So about that levelling curve.

[tommmsunb]

So recently I made a new toon, on a new server, partly because my server was dying and I wanted to level a new toon to max. I have 30 hours played on this new toon, around 13 of which are in matches, approximately 90 battles, aaaaaand I'm 25k away from maxing. Now you might think, okay, that's probably about middle of the pack right? Wrong.

 

Of those 90 matches I've won 77 of them, and typically I'm top kills/dmg. So I get bonus req from that. Approximately 1250-1500 req per match without 2x bonus.

http://i.imgur.com/7Upap9I.jpg

 

If I don't have stats like this and go middle of the pack I end up with 600-900 req per match(which mathmatically you can see I tested on the same character.). So, even with spending cartel coins on converting the ship req into fleet req from the weekly/dailies, doing just about everything I can to max out req as fast as possible, including a cartel ship I may add. It's taking whats projected to be over 100 matches in order to master a ship.

 

I don't think this is alright. It further goes to show that GSF is way too hard for new players to get into, and not fun enough when they first start for them to really feel compelled to.

 

My suggestion is to cut every upgrade cost by half, keep ships/base components the way they are, but make it so that a new player might be able to get 2 upgrades at once after their 2nd/3rd match for 500 each.

 

I can only think that if you are bottom of the pack you are going to take significantly longer to get parts that help you feel like you're actually doing something.

 

Thoughts?

Edited May 4, 2014 by tommmsunb

[Slivovidze]

You forgot the fact that even though you fly a fresh ship, you still do good. Which implies that gear is not the most important part of GSF experience.

 

Sure, giving the fesh guys mastered ships straight away could "give them a chance blah blah yada yada", but they would still be blasted to pieces by people like you or me or anyone else experienced, even with a fresh ship.

 

I say things are pretty much good. I wouldn't object slight cost reduction, but cut it in half? Nah.

When the fresh guys play with their stock ships, they may at least have hope that "once they upgrade" they will do good. And during the long upgrading proccess, they actually get good.

(Of course, then there are these guys who don't ever get good, and these wouldn't really appreciate the "help" of everyone flying upgraded ships.)

 

I honestly doubt there is a good solution now. Mistakes were made. There is a gear that heavily favours those who can abuse it successfully. The only way to give newbies a fighting chance would be a good matchmaking. Which we may or may not have, we are unlikely to find out as there is not enough players to fuel it. And thus the circle is formed. New guys being put against experienced guys lead to new guys quitting, which leads to small playerbase.

The solution would be to get rid of these big upgrades. Make tons of components, make them all available for decent prices, but no upgrades. That would lead to lots of possible builds, all obtainable by playing several games daily. By playing for a week, everyone could build their ship their way, and show what they got. That is however not gonna happen because that would be a huge, total revamp of system.

Edited May 4, 2014 by Slivovidze

[tommmsunb]

You forgot the fact that even though you fly a fresh ship, you still do good. Which implies that gear is not the most important part of GSF experience.

 

Sure, giving the fesh guys mastered ships straight away could "give them a chance blah blah yada yada", but they would still be blasted to pieces by people like you or me or anyone else experienced, even with a fresh ship.

 

I say things are pretty much good. I wouldn't object slight cost reduction, but cut it in half? Nah.

When the fresh guys play with their stock ships, they may at least have hope that "once they upgrade" they will do good. And during the long upgrading proccess, they actually get good.

(Of course, then there are these guys who don't ever get good, and these wouldn't really appreciate the "help" of everyone flying upgraded ships.)

 

I honestly doubt there is a good solution now. Mistakes were made. There is a gear that heavily favours those who can abuse it successfully. The only way to give newbies a fighting chance would be a good matchmaking. Which we may or may not have, we are unlikely to find out as there is not enough players to fuel it. And thus the circle is formed. New guys being put against experienced guys lead to new guys quitting, which leads to small playerbase.

The solution would be to get rid of these big upgrades. Make tons of components, make them all available for decent prices, but no upgrades. That would lead to lots of possible builds, all obtainable by playing several games daily. By playing for a week, everyone could build their ship their way, and show what they got. That is however not gonna happen because that would be a huge, total revamp of system.

