Posts by Centaurian

  • Why Not??

    I am puzzled by the indignance some players express when their opponent in a fight uses nanobots and shield batteries. In PvP matches, I completely agree with the practice of fighting without them, and always dump my own supply before entering the arena (wherever it may be at the time). This is akin to bare-knuckle boxing. :D


    But in gameplay, as in streetfighting, I fully expect my human opponent to use every means available to prevail in the contest. As I see it there are several very good reasons for this to be an acceptable practice in regular gameplay:


    1. Human players are deadlier than NPC's, and NPC's can be threat enough to occasionally need to recharge.


    2. Fighting NPC's teaches us to wear the opponent down, since most of them recharge, seemingly without end at times, especially for some of the stronger NPC ships.


    3. If you are any good at PvP, you'll wear down your opponent in the same way, because the supply of bat's & 'bots is finite, and consumed more rapidly in the more advanced ships, anyway.


    4. It appears that most players have a rank threshold they use to decide whether to engage another player in combat. But rank, unfortunately for the defending player, only measures the cumulative value of a character's net worth (ship assets and cash, with some value on exploration). Rank has virtually nothing to do with a player's combat experience (or lack of it), so a level 70 player might have never engaged in PvP at all, if they have been trading their whole career as a pilot. Yet this same player is expected to bare their chest and take their lumps in combat like a seasoned veteran!


    5. Sometimes, in the course of role-oriented gameplay, a player is confronted by multiple opponents, who again, may far outstrip them in experience. Yet, the less-experienced player is somehow also dishonorable by using every possible means to survive the encounter? (I am only speaking of standard CF-issue equipment here, not cheats.) I think not...


    6. If a player is going to engage another in combat, they had better be prepared to deal with whatever the defender has got. If they don't like the prospect of actually having to work at beating their opponent, then they are better off not to attack, instead of whining that the defender actually used (gasp!) all their equipment...


    7. We expect that players' skills at PvP will improve with each encounter, but if the encounter lasts for 10 seconds or less, what will the loser have learned except to avoid the winner at all costs? Less-experienced fighters need every bit of help they can get to stay alive long enough to gain the experience needed.


    8. Not all players are willing to play along with all other player's role-play. Everyone has the right to pursue their own goals in the game, and if some players cannot accept this, then we all have a problem, because some players are now imposing their will on others. For instance, I have no problem with the fact of piracy, or the existence of pirate clans, but I do not have to agree with the pirate's terms when they come calling. In the ensuing fight, MY role is survival, so why should I be held in derision for playing out a different role than the pirate, and using all available means to stay alive?


    It occurs to me that NPC combat is the model for roleplay PvP, so it's only natural for players to recharge during battle. In fact, I have just as much respect for the pilot who recharges, as for those who do not, because they are operating more controls during the fight, which can be difficult to do. As you may have guessed from all this detail, you can expect me to use ALL my equipment if I am attacked outside match play. :P

  • Taking the mick

    I can attest to Darkstalker's assertion about foreign incursions into Vespus lately. As a regular habit, I now watch the chat board as much as my navmap to track pirate locations, and there have been a lot of pirates,both clan and rogue, taking liberty with clan space. I know some of these brigands to be very aggressive, and don't know where roleplay ends and pure b***s*** begins...


    I side with the clans when it comes to this kind of behavior, because it threatens the entire stability of the server community, and as such, is no longer a game. I may be a freelancer, but this does not mean that I will show up alone when it comes time to defend my friends [1]

  • Role Play

    Quote

    - whiskey from custo (BGs should kill everybody, if they see them with whiskey)


    Again with the whiskey ban? Last I knew, there was no embargo on leaving Custo with ANY type of cargo... did I miss a thread on that?? Can't a pilot take home a little private reserve for the post-mission nightcap?[prost]


    Quote

    LoL so we kill everyone we see with a Shroud ?


    Hey, some of us got Shrouds BEFORE the system was closed!!


    As for piracy, well the pirates can go for it, but don't expect everyone to play along. If this role is overplayed, the way some rogues are doing it, the whole system will become too adversarial for many players, who will just leave, to find friendlier stars elsewhere. I don't really expect this to be a concern to the parasitic elements in the game, but it is something for the rest of us to keep in mind. I for one will not take actions that will encourage piracy, like paying "tax" (which is really just extortion). If I'm not a good enough fighter to beat them in space. so be it, I'll get killed, but won't lose any of my hard-earned cash.


    If anyone gets fed up being extorted, and wants an escort, I'm available, and my skills WILL improve...

  • New and Good trade routes are needed!

    Just one suggestion for the sake of the "truckers" - make mooring points at the largest bases functional for trains. I'm thinking of the Newark/Ft. Bush class of station, with wide separation between moors. This would more than double the accessible points for trains to trade, but cause OP untold headaches, as he works out how to do it without breaking something else in the mod...

