Other than analyzer type data and relic puzzles are identical. How about varying the puzzle content a bit between them.
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We need something new that wonāt become stale fast. Like generated not premade sites.
Shift into real exploration maybe. Not named sites on scanner, generated visuals background, findable cans to hack, real feel of something to explore to get riches instead hacker in space.
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This is really interesting.
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+1 for exploration agents! found a thread: https://forums-archive.eveonline.com/topic/248480/ that pretty much says what Iād like
"It would be great if there were some advanced exploration agents available offering only probing missions. Such as retrieve agent belongings trapped in w-hole or scan for agents stranded ship in system and repair it, etc."
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Yeah, I agree 100%.
Thereās quite a few of us who would like to see Exploration Agents added to the game.
What would an exploration agent add to the game, I donāt get it?
Just introducing more time sinks and complexity to something doesnāt make it better. If itās slower, reward must be better, and vice versa. Also fewer sites per time makes RNG feeling more unfair, because it takes you longer to profit from āaveragingā. With current hacking site mechanics it takes you ~4h of exploring to even out the RNG component.
Tie it into the lore and make a story out of it.
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It could add new missions requiring the player to utilize all the skills associated with Exploration, Combat and Logistics.
Obviously not everyone can envision the various content possibilities for that.
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I just want expansions again. They donāt do anything big anymore. They could do a big overhaul and expansion of wormhole stuff and other aspects of the game instead of these tiny tweaks every few days that donāt change anything really.
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I always picture explo missions as pulling up along side debris or monuments and such inside wormholes and getting out of your ship to rumage around in the dark ruins with a flashlight for relics.
Thereās an old Eve chronical where the characters were in spacesuits and rumaging around in a wreck or something in zero g and theyre going down pitch black corridors with frozen bodies and wreckage floating everywhere.
Reminded me of deadspace.
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Yeah, CCPās 2nd attempt to make WIS work was to have exploration dungeons for Avatar gameplay content. They could only get 2 or 3 Avatars to work within the same area which lagged a lot and whenever they tried to add another Avatar, the whole system would just crash.
As for Exploration Agent missions, they could give various missions that involved probing for specific objects, such as find a specific w-hole system, enter it and hack a can or repair a ship or deliver supplies to a station, etc.
Or send players to another system to scan for a site containing numerous cans and then hack a can there for a message in a bottle (container) which contains another location needing to be scanned for another message container needing to be hacked, which leads to another system, etc. Eventually it would lead back to the Agent.
Sorta like a āRound Robinā / āSeek and Secureā type of mission. However, unknown to the player, all the cans in each site contain message locations to different systems which are random spawns when the mission is generated, that way the mission canāt actually be documented for walk through guides. Could also have some of the message cans lead to a deadend site where the player is jumped by NPC rats.
The possibilities are endless, without having to incorporate overpowered NPC AI or requiring a fleet of player ships to complete.
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Nice ideas!
I recently made a blog post regarding PVE content improvements - just some ideas for missions and at the bottom of the article I have mentioned some Exploration Missions ideas.
Overall I do agree that exploration missions are something entirely possible and will be really nice to play.
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Good ideas. I,too, have suggested similar ideas before only to be informed that CCP āencouragesā group activities over any single player style content. Atm, EVE is in its death spiral which, sadly, has in the last 4 months greatly accelerated. Ahhh, but if they didā¦
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Nothing against some good story telling but relic and data sites are for collecting the stuff for t2 rigs and t2 module invention.
Those are pretty scarce since now everyone must fit t2 rigs on their keepstar and there are barely any materials left for ships to make.
I donāt know about you but a t2 large auxiliary pump costs as much as a t1 battleship these days.
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How about making big swathes of Null Sec non-occupiable.
Now that Null Sec is āoccupiedā, exploration by independent explorers is becoming un-viable.
I have been chased out of many āoccupiedā Null Sec systems. Not a whinge but a statement of fact.
I know I could join a Corp and be āsafeā but thatās not what I am after and I am happy with that, this is a sandbox after all.
Nevertheless, generating some new excellent exploration content that will most only make Big Corps richer seems counter-intuitive.
An unintended consequence of Null Sec system occupation is that the Big Corps can easily pop out of their nice player stations, set up gate camps etc without really having to apply much thought or planning, making these systems virtually no-go areas. Previously, they had to plan the operation and generally couldnāt maintain permanent occupation.
Just a thought to bring Null Sec back to the masses 
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That could work with Sansha Incursions. If the Incursion isnāt quelled by the Alliance, then that constellation becomes annexed from the Alliance Sov and becomes open space available for others to claim Sov.
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No that wouldnt work: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_UUHrMWh0A
Stain and Syndicate are not that small. Though competition is very high with exploration.
There are just a few things that are counter intuitive:
- 20kmĀ² grids
- insta-kill-trap citadels on all gates (because 5 billion NPC stations in all systems are not enough, so citadel spam online)
- people do not want to charge ātheirā pie with you
- people complain that they have nobody hunt down (iknowrite??)
elitatwo
All fair comments, which need to be thought about in the overall mix.
In my travels I have seen that there are considerably less pilots haunting/roaming Null Sec since the intro of Null Sec occupation. Consequently, there are dramatically less pilots to hunt. Big Corps canāt really complain that there are less pilots to hunt when they are responsible for running everyone out of Dodge.
I also agree, the Big Corps do not want to share ātheirā pie but what is being suggested is it shouldnāt be considered as ātheirā pie.
Just saying Null Sec is a different place with all the occupation / area claims / sov. As Drifter said, not a whinge, just a statement of fact.
CCP should not be developing content that will, on the whole, only be of most benefit to the Big Corps without first looking at the wider implications for the rest of the users.
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This would be an ideal way to help prevent the sites from being stale, it would/could also help stop one of the things that has always bugged me and that is āstandardā fits for sites.
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