Community discussion - improvements for new players

[aelfkins]

The first four combat drones(Basic Light weight, Light weight, Light, and Medium) are the same except for price. They look the same, and they do the same damage.

Make Imps consistent
A +1.8 imp gives a +1 Stat, while a -1.2 imp gives a -2 Stat

Construction and Research missions are boring and don't give enough xp for the time it takes to do them. I did an hour of research missions, and earned less xp than I did in 4 minutes of droning(TL3 Light weight attack drone).
Maybe have the constructors, and researchers(engineers, and scientists), start off with drones instead of pistols since droning level intelligence faster.

[aelfkins]

Have vehicles spawn closer to the depot. In a lot of the vehicle depot spawn points are hidden behind hills, or in holes in the ground that prompt you to have to run around looking for you vehicle.
If I didn't know that this was an issue, I'd assume my vehicle just won't spawn.

[Odimara Orca]

Pretty much agree with all the proposed changes.

I'd be careful with the quests though. NC is constructed as a grinder. A few Quests are o.k. But if you invest overly into a questing experience you fight a losing battle compared to other games which are constructed for the questing experience (also I'd like that Dev power to go to other areas where it's more necessary).

Yes NC is a PvP game. Fuck the carebears. They are 5% of the population at max while the other 95% don't log in because of the current state.

Also very important: Pre equip Armor and Implants and already inject the modules / weapons in the quickbar. A new player won't figure out how to implant a psi glove by himself. They're used to click 1, 2 or 3 then go do damage.

[aelfkins]

Have vendors list equipment by the items name instead of it's condition. So item sets don't get spit up if the vendor has a different condition for different items of the same set(I've seen this mostly with armor).

Have an option to sort vendor items by TL. It would make buying weapons and armor easier.

[Mal]

Tonight, we held a brain storming session on Discord regarding the difficulties that new players have upon joining the game (and some other things that will go in other posts).

Overview:

The main agreement appears to be the current grinding, and lack of information available to new players. On top of this, the cost of equipment, and quality of missions.

Suggested resolutions (or notes) are listed below the issue, and are marked with a > at the start of the sentence.


Starting a new character

• Starting equipment
  New characters start with items which are not necessary to their 'class'.
  Starting weapons for Droners, PPU and Soldiers are currently underpowered. Soul Cluster doesn't always target mobs. Drones do 1 damage a hit, and must be point blank to hit. Soldiers have 2 lots of grenades, which go all over the place, and currently do more damage to the player than a scorpion in the starting area.
  
  > Reworking starting equipment to ensure a more balanced introduction. Provide all characters only with relevant and useful items.
  
  > Rework damage for starting equipment to balance it out better, or provide more ammo for indirect fire weapons, which will use more ammo.
  
• Starting Skills
  Not all the 'classes' have skills which are useful to them.
  
  > Rework the suggested starting skills, to prevent redundancies. Keep the option for more experiences players to adjust the suggested starting skills.
  
• Highlight difficult classes
  Things like Hacker and PPU require more advanced understanding of the game.
  
  > Rate classes from Easy (soldier/PE) to Hard (PPU, Hacker).
  
• Some factions are more advanced than others
  TG, TH and CM are more difficult to begin in and could be isolating for new players.
  
  > Mark them as Hard, or Advanced, so that players know what they can expect.

Lack of new player information

Although we currently have the /help channel to allow runners to ask questions - it would be helpful to proactively provide information to them.

• Citycom Tutorials - Adding a series of short reference tutorials to the Citycom would allow players to look up advice on things like buying equipment, where to level, how to do quests (etc.). If we could have an in-game browser, this would allow a Wiki added to the game, with all relevant material covered.
  
• Video Tutorials - A series of short tutorials, hosted through YouTube, and which can be played within the game would be a brilliant source of information for players. If an in-game browser was added, this could also provide a platform for imbedding the videos.

MC5 Area

• Quests - Currently the signposts to the first of the newbie quests is not obvious enough.
  
  > Have it so that characters start with the quest to speak with the first NPC, so that he appears on their Nav when they first leave the Cryo Facility.
  
• Equipment Costs - Items within the newbie area are too expensive.
  
  > The research mission asks you to purchase items which can cost thousands of credits.
  
  > I found last time that the requested weapon was 5.5K - this mean grinding mobs to buy the weapon, then grinding more to afford the GR to my apartment.
  
