Aivlis Eldelbar
Ubuntu Inc. The Fourth District
7
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Posted - 2014.01.15 23:29:00 -
[1] - Quote
My 0.02isk on the state of nullsec exploration as of the current date:
-Data sites are worthless right now, I no longer fit Data Analyzers. I am yet to scan a Data can and regret not having the module after months of exploration.
-The loot spew is... tolerable. It increases the vulnerability of an exploration ship while they try to grab the loot, and if you know what you're after you can almost always get it all. And it still does feel like you're being punished by it, rather than rewarded for being successful at hacking the can; maybe we could get rid of it if you open a can on the first try? Since there isn't enough isk there to justify more than one player doing the site, I'd say it fails at forcing player cooperation. It would also be nice if the can types were a bit more meaningful; I mostly go for Materials/Parts, and they both contain the same stuff, while Scraps/Equipment are worthless 99% of the time. Data is situational, since you will always know if it's worth going for those or not, which oddly makes it the only can type that serves a distinct function.
-The minigame is ok, but needs some tweaks. I certainly enjoy it more that the old orbiting a can waiting for a salvager cycle to succeed, but it really gets frustrating sometimes. My main source of annoyement are Restoration Nodes: other subs you can find and then decide on the best course of action, but these you need to kill asap, always, so they are essentially an automatic hit to your coherence that you can't avoid, because you don't see them coming. Where the rest of the minigame feels like you can strategically solve, Restoration Nodes devolve into a by-the-numbers head-bashing session. All amplified by the fact that the games is sometimes full of them, so it's just a matter of having enough coherence to grind through them all, which seems out of place in EVE. This becomes even more of an issue in ghost sites, where failing a hack means taking a substantial hit from the can, so I rather dislike failing because the RNG threw a ton of these things at me. The easiest way to solve this would be to implement a cap on how much they can heal other subs, maybe 1.5x or 2x their original health? That would give us the decision: do I want to bash this thing straight up, or can I afford to look around a bit, since it can only do so much? Right now it can make you lose the game unless you headbutt it asap. The rest of the game is quite well done, with different utilities sinergizing nicely with subs, and more than one solution to most problems
-The payout overall is fine for the time invested, though a bit on the low-end due to more people doing these sites than before. Data needs a buff, as do the Ghost Site loot tables; I've been to quite a few already that had nothing but tools, which begs the question: why would anyone risk a ship worth millions (the only kind that can do those with some safety) for such horrid payouts? You can always be sure of what's in there before npcs spawn, and just leave if it's not worth the try. I must add it's nice that's that's the case, since being scrammed before you see all there is is some trit and 10 tools would be absolute bs.
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