PotBS - Question.

[schild]

So, I have a few.

What's the end goal (I am not talking about End Game, I'm talking about FUN)? As it seems to me, level 1-50 are identical. So maybe I'm just not getting something.

Sure, productions, ships and shit get better, and of course, the enemy ships do as well.

Maybe contesting ports actually gives some sort of benefit to the entire nation, but then, you're still doing the same thing. Maybe they added avatar combat (which bothers me less than I thought it would) because of how plain everything is, but really, it just amplified it.

Fighting too many ships? Board them fast, remove them as a problem. Fighting one ship? Just open fire.

Rinse.

Repeat.

Level 50.

Fight bigger ships.

What am I missing?

It seems they've admirably mimicked a fair cross section between Eve and early SWG, but then there's other things like the complete lack of fast travel between friendly nations. Travel is boring. period.

So, someone clue me in here.

[Venkman]

Come back in a year unless you want to join the monthly rinse/repeat cycle of port capturing, or be a crafter/tradesman that supplies the goods to those who do so.

[schild]

Oh, also, starting your game with a multiple hour fetch quest should be written on the stone tablet of things Not To Do.

Let's put it this way, I like the base game. But that's all there is to it. Unlike the politics of Eve or even the local politics between guilds in SW:G, everything here is entirely transparent and a little too... too... I don't have a word for it. But there's Not Enough There. Let's say Empty.

[Falconeer]

I'll quote myself: "EVE for infants with a piratey tone. File under: boo hiss."

Totally wasted chance.

Also, what Schild said.

[taolurker]

Leveling, getting better stuff, and crafting/economy are only part of the game.. The battles aren't the same exact every time, and fighting other players is where the game becomes more than the leveling. It's about the PvP, it's about flipping ports and having a 25 on 25 port battle PvP, it's about Nations taking ports from one another and changing who controls ports on the map. It's about building contention points around ports with a huge red PvP circle around you, in order to bring about the huge port battle (or smuggling goods through the blockade).

There's nothing identical about any combat you're in, and as you learn tactics or are with a team (PvPing with your English buddies??) maybe you'll see where it's not identical (or get pissed about not having a team and quit).

It seems they've admirably mimicked a fair cross section between Eve and early SWG, but then there's other things like the complete lack of fast travel between friendly nations. Travel is boring. period.

So, someone clue me in here.

There is fast travel between ports, but only after you have a second ship, and then you can "book passage" between ports where ships are birthed.

[schild]

Remember Tao, I play and am good at single player games. PotBS combat is getting there, but it's still light-years behind single player combat. Your defense for the combat is completely based on MMORPG combat in that respect.

There is fast travel between ports, but only after you have a second ship, and then you can "book passage" between ports where ships are birthed.

This is a terrible solution. Travel is only fun the first time. After that, it's the suck.

[taolurker]

Oh, also, starting your game with a multiple hour fetch quest should be written on the stone tablet of things Not To Do.

You aren't forced to do any quest, and that is a tutorial quest that you don't have to do (except for the rewards). The multiple hour thing is lessened a lot when you know how to use currents, and me I did the economy tutorial voyage in less than 40 mins.

Let's put it this way, I like the base game. But that's all there is to it. Unlike the politics of Eve or even the local politics between guilds in SW:G, everything here is entirely transparent and a little too... too... I don't have a word for it. But there's Not Enough There. Let's say Empty.

Maybe because you didn't join the rest of us and went solo is why it's empty?

Remember Tao, I play and am good at single player games. PotBS combat is getting there, but it's still light-years behind single player combat. Your defense for the combat is completely based on MMORPG combat in that respect.

Well then go out and group, because honestly that is where the fun of any MMO is.. and if you want to solo in MMOs you're playing the wrong games.

[schild]

Not what I meant by empty.

I meant depth to the game. There doesn't seem to be any. Port contention and such just seems to be your regular see-saw affair in conquerable content. Is there something I'm missing? What does port contention change about the game?

[Venkman]

Well then go out and group, because honestly that is where the fun of any MMO is.. and if you want to solo in MMOs you're playing the wrong games.

With 9.5mil other people 

Seriously though, if the game doesn't draw a soloer in, and is therefore really only for groupers, then it'll be niche. That's not bad of course, as long as your business model scales to match the revenue take from a smaller set.

