The current LE, what it used to be, and its impact on the community - Discussion

Hi there, havnt posted here for a long time.

The Law Enforcer, most of you hate or love it, and many even say it breaks the game.
I have to say, from my point of view, after playing for some weeks again and looking back at all the years of playing neocron: Your right, in its current state it does break some part of Neocron, and I'm not talking about stuff like bashing people in P2 or ganking, it breaks something even more important, something that made neocron unique in the first place.

I'm talking about the way people play as a community, currently you see only a few people without LEs, and those without LEs are mostly people with friend in clans or just pvp maniacs, the rest is running around LE'd.

Now lets talk about the pro and contra of the current LE, after that ill get to what it used to be and its impact on the community itself.

The current LE gives you, as a runner, the following advantages:

1. You cant get killed by other runners
2. You don't drop anything should you die

The disadvantages are:

1. You cant kill other runners
2. You cant hack belts
3. You cant join a clan

Basically currently, unless you got friend in a clan and want to join them, there is no reason to pull out your LE until your Capped (Or even WoC'd) and fully equipped to join the PvP fun, if you pull it earlier, your just fragmeat for those ganking/pvp maniacs.
This has destroyed one of the most unique features that Neocron ever had, the only other game i know which has a similar feature is EVE Online.

What feature you might ask?
Well, the LE used to have a XP Penalty, pulling your LE allowed you to level faster while being at risk to be killed by other runners.
You might say "Oh great feature, making us low level characters and PvE players leveling even slower.", well that wasn't the point of this, i guess the originally intended reason for this was to reward players who risk something, or compensate for the leveling time lost by dieing, i don't know what really was the intention KK had in mind, but i know its impact on the community, I've experienced it myself and seen it countless times happening.
In the old days, when you began your journey in neocron, there was a high chance that you meet a non LE'd player who would tell you about the XP Penalty of the LE, encouraging you to remove it. Many players did remove it, and entered the great part of neocron: Binding people.

When you removed your LE back then, you died a lot thanks to other players, you might even ask for help, and if you did, most of the time someone helped you defeating the ganker, be it just for the fun of a fight, or to protect newer players, whatever was the reason, there was a person who helped you, in this big digital world full of people you don't know, this could, and did quiet often, to some talk about the game itself, or even lead to a friendship, later even maybe a clan invite. The reason for this was simple, the person or persons who did help you are the first ones you might know that you could consider as friendly, people who you can talk to, ask questions, or even for help again, making him/her/them your first attachment figure inside the game, basically makes you meet people who not only just level at the same spot as you do.
If the persons helping you where already in a clan, there was a high chance that those people introduce you to their clan, explaining the advantages of being in a clan. Sometimes this whole process even led to the forming of clans out of now where, just from people who meet ingame.

This forming of bounds, was one of the most unique features of neocron in my opinion, and made me love the game since the first day, because it also happened to me, being ganked by higher level chars and asking for help, soon after that i was in a clan, not alone anymore, and that is where the real fun started.
That is what the LEs XP Penalty really did, and for those pure PvE players it didnt make a great difference, as they got used to the xp penalty from the beginning, for the rest of us it made a great difference.


And today, after many years of being gone, i miss this part of neocron, I'm basically alone right now, none of my old clanmates or friends play neocron again, and i only know those few traders i talked to, the crazy dude at plaza chilling there with me while i poke people, or the ones who i helped at getting started in this great game. All those clan, the mean nothing to me, as i don't know anyone of them, only those jerks from a CA Clan ask for a TL115 poke home visit in the middle of the night who didn't even tip a single nc, and those guys whining about the LE every night in the help channel.

So long story short, there should be a XP gain difference between LE'd and none LE'd players again.
Note i say difference, not penalty, as we cant just simple put in back the penalty again, that would just alienate the PvE players and low levels.
But we should increase the XP gain for non LE'd players.

This would bring the following advantages:

1. Encourages players to remove their LE to level faster.
2. Reduce the grind for those who primarily want to play PvP and those who don't like xp grinding at all. (Remember, many of us already grinded hundreds of hours in the old days to cap your multiple chars, we know nearly every inch of neocron, remember how many people where online at the double xp weekend?)
3. Increase the amount of none WoC'd PvP players. (Ill get to WoC and the stupid equipment gap it created in another post)
4. The most important one, it might bring back Neocrons best features, something no other MMO achieved as good as Neocron did, bringing people together.