 

While, yes I do decently in a stock ship, I, and a few others, are the exceptions, and we shouldn't be balancing the entire game in favour of the exceptions.

[Devrius]

I agree, I switched server as well and have been playing nothing but my Starguard and in 3 days I maxed all but weapons, engines and shields.

 

But that's mainly because I know how to fly it and end up in the top of the score board most of the time, including when my team looses.

 

The tier 4 and 5 of component are very expensive and they add abilities that depending on the component make a huge difference. At least those should have cost downs, maybe make tier 4 cost 7.5k and tiier 5 10k.

 

That's 7.5k shaved off the top upgrades, a solid start I would say.

[Kuciwalker]

While, yes I do decently in a stock ship, I, and a few others, are the exceptions, and we shouldn't be balancing the entire game in favour of the exceptions.

 

1. This
   
2. Also, flying stock ships isn't as much fun. This is not just a matter of the relative power level, and it would be equally fun if everyone were stuck with stock. Customized ships are objectively more fun, because you get to choose the components you like and because those components become objectively more easy to actually use. And some tools (ion aoe) are important and fun parts of the toolkit that you just can not access without a lot of levelling.
   

[General_Brass]

It's a double XP weekend, there has been a higher proportion than normal of new pilots in stock or little upgraded ships.

[Storm-Cutter]

But you get 1000 requisition for your first GSF match. That sets you up for the daily (750/ship) and the weekly - 500 fleet +2500 per ship. Even with the 2/3 ships depending in whether you are FTP/pref/sub that's quite a lot for your first few matches.

If you have CCs to burn, you can buyextra ships and earn rep on them every day and week without even flying them.

 

The daily and weekly are concurrent. You get 2x per day for each ship type. - Even a few matches a day you gain req for the first few tiers really quickly - within 4-5 matches. When your daily and 2x xp are done, you can easily earn 500 req+ for every match win or lose.

 

- If you buy defensive components/crew at the start you'll be in the air for longer. I don't see that it is too much of a grind. - I fly with 6 characters. Some are 4-ship masters and some are in 1st upgrade ships. - And I only do 3/4 matches a day at most. It isn't a grind. Nor is it a race to the top. It's for teamwork and FUN!

 

If BW gave you 250,000 free req to spend where's the fun in earning it? - And wouldn't people QQ that their efforts meant nothing?

 

What do you want? Bolster? Did that do any good for the ground PvP? No.

 

Best thing for newbies is to play. To stick with it. Maybe the vets could set aside a 'newbies only hour' once a week. The community can do this, no input from BW needed. Veterans can fly stock ships for that hour if they really, really have to fly. I'd propose 11-12 on a Sunday morning for instance.

Edited May 4, 2014 by Storm-Cutter

[tommmsunb]

Best thing for newbies is to play. To stick with it. Maybe the vets could set aside a 'newbies only hour' once a week. The community can do this, no input from BW needed. Veterans can fly stock ships for that hour if they really, really have to fly. I'd propose 11-12 on a Sunday morning for instance.

 

That sounds like the worst idea, there's no point to that and it ends up being boring for everybody.

[Kuciwalker]

If BW gave you 250,000 free req to spend where's the fun in earning it?

 

There's no fun in earning it. The point of the game is to fly spaceships, not earn requisition.

[tommmsunb]

There's no fun in earning it. The point of the game is to fly spaceships, not earn requisition.

 

Yeah, by the previous logic whats the point in flying a ship once you've mastered it?

[SithAceI]

I know just from my experience that the upgrade from tier 4 to mastered seemed to be quite the advantage. Survivability being one of the improvements I noticed the most. I have mastered ships on the JC and tier two ships on the Harbinger and I can say the difference in matches is being top of the board on JC and middle of the board on HB. Now if it is all just skill then I should have no differences on were I place, but that is not the case. Just my two cents.

[Kerensk]

The path from noob to mastered is long but how does the curve change as you upgrade?

 

I don't have any maxed out ships but going from ships built to spec with 2-3 upgrades per component to an all with stock new ships was depressing. I can't believe how far 10-20k requisition points will go, because flying those new stock ships was like flying with one wing missing.

