Heh. Well, I'm clearly not super great on patience of late (better today, sleep good).

At the same time, I do find it a little irksome to hear about what we should be doing "now", when I thought I just wrote a lengthy newspost about how crap has been going awry for us. I do appreciate that people have concern for the well-being of the game and community, but it could have been phrased a little more diplomatically.

Despite this, I really do appreciate feedback on what sort of dynamic constructs would generate some more focused activity. Stations are one thing, but not the only thing.

Threads like this also have a tendency to get derailed off onto debates of implementation specifics, which are not what the General forum is all about. It would be better to link to Suggestions threads and redirect specifics there. What we would actually be most likely to do, in this situation, is create a few, fixed "conquerable" stations, and avoid (for now) the complex dynamics of players spawning "stuff" and dealing with "real estate". But even the conquerable thing is going to take some time, as I mentioned before. It might be feasible to do in a couple of weeks, depending on how we go about it, but it might not.. every time we seem to add something, these days, it exposes some 10-year-old flaw somewhere else. We can look at giving it a whirl, but not until the big crashes and stalls are solved.

So, let's hope for a stable game, next week, without server (hardware) downtime or software issues, and then maybe we can start doing actual fun work again, instead of annoying and time-consuming debug/fix-it.

As another note regarding player counts, we will most likely see some influx there from the upcoming promotions.

/me waves his hands around and screams "DOOOOOOOOOM!!"

Oh, wait, we're all still here? Um, okay then, nothing to see here...

Carry On.

Incarnate,
No one expects you to squeeze out totally awesome player constructed stations tomorrow... Fridays release will be just fine...

Joking aside,

A simple stripped down temporary station with minimal functions located somewhere strategic would be sufficient to begin the very long and complex development process. I am only suggesting that it is time to lay the first brick.

Im not a diplomat Incarnate. I am just a player who spent 77 days online in the last 6 months talking to the new players and watching them leave after a few weeks. I am well aware of your problems as I have to deal with them regularly. This will not solve all your troubles. If anything it will make some of your problems worse.

Good luck and next time try a Pink Floyd tune called "Not now John". It might help you feel better....

First of all, I do greatly appreciate the fact that you care about our game and community, and that this attention stems from that.

A simple stripped down temporary station with minimal functions located somewhere strategic would be sufficient..

That does not exist. What there is, is a lot of old and inter-dependent code that will have to be modified in a variety of ways for both usage right now, and to avoid completely screwing ourselves over in the near future. This is not a single-brick scenario, this is a "major new project" scenario. I would have to assume you are not a software developer.

Im not a diplomat Incarnate.

The way in which you choose to deliver your message has a significant impact on how it will be received.

I am well aware of your problems as I have to deal with them regularly.

..aaand, that's what I'm talking about. It is very apparent that you have no idea what problems we have, or what we have to do to deal with them. You say you've seen many newbies leave.. I get to (sadly) look at the our internal statistical graphs every week, and watch the aggregate flow of people in and out. I'm well aware of our turnover rate issues. And although it's something I do wish to address, player turnover rate has been (unfortunately) FAR from the most pressing topic over the last half year (due to a lot of pretty bad stuff). The most a player can see is the gameplay flaws, a small window of turnover rate, and that Incarnate seems stressed lately; that's not a lot to go on.

It is not productive, not to mention a little arrogant, to make assertions on subjects of which you are not informed. Player turnover is not our biggest problem. Conquerable stations are not any easier to implement than conquerable capships, or player capships.

So, in general, everyone, let's stick to bringing up issues that we want, or that we believe the game really needs, and leave it at that? The game arguably needs player driven conquest scenarios (stations, sectors, whatever). There is no value into going down the road of how many subscribers we may or may not have, and if VO is about to evaporate unless we immediately go do X. All that discussion does is try my patience and make me less receptive to the underlying (and sometimes useful) discourse.

Let's stay positive. I would truly appreciate a Suggestion Forum post that rated some kind of top-10-things-to-create-Fun from the userbase (without the added "doom!" drama). That would be useful insight to me.

So, in other words PaK.. stfu. The devs have a good grasp on what they need to do, and the issues involved.

Sorry for not being more diplomatic.

Heh. Well, I have no trouble with the general idea of "We would really like to see conquerable stations in the near future! We need more stuff to do!", just without all the "hemorrhaging players" drama. Like I said, let's just keep the focus on what we want and need in the game, and less on the "if we don't, the sky will fall" stuff.

As a point of observed fact, adding new content and then attempting to bring in older players has not (mailing list, etc), in the last five years, resulted in big aggregate subscription increases. On the other hand, big influxes of new people does often result in that. Content does help retain existing people, of course. We'll see if capships or stations or some other thing brings in a few more vets, but I've generally concluded the whole "If you add X, I'll totally come back!" group is full of it. I can get them to come back with free time (like the holiday free-for-old-subscribers thing we did last winter), but then they tend to leave again.

Not really here nor there, but touches on some of the arguments behind adding X or Y content, and why those arguments are really best avoided anyway. Let's just do what we want for people who play the game now, that would create the most fun and can be implemented in the shortest period of time.

Anyway, I think this thread has achieved its purpose of bringing conquerable stations to my attention. Consider it duly noted, and I'll talk to Ray about how hairy that looks. I'm aiming to do newsposts on more sane intervals (again), so I'll post about it yay/nay in probably a week and a half or so (barring something bad happening). This coming week we still have some critical-fixing to do.

I'm now locking, to avoid further drama.