For the PvE only players and lone wolves, nothing would change, they still get the XP they used to.


Thanks for reading this.

Kind regards,
FullMetalFox
(Some maybe remember me as "Greyfox" from Mars)

This guy nailed it.

The reason my clan is here in NC is because we formed together with a few like-minded people in our faction and 10 years later a man who I now call one of my best friends (and a massive noob) recruited us to his clan. That went tits up and we started out on our own and met some other crazy people who I still keep in touch with over vent/facebook/etc.

The reason we talk about the glory days of nc1 is because of the people we met then and this was all because we took out our LE's and got to know one another.


P.s Fox if you want a new group of people to hang out with and get to know then you can find us at this address http://nc-regulators.co.uk

I agree in that there is a huge impact the LE plays on the community.

I agree that now-adays, it's shoot first, ask/talk later. With people keeping in their LE whilst leveling, and eventually pulling it out once they're finished leveling, it creates this element where people immediately think you're some hostile terrorist and they must kill you. Sure you can say that the reasons for factions means that people will shoot you because you're red to them.. but I also feel like factions are just a part of the politics in the game. If I see someone red to me, I shouldn't want to immediately pull out my weapon and start shooting them. This ultimately happens because people will say "well if you didn't want me to shoot/kill you, you should've kept your LE in. The use of an LE plays a huge role in shaping someones psyche of neocron. Imagine if a noob takes out his LE because he doesn't know the ups/downs of having it, I guarantee that he'd get shot down if he was leveling in a populated place (say regants) if he didn't have his LE in. Once again, factions play a role in this, but also just the current psyche of the game is "shoot first, make chatter later".

I think the incentives for taking out the LE should be an increased XP rate, however I believe the incentive of taking out the LE is being able to use an extra implant (which in turn, enables you to use better equipment, therefore leveling up faster).

Anyhow, I do not know the difficulties in implementing an XP boost for non-LE'd characters, and i'm not entirely sure if it would ever become a priority. What I would personally like to see though is a change in the philosophy/psyche of neocron, rather than some kind of progression of the story.

TL;DR- I agree with everything FoxDF said above, I only hope the DEVs spend time reading and interpreting it.

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Originally Posted by FoxDF

Hi there, havnt posted here for a long time.


Now lets talk about the pro and contra of the current LE, after that ill get to what it used to be and its impact on the community itself.

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Sorry, but : NO. We should not talk again and again with allways the same arguments and in THIS actual stage of the very, very NEW populated server TITAN about the LE.

TITAN was build up from the scratch, and every - i repeat : EVERY thing now at this time after short running of Titan is somewhat artificial, because almost 90-95% of the players are veterans. Give this server some time and you will see that things come to an equlibrium we are used to have. After the players cap their chars and have WOC most of them (nearly all, i guess) WILL remove their LE's.

This is the 3.446.334 th thread about the LE and it's fatal consequences for this game, but it is nothing more than a panicked speech with a wall of text about issues which were 1000x discussed already.

I think that the LE is a good thing to give players enough room and time for the decision ho he will play this game.

Little add:

"Reduce the grind for those who primarily want to play PvP and those who don't like xp grinding at all."

Stop turning this game in a pvp-shooter-action-oriented "counterstrike with furnitures" - if you have no time to level up go and play shooter or planetside 2......

Reed

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Originally Posted by DR REED

Blah blah etc

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Read what he said. There is more truth in one of his posts than 1210 of yours.

Reed, when i read your post, i get the feeling that you did not read anything below the part you quoted.
If you didnt, please do, this thread is not intended to be some "Me hates LE BASH BASH" kid rage quit or something, and doesnt contain anything like "remove the LE" or some other BS, and i would like to keep such dumb proposals out of this thread.

Hmm, apparently you did read it, at least some of it.

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Originally Posted by DR REED

Little add:

"Reduce the grind for those who primarily want to play PvP and those who don't like xp grinding at all."