[Verain]

I can't believe how far 10-20k requisition points will go, because flying those new stock ships was like flying with one wing missing.

 

This right here is worth repeating. It doesn't take very long to get the ships into roughly serviceable states- much of what you need is available with the cheap upgrades.

 

There is a short list of game changing upgrades that normally cost 10k or 15k. The disto shield final tier, or armor penetration are the stand outs. I think these should be made baseline and something else put in their place (you might have to nerf the baseline, so a talent that restores it could be fine).

 

There was another thread that actually proposed that all the ships be entirely flattened- basically, everyone gets mastered ships for free, and those of us with several, I guess, jokes on us. This proposal here isn't as bad, but it's still way too much.

 

I think what could be done is this:

 

1- Make the cost for opening up a new whatever 500 or 250 req. The 2000 is very hard to afford early on, and several ships start with trap weapons. A new player might look at 2000 for burst laser cannon or 1000 for an extra level of rapids and think "rapids is the way to go", trusting that the devs wouldn't have made those two literally the best and worst lasers, respectively. It should cost almost nothing to open all the things at base level.

 

2- 10k tier should be like 7k.

 

3- 15k tier should be like 12k.

 

4- There should be some way to play a ship with more req on a limited basis- perhaps once a week- as part of a semi-grindy weekly ground quest. Doing this stuff would also give you some req to spend, so it wouldn't just only come from pvp. The danger here is that someone might decide to not even bother flying until all their ships had 40k req or whatever, essentially stepping out of the game entirely, so there would have to be some limits- you obviously have to push people into the queues, as that is all of what GSF is.

 

 

When you did this change, you'd want to refund people requisition. Even with the modest thing I suggest would take the cost of mastering a ship down 24k. Many ships would generate far more than that, up to hundreds of thousands of requisition in refunds. Some of this would have to be in fleet req. Since many players got to their current ships by spending actual dollars, even this modest proposal could really hurt player faith in Bioware.

 

 

 

The proposal here- that the cost of a ship be like halved- would be utterly absurd. It would totally trivialize the time spent leveling existing ships, and the DOLLARS spent leveling existing ships. These are not the players you should be telling to "suck it". In fact, I suspect a lot of these proposals are based on a hatred of these players- I see the same posts, with the same tone.

 

"Hee hee if the devs listen to this suggestion, everyone who spent time making their ships good will have been WRONG and I think morally that they should be WRONG because they play the game more than me (everyone who plays less is a dirty lame casual, everyone who plays more is a nolife hardcore parent's basement loser) so the thing that they spent hours and dozens to hundreds of dollars on should be TAKEN AWAY and I'll pretend it's because it is all in the name of the two ship guys who care so much they can't even bother being subbed or buying any other ship at any time, and I'll pretend it's because of the mere existence of good players."

 

 

That's what I'm tired of seeing. I think you could- carefully- reduce the amount of req required, or slightly increase req gain, or bring in another way to earn requisition in monitored amounts by playing the ground game. Many of these would require some manner of in-game compensation to players who have already mastered or even COMPLETED those ships- ship req to some degree, but even fleet req or cartel coins.

 

 

 

If the devs leave it lie, which they probably will, all is not lost- just doing the weekly generates a bunch of requisition.

[Kuciwalker]

The proposal here- that the cost of a ship be like halved- would be utterly absurd. It would totally trivialize the time spent leveling existing ships, and the DOLLARS spent leveling existing ships. These are not the players you should be telling to "suck it". In fact, I suspect a lot of these proposals are based on a hatred of these players- I see the same posts, with the same tone.

 

Are you serious? I've mastered every ship I actually fly, and I've mastered some of them on multiple characters. Do you really think I'm advocating this because I want to screw all those horrible people who spent a lot of time on getting requisition?

[Storm-Cutter]

Newbies hour once a week.

 

That sounds like the worst idea, there's no point to that and it ends up being boring for everybody.

 

So what is so wrong about this? Giving the new pilots a level - ish playing field for just ONE hour a WEEK?

 

- Practice/play without being farmed.

- No dev involvement required.

- Earn req enough to see the daily /weekly out .

- Being somewhat evenly matched.

