New Player Experience Phase 1 Playtest

EVE Technology and Research Center Test Server Feedback
21

I had to stop partway through (sleepy), but this is what I gather from the test as a whole. I’m assuming this isn’t the complete New Player Experience system. Everything as it sits seems heavily geared toward people who already know how to play, and is likely a post-Aura tutorial from the experience we have now. I’m guessing this is in response to the fact that every other week in the Reddit ‘No Dumb Questions’ thread, there’s someone who just seems completely lost on ‘where to go’ next, despite Eve being the sandbox it is. This playtest seems less concerned with the actual experience of being a new player (since most of us aren’t new players) and more toward integrating Training as a category in the Agency’s Specify dropdown and making sure the flags can be started and created from nearly anywhere in New Eden.

I admit The Agency interface could use some cleaning up, but I’m beginning to see the merits in this. A light ‘Combat’ and ‘Industry’ tab is probably not going to be our only orange box tasks. Integrating into the Agency interface means that any task in New Eden, simple or complex as it may be, can have its own orange box task. Learning exploration? Orange box. Want to do Abyssal Deadspace? Orange box. Setting up an Upwell? Orange box. New event with weird mechanics? Orange box. Anything that could require the smallest semblance of handholding could have it’s information hand delivered to the Agency system, and this playtest seems mostly concerned with ensuring the tasks as they are laid out can be done anywhere (Even in Nullsec) and in anything (like a Corvette and only a Corvette). It creates the training sites when you initiate the task, it guides you in what you can do (vaguely) with what, and overall, and is a system that can be infinitely expanded upon without requiring newbies to stay in one area or use a specific ship, like some of the L1 mission paths.

It needs a metric ton of polish, and even the system as it sits has bugs, but the key factor of this new tutorial is that it can be expanded and be made more malleable with all the ways the system branches and converges on numerous points.

5 Likes
22

So I was in a cruiser, started the first mission and completed it in a random location 1.0,

  • moved me to fd-mlj docked
  • quit my caracal
  • pod to the second station to get the rookie ship
  • start the agency combat 1b mission, before the 1a
  • warp there kill few ship the warp out at 20% shield
  • enter a keepstar for repair
  • warp back to the site, no more mission
  • start it again, finish it at 20% armor, it never registered as finished
  • start the 1a, finish it, ok it is yellow done.
  • start the 1b again, finish it, still not registering the finish, it don’t spam the boss

What am I doing wrong? Also, tutorial doesn’t explain how to warp to, that you need to target a ship, that you need to approach it, or that you need to clic module to activate them. Maybe a video or arrow on the screen could help to understand how it work.

Skill book tuto is well done easily understandable, same goes for the falloff training it show how the thing work (maybe talking about the tactical overview?), tracking is also easily understood. It is also cool to receive a ship via the tutorial, I remember when I started, It took me days to get my first ship (above the rookie) and It got destroyed right away in low sec I didn’t know what it was, I was just following the lv1 transport mission and I ended up there, and got killed right there. I almost quit eve because of this, it was too much effort to get a ship.

The fitting mission has to happen in a station Aura says, but you allow to activate it in a raitaru, or a keep star. I redeemed the stuff there but Aura doesn’t let me continue the mission, it says I’ve to be in a station. So I assembled the ship, put everything in it and moved to a station. I know how this work but if I was new I would have been lost. Now in the station, aura tell me to open the fitting windows but no arrow show me where it is.

For side quest, 1b, 2a, 2b, 3b, 4b, 6a not yellowing and 6b showed an error message “failedtoactivatemission” the second time he let me activate it, Aura tell me to warp to it but no warp coordinate are provided. When I enter a station, I receive a notification saying it was finished and is now yellowed.

Now I started the mining mission, but since the test is in 0.0, there are big npc out there. I’m in the frig you got with the fight tutorial and I can’t do anything against them. I’m at mission 2 mining veldspar.

Blocked at mission 5 of the mining carer, I brought the mineral from the market, I’ve the quantity but the mission does pass to yellow. Test finish I can’t go to the next step.