Stop turning this game in a pvp-shooter-action-oriented "counterstrike with furnitures" - if you have no time to level up go and play shooter or planetside 2......

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That is not my intention.
My intention is to encourage players into forming bounds and clans, and reward them for taking the risk of getting killed while leveling.
And at least i as a Veteran would be happy to level a bit faster, as i capped more than 10 chars in NC2 alone, which means i did a ton of grinding back then.

He's trolling, or asking for a Casual Farming game.

LE with the old exp penality should be ok.

The only issue I have with LE's is their unrestricted, worry-free access to end-game content.

I can appreciate the fact that this is a game, and feel that using it as a leveling tool is fine, to an extent. However, this is still a Cyberpunk, Post Apocalyptic game. Nothing about those words says safety guaranteed, free hands available to be held should you get scared.

85% of your stat levels completed? Your LE pops out. You're a big boy now, best to make friends and use strength in numbers less you fall to the many perils that exist in this not so friendly world of ours.

I can only support the ops suggestions! (nothing to add here)

With the OP too. PvE players generally aren't as fussed about how quickly they reach cap anyway. It's all about the journey there ;).

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Originally Posted by Strife

85% of your stat levels completed? Your LE pops out. You're a big boy now, best to make friends and use strength in numbers less you fall to the many perils that exist in this not so friendly world of ours.

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I would like the XP to stop at this level and only begin when the LE is removed manually. It makes it easier on those still wearing it as they still have the choice. No WOC/MC5/Other future to be added Endgame content(tm)

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Originally Posted by FoxDF

Reed, when i read your post, i get the feeling that you did not read anything below the part you quoted.
If you didnt, please do, this thread is not intended to be some "Me hates LE BASH BASH" kid rage quit or something, and doesnt contain anything like "remove the LE" or some other BS, and i would like to keep such dumb proposals out of this thread.

Hmm, apparently you did read it, at least some of it.


That is not my intention.
My intention is to encourage players into forming bounds and clans, and reward them for taking the risk of getting killed while leveling.
And at least i as a Veteran would be happy to level a bit faster, as i capped more than 10 chars in NC2 alone, which means i did a ton of grinding back then.

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It's always the same for some guys here: Why do you think i didn't read the post ? No need for arrogant phrases like these from William Antrim...

Your sight is the goodguy one, my time on Mars was dominated by cheater/ganker clans and players, using every cheat and hack they could get, editing every single client based file which gave advantages. Besides that of course normal and friendly groups and clans were gathering and this was possible even with this construct of LE.

Your first part is reading somewhat like a glossing view of Neocron (i am not trolling :) ), and then come your conclusions, which are not matching the former part ot your post:

- enhancing the XP gain for non-LE
- increasing the non-LE-pvp-faction (but how ?^^)
- you are encouraging players to form/ joi n clans (but why ? is this necessary ?)

I am not trolling or affronting you, i am only tired to read again and again how LE is runing the game. As i said let people choose how they wish to play the game. If you makes things worser for one of the groups this is not let them choose.

And to make this clear: I ever have (and will) oppose intentions to transform this very nice MMO+roleplay game into a cheap copy of 3rd person pvp trash. Neocron is a very unique composition and it would be great pity if this direction is chosen.

Make good balancing, add (not remove !) content, add comlexity (not simplifications!), make game fair (remove exploits & hacks, ban cheater) - this makes sense and this is what the game is lacking at most.

Reed

I believe they already stated they have no plans to change the LE, so the complete forced removal is probably never going to happen. They want the removal to be a choice made by the player.

That being said, kudos to the OP for bringing up the discussion in a well-thought out manner! How difficult would it be to change the settings in certain zones? MC5 for example, could that zone deactivate the LE? I believe this was brought up in a previous thread and it was something I thought was a good idea. Though, that does only address one of the concerns (access to end-game content without risk) but that could be incentive enough to have those on the fence pop it out early....I mean, why leave it in if MC5, DoY Tunnels or whatever else, the LE is deactivated anyway? Thoughts?

I completely agree with the main idea here.