Regardless, there's no right or wrong. PotBS ship combat is ok solo, great in groups, but not because the act of combat itself is engaging. It's all the other factors that go into it that, in aggregate, make it fun. It's like, to me, Freespace 2 vs Eve combat. Way totally different animals and fun for very different reasons.

For sometimes very different audiences.

[taolurker]

Not what I meant by empty.

I meant depth to the game. There doesn't seem to be any. Port contention and such just seems to be your regular see-saw affair in conquerable content. Is there something I'm missing? What does port contention change about the game?

You've played MMOs, and honestly there is no depth to any of them. You level to get new abilities, fight stronger foozles, and get phat lootz.. You press hotkeys when they refresh, get different quests and target different things. Pirates of the Burning Sea is the exact same as every other MMO, except you actually move around strategically, figure better tactics, and get all the sameness that every other MMO has.

The change that comes with port contention is PvP areas that erupt around ports by accumulating contention points, ports changing ownership and port battles. This is the "raid" that is the end game of every other MMO, but here you actually steer around instead of standing in one place hitting the hot key over.

If you think there's something you're missing, then my only response to this is that you were missing the chat and group aspect, which obviously isn't for you because you're looking for a single player game.

It's not for you, and that's fine, but me I actually like it (and I can see at least a few months having fun with it). Hellgate London bored me to tears after about the first 2 hours of beta'ing it, and this game has had me playing since that beta ended (and  I'll be buying their box).

Different strokes for different folks and whatnot.

[schild]

Mm? I chatted. With the British Nation Folks!

Anyway, there's something there I'm not putting my finger on, I'll probably jump in at live a little bit. I'm just happy it got DannyB away from Tabula Rasa. ^_^

[Triforcer]

Tao, is there much for a lone pirate to prey on, pvp-wise?  Or is the ol' 5 ship gank squad paradigm?

[schild]

I can answer that, there's a lot of lone pirate. And then there isn't. The level range due to the amount of travel is crazy. Like level 1 pirates and level 30 ones within a few miles of each other. They've tried to replace that with missions that you can instantly jump into, and for a few hours, that's fun. But repetition ruins it. Of course, there's that whole avatar combat thing, but we know how everyone feels about the avatar combat.

[SnakeCharmer]

I honestly think once the people (communities) playing the game mature a little bit into known alliances / rivalries and players names/guilds get established, that sort of thing, it will get better, so to speak.

Question that greatly affects the above:  Are they going to do the daily reset of port control?

[Venkman]

Think it was monthly resets. That to me was the first big element that started to impact my interested. In Eve, the universe is player controlled and therefore mostly a result of players owning, expanding, building. PotBS though, without any sort of way for players to "permanently" own something, feels more like a game.

That's fine if you like, and understandable given that the Caribbean is not some infinite-huge custom-created fake galaxy. But still, I would rivalries and corporations and whatnot require a permanent sense of ownership and impact.  Having said that, I think it's only ports that reset, but your other holdings remain. So you build up what you can around the contestable ports to retry every month/whatever-period.

The other thing that hampers these sort of emergent (and therefore deeper) dynamics is the wholly contrived DAoC-style split between factions. Even in Eve, you can jump between factions, and the player organizations are largely separate from that. PotBS is more about CTF waaaaarrrr from what I felt. Could be wrong there. And obviously not everyone sees that as an issue, folks like Tao and others who enjoy the game.

[Hellinar]

I honestly think once the people (communities) playing the game mature a little bit into known alliances / rivalries and players names/guilds get established, that sort of thing, it will get better, so to speak.

Question that greatly affects the above:  Are they going to do the daily reset of port control?

As I understand it, each nation starts off with points for the control of their starting ports, about 150 each. They then get 10 points for capturing and holding other nations ports. First nation to reach 300 points wins. Point totals are only counted once a week, so they are not expecting rapid victories. When one side is victorious, everybody gets prizes (bigger ones for the winner) and the map resets. Pirates get 3 points for each port they capture, but lose the ports after 3 days so they can recapture them.

More to\o it than that, but I think that is the general idea. The whole thing was speeded up in beta for testing, but I think its intended to be quite a long time (months?) between victories.

[waylander]

I beta tested the game for a while, and other than the ship combat the rest of the game was boring as hell for me. Its basically about amassing resources to build bigger ships, and then using them to capture ports that will simply reset once one side wins.  So nothing you do has any lasting impact, and to me that lessens the meaning of the repetitive things you have to do to build bigger ships in that end game.