  • Fake Chars

    Since you've brought it up, there is also another version of this issue which may be helpful to air out... I am not in a clan, nor will I ever be (I'm too restless for that), but, some of my characters have been mistaken for clan characters. I guess I missed the rule about how to name a character when I first began secondary characters, but since I was not using "prefixes" that were recognized clans, I naively assumed that the main-line clans would readily note the difference, Instead, I now am routinely asked what clan I'm in, and my newer characters viewed with suspicion. My original, and main, character is Centaurian Alpha; so when I decided to build a freighter, it seemed natural to call it CA_Cache, denoting that the "cache" belonged to C entaurian A lpha, and I had noted that I was not the only player using such a scheme.


    This went well enough until I introduced the "SS" series of ships (Sirius Ship), SS_Endurance and SS_Damocles. For some reason, this "prefix" causes consternation among the clan guards, even though, to my knowledge, there has never been a clan here using it. OP declined to make any change to these character names, to avoid making them unusable with respect to their console function, so we're stuck with them.


    I'm not inclined to kill a perfectly good character just to ease someone's insecurities, so this serves as record to anyone who wants to confirm my characters' ID... 8)

  • New and Good trade routes are needed!

    @RGHawk- the whole point of my reply was to question the practice of focusing on trains. The way I see it a trade route does not have to be serviced by a train alone. As you pointed out, there is no trader's license; ostensibly because large-scale commercial operations were not something that were anticipated, only made possible. If someone wants to idle their time away slogging down the lanes with a train, more power to them, but they shouldn't complain that the game is now no more interesting than having a trucker's life... X(


    As for the route I suggested, there are several rates of return on that route, and if a trader does not carefully manage their rep, they can come into some very exciting gameplay, even without the prospect of piracy! And it is but one of many, many possibilites, as you have pointed out...

  • New and Good trade routes are needed!

    Quote

    It doesnt matter if they are short, long, etc but I think it would be good to have a new trade routes with better profit.


    What do you mean by "better"? There are several routes that produce more than $1000/unit profit, and at least one that I use with $2000/unit profit. It seems to me a lot of players are just plain lazy, and want immediate gratification (e.g., million$/hour). I can make over $1million/hour without leaving NY, and this is with a lowly serafina freighter.


    You want wealth, and the advancement it brings? WORK for it! My gut feeling is this is the very reason OP closed the hyper-profit routes in the first place, is that players go for the cash, and ignore the richness of the rest of the mod, which he has built so diligently. Go play monopoly, if all you want to do is count your cash; in CF (as in life) it's main usefulness is to help other players. :rolleyes:


    Here's a route that will make good money, and actually give you some gameplay (but you'll have to use a freighter): buy station blueprints @ Detroit (NY), sell them @ Nansei (Kyushu); buy black market @ Nansei (I forget the commodity), sell @ planet Kyushu; buy niobium @ planet Kyushu, sell @ planet New Tokyo; buy prisoners @ planet New Tokyo, sell @ Fuchu prison (Shikoku); buy water @ Fuchu, sell @ Leiden (Galileo); buy phage (BM) @ Leiden, sell @ Pueblo, buy superconductors @ Pueblo, sell @ Norfolk (?); start over. With even a humpback or dromedary, this circle should produce more than $1 million per round, and with a bullpup3, more than $2 million. Try it for yourself...

  • meaning of life

    Quote

    @ Centaurian ohhh! camon,do you realy meen theat ?


    Yes, I do, and it is a comforting thought. Of course, lots of people subscribe to the "goo -> zoo -> YOU!" theory, but I have seen enough evidence in my own life to be confident that there is more than mere sentient biology operating in the universe. And consider that the majority of humans believe in some form of God; can all 5 billion of them be wrong? (The other billion or so are welcome to their doubts.)


    At the end of the day, I am happy that I have purpose in life, even if others can't see why I should be happy about it! :D

  • Fresh Meat

    Samothraki:
    I don't speak for the server police (SP's), but the no-PvP in NY rule is pretty much observed by all. Sometimes players get shot up inadvertantly, while others are testing new weapons, or getting used to an environment rich in NPC targets, but I have not seen a deliberate kill in NY. Besides, there really is no sport in fragging someone below level 50, if you're already above that. :)
    As for hard drive scanning, as far as I know, this is something reserved for admin's who are investigating cheats, and is done with consent, not in clandestine fashion (SP's, am I wrong??).
    So welcome to the best FL site in the galaxy, and enjoy those early jitters as you get your space legs; we've all been through it :D See you in space...

  • FL Economy

    I agree we could possibly do with fewer black market items, and some of them tend to strike a nerve with people. But if the values could be adjusted to take this into account, it would increase their relevance to the underground economy, and make it more worthwhile to risk hauling them. There are few contraband cargos I will haul, just because most of them aren't worth the trouble... An adjustment might be made in long-haul values, by giving higher returns for most goods at some distance, as is the case for most VIP's. Just a thought...