Captin, we're safe! .. Are we?

[Liq]

Recently, the mindset of "Make Safezones Safe again!" has gained a lot of supporters. Requins are sniping noobs all over the place.

In this thread I would like to have a formal discussion about safezones, if they should be a thing, and if so, under what circumstances.

I think the game (-devs) have to finally make the decision whether or not newbs should get absolute protection in a certain area or not. In their current state, the reinforcment zones are not fullfulling their role of protecting noobs. Those often don't even know how to call for help in nation chat. It's rather the more experienced captains that are gaining from it, so they can craft / trade in peace. The game is getting closer to a release state, Port UI should attract quite a few new players and perhaps we will also see some returning players. However, it will most likely not take them long to say *eff this* after getting sniped @ the capital and put the game away again.

There was an attempt to fill the spot of PvP for those that want it, with the Patrol Zones. However, with a pretty bad execution. Personally I don't even dare anymore to attack certain nation players in the zones, because I know the probability of more of them spawning in half an hour later is pretty high.

Thus, I think having a 100% safe zone (nation owning the zone is not attackable) is the right way to go, given...

• 1 Zone per nation
• Smaller zone than the ones we currently got
• Chooseable "High-Sec missions", which ONLY spawn in the green zone, granting significantly less rewards than...
• "Low Sec" missions, which spawn in an area outside the first, green zone, grant more rewards
• by @Christendom:
  • Ships crafted in the zone are only basic (green or blue)
  • Cannot tow a ship to / from ports within the safe zone

 

The idea of a 100% sec zone should be to give new players a place to get into the game; not give vets a secret cave to hite at to produce all their stuff they need.

 

 

*Ermagerd, where do I now go to kill stuff??*

 

For there to be a safe zone; I think there needs to be a reliable alternative for players to find PvP. *You scrub, we got Patrol zones for that*... yeah sure, we do. However, with a pretty bad execution. 30 min open battles @ a place where both sides on their own will, to get PvP, is not a solution. A while ago, I posted a suggestion, how the ideal PvP zone (in my opinion, of course) would look like. 

 

As far as I know, the patrol zone IS on the devs to do list, however only after the Port UI (and localization?) is done. I fear that will be too late, though.

 

 

The two zones explained:

 

• "High Sec" - Players of the nation owning the zone CANNOT be attacked, at all.
• "Low Sec" - Players of the nation owning the zone CAN be attacked, Only extra rule is battles stay open for a little longer than the rest of OW - perhaps 10 minutes

 

Zones visualized (Just an example, not too sure about the zones size), just for you to get the idea:

 

 

Pro's

• Noobs are safe.
  • Better player retention rate
• Less salt.

Con's

• Less sandboxy.
• PvP zones are more Arena-ish.

 

 

Edited September 1, 2018 by Liq

[Christendom]

I've made similar suggestions in the past.  Most traditional MMOs have multiple sectors with different ROE to protect their new players and ensure they turn into old players.  NA fails hard in this.

I'd add a couple features to your green zone idea 

- Basic ships are only craftable in protected ports.  Maybe green quality or basic 3/5 blues.  This would ensure noobs can still craft and do their thing AND vets cannot abuse the zones to craft good ships.  

- Cannot tow in or out a ship or OW tow to any protected port.  All goods must be shipped in or out.  Again, noobs stay in the zone  vets can't hide in it.

Major problems with your idea. 

- too many nations
- not enough players
- no natural progression to player owned ports

[Liq]

Thanks, good points - added them with your name in the main post.

but, what do you mean by...

6 minutes ago, Christendom said:

- too many nations
- not enough players
- no natural progression to player owned ports

Are you suggesting to reduce the amount of nations? Also I dont know if safe zone ports not belonging to any clan has to be a bad thing. Them being "nation" owned is okay, I think

[Captain John Keats]

New players DO need an area to run missions and learn the game, also people returning to try new ships and changes to the game. However, these ‘safe zones’ need to be 100% safe I.e no one should be able to attack them. But more importantly, they should NOT be at a nations capital (KPR for instance) or surrounding a valuable port for trade. 