- More players coming on-stream......

 

I don't see a problem. -Or did I miss something? Please feel free to enlighten me, Tomm'.

Edited May 5, 2014 by Storm-Cutter

[SammyGStatus]

Newbies hour once a week.

 

 

 

So what is so wrong about this? Giving the new pilots a level - ish playing field for just ONE hour a WEEK?

 

- Practice/play without being farmed.

- No dev involvement required.

- Earn req enough to see the daily /weekly out .

- Being somewhat evenly matched.

- More players coming on-stream......

 

I don't see a problem. -Or did I miss something? Please feel free to enlighten me, Tomm'.

 

I agree with Tom - I don't see an hour a week deal being something that the devs would design. Maybe another daily, but a time limited amount with increased rewards for people who haven't played the game seems... farfetched? I just think there are better ways to go about getting newbs geared, like flying with vets who can not only give them a chance to win, but can also provide instruction while increasing their overall req. Truthfully, if it's a domination at least, newb ships should probably just sat cap for a round or two so as to get the intro level done / the daily done / the weekly started. It is definitely going to take time to gear up a ship, but if there were incentives along the way, I think that may encourage people to continue playing. It'll at least keep them gearing up

[Fractalsponge]

If there were sufficient incentives (i.e. like ground game comms, maybe some by requisition transfer), people would plow through it regardless. In the process they'd get good enough to enjoy it. We all know the process is this: increase population > make real matchmaking happen.

 

That said, I'd be perfectly fine with flattening the top two upgrade tiers a bit, maybe 7.5k and 10k. That's coming from someone with 7 mastered ships (but I didn't spend any money doing it, so I can see this not happening).

 

To echo Verain, if you can get someone to queue to the 40-50k requisition point, all the ships are perfectly reasonable. The problem is more with bad initial component selection. What if instead of making the unlocks cheap, you have all ships started with all components unlocked, so people can mix-and-match and find what works best for them, and increase the prices of the mid tiers to compensate?

 

Making the most critical effects baseline to the component is also a great idea.

[Bull_Five_Golf]

Population is the problem not the cost of top tier abilities. Someone who has put the time in to earn enough rep to afford a single tier 4 improvement on a single component is already proven they are invested in the game.

 

The problem happens when Team A: 6 x 2 two ship new players and 2 x 5 ship players are in a match with Team B: 6 x 5 ship players and 2 x 2 ship players, and a couple people on vent. Team A gets slaughtered and the new guys don't live long enough to learn to improve. The best part about this scenario is when the 2 experienced players on Team A leave the ops group 2 minutes in because they know it's going to end up 5-50 in TDM. Then the match gets back filled with people looking at something like 7-45 on the score board and they wonder *** is going on with the game.

 

There is only one way to vastly improve the population:

If there were sufficient incentives (i.e. like ground game comms, maybe some by requisition transfer), people would plow through it regardless. In the process they'd get good enough to enjoy it. We all know the process is this: increase population > make real matchmaking happen.

Unfortunately none of this will happen because that would require development resources and as we all know: "GSF is in a healthy state right now."

[tommmsunb]

If there were sufficient incentives (i.e. like ground game comms, maybe some by requisition transfer), people would plow through it regardless. In the process they'd get good enough to enjoy it. We all know the process is this: increase population > make real matchmaking happen.

 

That said, I'd be perfectly fine with flattening the top two upgrade tiers a bit, maybe 7.5k and 10k. That's coming from someone with 7 mastered ships (but I didn't spend any money doing it, so I can see this not happening).

 

To echo Verain, if you can get someone to queue to the 40-50k requisition point, all the ships are perfectly reasonable. The problem is more with bad initial component selection. What if instead of making the unlocks cheap, you have all ships started with all components unlocked, so people can mix-and-match and find what works best for them, and increase the prices of the mid tiers to compensate?

 

Making the most critical effects baseline to the component is also a great idea.

 

I also have around 7 mastered ships, and I've converted cartel coins and I've bought IL-5s twice just so I can start out easier on other servers. I personally would not be insulted by any of this and I know many other people who have as well who I can guarantee you wouldn't mind it either. Though the concern is appreciated.