[Hoax]

My interest just went from medium-rising after talking to a friend I let use my FP account who was telling me how cool ship combat was to not interested at all in the time it took to read this:

In the end, since I'm interested in PvP, I spend a lot of time "preparing to play." I spend a majority of my time in-game doing things I don't like doing for the few times I can do what I like to do. Want to be the lone pirate of the seas? Forget about it. If you're not running in a pack of 4-6, you're just an easy kill for someone who's in one that has an even half-decent tackle ship. Spawn points in PvP are ad hoc, so you can dodge bullets sometimes... and sometimes have no chance when you spawn 100y off of a fourth rate.

I was sort of hoping for a play to crush, winners gain $$$ in pvp for winning and losers have to go grind for 6 hours and eventually quit because they are bitches system.  No, that should not have been in green.

Schild, I'm glad you posted this thread, I didn't even beta PotBS but I had originally been quite excited about the prospect of the game as something that could pull some RL friends I haven't gamed with in awhile back together and also the pirate aspect might have grabbed some non-MMO players.  Sadly though I just never got a great vibe from the overall response to the game once the NDA came down.  Also I don't trust anything that waits so long to drop the NDA.  I let someone else use my FP account to beta it towards then end and he said pretty much the same things (ship combat fun, grind boring, avatar combat whack) and it didn't hook him in the slightest.

The quote above though was really what sealed it and is sort of what I expected.  "RvR" does nothing for me.  If I wanted that I'd be on a L19, 29 whatever twinked out char in WoW enjoying some sport pvp.  Oh, and playing TF2.  I think I'll be resub'ing to EVE sometime shortly instead of messing w/ this one.

[Abelian75]

I have no idea how the whole pvp angle will play out, but so far I have to say I'm really, really enjoying the base game itself.  The combat is really neat, the differences between the various ships are pretty huge, and the missions are actually surprisingly varied and fun so far.  And seriously, shooting some dude in the face before he can even reach you is REALLY satisfying.

The UI blows my dick, however.

[Engels]

So, uhm, are the 'quests' to go kill pirates at sea in 'instanced' sea places, or are they in the actual sea arena everyone uses? In otherwords, is it like Eve, with 'deadspace' pockets where your own personal quest combat takes place or do your quested naval battles occur in shared space?

[schild]

Deadspace pockets.

[Venkman]

What schild said.

But you can still engage NPC and player pirates (or other factions) in the open sea, like Eve. Upon doing so though you're moved into your own instantiated battle space, more like Ultima III/IV (travel as a single avatar but you're really a full party, which you find out in battle mode).

[Rendakor]

What schild said.

But you can still engage NPC and player pirates (or other factions) in the open sea, like Eve. Upon doing so though you're moved into your own instantiated battle space, more like 90% of RPGs (travel as a single avatar but you're really a full party, which you find out in battle mode).

FIFY.

How does this work in an online game? Do you disappear from the open world while fighting? What do other players see, a cartoon cloud like The Realm? Does this mean encounters are effectively "locked," even when initiated in the open world?

[schild]

It might as well be a cartoon cloud on the open water. This box appears with some stats on the battle and two ships in a red circle on the water below it and it tells you whether or not you can join.

[Abelian75]

So one of my larger issues with the game's content was that there were way too many low-level missions you got all at once in the starter town(s).  The patch today just removed like half of them and increased the level of the remaining ones.  Yay, that was quick.

[Mrbloodworth]

It might as well be a cartoon cloud on the open water. This box appears with some stats on the battle and two ships in a red circle on the water below it and it tells you whether or not you can join.

Its a side affect from the method of "Open seas" they use. When your traveling in the "Open seas" you are in a scaled (at least 2x+) version of the sea, this decreases  travel time by compressing distance and speed your boat is  traveling at...when you enter an encounter, you are basically zooming back down to the real time, and distance. Its akin to say, FF series when running around the open map, only, you CAN see your opponents in the open sea
(There was another Jrpg that showed you cridders on the map, Crono cross?), and run IF you can (there are also skills for this) run.

Also, if your so inclined, anyone can send up a flair, that effectively opens up the encounter to anyone. They have blogged about this many times, initial version was one huge open sea, but the travel times were insane and NOT fun in any shape or form. They have stated many times the reasoning for all of this, and have said they hope, int he future, to possibly tweak the system to a more open one.

Also, as some one has said, there is instant  travel, you can pop to any where you have a boat. Other than that, if you are sailing for an hour, you are not doing it right, and not taking advantage of the wind, boat, and currents (and other skills).