[Christendom]

2 minutes ago, Liq said:

Thanks, good points - added them with your name in the main post.

but, what do you mean by...

Are you suggesting to reduce the amount of nations? Also I dont know if safe zone ports not belonging to any clan has to be a bad thing. Them being "nation" owned is okay, I think

Number of nations definitely needs to be reduced.  We are currently spread far too thin for our player base size.  A lot of the reason folks are able to gank in safe zones currently is because they is a reduced risk of reinforcement by other players.

2 minutes ago, dark lord rediii said:

he means that there is no reason to go out of the safezones for bigger missions or something like that

Kinda.  There needs to be other incentives for players to leave safe zones also other than just increase mission XP and payout.  

I would almost suggest that the nations have a 2nd area that is non-capturable but not a safe zone.  Players can craft higher level ships there without risking losing their shipyards BUT still have to traverse some risk to do so.  Basically what Belize is to KPR.  Hence what I mean by progression.  

High Sec - low level crafting - no pvp
Low Sec - mid level crafting - battles stay open
Null Sec - open crafting - no PVP restrictions

I'd say players need to be progressed along by the game, gently, from high all the way to null sec.  Null sec is the proverbial sandbox of player owned ports and anything goes.
 

[Hethwill]

No. No. No. No.

( and pirates hardcore & RoE 2mins or WYSIWYG big circle )

😎

[HachiRoku]

33 minutes ago, dark lord rediii said:

he means that there is no reason to go out of the safezones for bigger missions or something like that

it really bothers me that your name not caps. Change it to Dark Lord Rediii please. I really cannot stand it anymore. Its driving me crazy

[Powderhorn]

I'm in a rare moment of disagreement with @Hethwill the Harmless.  I think the idea of smaller safe zones, with hi-sec missions spawning in those hi-sec missions, is a boon to new players learning the ropes.  Not these mega, coast-spanning zones, but just one safe-zone around the true capital.

Low-Sec missions should just be ones that have regular RoE (for ease of use/programming).

For other ports, I'm OK with keeping many of the ones we currently have as non-capturable, but I think we should remove the safe zones around them.

[Kejsaren]

What about removing all safe zones whatsover and enabling pvp on and off, only switchable once per week or something. That way new players can learn the game and stay safe if they want but they wont be able to participate in any pvp activity.

Problem would be that people could use alts with flagged for no pvp for trading and such.

Edited September 1, 2018 by Po Tsai

[Pada]

Full protection for new players up to Flag Captain, after that only ROE protection (battle always open) in own zone.

[Sir Texas Sir]

21 minutes ago, Pada said:

Full protection for new players up to Flag Captain, after that only ROE protection (battle always open) in own zone.

I’ll tell you right now I have keep lower level players  it’s maxed out gear to beat the tar out of higher level chars that bring in low level alts to farms these chars on other games.  It would be abuse just like a pve/PvP ok flag.

[Busterbloodvessel]

34 minutes ago, Sir Texas Sir said:

I’ll tell you right now I have keep lower level players  it’s maxed out gear to beat the tar out of higher level chars that bring in low level alts to farms these chars on other games.  It would be abuse just like a pve/PvP ok flag.

Translation anyone?

Buster (Prescription only)

[jodgi]

Good post @Liq.

I can't vote because I don't know if one or the other truly is, as we say: "Good for the game".

"It works in EVE" is not an argument that wins me over, in fact it just makes me highly suspicious. I'll be diplomatic and say that EVE is not a game for me.

I could vote for absolute safe zones as big as can be, but that's just because I'm tired of listening to people asking, begging and whining to get them. I'm also in continuous mild shock over vet players going to capitals to prey on the weak almost like they're content with it. "But that's where everyone are, jodgi!". That pushes me into the annoying observation that if everyone hides from loss why do we pretend to love loss? I'm in good spirits today so we won't go there.