Reason there is so many LE threads made by different people is that people want changes, simply enough.


I think the LE was mainly in game design to make it marketable back when it was pay to play.
I bet you the original designers didnt want it but were asked to by the marketing ppl.


In a game were we have redlight district with neon nudes, bukkake girl in OZ, every creature out there wants to kill you, and a city ran by crime syndicates, I think pvp was indeed intended from the start, and for everyone.

i suspect this isnt the last anti-LE-thread. though most players are perfectly fine with the current situation, there's a vocal few who refuse to understand there's different playing styles, and who wont stop whining (sorry, but that's what it is) about other people having opinions on their own.
removing the LE already has huge advantages - you get a critical 4th brainslot and access to PvP, the most valued endgame content - so remove it and have fun playing your way. really.

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Originally Posted by Torg

i suspect this isnt the last anti-LE-thread. though most players are perfectly fine with the current situation, there's a vocal few who refuse to understand there's different playing styles, and who wont stop whining (sorry, but that's what it is) about other people having opinions on their own.
removing the LE already has huge advantages - you get a critical 4th brainslot and access to PvP, the most valued endgame content - so remove it and have fun playing your way. really.

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This is a horrible attempt at pretending there's all kinds of awesome super reasons for removing your LE. The 4th slot is in no way critical...unless you're PvPing.

There is no real bonus, or incentive for a player to remove their LE unless they were going to in the first place. And that's the problem.

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Originally Posted by Strife

This is a horrible attempt at pretending there's all kinds of awesome super reasons for removing your LE. The 4th slot is in no way critical...unless you're PvPing.

There is no real bonus, or incentive for a player to remove their LE unless they were going to in the first place. And that's the problem.

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biggest advantage by removing the LE are Clans!

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Originally Posted by Mortis

biggest advantage by removing the LE are Clans!

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I stand corrected, the one bonus.

Remove le"s i want to pekay anyone anytime stoopid carebears!

You fucking morons who ( apart from strife whos point i will address in a moment ) have totally failed to grasp the whole quintessential point of this opening post.

For the record i wholeheartedly DISAGREE with forced removal of the LE chip on people and im not 100% sold on the dissallowing of LE players to participate in the high end content stuff (mc5 etc) From a story point of view you go there to have the damn thing implanted and get brainwashed when you start. How would the top end game content then deactivate it so it cant be used in the zone when farming parts....... its a tough one but my tiny brain cant configure a good idea right now.

So back on topic. This is not about encouraging people to remove the le so they can be ganked or get involved in pvp so some 1337 Pr0 Pk4r5 can 0wn everyone and turn this game in to cs.

What you people who disagree with the op need to do ideally is actually take the time to consider just what was actually proposed instead of spewing forth the same rhetoric in each thread. Just like the Anti LE threads get old so does your bullshit.

Until this one.

I actually see the bigger picture in what is being profered for discussion here. Without an LE people will join clans. It will foster that sense of friendship and kinship. It will grow the player base. It IS the essence of neocrack. Its how this game grew and got started. Complete immersion in this cyberpunk world with likeminded individuals. This is how some of us got fucking hooked on this game. The community made it so. If you got ganked as a low level you called it out on trade and people came. the community self policed itself. It took care of the new runners. It gave them something to aspire to and its what kept people coming back all these years.

Its that that i miss the most out of nc1. that sense of community. I realised this after reading this thread. we all miss aspects of the game back then for different reasons (class balance et al. Different classes being viable/op hybrids anyone? :P) but i realised reading this thread that what got me hooked in was the chance to wear a clan tag. To be a part of something and to truly enjoy the game experience.

I accepted i was cannon fodder (even whined like a little bitch at level 30 cause i lost my 4 slot TAR because i was pked. pre belt drops guys. weapon 1 was droppable. the guy gave it me back in the end. i still hated him) and i got on with the business of levelling. I would never have learned to pvp if i had not completely immersed myself in it from the word go.

Yes the game has changed. times have changed. balance changed it. woc changed it. But the underlying theme to this is the playerbase. Its how you retain a good solid core of people. Clans. Factions. Alliances. Politics. Wars. All these things made nc great because underneath it all was that risk and threat of a fight that added a layer of extra brilliance programming cannot on its own deliver.