The entire game is about conquest, power, and controial of the carabiean, using force or economics. (Take a look at tax rates in ports of opposing factions)

One of the strongest aspects of POTBS, is the combat, 2 level 20's can take out a level 40 using TACTICS. This is true for any number of combinations. Level really only gives you more options to play with (and some Power+). I find this to be one of the best parts of the games design. A bigger ship is not always better.

The avatar combat does, still need some work.

You would think, that those that dislike  travel, would really enjoy that, for at least missions, for the most part, you are instantly thrown into the action...and grouping, and getting to the action, have never been easer in any game. That, to me, balances out some of the more (non-combat) missions that require long travel times, or the time associated with the more mercantile side of the game.

Considering i just did a quest the other night in Wow, where i had to travial for a huge amount of time, just to be told to go back...i'm fine with the open seas and instanced encounters POTBS uses.

[Xanthippe]

So one of my larger issues with the game's content was that there were way too many low-level missions you got all at once in the starter town(s).  The patch today just removed like half of them and increased the level of the remaining ones.  Yay, that was quick.

That's a good change, I think, as long as I can still get cash.  Cash from questing is very nice.

[Xanthippe]

Schild, there is "insta porting" between towns, if you have a ship in each town.  A standard trick is to leave a ship at the capitol city so that one can port there for turn-ins (pennants for freetraders, for example).

[WayAbvPar]

So one of my larger issues with the game's content was that there were way too many low-level missions you got all at once in the starter town(s).  The patch today just removed like half of them and increased the level of the remaining ones.  Yay, that was quick.

That's a good change, I think, as long as I can still get cash.  Cash from questing is very nice.

There ARE a ton of newb quests, but I liked it that way, since you could still do them when you were a couple of levels higher and get paid. I have been leveling a Free Trader with no combat skills (other than speed buffs), so taking away lower level missions will make my life more difficult.

They really need to add some alt way for FTs to gain XP. I may have to join a society wolfpack group and leech experience at some point.

[Abelian75]

Yeah, there was nothing, like, harmful to your character due to there being so many missions (indeed, it actually let you get pretty high level while doing really easy missions), but I think it was a bad way to introduce you to the game.  I'm all for not overwhelming people with a buttload of quests in the first couple hours of the game.  I'm not saying the change helps me at all, since I've already gotten past the "do I like this game" hurdle, but I think the change will help a more people get past that hurdle by giving them a much more directed and less spammy intro to the game.

[Mrbloodworth]

Patch Notes for Build 1.0.44.0

01.14.08 by Rev

Welcome to our first post-launch patch!
Highlights:

    * Stability: This patch includes several client graphics fixes that will improve performance, remove glitches for some ATI video cards, and stop crashes. We also fixed a crash in the sound manager and several server crashes.
    * Sound Fixes: We fixed a client bug many of you encountered where your framerate in towns would slow down temporarily while music was playing. This is now gone. If you turned your Music volume slider down to avoid this problem, turn it back up again!
    * Low-level mission revamp: The Open Beta taught us that there were too many missions in the low-level towns and that they were even lower level than they should be. We have made many changes here so that the number and level of missions better matches your leveling rate. This change means you will have missions closer to your level more often. That means the missions will be less boring (fewer “minor” ships!) and will also give better XP and doubloon rewards because they’ll be higher level. Details are below.
    * Black Point: We also fixed the problem with ship deed turn-in at Black Point.

Known Issues:

    * We’re still working on the problem where folks can get stuck on an infinite Loading screen when trying to port to a different ship via the Harbor Master.
    * Black Heart, Black Powder: Often your NPC ally will refuse to follow you after you interact. This breaks the mission. You may want to hold off on taking this mission for now.

Differences between 1.0.35.0 and 1.0.44.0 include but aren’t limited to:
Ships/Combat:

    * Black Point has a Harbor Master now. You can now use the deed you turned in there.
    * The ‘Pommern’ Frigate and all variants are now named the ‘Hercules’ Frigate instead. This is purely a name change and no stats were altered. The modeler of the ship requested that we use this name and we were happy to comply.

Swashbuckling:

    * Whenever you block an attack, you now lose 4 Balance points. This has no real effect on combat, but it does resolve an exploit where you could stack Block and Balance buffs and actually become invulnerable. This slight Balance penalty is enough to resolve that exploit.
    * Lead From the Front & Improved Lead From the Front: These skills weren’t buffing NPC allies as they should. Fixed that.
    * Revive: If you were playing avatar combat in a group and someone Revived you after were defeated, enemy NPCs would ignore you once you came back from the dead. Now they agro on you as they should.