In my heart I'm more like this:

1 hour ago, Hethwill the Harmless said:

No. No. No. No.

( and pirates hardcore & RoE 2mins or WYSIWYG big circle )

  😎

Btw, Heth, how does it feel to be in line with Doran and Kaos?

Highly self serving but I'm a believer in a competitive (anti gank) patrol zone (ish) thing.

I want to fight people who want to fight.

I imagine a functional patrol zone that attracts fighters and partially relieves the so called noobs around capitals. It won't fully relieve capital zones because this is a full loss sandbox and there will always be plenty of guys who prefer to scumbag easy kills over proper fights.

[Hethwill]

Solomon Law jodgi.

[jodgi]

2 minutes ago, Hethwill the Harmless said:

Solomon Law

You'd have to spell it out to me. I'm only familiar with the baby Solomon threatened to cut in half to identify the true mother, I fail to make any NA connections so it must be some other Solomon?

[z4ys]

11 minutes ago, jodgi said:

I want to fight people who want to fight.

Giving them Zones aka Hope they will never learn to fight. Go to a zone and even vets and pvp pros stop at the boarder of the zone (if its theirs) because bad things might happen and advantage is lost. Its all about advantage people only want to fight when they think they have the advantage. But atcual you can earn the advantage by fighting but that is the game not showing to its players.

Overpowering AI killing a cerb in a santi getting a book of the five rings is the wrong apprach. People never have learned to fight. They even struggle to fight 2 ai cerbs in the final exam without mods. Because they never learned to play proper.

By not experiencing failure people cant improve. Sure its not a pony farm but its age oif sail with rough seas.

[Hethwill]

@jodgi the case in discussion, either no safety whatsoever, or full safety.

Zone "blinds" folk to a "the guys in my nation can jump in and help".

 

[Christendom]

It amuses me that people think this is a bad idea, though I'm not surprised. 

If you want to grow the game and keep newer players around so they become vets, this is how you do it.  Most MMO games that actually have player bases implement some sort of new player protections so they can grind up in peace and figure out the ropes.  Naval Action does not and that kind of explains how you sell 120k copies and not 2 years later your 2 servers barely crack a combined 600 population online at once.  People want to grind, PVE and do carebear stuff in peace without having to constantly get ganked by a bored population of PVP vets.  A PVP server merely implies that PVP is an option and players can be killed.  It does not mean they need to be subjected to constant slaughter 30seconds outside of capital and new player zones.

Change nothing and NA will continue to sputter along until the goodwill of returning players is exhausted and it finally dies.  The current status quo is not good.

Edited September 1, 2018 by Christendom

[jodgi]

1 hour ago, z4ys said:

Giving them Zones aka Hope they will never learn to fight.

Yes, it could be an argument against a truly safe zone. You're just postponing and possibly even compounding a problem.

Maybe that's where the idea of partially safe zones came from? No safety too harsh, full safety weakens the mind, so to speak.

I don't have the wisdom to decide between no, partial or full safety.

Anecdote: I was hit by a Swede gank squad just on the edge of our reinforcement zone. I saw I wouldn't be able to escape them or beat them, so I concentrated on dragging them into my zone. I paid attention to wind (duh) and used counter tag to avoid a too unfavorable start. Because of neutral to slightly favorable wind and my reinforcement bots I only had to deal with two hercs while their big consorts beat upwind while being annoyed by my big clickbots. One of the hercs broke off to avoid sinking and the other didn't feel like fighting my vanilla frigate alone so I was soon left alone to escape upwind. I left them entangled with my leeward bots (that is punishment worse than sinking, but I know I'm special in that regard).

The current reinforcement zone works great for me, but I don't truly want it or need it. I will admit that anything that makes life hard for these 5 guys+ ganksquads in capital waters feels like a good feature.

57 minutes ago, Borch said:

Guess what, in your scenario they will never learn. People hate losing. They will quit the game instead of sticking to it and getting better at it... ... Your dream about 100% pure PvP population wont ever happen in sandbox MMO

So you're saying that sandbox games attract weak minds while shitty mobas foster people who push through and learn (to a greater extent)?

