I usually try to target around ~ 15 CE(S)T for releases since I'm responsible for them, but this release requires staff from multiple areas to work together due to the deployment of fully new backend services (plus website) - hence I'm not able to commit to a clear goal time for this specific update. It's more of a it goes out when everything looks good, which makes the time a bit flexible. I'd guess anywhere between 15 and 21 CE(S)T.
Read moreThat sounds like a great idea for new game mechanics as WT players are some of the most dedicated players that love to break the game and push it to its limits. But on the flip side, the most dedicated players may not be the best to gauge reception to microtransactions as they are probably the most willing to pay and engage with the marketplace.
White Tiger actually only serves as civics, technical and stress test - given the server is modded (and gets things during release builds that may make it into the next game update), it's not suitable for all cases of game mechanics testing - it's also a very concepted server, but the popularity resulting from that makes it the perfect choice to find as many bugs and issues as any possible that any server could stumble over when doing whatever we didn't forsee.
While the marketplace is specifically targeted towards existing players wishing to support the game, I can assure you that the feedback on it was just as mixed as everywhere else - though that was expected to begin with.
My main concern on this feature would be that these block sets and furniture items are effectively transferable by having the DLC owner place the blocks. They also can exist anywhere in the world (seemingly without limits). This does give advantage to players who partake in the competitive/casual artistic aspect of building things.
In contrast, clothing items can much more readily be made completely non-transferable and only wearable by the DLC owner. (Also, clothing like this is rather limited in scope to the player itself and cannot exist arbitrarily in the world.)
Edit: I do understand that there are business needs to ensure ongoing funding for development. However, I do want to push back on the statement "there is no gameplay advantage" since that requires strictly narrowing the definition of gameplay as 'tech tree advancement'
Eco revolves around playing with a large amount of players and also friends - the only way to reliably prevent players from placing blocks for others would be to disallow them to do so on any property that they don't own (and transferring any property they own) - which isn't viable and detrimental to the play experience. We also want players to be able to share their cosmetics with friends, as it is usual in other sandbox games - like Space Engineers. That is especially relevant for the share of coop players, but no less on multiplayer servers.
When we talk about gameplay advantages the scope naturally is always only the game mechanics. Eco doesn't revolve around any competetive artistic aspects as you mentioned, such activity results from personal player goals and interests of formed communities, but is not relevant to success in regard to the game goals, as such there is no gameplay advantage. Players can also have extremely different personal goals - not rarely such that...
Read moreZataku Table gives 3 room value while a regular Lumber Table gives 2.5
I am assuming this is a mistake?
Yes, of course, it was reported in playtest and already addressed in a PR yesterday.
Originally posted by André: Tried on Windows X64 and Linux Bazzite (Fedora)
Log is from Eco_data/server/log
I try to play completely offline. No cable or wlan. Truely offline.
Block shapes are made specifically per blockset, so they already have differences for most base sets. The introduction of paid skinned variants of base blocksets also doesn't mean we wouldn't add some shapes to base sets every now and then, as we have done in the past.
It is correct that we do consider these variants to be cosmetic. The gameplay value in the building mechanics is created by the economic and tier value of the base sets and the necessary requirements of having a specific tier and the linked material cost. Paid blocksets will always be variants of a base set with identical properties - not introducing any form of new crafting material or having a different tier - they are hence mechanically identical. How they look or how many shapes they have is not relevant to the gameplay loop, but solely cosmetic.
We had no plans to introduce additional blocksets to the game without them following a function, given that is their actual purpose and for the current g...
Read morejust a little PSA: you can enable crafting of all marketplace items for free in the server config
That should not be the case, the setting is just for allowing using items you have - but do not own the blue print for.
Yes, you can completely turn the marketplace on your server off, if you don't like it. You also cannot trade marketplace items or use them as non-owner unless you specifically enable either of the options - which is displayed to the user on the server list.
As for the reasoning I refer to plenty of other threads all around to not circle through all the same arguments for and against again.
I played on the Ember servers that did this and it really did encourage more play for a longer amount of time during seasons, so I'm excited at the prospect of this being natively within the game!
Mind noting in detail what parts they did and how they implemented that via current systems? (I guess some manual admin interaction would be part of that?)
Read moreOK so I powered up the PC to write this one and I hope I don't get downvoted into oblivion.
To mitigate solo players tryharding into one advanced field and creating a monopoly we could:
Make research and unlocking skills consume more time and resources. Even the basic resource skills would require research.
Create an modifier to research speed and amount of resources required based on a settlement cultural value (culture bonus for nice architecture plz), ecological impact, population, mechanical power, electricity and other factors you can think of to make researching while being citizen of an settlement attractive.
Make knowledge transfer organically from the first person that unlock it to his settlement and beyond. This way the tech will not get "locked" until another person researches it again or buys a skill scroll. The more goods made with that skill you sell the faster it becomes "common domain". After reaching some thr...
So you basically want to avoid the "hard" gate in server progress that the idea has? I guess it could be possible to balance spread mechanics in a way that power players are sufficiently migitated, but I think that would be very hard - especially when thinking of the system needs to work on different server sizes and with different compositions of players.
The general idea of knowledge spread between settlements is something I also considered, though, so thanks for that feedback :)
Read moreYou post here under the label "SLG Staff", but you constantly use your subjective assessments as a player and state that your position is not official. Then what is the point of our communication? I'm not interested in having a conversation about monetization and its methods with someone who sees nothing wrong with what I consider to be blatant abuse. You clearly aren't interested in my opinion because you keep claiming you have statistics and they are more important.
I'm not arguing that statistics are more important. But I don't understand why we're having this personalized conversation then. Just keep an eye on the stats. Right now your game has the lowest online since the release of Eco 9.0. For the first time in the history of your game, user ratings have collapsed. I'm convinced that the reason is the announced business model, even though you think it's harmless.
I will also try to influence the stats from my side. After all, it is important, as we are both co...
I have that tag because I work for SLG, but that does not mean that everything I say somewhere (especially when I specifically note "I" instead of "We" - I cannot on demand turn that tag off, unfortunately) is a direct SLG statement just because I work for it. Many members of our staff are around on some channels and engage with players on a regular basis, much of that interaction happening in our free time. Providing some insight and personal opinions by people working on a game can be very interesting to players, even if it is for some reason not for you - Reddit is ultimately a discussion platform, one of its very purposes is to exchange opinions. You posted an interesting thesis, I was intrigued and asked to find out what is behind. You asked me questions - I answered. I asked you questions - you answered. You brought up feedback - I made sure the team hears it.
I am not sure what your exact expectation was, given the company stance has been provided long before our dis...
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