Chris Roberts Back in your wallet - STAR CITIZEN

[veredus]

While that's sort of almost funny, not sure what it has to do with what is basically a pre order bonus.

[Sky]

Having a permanent free backup ship?

[Venkman]

Quite a few pages dedicated to a theoretical bonus about a hypothetical game. How about we worry about it in 5 years when and if this launches

And yes, I am fully aware I was once an ardent defender of some of the things DAoC might consider ripping off from EQ1 back when it was first announced 

[Draegan]

I assume insurance on those starter ships is equivalent of giving WOW players free griffon rides for life.  Or something.

[Lantyssa]

You get a free stripped-down Rifter.  Whoopie.  Huge money savings there.  Look out galactic market.

[Hoax]

You get a free stripped-down Rifter.  Whoopie.  Huge money savings there.  Look out galactic market.

Not even doesn't it just mean your insurance doesn't ever expire but you still only get a crappy insurance payout that is less than the value of the ship?

[Mrbloodworth]

Ship is replaced. Nothing else is, Cargo, mods, Guns...whatever is not bolted down.

[Kitsune]

Yeah, you pretty much have an infinitely replaceable hull for the ship you got with your prepurchase.  That's it.  Cargo and equipment's up to you to replace if you get it shot out from under you.  And if you paid the $30 you apparently have the crappiest ship in the game, so free hull replacements for that are a bit underwhelming.

[5150]

Yeah, you pretty much have an infinitely replaceable hull for the ship you got with your prepurchase.  That's it.  Cargo and equipment's up to you to replace if you get it shot out from under you.  And if you paid the $30 you apparently have the crappiest ship in the game, so free hull replacements for that are a bit underwhelming.

Until you read the recent insurance FAQ and find out what happens if you dont have insurance and cant afford a new hull......

and if you stumped up for a larger hull then the benefit/cost saving becomes even more attractive

(you become someone else's bitch (PC or NPC) until you earn anough to buy a new one)

[Mrbloodworth]

I thought the whole, getting subcontracted until you could afford a new ship, thing was rather clever. Depending on how its done.

[Lantyssa]

When was the last time someone in a space sim went completely broke when they weren't being a complete moron?  So there's an edge case.  Probably an option if you don't want to risk your own ship, too.  I'm not being convinced this is a terrible thing yet.

[Samprimary]

It would actually be kind of cool in a way if there was a game mode in which the two game over conditions are

1. death, or
2. debtors prison

[Lucas]

Now this is quite an exciting update, about the death mechanics in Squadron 42 (the single-player game) and Star Citizen itself (the persisten world space) 

http://www.robertsspaceindustries.com/death-of-a-spacema/

Here are a couple snippets, but I encourage you to read the entire article, it's VERY interesting and informative. At the end of the article, there is also a brief FAQ.

In Squadron 42, this is pretty easy to achieve. You need to complete the mission to move forward and you can’t save while in space. You die you just go back to the previous save point, normally before you launched on the mission.

In Star Citizen:

If you don’t manage to eject in time, or someone blasts your ejected character (which carries a harsh penalty if you do this in “civilized” space), your badly charred and almost dead avatar is recovered and you wake up in a med bay.

This is also true if you are killed in a boarding action and your teammates can’t or don’t recover you. If this happens it is assumed that your dead body was evacuated into space and then recovered.

Every “death” creates wear and tear on your body. Depending on where you were hit and how you died, your character may require a new body part, which can either be cybernetic or organic. Eventually after too many deaths, your character’s body will just give out, and instead of waking up in a med bay, you’ll be attending the funeral of your fallen character from the eyes of the beneficiary you specified when originally creating your character. If your old character has done something noteworthy (akin to an in-game achievement), his headstone might read “Here lies Chris, discover of the Orion 2 jump point, slayer of the Dread Pirate Roberts, and a Citizen of the First Order.”

[Draegan]

That's interesting.

[Mrbloodworth]

I like it.

[Sparky]

I'm surprised people aren't bitching about the microtransactions.  You expect them in a F2P game because they have to make their money somehow.  But pay-to-play when people have already paid his development costs feels pretty cheeky to me.  Depends how it's done of course.

[Mrbloodworth]

I do not recall an article about microtransactions.

[Sparky]

I do not recall an article about microtransactions.

http://www.pcgamer.com/2012/10/17/star-citizen-system-requirements-modding-and-potential-microstransactions-detailed/

There's not much info, just "only for stuff you'll be able to acquire through normal play" which really doesn't tell us anything.  I just find the idea a bit disappointing in a P2P game they're making with fan money.

[Lantyssa]

It's no different than Guild Wars 2, other than the initial fan investment, which is like macro-transactions up-front.