You will call me facetious, but that is the natural implication of what you said. In mobas normal players lose more than half their battles but thousands of concurrent players keep at it.

(It's so tempting to take one of my habitual jabs at the greatness of loss mechanic right now, but I kinda promised to refrain.)

[Raf Van Boom]

And if you implemented those where would the 'coast guard' people live? I get that ganking newbies is bad for the game but you don't seem to realize the safe zone mechanics created content for people not willing to face the added risk of leaving those safe zones.

 

[Licinio Chiavari]

2 hours ago, z4ys said:

Giving them Zones aka Hope they will never learn to fight. Go to a zone and even vets and pvp pros stop at the boarder of the zone (if its theirs) because bad things might happen and advantage is lost. Its all about advantage people only want to fight when they think they have the advantage. But atcual you can earn the advantage by fighting but that is the game not showing to its players.

Overpowering AI killing a cerb in a santi getting a book of the five rings is the wrong apprach. People never have learned to fight. They even struggle to fight 2 ai cerbs in the final exam without mods. Because they never learned to play proper.

By not experiencing failure people cant improve. Sure its not a pony farm but its age oif sail with rough seas.

I have agree.

I know and agree newbies need some protection, still a good share of us learned NA the hardest way: no safezones, no superbuffed AIs, not even forts. Getting ganked badly. Asking ourself the simplest questions: why I got ganked? Can I avoid it? And... How did they fight? On which ships? And daring to ASK for tips.

And we are still here.

A truly safe zone is good... But it should never become where a bunch of (ingame hour wise) vets hide getting rich without risks as R-areas are at the moment.

The mantra of "poor noobs" is old and stinky: majority of my preys (and they are a lot - I know more Brits captains than  spanish ones) in KPR are R.Adms with some commodores and flag captains in between; not by chance being the majority of players'.

And they are noobs in the soul: their first manouver is... trying to avoid me (even on an Ocean seeing me on Requin, alone). The most refreshing battles I saw is against "newbies" that try to fight or try to tag (even if I know it is a suicide for them, like a Cerberus charging a Requin); and within not "elite-ish" and rich Brits there is a bunch of newbies that fight better than the firsts, that try new ways to counter. That dont feel humiliated ASKING "what did I wrong?".

Being sunk by a couple of these was absolutely pleasant to me: because I saw them partly trained by me.

 

When I played World of Warcraft (let's say vanilla one) there were 60 character levels, and true game started at maximum level. Choosing a PvP server you knew you can be badly ganked outside an area close to national starting area and Capitol.

Guess to which level you could live in free pvp areas around the Capitol?

Up to 15th level. At 20th you were (and are) obliged to move out safezones to level up. And nothing banned top levels to kill lowies (and just to underline, 10+ level gap meant be oneshotted - literally, not trying to run like in NA).

EVE is the same: you have ZERO chances to level up/get rich/farm something worth in "High sec" areas. These are simply trading/meeting hotspots in the end. In lowsec/nullsec systems a newbie will last a matter of seconds (literally) not minutes as in NA, if ganked by a couple of vets.

 

So, surely fine a truly safe zone. But not a way to live safely that way and top rank, nor rich.

Doctors didnt order you to join a PvP server.

The truth is: a bunch of eternal noobs wants their peaceful pveing and AT THEIR CONDITIONS (aka 10v1 ganking) get some PvP.

PS: there are traders too. Yes.

Also in the super competitive EVE. And their are damn important: make getting cash, trading and crafting a difficult skill (not something a committed pvper Can  do finely while AFK) and traders/crafters will get their spot. Well protected by die hard pvp mates.

[Cmdr RideZ]

Need for safe zones is bound to economy, building and losing ships + upgrades/books. Also bound to grind.

If everyone has it all the saze zone don't matter that much?

The games like WoW cannot be compared as in those you lose nothing.

 

We can divide our PvP players in 3 groups, this is rough so don't get stuck too much in the details...

