(assuming a 2 week server).  This way someone who flys a lot can get a reward, if they choose.

That is not a bad idea, I kinda like it.

Me too.   Just one problem.   How could the FMs buy it?

Try a DB edit to modify the PP value for the FM accounts.

[FPF-DieHard]

Pesonally, I would like to see the OOB ships avaliable for general purchase at insanely high prices.  This could work on a short server, like GW3.  Make them about 200,000 to 300,000(assuming a 2 week server).  This way someone who flys a lot can get a reward, if they choose.

That is not a bad idea, I kinda like it.

Me too.   Just one problem.   How could the FMs buy it?

Try a DB edit to modify the PP value for the FM accounts.

That will work to, can you show me how to do that?   

[el-Karnak]

Pesonally, I would like to see the OOB ships avaliable for general purchase at insanely high prices.  This could work on a short server, like GW3.  Make them about 200,000 to 300,000(assuming a 2 week server).  This way someone who flys a lot can get a reward, if they choose.

That is not a bad idea, I kinda like it.

Me too.   Just one problem.   How could the FMs buy it?

Try a DB edit to modify the PP value for the FM accounts.

That will work to, can you show me how to do that?   

I may look into it soon. How hard can it be? 

[Strongbad]

Lets face it, we've taken the SFC community far beyond the original intention or design of SFC2/OP because we make custom maps, decide who wins by virtue of victory conditions, limit DNs, assign them, etc...  the PP system is something they made so that in a disorganized server things would work themselves out.  But we're past that now.

The alternative is to quasi-RPG it all and have "fleets" with loose "command structures" and assign people ship class types (though maybe not specific hulls, except for CCs and up).  Make the whole thing order-of-battle based, and so there would not only be a limited number of DNs and BCHs but even a limited number of CCs and ships like missile bombardment craft.  No offense to anyone, but it seems weird to me to always be facing off in D5Ds, and NACs, and CAD+'s and PF tenders when it oughta be F-CC vs K-D7 kinda stuff a LOT more often.

I think it might make it more fun if some of the serious players got to square off in "lowly" DDs and FFs instead of BCHs and DNs for a change...    We've got a lot of great ship captains.  Why not give them a challenge and see what they can do in a light frigate instead of a battleship?  Make the game about low DV hexes and capturing stuff, advancing ground, and working as a team, not playing 800 missions in one hex to flip a base or something. 

Or, to address what J'inn was saying, if you lose your CA, it SHOULD matter, no matter how many hours you've put in, because your ship was destroyed.  If the Enterprise gets blown up, then its blown up! (snicker)

You get stuck in a refit CL for a couple of "years".  Not to make it so one side woud totally run the other over, mind you, but I think a combo of low DV hexes and fleets that more closely resemble the stuff from the board games might make things less predictable and more interesting, plus it would probably be harder for any one side to win so easily because, in war, there's a lot of ways to lose.

 It couldn't hurt to try at least.  The whole point of the thing is to have fun, right?  I have the most fun when it's not the same old "run the AI over, wash, rinse, repeat" routine.  Or PvP fights that aren't determined by missiles or tractor-anchoring the enemy.

[GDA-S'Cipio]

Pesonally, I would like to see the OOB ships avaliable for general purchase at insanely high prices.  This could work on a short server, like GW3.  Make them about 200,000 to 300,000(assuming a 2 week server).  This way someone who flys a lot can get a reward, if they choose.

That is not a bad idea, I kinda like it.

Me too.   Just one problem.   How could the FMs buy it?

During a DB cleaning, just use Evil Dave's flatfile DB editor to change the FM's ship into the one you want him to have.  It seems to work fine on my DB's so long as I don't repeatedly alter anyone's ship without their buying one in between.

-S'Cipio

[FPF-DieHard]

During a DB cleaning, just use Evil Dave's flatfile DB editor to change the FM's ship into the one you want him to have.  It seems to work fine on my DB's so long as I don't repeatedly alter anyone's ship without their buying one in between.

-S'Cipio

This flatfile editor is like Bigfoot, i keep hearing about it but have never seen a copy.  Can somebody post a link or email it to me?

[GDA-S'Cipio]

This flatfile editor is like Bigfoot, i keep hearing about it but have never seen a copy.  Can somebody post a link or email it to me?

I'll take care of that sometime late tonight.  It's really cool. 

-S'Cipio