  > The GR shouldn't charge to take players to their first apartment to avoid players getting 'stuck' in MC5 and having to grind.
  
• Equipment Relevance - There are items on the first vendors which just aren't relevant, such as ammo for WoC weapons.
  
  > Create a new list of newbie specific item groups, with subsidised pricing, to ease players into the game.
  
  I started a PPU and knew to put points into Rifle so I could actually kill things, since Soul Cluster is broken - how many newbies would think they'd have to do that right off the bat?
  
• Healing, armour, recycling - levelling is basically horrible until you get these three things.
  
  > Players should be provided a full set of armour, a TL3 heal or equivalent and a recycling tool, plus the skills required to use them, by the time they leave MC5. This will allow them to focus their funds and effort on levelling, rather than hunting these items - IF they even know about them and their benefit in the first place.

Levelling

• Grind (levelling) - Other than MC5 missions and EPICs, there is not much more than grinding in the way of levelling up a character.
  
  > Introduce a series of mini-quests, which can be started in popular areas such as Plaza 1. These are arranged similarly to EPICs, in that they will require players to complete several tasks around the city, and grant decent items (allow players to choose from a list to cater for unusual setups) and large XP rewards for their completion. Either mark the missions on the map, or have the NPC contact the player to let them know where they can find the content.
  
  > Up the XP gain. The main aim of the game is PVP. It was speculated that the grind should be shortened to allow players to begin end-game content quicker.
  
• Cash - if XP is raised, it could mean that players are unable to afford new items to keep up with the pace of their levelling.
  
  > Credits are mostly irrelevant towards end-game, with most items now bartered with tech parts. Up the credits reward for all missions, except research, to allow players to have a cash flow that will balance with their levelling rate.
  
• Too many players relying on a limited number of spots to level us. Let's face it - drone/grenade launcher + El Farid = levelling. Sure, some players don't, but the overwhelming majority do. And it makes the ones that do it without an LE a very easy target.
  
  > There's a lot of unused space out in the wastes that could accommodate levelling areas. The main thing that makes EF so convenient is the fact that the Queen spawns Big Scorpions, that spawn little Scorpions in turn. This makes for quick spawn rates, quick XP, and quick money - all in a limited sized area. Introduce more areas with this general mechanic perhaps? Providing more areas will allow players the opportunity to scout out their own favourites.
• Levelling spot ganking. Log out in the levelling zone. Kill anyone without an LE. Log out in the zone to avoid repercussions. Too easy. Soul Light too low? Just idle somewhere until it regenerates.
  
  > Introduce an elevated loss of soul light for ganking in levelling areas. Currently, having high Soul Light incurs a lower penalty for killing than having a low Soul Light, so players bag a couple of kills and idle in Plaza till they have high Soul Light and don't drop items in their belt as easily/their belt is harder to hack if they're caught. Make it a BIG penalty for killing in a levelling spot, and the occurrence will drop, as players are more worried about dropping their stuff.

LE and PVP

• LEs are counter-productive for the game. This is a PVP game, and there's not a big enough incentive to remove an LE.
  
  > Player XP should cap at around /45. This will allow a player to complete their Epic missions before getting into the main content. Once they get to /45, the XP should cap, and they cannot carry on gaining until they remove their LE.
  
  > Alternatively, LEs should not work outside of the city. There are sufficient levelling areas to avoid contact with other players in the wastelands. Quoting: "If you are a trader and want to sit in an outpost to get the bonus you shouldn’t be unkillable". It IS a Warzone, after all.
  
• Dropping items in belts. Currently, if a low-level player removes their LE and is PKed, they can potentially lose an item that is integral to their development. Conversely, the chances that this item is worth taking for the PKer is low. With this in mind, you have a situation where the PKed player could potentially just be demoralised to the point of quitting, for the sake of the PKer gaining a few thousand credits at Yo’s.
  
  > Players under /45 don't drop items in belts. By /45 they should have had time to learn the game, and stand a better chance of escaping an attack.
  
• Benefits of a clan are not explained. Clans are, for the most part, very important in NC. They provide protection, and a way to crowdsource resources. Any item lost in a dropped belt is likely easily replaced if in a clan, meaning losses are minimal.
  
  > More advertising of the benefits of clans, and how they outweigh getting PKed is required. In-game posters could be a nice way of doing this, as well as an article in the above-mentioned tutorials.