Missions:

    * Black Heart, Black Powder: Fixed a bug that would prevent you from leaving the mission.
    * Low-level mission revamp: We had a LOT of missions in the starting town of each nation (Jenny Bay, Vera Cruz, Charlesfort, and Marsh Harbour). This was kind of cool, but it also meant that if you played every mission in the first town you could leave as level 11, which meant much of the mission content in the low-level towns would then be trivial and, frankly, boring. To improve this, we have removed several missions from the first town. These missions are now gone from the game:

Atonement
Big Cargo
The Captain-Cook
Good Riddance
No Loitering
The Roving Eye
Scout and About
Sea of Souls
Thinner Than Water

If you already have any of these missions on your characters, you will still have them and can finish them as usual. But they will no longer be offered by mission patrons.

    * Low-level mission revamp part 2: The levels of missions in the second and third towns were too low. Very quickly, you could be level 12 but still be playing level 4-6 missions. This meant too many low-level missions were boringly simple and you were frequently fighting “(minor)” ships, which are incredibly weak and can’t be captured or claimed for pennants and commendations. We have done two things to improve the low-level mission experience in the second and third towns.
    * We have adjusted mission levels throughout the second and third towns to keep better pace with your level as you play. This means the missions will be more challenging, and you will pretty much stop seeing “(minor)” ships once you get to the second town and beyond. In addition, since the missions are higher level they will give you better XP and doubloon rewards.
      The second town used to have missions that were mostly levels 4-6. They are now mostly levels 7-9. This affects Rosignol (British), Barilla (Spanish), Fort Caroline (French), and Morgan’s Bluff (Pirate).
      The third town used to have missions that were mostly levels 6-7. They are now mostly levels 10-12. This affects Georgetown (British), Villa Hermosa (Spanish), St. Augustine (French), and Harbour Island (Pirate).
    * As you may have noticed, most missions are reused for all four nations with different characters, text, and enemies. Because we had a surplus of missions in the second and third towns, we have removed some missions from some nations. That means if you play a different nation later on, you will find missions you haven’t seen before.

Second Town (Rosignol (British), Barilla (Spanish), Fort Caroline (French), and Morgan’s Bluff (Pirate))

    * The Bettor Man: Now British and Spanish only.
    * Bon Appetit: Now French only.
    * Booty, Booty, Booty: Now French only.
    * Bring Him Back Alive: Now Spanish and Pirate only.
    * Damning Evidence: Now British only.
    * Escort Service: Now French only.
    * Important Discovery: Now British only.
    * A Matter of Honor: Now Spanish and French only.
    * No Respect: Now British only.
    * Out for a Limb: Now Spanish only.
    * Physic: Now Spanish only.
    * Proving Grounds: Now Spanish and Pirate only.
    * A Regular Customer: Now French only.
    * The Sage of Ale: Now Pirate only.
    * Suspicious Activity: Now British only.

Third Town (Georgetown (British), Villa Hermosa (Spanish), St. Augustine (French), and Harbour Island (Pirate))

    * Back Ordered: Now British, French, and Pirate only.
    * Dead of Night: Now British, French, and Pirate only.
    * Dirty Dealings: Now Spanish only.
    * An Eagerly Awaited Guest: Now Spanish only.
    * Free Samples: Now British, French, and Pirate only.
    * Looking for Trouble: Now Spanish and French only.
    * Meet the Father: Now Spanish only.
    * A New Business Partner: Now Spanish only.
    * Not in My Port: Now Spanish only.
    * Pay Day: Now Spanish only.
    * The Perilous Road: Now British, French, and Pirate only.
    * A Proposed Merger: Now Spanish only.
    * Rival Company: Now Spanish only.
    * Running Late: Now British only.
    * The Searcher: Now Spanish only.
    * Fort St. Catherine: Now French only.
    * Submit or Die: Now British and Pirate only.
    * Trying Dutchmen: Now British, French, and Pirate only.
    * Tying the Noose: Now British and Pirate only.
    * Under the Black Flag: Now Spanish and French only.
    * Un Viejo Convoy Grande: Now British only.
    * West by West India: Now British, French, and Pirate only.

