Beacon Persistence (redux)

[Clexarews]

I agree with Karo that a fueling station prop could be handy so you don't have to remember where your beacons are all hidden.

[Lady-Rosetta]

To be honest, if i have job duties or other real life things that cause me to take a longer leave from the game any reminder by that game annoys me greatly. Because you don't have time for it and game-thoughts can't be part of your life in that moment. So it becomes nothing more than spam. An alarm hastily put off in order to not lose concentration for the stuff youre involved with in that moment.
Obviously no reminder if youre the sole responsible isnt working either.

I'd just feel disappointed and move on to something else rather than find my stuff gone or being reminded in it in wrong moments. This is why i liked the voting system so much: you dont have to be reminded in the game, but often you still hang out with the friends youre playing with so they will simply vote for your build to stay open. Without having them to have to decide to spend fue on your build when they also need it for their own.

Then, as a comment to others: the wood and leaves may be cheap but what will matter is the higher beacons. They will cost resources that are rarer. And with fuel, the beacons will also need fuel WHILE BEING ACTIVE as far as i understood. That means constant refueling even while youre active. It will take up gametime that can be spend in other ways for everyone that is active and doesnt need to somehow assure the game they still want their stuff.

[luke-turbulenz]

We're hoping to have menu in-game you can view which will show you a list of all the beacons you have and their most recent status.

[Karokendo]

That system would be really great, but i wish i could also refuel other people beacons linking them to my Beacon control.

To make refueling bigger projects easier

[Wichall]

Placing a beacon does not reserve the space until fuel is added.
"Simple Beacon Fuel" is hand crafted from a small number of trunk and leaf blocks.
Adding beacon fuel to an un-fueled beacon reserves the plot.
It doesn't take much fuel to fully fuel a beacon, a beacon fully fuelled with "Simple Beacon Fuel" will stay around for two months (exact timings TBD).
Using more complex and rare resources you can craft two more advanced beacon fuels which can keep a beacon around for up to four and six months respectively (exact timings TBD).
If a beacon gets low on fuel, a graphic is displayed in game, and if the player has registered an email address with the game, then an email is

Let's say I'm a griefer, here is what I can still do:

• Place beacon in grief-y place
• Fuel beacon
• Fill beacon with gravel or desired grief-y block
• Wait for beacon to run out of fuel and enjoy griefing
• Repeat.

So, raise the costs you say?

• This is where I stop playing, sorry.

So, we could have beacon fuel be very expensive for initial openings or have very small fuel limits for the first few days/weeks a beacon is placed.

• Well now we're getting a bit more complex
• A beacon is an ongoing worry/responsibility for new players
• We're travel-locked for a bit whilst starting new beacons as we need to be on top of fuelling them, great.

Well, there are more things we can try...

I just don't get fuel. Griefers will always be there and will always grief you if they really want to. If the fuel cost is so small then why bother having it at all?

I'd be much happier with beacon "life" based on prestige or some similar formula, with the additional option of player "voting" to accelerate the rate at which beacon "life" shortens. Voting in a similar way to Karokendo's proposal.

[luke-turbulenz]

You can refuel other player's beacons but you'll need to approach them manually. Linking them to other player's beacons would stop the natural decay of an abandoned or unused beacon.

[Karokendo]

Maybe beacon progression skill line where you can add points to certain skill and expand beacon protection time?

[Wichall]

Surely a griefer can also use this skill though and just extend their griefing beacons?

[Clexarews]

To be honest, if i have job duties or other real life things that cause me to take a longer leave from the game any reminder by that game annoys me greatly. Because you don't have time for it and game-thoughts can't be part of your life in that moment. So it becomes nothing more than spam. An alarm hastily put off in order to not lose concentration for the stuff youre involved with in that moment.
Obviously no reminder if youre the sole responsible isnt working either.

You know most emails platforms allow you to create filters and folders right? If something makes you take a break you can just filter out boundless emails and it only takes like 5-10 seconds.

Then, as a comment to others: the wood and leaves may be cheap but what will matter is the higher beacons. They will cost resources that are rarer. And with fuel, the beacons will also need fuel WHILE BEING ACTIVE as far as i understood. That means constant refueling even while youre active. It will take up gametime that can be spend in other ways for everyone that is active and doesnt need to somehow assure the game they still want their stuff.