Bumping for Bifrost, following a discussion today.

[William Antrim]

You know what would go a long way towards improving the new player experience?

One - write a guide with up to date information on how to do stuff and host it on TH.org.

Two - put a splash screen into the game at account creation saying - this game is really old so dont expect AAA standards but if you have any questions go to this site and link to TH.org or here.

[Zoltan]

Play like its 1999?

[William Antrim]

Yes basically. Making suggestions which take up hundreds of man hours is all well and good but someone has to implement them. With the speed of development in this game I dont see those suggestions coming to fruition before the end of the decade in all honesty. You've spent 3-4 years on the balancing project. Entire game series have come and gone since then.

If you want to improve things then you need to go back to basics and make the simplest easiest changes possible and let the game play to its strengths, not apologise for its weaknesses.

[Torg]

The first four combat drones(Basic Light weight, Light weight, Light, and Medium) are the same except for price. They look the same, and they do the same damage.

Make Imps consistent
A +1.8 imp gives a +1 Stat, while a -1.2 imp gives a -2 Stat

Construction and Research missions are boring and don't give enough xp for the time it takes to do them. I did an hour of research missions, and earned less xp than I did in 4 minutes of droning(TL3 Light weight attack drone).
Maybe have the constructors, and researchers(engineers, and scientists), start off with drones instead of pistols since droning level intelligence faster.

Basic drones appear to have the same damage mostly because of rounding errors. Just select what fits you best. And yes, XP gain from doing cst, res or rec is terribly low, and something needs to be done about that.

[Celt]

You know, the fact that 50% of the people on Discord feel very strongly against LE's is utterly meaningless. Neocron has been made less and less interesting for players who don't want to PVP and particularly, as the population dropped, activities for non-PVPers completely dried up too.

There was a character on Uranus who just stood in Plaza 1 for several hours a day, day in, day out. He had alts but he never PVPed, he just wanted to play NC his way. Countless PVPers used him to re-implant after dying elsewhere.

I had a small list of researchers/constructors who were trustworthy to res my techs and build my rares. Again, they tended to have no interest in PVP and tradeskilling was their main activity.

There were entire clans (the majority of clans, actually) who had no interest in op-warring. They were social organisations where players conducted PVE and tradeskilling.

There was none of this asinine "NC isn't hardcore enough, we must fuck over people who don't want to PVP" when Neocron was at it's busiest so I'm not sure what mental hoops people are jumping through to think that somehow making NC even less attractive to players is going to make it more popular.

Most of the people posting silly arguments on the forum seem to mistake "what I think is good for how I want the game to be played" for "what is good for the game". This is clearly shown as, when confronted with even a rudimentary rebuttal of their unmitigated shite, they quietly slink away until they feel confident enough to raise their head above the parapet to unleash another load of crap.

[Frell]

I would like to see storage lvl 7 from outzone 2 (under the gr) to removed or copied to plaza 1 near the CA HQ.

Its a great little dungeon and i don't think many new players will ever find it in outzone 2

And i don't think too many players would miss if you would remove 1 out of 2 lvl 1 sewers from plaza 1

[William Antrim]

You know, the fact that 50% of the people on Discord feel very strongly against LE's is utterly meaningless. Neocron has been made less and less interesting for players who don't want to PVP and particularly, as the population dropped, activities for non-PVPers completely dried up too.

You know its mob rule that got a lot of things changed in this game in the first place right? Belt drops in war zones? GRs locked to clan only etc etc.

I dont actually think anything has been removed for the non-pvp crowd down the years aside for the ridiculous mob damage/hp changes that 2.2 brought with it. Certainly not much was removed and one major dungeon was added (regants). What else is there to add? Woc was added, this gave the grinders something else to grind for. Sure thing they could have made more of it but I dont see much ever getting lost. Moreover I think it was a case of the PVE crowd actually getting bored of the content as it had been done to death. There was a time when you could solo most of the content in this game, sure it was good fun for a time but with the 20 yr old AI it became surprisingly easy.

I think this is time catching up to the game and the engine showing its age which has done this, rather than anything the "pvp" crowd as you put it has done to the game. The only major thing left to draw life in this game is the pvp. The PVE crowd have long gone to new games in search of a more fulfilling experience from what I can see. But hey, thats the beauty of opinions, none of us is wrong.