KEROSIINI-TERO
Seraphim Initiative.
CRONOS.
248
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Posted - 2012.10.10 17:25:00 -
[1] - Quote
I urge people to remember that a char with higher SP is not necessarily that much better in absolute terms. The reason is that a single weapon, or any speciality, can be maxed out by playing a medium amount relatively easy. While maxed out, it is the EXACT same as for the hardcore player while the hardcore player is more versatile.
Meaning, a 6M SP person who has maxed assault suit with AR is on par with 40M SP player in assault suit+AR with no kill advantage on either side. The 40M SP dude has a different advantage: different suits and vehicles up his sleeve, so he can adapt and have the right tools for the job at hand (which on the other hand in most cases can be countered the rock-paper-scissors way).
I believe CCP's initial plan was to give hardcore players incentive to play by opening up many different options as they progress, while getting the average player a fighting chance by specializing in one area first.
Of course, the brand new characters and newbies to the game are in disadvantage compared to all the others, but that is somewhat inevitable - one can't have everything straight away. The newb's challenge is directly proportional to how deep the said specialization goes, if the proficiency skills are strong it's harder for them, if the profic's are something like 1% or so it's easier.
However, while important, this newb issue is not the one at hand.
SP gain system affects in the long term all: character development, player interest and overall balance.
(wow, that was a bit of a long introduction...)
It is in everyone's interest (both communitywise and for CCP's profit) to have as large regularly logging playerbase.
It would be best to have system that encourages to log on regularly for a smaller period of time (remember, it's tempting to play 'still one more game' with your friends even thogh the rewards aren't that great).
This is created best by having the 'sweet games' or 'happy hours' in every 24h or 48h.
Supporting the large playerbase is the fact that there should not be a godlike cadre absolutely untouchable players. Lot's of that is avoided by the lateral developement of characters explained in the intro. The rest is done by keeping the amouont of sweet SP's pretty small.
Someone might criticise that missing a day sets you back. True, but missing one or two days shouldn't be THAT big. How about weekend players? Well it might make sense to give some additional boost if you havent played for, say, four days. But we would have to be careful not to create a situation where it's better NOT to play for some days in order to get more SP as that would be bad.
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My vote? Closest one is OPTION 4. |