1. Gank PvP

These guys live next to enemy green zones or now also with DLC ships on green.

Green zones are very important ganking zones for these guys.

Always gear advantage in fights. Ships designed for ganks need a gear advantage or ganking will end very soon.

 

2. OW PvP

Many kind of guys in this group.

PvP location does not have to be on green. Actually, content outside green would be better as you know the targets there actually are for PvP.

It does not matter if guys on green get their gear grinding PvE, as they just hope them to get a new ship and leave the green asap for more PvP.

Many want competitive fights that are decided by skill and not by gear.

Green has been important for these guys as there is nothing else.

Sub category so called "Good Fights" belong in this group.

Many in this group who wanted balanced, competitive and skill based PvP quit the game already.

 

3. Port Battle PvP

These guys want even fights in a big group, have social fun while playing the game.

Many from this group are not interested from ganking and not much from OW PvP.

They want that their commander is good and have group success or fail if it comes to that.

These guys probably benefit from greens.

For many this is the main content.

 

---

The biggest group is probably group number 3. I don't have facts I simply could imagine that is what most people want, always has seemed so.

Devs will create content outside greens and we can sure then make green zones PvE only areas. The size can be the same as it is now, the map is huge and can easily support these areas.

Green Zones will benefit new and old players. It should be an area where people grind to be able to do PvP. Everyone will leave the area when they are ready.

Green Zones will help us to get more PvP as people can grind new ships there. Lighter economy could improve this process.

The only group that really needs green zone PvP or game that does not have green zone is the Gank PvP group? Only group suffering is the Gank PvP group.

[Lovec1990]

Safe zones should only be for low level players so they learn how too fight and get money for better ship, but saddly game is designed atm that many refuse to do PvP becouse its not worth it 

[Sir Texas Sir]

9 hours ago, Busterbloodvessel said:

Translation anyone?

Buster (Prescription only)

Some games will restrict safe zones to lower level players so that higher up level players can't come and seal club them.  Well players will make alts and bring in low level chars that they gear up to the max at that level before having to leave the zone and club new players with hardly any gear.  So on games like that in the past I made alts/chars of low level and geared up but to do the counter....kill the newbie seal clubers that think I'm a newbie too and get a surprised when they find out it's actually a geared up skilled player playing a lower level char.  

Hell I did that on here ran around with a low level char in the shallows just to get jump by max rear admirals thinking I'm some noob to find out I very much wasn't.

People that Seal Club and Newbie gank will do it no matter what if there is a chance.  The best way to prevent this is to make proper total safe zones for folks to level up and play casually if they want.  You can't force players to do what they don't want.

 

A while back in one of the videos for SC Chris was asked why they are making the game mainly PvE (80% of the world will be PvE with most encounters being that).  His statement goes something like this.  "You have winners and looser, and with an all PvP game you will always have looser.  We play games to have fun and if your loosing all the time it isn't fun and those players will stop playing.  So you need to have a balance and the best way to do this is to have the majority of the game PvE with some PvP element."

I remember a game where the map was almost all PvE and only had PvP in certain zones the players made.  POTBS worked great until well in my view they went F2P and you always new where the PvP was and if you didn't want to get involved you went to other parts of the map.  This game needs something like this to let folks know the PvP Hotzones.   Ports are flipped to fast in my view, but it's the only way to do it with the current system or you would never get a port flipped.  In my view that zone should be a hot spot until the port battle and cool down.  Give extra rewards to these red zones and I bet you will see more ports flips and fights in them  and not just int he PvP Zones.  People are going to gank no matter what if you let them.  There is no such thing as a fair fight, but you need to let folks grow and play at there own pace.  Yah they might never get good to a PvPer level, but they should still be able to play the game and enjoy it too.

[Hethwill]

And some games offer no safety at all and with total gear loss, some even with rank/skill loss associated.

I wonder... I mean I just can't imagine why they pack so much popularity... *shrugs*... a couple millions of players must be masochists...