They are releasing the server code though, so you can do whatever you want in your homebrew server.  This is just for their official server where you play with the rest of the world.

[Sparky]

Oh that's good news.  Consider my jimmies unrustled.

[WayAbvPar]

Roberts seems almost child-like in his naivete regarding griefing. Permadeath will be way too juicy a target for griefers. 50 throwaway characters using up some vet roleplayer's last life will create comets made of frozen tears. I will definitely be with the goons on this one, if only to avoid being targeted 

[UnSub]

It's no different than Guild Wars 2, other than the initial fan investment, which is like macro-transactions up-front.

Except that GW2 is out and this game is still under development but promising a lot. We've still got a long while to wait before we can see what the final revenue model turns out to be.

[5150]

Roberts seems almost child-like in his naivete regarding griefing. Permadeath will be way too juicy a target for griefers. 50 throwaway characters using up some vet roleplayer's last life will create comets made of frozen tears. I will definitely be with the goons on this one, if only to avoid being targeted 

I predict Roberts current on plan on death will not make it out of beta

[Mrbloodworth]

Roberts seems almost child-like in his naivete regarding griefing. Permadeath will be way too juicy a target for griefers. 50 throwaway characters using up some vet roleplayer's last life will create comets made of frozen tears. I will definitely be with the goons on this one, if only to avoid being targeted 

Did you read the whole article, or just the quoted part here?

[WayAbvPar]

Of course I read the whole thing. My comment stands as written. If you can kill or take things permanently from other players, people will do it just for the grins and the rage. What part of it do you think will prevent this from happening?

[Mrbloodworth]

Not saying it won't happen. However, as there are no skills tied to an avatar, there is not much to lose.  It was also stated that you can gain back "lives" as well. Its also extremely cool that death itself, like dark souls, is part of the world lore, even if your avatar is lost, accomplishments live on.

[WayAbvPar]

It won't be the material loss. It will be the long time character that someone is inordinately proud of, and which will cause them to rage quit when they get targeted and hunted into extinction.

[Mrbloodworth]

I don't really role play anymore in video games, but.

So?

Whats cooler than having an offspring who retains the history of a previous character, including partial ( Faction? ) affiliations and ( Player ) recognition? That's rather dam awesome from a Role-player perspective if you ask me. Sure, it will sting, but, this is a niche game. I think you are putting mass market expectations on it. Its not that dissimulator from eve in many regards.

Where you see Griefing, I see permadeath as being ingrained into a world. Instead of slapped on top like so many other systems. I'm not sure whats wrong with a group hunting down a player. Its part of the game, its part of the lore, its part of its life cycle of the world and history, and its not the end of the world.

The scenario you seem to think will happen, where 50 goons camp one planet and blast some guy every times he leaves the planet is highly unlikely to be possible, and if it is, only in non-secured parts of space anyway. Not when apparently you can get taken to any plant you have a ship on.

And we are not even talking about Mercenary contracts yet.

[Lantyssa]

I think you're underestimating the ability of Goons to break the system in order to cause havoc if that's their goal.

I plan on playing publicly and on a personal server.  If the former gets too bad, I'll just spend all my time on the latter.

[Mrbloodworth]

Considering how the PvP is to work, I don't think it will be an issue anywhere but rim worlds. Again though, I think this is a case of a behavior being embraced in a design, rather then suffering from its attempt to mitigate it. The very first barrier in this is, they would have to be a better pilot than the target, unlike Eve.

[WayAbvPar]

Nope. Just have more friends with less to lose.

[Ingmar]

Whats cooler than having an offspring who retains the history of a previous character, including partial ( Faction? ) affiliations and ( Player ) recognition?

Keeping the original character comes to mind.

[Typhon]

He can fix all these complaints if he makes your characters age.  Each character has a fixed amount of game time to achieve stuff.  All characters die and will their stuff to the next character you create.  "Lives" are just how many times your character was able to cheat death.

[UnSub]

Whats cooler than having an offspring who retains the history of a previous character, including partial ( Faction? ) affiliations and ( Player ) recognition? That's rather dam awesome from a Role-player perspective if you ask me.

Mechanics kick roleplaying in the ass every time.

If your character 'dies', what's the process for creating a new one? Do you have to go through character selection again? Remake the face / body or just select the exact same one you had previously? If it happens in the middle of a fight, how much extra time will it take you to get back in the game? It sounds a bit like you can 'pre-select' your offspring's body, but that doesn't mean that people will.

Like many things in Star Citizen, it sounds like a good idea, but I think it will be mugged by player reality.

[Samprimary]

I'm just gonna go ahead and say that right now I am staring at the dead razor's edge, and I have no idea if this game is going to turn out sucky or cool, and I legitimately think it could go either way at this point.

And man, man do i want it to turn out cool.

please.