Now tell me. can you get all this with the LE chip still in. NO.

Joining a clan should mean something again. I accept that so many of you went through the bad years of terra which fortunately i did not. I quit in late 2007/early 2008 and walked away with no intention of returning until late last year before the server move to canada when my brother (props to him) pulled me back in and here i am.

So. Open your minds not your mouths. Apologies for the opening flame in the post but stupidity and ignorance piss me off and im still unsure which of you who object to these posts suffer which but rest assured both can be cured.

Peace.

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Originally Posted by DR REED

Your sight is the goodguy one, my time on Mars was dominated by cheater/ganker clans and players, using every cheat and hack they could get, editing every single client based file which gave advantages. Besides that of course normal and friendly groups and clans were gathering and this was possible even with this construct of LE.

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Ive played a long time on Mars, since the launch of NC2 back in 2004 until Summer 2007 (At that time most of my friends left NC, and the Population was so damn low, it feelt like neocron was dead). Do you realy believe that i didnt experience all this exploiting and cheating? I did, i dont even want to count how many times ive been blown to pieces by APUs casting thru a whole "Mountain/Hill" at CRP. And back then, the LE still had its penalty.

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Originally Posted by DR REED

Your first part is reading somewhat like a glossing view of Neocron (i am not trolling :) ), and then come your conclusions, which are not matching the former part ot your post:

- enhancing the XP gain for non-LE
- increasing the non-LE-pvp-faction (but how ?^^)
- you are encouraging players to form/ joi n clans (but why ? is this necessary ?)

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Might be glossy, but i prefered to remember the good parts of my time in this game, and not the bad parts, especialy not if thoes dont have anything to do with the threads subject. And the middle part explained what the xp penalty did, encourage players to remove the LE, experience other parts than just pve grinding earlier. And the conclusion of a XP Gain is simple, as now everybody new is used to get 100% xp even with an LE, a penalty would alienate those players, but a XP Gain would not.

The XP Gain it self, as a reward for taking the risk of getting ganked, would increase the amount of players playing against each other. Who? Many people would remove it to level faster, this would also increase the amount of higher level chars with no LE. Currently most people only remove it to join a clan or once they WoC'd.
Because the bound of good Clans was something NC did better than most games, and i believe new players miss a good part of NCs fun without a clan.

If your a PvE Only player, Lone Wolf, or only joined bad clans in your past, then i can understand why you ask for a reason.

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Originally Posted by DR REED

I am not trolling or affronting you, i am only tired to read again and again how LE is runing the game. As i said let people choose how they wish to play the game. If you makes things worser for one of the groups this is not let them choose.

And to make this clear: I ever have (and will) oppose intentions to transform this very nice MMO+roleplay game into a cheap copy of 3rd person pvp trash. Neocron is a very unique composition and it would be great pity if this direction is chosen.

Make good balancing, add (not remove !) content, add comlexity (not simplifications!), make game fair (remove exploits & hacks, ban cheater) - this makes sense and this is what the game is lacking at most.

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I never said that the LE is ruining the game itself, only that its current version breaks a part of the game, and i never wanted to take away the choice of how to play, thats why i did talk about an XP Gain and not a Penalty, its encouraging people, giving them some reward for choosing the risky way, like it used to be.

Now apparently you still didnt get it, so ill make it clear once more: I never had, and never will have, the intention to turn NC into some generik pvp shooter.

And the Dev Team is already doing a better job at balancing then KK ever did since nc2.0, and i never said anything about removing or simplifying content.

TBH I think this game needs to be played without a LE. It's the best way for me to really experience everything NC is.

However, I tolerate other people's play styles and opinions regarding this matter.

To me these threads about the LE feel like a gaming culture clash.

It's like casual gamers against hardcore players. Ten years earlier games were not as forgiving as today, but the market was also a lot smaller. Gamers once were laughed upon. Now it's a mainstream thing, and this has changed. There is no reverting back.

Playing without a LE makes the game much harder for normal players.

I don't think there will ever be a common ground between these two factions.