The way I understood @olliepurkiss here:

It doesn't take much fuel to fully fuel a beacon, a beacon fully fuelled with "Simple Beacon Fuel" will stay around for two months (exact timings TBD).

is that full fuel = two months (exact times TBD). So no, you don't have to constantly refuel while active. You can craft fuel, get like 6 months worth all at once, and then chill. Just keep some in storage and then you don't have to farm the more rare resources.

A voting system would be too easy to dupe. There needs to be at least some sort of effort involved somewhere.

---

Let's say I'm a griefer, here is what I can still do:

Place beacon in grief-y place
Fuel beacon
Fill beacon with gravel or desired grief-y block
Wait for beacon to run out of fuel and enjoy griefing
Repeat.

I'm not understanding this example. a.) how is filling a beacon with gravel griefing? b.) how does the grief enjoyment only begin after the beacon runs out? I don't think any griefer is gonna wait 2 months to see their work pay off.

I just don't get fuel. Griefers will always be there and will always grief you if they really want to. I'd be much happier with beacon "life" based on prestige or some similar formula, with the additional option of player "voting" to accelerate the rate at which beacon "life" shortens. Voting in a similar way to Karokendo's proposal.

This is also griefable. Say grief guild A comprised of 30 players decides they really don't like guild B, comprised of 10 players, and wants to grief them. They all vote down guild B while guild B votes themselves up. Guild B now has -20 votes and loses their stuff.

[luke-turbulenz]

This is mostly about keeping communities and towns available for other players who want to be a member of it. If a player who was a member of the area leaves the game or moves onto to a new town and forgets to take their plot, the other players in the area are left with a locked plot forever.

The fueling system feels like a natural part of a colonization experience where you build a home, maintain it, improve it and advance it on to something special.

Yes, players will try to grief it but a general in-game reporting system can have an option that says, Player's Build is damaging my experience. As well as other options like Abusive Player, Harassment, etc.

[Wichall]

Precisely my point, griefers will grief so stop trying to design a grief-proof system.

[Clexarews]

If griefers will greif then there is no grief-proof system...I really don't get what you're trying to say. This system is being designed so ghost towns and whatnot can be cleaned up.

[Wichall]

So why do we need fuel to stop that? If you read my post I suggested an alternative, Karokendo also has a lengthy proposal you should read.

[Clexarews]

Difficult to real other's posts when they don't read yours. I've already countered by saying a number game could easily turn the voting system into an easy way to harass others.

[Wichall]

Well now we're going round in circles, read up to my points on griefing. I'm out.

[AnnieGYG]

Maybe we should wait and see what the recipes are before saying it'll be loads of extra time and work?

It might be stuff that's easy to gather during your normal day to day activities - in which case it would be a few clicks of a button once every 6 months, depending on how many separate beacons you have.

I definitly understand the pain of the Oort temple having so many different players together and so many beacons - but that'll be solved with a Guild beacon later on.

[james]

The fuel system doesn't aim to be the anti-griefing system.

For pure anti-griefing we have plans to enable: report player, report beacon, and report location. Whilst griefing is sometimes blatant, it can also be subjective.

[Lady-Rosetta]

Yea Clexarews i also have the feeling you didnt really understand my points. You should probably read Karos proposal first before countering our arguments regarding the voting system.

As to the continuous fuel tou misunderstood my point that these 6 months will not cost wood and leaves and that they will be running down while the player is infact active. So 6 months of active gametime will cost fuel rather than it costing 6 months of fuel foe protection off of an inactive player. Seems quite unfair to shackle an entire games population to fuelling just because of ppl abandoning base. Its the ppl who abandon that should be worrying about it not those who play.

[Wichall]

Okay this sounds good, the only reason I talk about griefing is that most of the anti-player moderation arguments bring up griefing as the issue behind this method.

I don't get why the fuel system is needed at all though, my favourite option is prestige based expiration dates.

[Dzchan94]

Well if you have friends willing to protect your stuff, then why not?

Not everyone is gonna have that, and thus get their plots erased. And why should the friend collect? You can easily leave 2 years worth of fuel, and just ask your friend to use it. You don't have to go out of your way to collect it, you can just use the fuel your friend left for you to use.