I don’t think we would want to lock early players out of specialization - I think we would encourage them to specialize as early as possible - taking advantage of COGC, etc. I do agree that Fuel Refining should be merged into Resource Extraction.
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Yeah some buffs should be made if needed vs just removing it as a starter option.
Fuel should probably be its own topic though.
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As a newer player, I’d like to add my two cents. I agree with what lowstrife suggested. I played back in 2021 and ended up quitting because there was virtually no market liquidity for new players to meaningfully participate. Combined with the slow early-game progression, there just wasn’t much incentive to stick around.
I recently returned, and the improved coordination to support new players has helped a lot. That said, for someone who is completely new, simply trying the game without digging into the forums, I think retention will still be very low. Outside of basic goods, there isn’t much market liquidity, which makes it hard for new players to really engage with the economy.
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It highly depends on what cx you’re on how much liquidity there is. Moria and antares are substantially better than hortus\benten.
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In some ways, I wish new players would be funneled into Moria or Antares to make it easier for them - but this would match with my earlier proposal to have ‘points’ for bases - instead of a 1-1 HQ to base - and this would help ‘encourage’ senior players to leave the area and go to other places. But the player base just isn’t big enough to support four different CXs with enough liquidity that new players have ample volume.
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I think an interesting specialization mechanic could be reducing the area on bases for the players specialization. This would mean that players that lean into their specialization would see mainly a ppa advantage. Their profit margins would be the same as non-specialized players.
I dislike this. I think specialization should come from a base bonus applied. I think simply reworking the HQ system to provide meaningful benefits would go a LONG way to fixing this issue.
We could also merge this idea with my earlier idea about having an HQ Point system where bases away from the core would be cheaper to encourage players to slowly move out from the core - we could also say that the cost of a base on a planet with a COGC that matches your specialization the base is ‘cheaper’ in terms of points then a different base. 