Split: Difficulty for new players

[Cody]

... which still leaves the problem of how to make the game accessible to new players?

I reckon it is accessible to new players - it's just that sometimes, the dice roll goes against you. As a_c says, there should always be an element of risk.

[Diziet Sma]

We have a fresh crop of new players, thanks to recent events.. why don't we seek out their thoughts and opinions on the difficulty of starting out? How are they coping with the changes in 1.77? Even if that entails some of the mods PMing them to ask for their input on this thread..

[CaptSolo]

I have not yet installed 1.77, but will... eventually. Will have to see how I fare against NPC's who can red-line their lasers. Mind you, the pirates in my Ooniverse are already very dangerous.

[mandoman]

Heck, the only thing I was noting was how quickly my Military Grade shields went down after two or three hits from a pirate. If that is equal to a player, I'm missing something. It takes way more hits than that for me to blow a pirate out of space, unless he holds still long enough for me to get him with a single laser stream. Doesn't happen often. What's the point in Military Grade Shields, if they can't stand up to laser fire any better than that?

I guess what I'm getting at isn't the number of pirates in the scenario, but the incredible amount of fire power they have. The player is still just one ship, so when you give pirates that kind of fire power, and they show up as a gang, the player is lucky to come out alive. If it's a new player, that's all she wrote. Also, pirates are able to use their aft lasers a whole lot more effectively than the player. I can't switch to aft view to fire at a pirate on my tail, when there are three others circling around me, all firing at the same time. Yet, a pirate ship does that with ease. Not a good balance. I actually noticed that little quirk in 1.76.

[Disembodied]

I reckon it is accessible to new players - it's just that sometimes, the dice roll goes against you. As a_c says, there should always be an element of risk.

There's always risk: you still might meet a Thargoid, wherever you go. There are other factors too, e.g. pirate behaviour. A Jameson in a brand-new Cobra III is going to get destroyed by pretty much any combination of pirates, jointly or singly - but if you can eject some cargo and run away while the bad guys go after it, then that would make an occasional pirate scare in a civilised system more liveable/survivable for new players especially. I'll need to check this out.

What I think is a mistake, though, is to make players have to play the pretty much the same game wherever they go. If everywhere is a potential battleground, every system becomes more or less the same. It also makes things very difficult for new players, and for players who want to live a peaceful life. There are plenty of dodgy systems for those of us who fancy a scrap: it might be nice if there were some systems that non-violent players could call their own, too (with occasional bug raids thrown in for spice).

[Diziet Sma]

Also, pirates are able to use their aft lasers a whole lot more effectively than the player. I can't switch to aft view to fire at a pirate on my tail, when there are three others circling around me, all firing at the same time. Yet, a pirate ship does that with ease. Not a good balance. I actually noticed that little quirk in 1.76.

Wait until you start meeting pirates with side-lasers installed.. they're not in the core code, but they now have the ability to use 'em, if an OXP gives it to them..

[mandoman]

Wait until you start meeting pirates with side-lasers installed.. they're not in the core code, but they now have the ability to use 'em, if an OXP gives it to them..

I've developed my own answer for those attacks, and so far it seems to be fairly effective.

[JazHaz]

I'm not 100% sure about this, but I think CommonSense's Custom Shields OXP makes the difficulty a bit higher. I'm thinking about removing it to see.

I have noticed that combat in 1.77 seems a lot harder than in 1.76.1. I have been playing a bounty hunter game, yesterday, for an hour and got destroyed about four times, which is quite a lot for just an hour of play. I don't really have any OXP ships that are too difficult, as I've tried to stay with the core ships and equivalent for difficulty level.

[mandoman]

I'm not 100% sure about this, but I think CommonSense's Custom Shields OXP makes the difficulty a bit higher. I'm thinking about removing it to see.

I have noticed that combat in 1.77 seems a lot harder than in 1.76.1. I have been playing a bounty hunter game, yesterday, for an hour and got destroyed about four times, which is quite a lot for just an hour of play. I don't really have any OXP ships that are too difficult, as I've tried to stay with the core ships and equivalent for difficulty level.

I now know that having a bounty on your head doubles the already elevated danger of 1.77. It's bad enough when the pirates come after you, but when you are pounced on by the Gal Cops as well, it's impossible. I took out a ship I hadn't flown for a while, and forgot that it had a "Offender" status because my finger slipped again, and I shot the Main Station Buoy on my way out of the system I had been in before. Kind of stupid, and I don't normally do that any more, but it sure set me up for a killing when I launched this time. I barely escaped to the next system, but was met by a whole fleet of Navy Vipers, and Befemoth. Heck, my shields hadn't recovered from the last system barrage yet, so it didn't take long for me to go boom. 1.77 doesn't allow you to remove the Offender status in game either, so I'm just going to have to fix it in the Saved Games file. I can still do that, right?

[Cody]

I barely escaped to the next system, but was met by a whole fleet of Navy Vipers, and Befemoth.

Those aren't core ships, though... that's OXP-induced trouble.

1.77 doesn't allow you to remove the Offender status in game either

Yes it does... same ways as before.

[CaptSolo]

Okay, Have both 1.76.1 and 1.77. Copied all my AddOns to the new Oolite. Took off from Inera main for Esredice. Arrived there undamaged but had a one occasion where aft shield almost down. Conclusion: It's awesome, especially the new NPC behaviour and combat AI's. To the Dev team: Congratulations for an awesome new version.

[cim]

I reckon it is accessible to new players - it's just that sometimes, the dice roll goes against you. As a_c says, there should always be an element of risk.

I think risk is only fun if there's a way to mitigate it, though. A new player really doesn't have many options for that, at the moment, and a single Cobra I or Moray can be deadly if it fires its missile (which it always does, if the player starts winning). Conversely, for an Elite pilot in a well-equipped ship, there's barely any risk at all, and that's also a problem.