My opinion is to let everybody play the way they want. It's the same in life. Let people live the life they want and let them be what they want to be. As long as there is no harm done to others this is perfectly fine for me.

Of course it would be cool if there was no LE at all. I'd like that a lot. But it is not possible at the moment. If a new PvP server were to be made where there is no LE at all I would play it. Since the comm is still too small for this it doesn't make sense now.

I suggest to take it as it is and let the people play the way they wanna as long as we are all together on one server.

I support the thread openers suggestions to I think 100%.

Oh and for the record: I am against taking out the LE completly, by force, or anything resembling that (Since there are always people that mix serveral ideas up and go critical)

As I already said, I have to support the OPs suggestions. But there is something I want to add:

There are people in this game, which level their characters, hunt some rare parts and do some WOC Runs just to be able to compete in PvP later on. They are able to do all of that while wearing their LE.

I think it should not be possible to level for PvP Gear (and I say PvP Gear because you don't need Rares or a WoC-PA for PVE!) without having to do some PvP in the Meanwhile.

An XP Increase for none LE players would reduce that too i believe, but taking rares and woc away from PvE players wouldnt be a good thing as most PvE players like to grind and collect stuff, it would basicaly cut content away from them, as yes they dont need it, but they sure would like to have it.

With the XP Increase for none LE players, there would still be a choice, level and collect safe, or risk something and level faster.
And quiet frankly, nearly all the guys ive talked ingame about the WoC and LE issues, said they would risk getting killed for a XP Increase, which would automaticly decrese the amount of LE WoCers.

Really, FoxDF nailed it. I couldn't agree more with your post. I genuinely don't understand how people can disagree with you, unless of course they never experienced the times you speak of. If that's the case, I feel sorry for them; they don't have a clue what they missed.

Now, here's my thoughts :

Option 1 :

- XP gain HALVED for LE'd players
- Stat cap at 85% of max level (not WoC)

Option 2 :

- LE falls out at xx/30

Option 3 :

- Some kind of boost to non-LE players, maybe a 30% boost to XP gain.

Option 4 (my personal favourite) :

- Remove it from the fucking game, entirely. Force players to come together to combat that PKer. Make it all matter again.

I disagree with you but only because i don't think its fair to punish players for keeping it in. times have changed. I fully support more benefits to removing it. It will serve both sides of the argument. I still feel it robs people of true immersion in the game though.

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Originally Posted by Doc Holliday

I disagree with you but only because i don't think its fair to punish players for keeping it in. times have changed. I fully support more benefits to removing it. It will serve both sides of the argument. I still feel it robs people of true immersion in the game though.

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I read your post in full, I already know you disagree with me ;)

I do see your point, however I think it's perfectly fair to punish people for leaving the LE in. The more pro-LE players that leave their LE in, the less immersion for those that don't. Story line aside (and yeah, I've read it - you made me), we're talking about something that would improve the game for everyone here; even those that disagree. They may not see it now, but the OP was completely bang on in painting a picture of the old days.

This thread has made me realise that tt's not so much that I miss NC1, it's that I miss the sense of community and forced communication we had back then.

Here it is in its simplest form :

Example 1:

You're in the aggie cellars, when you encounter another play. Both players are LE'd. The chances are, neither player will talk to, or even acknowledge the other. They'll simply ignore one another and continue with their PvE content.

Example 2:

You're in the same aggie cellar, when you encounter the same player. Both players are non-LE'd. There's absolutely no way you and this other player will ignore one another. You'll start a conversation, or at least attempt to, in order to assess your safety down there with this player. Result of this situation? You either make a friend, or you make an enemy. At the very least, you've acknowledged and made contact with that person, meaning you'll remember their name and say 'hello' next time. Either way, you've just levelled up the community spirit.

Read All the arguments and TBH its all pointless atm because untill they balance the game as far as class/weapon damage/ need for speed all we are ever going to have is the players allready in the game, make too many changes and face empty servers as people get bored and stop logging on and as people freely admit that 95% of players keep the LE in guess what changing the LE situation ain't gonna help the player base.

Work on balance and everything else will fall into place.

Make a new pvp server and then watch it go down in flames like before imho, dont ruin titan