[WiseStranger]

Suggestion to make a "Noob hour" where veterans play stock ships against new players won't help one bit. A veteran in a stock ship will still vaporize new pilots. There should be another solution to this problem.

 

Giving a lot of requisition for free is not a solution either, however there is something in this idea. Based on my experiences with different ships and flying stock ships, first and most important item on the list of a new player is survivability. With the missile lock fest that's going on in the game (missiles, mines, drones) each stock ships should come with enough requisition to upgrade engine component or better yet, each engine component should not have any upgrades for cost and reuse time and just have base values set at the level of upgraded component.

 

Additionally there should be a tutorial mode/part where a new player has to learn how to evade missiles. Considering that we have missile drone in-game, devs should just add lock on time and put it into tutorial to let new players practice. There are too many games where people try to outrun missiles instead of using a missile break. Or die to protons where they could have survived.

 

Another thing that needs to be done in respect to upgrades is the trade off. If you get a benefit, you sacrifice something else. And not as trivial as choose to ignore armor or bypass shields that we have right now for some weapons. For instance if I get shield bypass my weapon consumes more power per shot or for armor ignore on a weapon, that weapon becomes less accurate. A stock ship should be a nice balanced ships that you can adjust for your play-style, but every adjustment should come at a cost.

 

It works well for minor components as when you choose one, you loose the benefits of the other. Choose faster engine regeneration and you loose on larger engine pool or faster turning, etc...

Now we need to get this idea to major components and possibly eliminate tiered upgrade system. Make multiple options that are unlocked individually and alter some characteristic of the component and put a limit to how many options can be active on a weapon at the same time.

[dailus]

All i can say is wow. Everyone wants somthing for nothing. They want to be "good" at gsf with no practice. By OP's testimonial he did pretty well even on a starter ship because of his skill. I say suck it up buttercup and learn to fly, as you learn you upgrade. Its not that hard.

 

Edit : Removed politcal reference.

Edited May 5, 2014 by dailus
Removed political reference,

[tommmsunb]

All i can say is wow. Everyone wants somthing for nothing. They want to be "good" at gsf with no practice. By OP's testimonial he did pretty well even on a starter ship because of his skill. I say suck it up buttercup and learn to fly, as you learn you upgrade. Its not that hard. Maybe they also think the should get 15 dollars and hour for serving fast food?

 

You have horribly misunderstood this entire thread, and an obvious troll is obvious. Coy attempt at turning this political. This is about learning curve, and the acceleration of that curve. Just because it has been designed doesn't mean its a good design and I'll leave it at that.

[Storm-Cutter]

no no no.... I think you're misreading.....

 

Just an hour where us vets don't play and let the new pilots zoom around shooting one another on a more-or -less level playing field. Before that and after that it's a free for all as normal. But it might just help a few interested people get a flavour of GSF without being farmed.

 

My guild-mates want to PvP in GSF, but I can't protect them all in the game. They've done to tutorial a few times, but when a match pops, the aces swarm all over them and they spend 1/2 their match respawning. This puts them off!

 

I had the advantage of learning the ropes on the PTS where everyone was a noob. But not everyone did.

Edited May 5, 2014 by Storm-Cutter

[dailus]

Ok so the politcal reference was a bad idea, but I stand by my opinion. I am an older gamer, I am definately not as quick with the controls as many out there, but I stuck with it and learned. I have also started on a new server recently and it doesnt take long to become competitive. Gsf is not hard, if I can catch on and play competitively anyone can. Edited May 5, 2014 by dailus

[tommmsunb]

no no no.... I think you're misreading.....

 

Just an hour where us vets don't play and let the new pilots zoom around shooting one another on a more-or -less level playing field. Before that and after that it's a free for all as normal. But it might just help a few interested people get a flavour of GSF without being farmed.

 

My guild-mates want to PvP in GSF, but I can't protect them all in the game. They've done to tutorial a few times, but when a match pops, the aces swarm all over them and they spend 1/2 their match respawning. This puts them off!

 

I had the advantage of learning the ropes on the PTS where everyone was a noob. But not everyone did.

 

I'd rather try to train people rather than ignoring them. Just leaving them on their own won't really help.