My phased blaster mk II's are starting to piss me off with their low damage/slow velocity. So I've gone on a quest to find tachs or gravs, leveling up as needed.

But I have no idea where I'd find tachs or gravs, or what level I need. Since I can only buy a heavy battery in Edras command, where I have a nuetral standing of +48, but not in Itani space, with a standing of +900 something, (same with iceflares), I have to wonder what standard dictates the equipment a station has for sale.

To a complete newb this would be even more annoying/troublesome. He might level his light weapons license, only to see in station that he has not gained any new weapons. That makes no sense from any standpoint, and is frustrating besides - you mean I spent hours for nothing?! Apparently different stations sell different levels of weaponry, but you don't know who sells what where and the only way to find out is to fly from station to station.

Inevitably, this game will be compared to EVE. And one thing I actually liked about that game was that you could see where equipment was from any station. For instance, if I wanted to buy my tachyons but they weren't available at my current station, it would tell me that the nearest station is two jumps away and they cost XXXc. I can then save myself the tedium of jumping to every station to find my precious tachs, and just go straight to the source.

So my suggestion then. In the current buy screen, equipment is either green or gray, depending on whether you can afford it or not. I propose adding another color, maybe orange or blue, that says yes, you can buy this weapon, but it's at Pelatus Bunker (0-15). That way when I level my light weapons to seven, or whatever, I don't check the buy screen and see the same old weapons at a station that doesn't sell much equipment.

I don't know if this is possible with the current design, but it would save a lot of frustration. There's nothing worse than killing a hundred bots only to dock and discover that your brand new expensive lisence doesn't seem to do anything.

Tachs and Gravs can be bought from Corvus. Especially at Odia M-14.

Well, thanks, but having something in game would be better than having to ask the forums.

IMHO:
I know that exploring can be tedious, but sometimes the joy of discovery can make up for it. Finding the stations that have those desirable weapons is one of those joys. Please don't change it...

So every time you level you have to fly all over the universe to check each individual station to see if you get a new weapon.

Err.. not very marketable :/

Starfisher, it only takes about 45 minutes to go to every system in the game if you have a good battery. And a good rule of thumb is, if your homenation doesn't have it, Corvus probably will.

I know that. You know that. Are you going to tell every newb that? What happens when they expand the universe and add new weapons?

And who wants to spend 45 minutes flying to every station to see if they have a new weapon? If it can't be done within the current design, then that's that. If it can, though, I think it definately should. I mean, it's an eminently sensible feature - save the user frustration and they like your game more.

Of course we want everybody to automatically know where every weapon and ship is all the time for every license. We wouldn't want any player interaction in there, oh no, just go there and get this.



All of us lot after a couple of hours knew where most of the stuff was, it shouldn't be that there is no discovery element in the game.

Have you read Lin's related thread? This feature would mitigate the disappoint she talks about by showing you that yes, you did get something for that level, it's just over there instead of in your home sector.

[edit]http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard?thread=5198&page=1

That's basically the reason I made this suggestion. It sucks to level for hours then get apparently nothing. This way you see that you got something, but you still have to go get it.

"are you going to tell every newb that?"

So understandably I assumed you were talking about lower levels.

Yeah, my mistake. But it still covers all levels - it doesn't matter if the transition to level 4 gives nothing or if the transition to level 8 gives nothing. Both are frustrating and should be avoided if possible.

I heartily agree with your observation, starfisher, and though I think your solution is a good one there are a few potential problems with it.

The first as UncleDave hinted at is that if you knew everything about the universe at all times, there wouldn't be much of a point in exploration, and it would de-emphasize player interaction. In other words, you wouldn't have to ask X player "Hey, do you know where I can buy tachs?" and you also wouldn't have to jump from sector to sector in search of a station that sold them.

There is a precedent for this kind of fix: at first the system map didn't tell you what bots were in what sector, and now it does. I could be wrong but on the whole I think it makes the game less tedious and more fun when you don't have to go randomly hopping from one sector to the next in search of the right type of bot. The same concept probably holds true for finding the right station to buy stuff; its better to have at least a *general* idea of where to look so you aren't hopping randomly from station to station.

Rather than telling you *exactly* what each station sells, perhaps the system map could assign a tech level or a brief description for each station, so the player would have a general idea if what they are looking for might be sold at that station.

The second problem is clutter. Already as you level up the "buy" tab grows and grows with all available weapons, batteries, and cargo. Can you imagine what it would be like if the buy tab displayed every item in the universe, available or not? Perhaps this could be solved by subdividing the "buy" tab into "equipment" and "cargo" but it still might become cluttered if all items were displayed.

What if as you were granted a new license level, you were given a message telling you what new items you now have access to, but not necessarily where to find them. Something along the lines of "Congradulations, you now have access to the Tachyon Blaster Mk I and the Vulture Mk IV at certain stations." Or better yet, in the information window for the license test, append a paragraph that says "This new license level will unlock: X, Y, Z etc." Since some items require specific levels in multiple skills, the message would display what items would be unlocked based on the player's current skill levels.

I didn't think of clutter, that would be a problem. Although simply stating to the player "You can now buy X" is a little abrupt. Maybe, instead, have a general message: "Check high technology stations for new equipment" or "Prices have been reduced due to your new standing" would be better.

At least we can agree that level frustration IS a problem and could use something to address it.

Starfisher, I did not mean to imply that we should have to explore the entire Universe everytime we "level-up." Although the leveling process is not totally broken, it is IMO, seriously defective. In the first place, when one "levels-up" there should be a definate reward, and you should NOT need to search forever to find it. When you earn enough experience to reach the next level, the game tells you to return to your home station to take the "test." This being the case, your "reward" should be available immediately at your home station. AND there are a lot more ships weapons etc than levels, so there should always be "extras" available for "discovery."

As to the "defectiveness" of the levelling-up process. At present, I do not play as much as I used to. The reason? The mind-numbing boredom, the time consuming tedium and the sheer frustration of levelling up. You work at increasing your exp points for an hour or two, and then, feeling somewhat proud of sticking to it all that time, you go to check your progress. "Good God!!! All that work and I STILL need 75,000 points?????" That's when I log off.

I know this is still a "work in progress." And it's a damned good work in progress,
that's why I keep coming back. But without a MAJOR improvement of "levelling up" I will never pay to play...