What I'm thinking about at the moment as possibilities is a fairly large set of (semi-independent) changes (and this is semi-stream-of-consciousness first thoughts and talking points, nothing more). Here goes:

Principles:
(if you think these are wrong, you'll really hate the next section...)

1. Corporate States (and Democracies, almost as much) should be safe enough for Jamesons to explore and trade up a bit. Safe does not mean "no combat" as in the Diso-Leesti run in Elite, or the Sol-Barnards run in FE2. It just means you need better ways out of a fight than "die" or "kill them all", and routes to use them that are easiest in core systems.
2. Conversely, Anarchies (and somewhat Feudals) should be very challenging, even to an experienced commander. In BBC Elite, these were "you get one jump drive use, and then it's a running battle the rest of the way to the station". The station is somewhat further away in Oolite, so that's perhaps a little much, but it should never be "easy".
3. Going off-lane should never be necessary in the core game. Off-lane should be more dangerous than on-lane, not less, at least for plausible routes to the planet. Get way out into deep space and that's perhaps a bit different.

Ideas:
(Some more like the original Elite than we have now, some less like it; probably all controversial)

1. Adjust system population. At the moment, the populator only changes the number of pirate groups between governments. If it also adjusted the size of the groups and the sorts of ships in them, this would allow greater differentiation between governments. (differentiate to role=pirate-weak, role=pirate-medium, role=pirate-strong, role=pirate-freighter or similar?)
2. Adjust pirate behaviour. At the moment, all pirates are generated on system entry, sit on the spacelane until they're killed or full, and once they're gone, they're gone. If, instead, they came in to the spacelane from bases outside it (off-lane pirate coves/hermits, witchspacing from nearby systems, suitable OXP stations) the running battle feel might be there in dangerous systems It also gives more space for off-lane to be the dangerous bit with the pirates raiding into it. Make pirates reassess the odds mid-fight, too - if you kill half a pack, the rest might try to retreat, or they might go after you personally for revenge and ignore their original trader targets. Dice...
3. Adjust trader behaviour. Allow trader groups to help out each other against pirate attack sometimes. In a safe system, if you get attacked by a pirate, maybe a nearby trader will help you out. (Or even more sophisticated: let the player somehow negotiate escort or mutual protection deals as they go along? let traders do the same with each other and passing bounty hunters?)
4. Improve group cooperation: If someone fires a missile at a friendly, and they don't have ECM but you do, ECM it for them! Needs the player to be made a honorary member of a trader group, but this can give a way out of "Oh, they launched a missile. Sorry, you're dead." provided they can keep up their end of the deal and keep the Boa alive.
5. Widen the spacelane, at least in safe systems. Put multiple Coriolis's in orbit, and let inbound traders pick one. Some work needed to make them all be the main station (so you can't go to one, buy 10TC, go to the next, buy 10TC, etc.) This makes the spacelane wider, which both reduces mass-locking on the way in, and also makes you safer if you stick to the middle (which is where police and bounty hunters will patrol) because pirates have more patrolled space to get through to see you. In dangerous systems, probably everyone will stick to the narrower bit until they reach the planet, and then split up.
6. Estimate the player's role: At the moment the game engine (approximately) treats the player as having role=trader. Even if they're a hardened pirate, or a famous bounty hunter, or flying a ship with no cargo hold. It should be possible to watch their actions and assign them the role that best fits their reputation. (So one very easy way to avoid being killed by pirates: join them). This can go back to trader behaviour above - if you get a reputation for helping out fellow traders in a fix, maybe they'll help you out too.
7. Give NPCs shields: ...but to even the odds, also give them systems damage, same as the player (or the Griff Krait). Once they start taking systems damage, there's a good chance that they'll be very combat averse and just try to reach a friendly port, or perhaps even jump straight out of the system, so scaring off a pirate by blowing chunks out of its hull doesn't just buy you a few minutes until it comes back. This might actually make quite a few ships easier - a basic shield is weaker than most NPC energy reserves, so you can probably scare it off with fewer shots, even if finishing it off is trickier ... and they might start retreating before firing missiles, so Jamesons without ECM could let them go. Conversely a proper pirate pack or a freighter's escort wing can cover each other to let shields recharge ... but you'd usually have to be looking for trouble to fight those

Extra core features needed:
(Some of these you might recognise from elsewhere, and there are obviously more general uses)

1. More flexible, probably JS-based, system populator.
2. Much higher-level AI language. (JS, yes, but probably a nice AI library on top of that so that it doesn't require fifty lines of code just to fly from A to B, reacting sensibly to things on the way)
3. Internal damage model for NPCs (and ideas about what damaging an NPC's Multi-Targeting System might actually achieve)
4. Allegiance model beyond ship groups and roles; more flexibility on player's perceived role

[Cody]

Crikey! The game engine would have fun estimating my role. <dons his thinking sombrero - makes coffee>

[Pleb]

I think I have to agree with pretty much everything cim covered there. I especially agree that the system populator should be editable by JS, I managed to publish a rather clumsy/messy code hack that enabled this before but something more elegant would work better.

I also agree that the space lanes should be widened and that there should be a lot more traffic than there currently is. When Oolite was first released computers were not as fast as they are today, and it makes sense to increase the amount of ships that are in the core game, rather than having to rely on OXPs to populate the star systems.

[Diziet Sma]

Lots of interesting ideas there, cim, and nothing I would take exception to.

As EV indicated, there might have to be some thought given to various possible nuances of player behaviour.. such as those who play as a contrabandista or a 'clean' pirate, perhaps..

The higher-level AI language sounds interesting, too..