Gartel Reiman
Civis Romanus Sum
Core Factor
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Posted - 2009.09.15 12:23:00 -
[1]
 Originally by: Memphis Baas
We're paying rent on the gates but we're not getting anything FROM the gates
You're not paying rent on the gates at all. According to the blog you're responding to, the charges are "an upkeep system for the space you hold and develop". While the first blog mentioned gates in the context of upkeep, people seemed to take it that you're paying for the gates themselves when I thought it was clear that you're paying for the upkeep of the system.
Hopefully all the requests about being able to control gates (which would be bad for the game in any capacity) will die out, but somehow I doubt it.
Originally by: Memphis Baas
It's full of promises of riches and potential (and fun) for the empire dweller and for new players and for everyone, but all of the changes are quite a disruption to alliances. I don't know if you've convinced [leaders] to continue playing
Actually there isn't anything here about empire, it's all 0.0. And if people were willing to put time and effort into building up an alliance before - I can't see them giving up at precisely the time they get a lot more tools at their disposal to do this, and a lot more potential rewards from it. The changes in Dominion if anything will be bringing more diplomacy to 0.0, and more ability to succeed and thrive without having to destroy eleventy billion control towers, so that's definitely going to be a plus point for the kind of people you're describing.
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You're building up hype and are advertising all the changes with big grins and hugely-positive words, and you have NOT talked about plan B or a reversal strategy at all
A reversal plan? If the dev blogs were to mention such a thing, it would definitely weaken my faith in it.
And why would one be needed? The concept is valid. The concept is clearly miles better than the current system. Even a "pre-nerfed" version will be much better. The exact details will need balancing, but the idea of dropping the concept altogether is crazy.
Plan B, if you like, is to take note of the parts of the new system that aren't working quite how CCP intended after deployment, and patch them so that they do. Just like it is with every change...
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You also haven't talked, lately, about just how good and hard-working your developers are or have been. I think some of that is needed, because you're promising the moon with this expansion, and we don't really know if you can deliver it.
I wouldn't say that's necessary. However hard the developers have been working, it won't be changed by the description of it in a devblog. And it's not like we're stakeholders in the design process at all, above and beyond offering commentary on the released information which may or may not be taken on-board by CCP. Frankly, it's irrelevant how many platitudes we get about how hard the devs are working - what matters is how good the expansion will be when it hits TQ, which is completely unaffected by how hard we think the devs are working now.
Originally by: Cassidy Usaro
a quick, easy and instabil conquer mechanism will lead to the situation were all gimicks you throw in on the "build empires and improve ressources in your space" side are rendered meaningless. Nobody will invest billions in perks if they are not substantially safeguarded by a fortification. The write-up sounds to me just like stationpingpong2 with the differences that the pingpong is about your own investments instead of game created assets.
I didn't take that from the blog at all, quite the opposite. In fact Greyscale even explicitly stated the devs are aware of the problems with pingpong and will be avoiding it. Rather, it sounds like the "descriptive" method of gaining sov means it will be harder to beeline straight for the minimum technical steps to gain it; you'll have to actually exert control over the system, actually push the other guys out. Details pending, of course. 
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