If you already have any of these missions on your characters but they are no longer valid for your nation, you will still have them on your list and you can finish them as usual. But they will no longer be offered by mission patrons.
Economy:

    * Fixed the bug that caused Brits who took the Economy Tutorial out of Bartica to end up with a warehouse in Les Hattes, much to their surprise.
    * Fixed a bug that prevented searching the Auction House in any language other than English. You can now search for auction items in the language you’re using to play the game.
    * During the end of beta event, players spammed the Offer button in the auction house, causing transactions to stall and get screwed up. This won’t happen anymore.
    * ‘Renard’ Chasse-Maree: Fixed a bug in the pricing for the Junk Merchant/Fence.
    * Polacre: Fixed a bug in the pricing for the Junk Merchant/Fence.
    * Ballast: Fixed a bug in the pricing for the Junk Merchant/Fence.

Stability / Performance:

    * Made a graphics performance fix. Stopped rendering stuff every frame that didn’t need to be rendered nearly that often.
    * Fixed a memory leak in the texture memory manager.
    * Players with lower-end ATI cards encountered horrible visual problems in the game. We fixed most of these issues in the launch build, but now we’ve fixed some more. If the game ever looks like The Matrix to you, we think we’ve solved that problem.
    * Fixed a crash that would occur if you changed your graphics preferences (particularly your texture slider), and then talked to the Harbor Master to look at your Dry Dock UI.
    * Fixed a crash that occurred in boarding combat just after both the enemy captain and the player had been killed (in that order), and before the player respawned. This is what sending those crash reports to Microsoft buys you: This has been reported by a Beta tester but we couldn’t figure out the repro. But once we got the crash dumps from Microsoft, we could tell what was going on and fix it.
    * Made a fix to the sound manager to clear sound buffer cache. This might prevent a game crash we’ve seen if you stayed in the same place for a while when there were a lot of sounds, such as Tortuga.
    * Added some logging to help track down a game crash we can’t figure out.
    * If you get an error about needing to open a port range in your router, you’ll now be shown the correct ports (7010-7100) in the popup window. We recently changed the range to try to work around connectivity issues on college campuses and the like.
    * Fixed a zone server crash that could occur if players landed in the room not on the nav mesh.
    * Fixed a zone server crash that could occur if you leveled up just as you died.
    * Fixed a zone server crash that we saw numerous times over two days during Open Beta but not before or since. We don’t know what caused it, but it shouldn’t happen again.

UI / Art / Sound:

    * Adjusted the names of the EU servers to show their languages.
    * Fixed a bug that prevented the Chat tab titles from being localized.
    * Fixed a problem with how NPC names can show up in localized versions.
    * Your framerate would die if you were hearing town intro music while standing near an NPC musician who was also playing music. Fixed this bug.

Misc:

    * Removed text we thought might offend the ESRB.

[WayAbvPar]

Luckily I have most of the quests either done or in my journal. Having enough money to get started economically at a low level just got a hell of a lot harder (and it wasn't easy before!).

[Abelian75]

Luckily I have most of the quests either done or in my journal. Having enough money to get started economically at a low level just got a hell of a lot harder (and it wasn't easy before!).

Everyone's saying this, but I don't really see why.  It's not like you and I were able to magically cram more missions in the same period of time, and I'm certainly not out of missions at level 15.  Indeed, I have an entire journal full of green missions, and I also just learned I skipped over the entire "second" port straight onto the third.  I would have done the same number of missions by this point if there had been fewer in the newbie ports, I'd just be on my third hub instead of my second.  Still would have made the same amount of money/time, and probably more, since I'd be on to more level-appropriate missions.

So I don't really think it will do anything but improve the newbie experience, personally.  The only way it would yield less money/time is if you were in danger of running out of missions at any point, which won't (as far as I understand) be the case until you are level-capped.

[WayAbvPar]

If you are leveling a non-combat character like a free trader, green missions are your bread and butter. After about level 6, I get my ass handed to me by another other than green missions (in the hardcore combat missions like Scout and About, Heartless Romantic, etc). With more low level missions available, I could use a higher level ship to do missions below my level for db and XP.

[Simond]

Not what I meant by empty.

I meant depth to the game. There doesn't seem to be any. Port contention and such just seems to be your regular see-saw affair in conquerable content. Is there something I'm missing? What does port contention change about the game?

There's a pun here about ships, depth and understanding/fathoming that is, alas, fractionally out of my grasp.

Also: EVE has depth but people write it off as a spreadsheet.