FM : I think they are good or bad depending on who you actually have to kill.

If bots then they are too good.

If human players, then they are about right.

My suggestion is to make "real" players worth more, say 1 real player = 3 bots, tone down the cash rewards to half, and XP to 500 per player and increase the number of bots needed to 6 per mission per player.

Figuring out group rewards for future missions is dificult for the many reasons given in this thread.

In a MMORPG you should encourage group play, if a mission is the same as a solo mission there isn't much of an incentive to work together.

In the roup combat mission the mission increases the number of bots required at each stage but doesn't not also increase the potential rewards. This means it takes longer and is more difficult to earn XP.

However if the increase in XP is based on number of group members then it is possible to have the rewards scale up to extremely generous amounts.

Also with a solo mission it is obvious who did what to earn the XP. However in a group mission it is possible to slack off such as hanging out in a station, and still reap the rewards. However constraints such as you must be in the sector to receive credit are difficult becuase in this game you often have to leave to repair your ship or sometimes you die.

The BP and AC missions show the two extremes in group missions. I have faith that Michael and the other devs will find a good balance for future missions.

new BP : (alone)

+350/+350/+350/0/0 & +2500 credits (moneys).

sound correct. but only 2500 (credits)? :-(

well keep it and let' see.

PS : no better xp for players kills!
all depends your tactics. NPC are really hard to kill if do not use rockets and missiles. they shoot 10x better than any players.

FM: So people are still feeling the rewards are too high even after a1k0n toned them down yesterday?

Yes, I feel that they are still far too high.

The bots are very easy to kill in a warthog with screamers. On a good run I'd burn through 4 in about 2 minutes (4 screamers, 3 of them hit, boom the cent's dead), reload and get back out there in 2 minutes. I'd say I was averaging 5-10 bot kills every 10 minutes.

How many PKs do you think the average player could get on the buisiest night in Sedina B8 in 10 minutes?

PS : no better xp for players kills!
all depends your tactics. NPC... shoot 10x better than any players.

In my experience this statement is false.

The way I see it, the border patrol mission is supposed to be centered around pvp, while the advanced combat mission is supposed to be centered around pve, correct? The bots on the border patrol mission are more something that was thrown in to keep things interesting when there's no one else doing the bp mission. Otherwise, what point is there in doing the Advanced Combat mission? But no way is a bot going to be as tough to kill as a player. Every single player has their own unique style, tricks, surprises, teamwork, and survival instinct. The bots in the bp mission are about as difficult as a prosus assault, and I think the rewards for killing them should be similar.

Point #2:

So in a group of 8 everyone kills 3 bots, but they get rewarded like they've each killed 24? o.0 That's a 100% scaling factor!

This means for each person that joins the group, they could be doing nothing but sitting in the station, and they would technically be pulling their own weight. Hmmm.

I think the scaling factor for the xp should be closer to 10%: that way for a group of 8 they would be earning xp at a rate 80% greater than normal. Therefore if one person is sitting in the station afk, it would still hurt the group by a factor of 20%. Everyone has to pitch in at least a little.

Ah good, now we're getting some useful suggestions. Can we put them here? :

http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/3/10620

Just another point of reference. With nonstop botting in a regular day, of course taking breaks once in a while, I can usually only go up by 2 levels for each XP area. So if someone said you can get up to level 10 in 2 days.... that's still A LOT, since for the the rest of us who just bot regularly it would take up to 5 days to do that. Border Patrol missions should obviously be more rewarding, since PKs are involved. But judging by what people are saying it still sounds pretty high to me. Unless the information on the revision is inaccurate.

I'd just like to point out that in a group of 8 each player is earning an average of 2k/2k/2k per bot kill.

Sit down and do the math if you don't believe me.

Well, perhaps you could make it a tapering effect. So that (in addition to CCB's suggestion, which I like) you couldn't use it to level more than 1-2 chars.

arolte, the 2 days was by using the BP mission not by using the AC one. I said it took me 9 days of botting to get myself up to 8/9/9 and I was botting quite intensively to say the truth(played 16+ hours a day). Although I also added quite alot of traderuns which took time away from the botting not to mention that i didn't reach the same level as in the example of 10/10/10, which would have taken me atleast another day maybe 2.

My point is just that levelling a char up in timeframes x times lower then solely is not the way if x >1.5. There would still be a distinvtive advantag eof something like 30%... but not friggingly 400%. Moderation is key...

And nya, people are doing the mission because it is naturally fun but also easy... I wonder if you would do the missions if they gave the same reward as the solobotting missions. Its still fun right? So there is no reason why people would not do it anymore.

" arolte, the 2 days was by using the BP mission not by using the AC one. I said it took me 9 days of botting to get myself up to 8/9/9 and I was botting quite intensively to say the truth(played 16+ hours a day). "

once again you are comparing a group vs a solo!

just try the AC in group and see.

[Il ne fait pas beau d'appeler des personnes sourdes-muettes - FM]

Nya, I already explained in my previous post how AC works, I've done it in group and it's not worth it. It's better to do AC alone than it is to do in group.

Nya, im getting a bit tired of your so called know it all and always way off base posts...

During beta groupmissions AC missions were pretty rewarding, but for already a loooong looooooooooooong time they suck tremendeously. I would suggest you try them out for yourselve.

just spend 10 minutes on a goup AC and on a group BP... you'll notice the difference in actual reward pretty quickly, which is actually the reason why practically nobody has been doing them for ages, and a lot of people have been requesting for an improvement.

Not to mention that I compare with whatever I want, there should not be a difference of more then 150-200% over the normal reward for a groupmission (if the needed kills stay the same).

PS: especialement quand il comprend le francais.

well so according to you AC mission in group suck. tha's why no 1 do it anymore in group.

so now you want to kill the BP mission in group too.

nice goal.

any thing fun in VO?
no 1 do spy mission
no do scrap yard
no 1 do Ac mission

oh cool a new BP mission! let's get it down too.

well go back to mining and trade guild. so cool.

PS :

BP mission > AC mission! just because it's harder. logical to me.

you want to make/keep this game as leveling goal.
it was a mistake. time to change it. there so many licences and the standing to work. taking month to raise only 1 licence such.
what's fun? the game isn't supposed to be like that. that was a mistake.

Ayn.... the AC mission is a lot harder than the BP mission, and obviously, the rewards are a lot less. In a solo AC mission, my bot list is as long as the kill list for a BP mission with 5 participants. 15 Bots. And for those 15 bots, in the BP mission, i get 10 times the rewards, if not more. This is not logical, no matter how you look at it.

Just a statistic on the AC side of things...

I decided to improve my combat level last night through Advanced Combat, because it doesn't make sense for a trader to tank his standing. This probably won't break any records, but I was doing better than 10k combat XP per hour. Based on what other people are saying here, that's about 40% as efficient as BP.

Regarding the whole concept of XP vs access to equipment, it's a bit late to change things now, but perhaps a mission-based access system (night of a million badges) would be better?

The BP mission disrupts how RPG type things go. You're supposed to work hard with moderate speed (not slow, not extremely fast) to rise in access to equip. Equip being weapons, batteries, and ships. However, this is also a skill based game, which usually means everyone gets the same chance to get the same items and fight. On a much larger scale, it could be seen how BP disrupts the RPG aspect, which hurts the twitch aspect too.

It's not all skill based. I'd never think a bus can kill a cap ship if both were really trying. Although BP, which I suspect, will (as it should) be balanced (which would be less xp rewards), it's a permanent change in the RPG aspect. They now have really great levels. Although this won't make a huge huge dent in today's VO, it could turn out to be a monstrous problem.

It's no jealousy thing. I'm seriously concerned the after effects are potentially dangerous for VO's future, which are current subscribers, new subscribers, and trial players.

bp has been tweaked today, it now gives 300 xp for each person in the group for the reward and it now gives less money.

so the max xp is 2400 xp

Crippled: You are correct. This is NOT logical. In the AC solo mission, you start
out having to kill 4 bots. For this you get 350/210/210. As you progress, the
requirement is to kill 5 bots. For this you get 350/210/210. Further on you must
kill 15 bots. For this you get 350/210/210. Where is the logic? If the amount of
"work" increases, so should the reward. From what I read here that's the way BP
is working. In the trade missions, rewards tend to increase, sometimes dramatically. I've received 22,000 points for a few and over 30,000 for one. This
has been noted in the forum before and there was no great beating of breasts and
rending of garments. Why? Because it is "only" trading? Not something "l33t"
like combat?

BP now gives almost no money, but quite a bit of XP. My main gripe with this thread is the interesting "facts" people come up with.

1) The Cents are close to Prosus. If you just fight the bots it is trivial to kill 15-20 of them in a run with a properly configured ship.

2) Botting from 0-9 with the old combat missions is fully doable in around 20 hours of pure botting.

3) Adding players to the default combat missions doesn't give ANY bonus to the XP per bot you're killing. This is the major differnence from the border patrol. It does NOT pay off to be grouped when doing combat missions.

4) People are harder to kill, even beginners, than the bots. Bots are AI, they make the same constant mistakes every single time. Learn to fight them.

5) I'd much rather see people get a lot of money than drop the XP any further. Money is so easy to get anyway that giving combat-people a way to make it without doing trade is a very good thing. Yes, it has been over the top, but right now we're getting maybr 5K per mission, which hardly pays for ships. Give fighter pilots a way of life! Nerfing the cash to 10% was overkill, it'll just make people even less interested in sticking around to the bitter end.

6) UIT fighters have to choose sides to make money and XP with the same ease. This is a good thing! UIT isn't your average starting point for fighters! If you wanna fight, join a side of a war.

7) To compensate 6, trade missions that favor UIT-friendly characters should exist. With this, Itanis and Sercos should start at the same UIT level.

8) As Spellcast said, the trade missions changed things more than BP ever did. It used to take months to build a single faction. Now you get a moth at 5/2, which takes a couple of hours if you get a good mentor. After that, your factions just ballon like mad. Four missions from Odia, you've got Corvus to 800+. Move to Latos and fix your Orion standing, four runs.

And lastly, people who do BP have at least some possibility of getting PVP practice. If you've got level 9 combat from botting in two-three days, you're still targetpratice in PVP. BP might help make people learn PVP. This is a good thing.

Uhh, let me clarify on the reduction. 300xp for 1 person completing mission. That's 100xp per kill, from the original 350, to the 250, to now. Let's see, 500 combat xp for 8 prosus, is 62.5 per kill. So it went from 560%, to 400%, to 160%. That seems decent enough.

If I heard correctly, the bonus given to whole group wont be 100% per member, that also should be a lot more reasonable as well.

I'll have to take a look at how much BP gives me and how quickly for myself later, but I do have to say, the numbers definitely seem a lot more reasonable.