Also, hit point on the fighting career are way under what is found in the universe, I was in front of big ship I could kill in the rookie ship, when I started mining I found the same shiptype in the belt but those where the real deal, a beginner might associate ship icon to power they encounter in the tutorial but when in front of the real deal get destroyed cause it is not the same hit point. Maybe more text to explain the difference?

1 Like
23

Industry part 9 - mine and build a venture.

Well, I mined some but bought most of the minerals, 1 & a half hours to build.

But the instructions on the side say buy a venture, which I also did. This does not complete the section. Unknown if it will complete with the manufacture of a venture, still over an hour to go on making it.

1 Like
24

For now I have played only in combat career and made a few notes. I’ve submitted EBR-157617 with play session in-game log with multiple issues. Started new character for full experience, so no FD-MLJ, just usual starter systems.

Some confusing\game breaking stuff:

  • Missions 1a, 2a, 2b, 3b, 4b completion flag was never registered so it was impossible to complete them
  • Mission 6a failed to register “Warp to mission” step so it was impossible to complete
  • Mission 6b triggered error on selection and borked whole combat career
  • it’s possible to abuse redeeming system in mission 5 and spawn unlimited amount of items, by switching between mission 5 and other available mission.
  • On session change (jumping between systems) I’ve noticed objective UI and sound effect duplication. Could be confusing.

Some other notes:

  • Missions 1a\1b\3b\3a are really tough for new player. NPC’s hit hard and you need to act fast, use AB, think fast to not die there. If this is a ploy to teach new players about death concept, it will work well. If not - make adjustments. If you spawn new player corvette with AB fitted anyway, why not spawn it with some other helpful civilian modules as well? Civilian modules are horrible but repair module and damage control could help a lot!

  • Mission 4 “finally” teaches us about afterburner concept. But in order to not die in those hard initial missions, player must have been using AB already so it looks kind of pointless at this stage.

  • Also 4 stage asks player to locate “Home” station but this concept was never explained. What is a home station? When I triggered this message I was in neighboring (to my starter system which is presumably considered as my home?) system and Aura message asked me to locate my home in overview. But it was wrong system to locate my “home”… Most commonly players locate their home via assets window (ALT+T). You could mention that or implement another more obvious way.

  • Stage 5 as mentioned previously could be exploited with infinite redeeming. But that is not even main issue here. The choice for redeemed items is strange. If you spawn goodies for new players, you could at least spawn some useful fittings. I played Minmatar and system only gave me 2 turrets for my Rifter (and rifter can fit 3) and 200 pcs of unpopular ammo (200 pcs is not enough if you confused or slow). Players may have to rely on redeeming exploit to get one more turret and more ammo. So please think about this, pick some basic fit examples from here and add useful items to redeeming.

  • Speaking about new player excitement, those combat missions are extremely dull and boring, and non-existent loot and weak rewards only add to that feeling. You probably removed loot from those training sleepers in the past, leaving just metal scraps and Civilian Afterburner for some reason but it’s time to change that and add generic loot table at least. I won’t even rant about other games with random loot - imagine you starting in PoE, for example, and THE only loot you got in Act I will be that skill gem and nothing else. Truly “Welcome to Eve Online. Here’s a rubik’s cube, go ■■■■ yourself.” (not like it’s a bad thing)

  • Mission 6 completes abruptly without any reward or Aura feedback, leaving player with “meh” feeling. Compare this to old career agents with useful loot, free ships and Destroyer end reward :expressionless:

  • And last thing for now related to UI. Maybe it’s just me but I’m always trying enabling those tasks by clicking on imaginary rectangle (on task text basically) - that is consistent behavior with Agency tasks. But the game only recognizes clicks on small icon, ignoring clicks on text:

image

4 Likes
25

I liked the storyline approach FAR better. This ‘Agency’ version is useful for someone that has tried before. I would strongly recommend including both approaches to new players.

Using cruiser to attack and then leaving the wrecks with scrap is just evil. WHY AREN’T you teaching new players to check wrecks for valuable items???

As above the “Agency” is so slow and bad at searching, plus I can see little reason for even employing it in the first place. Seems like someone is attempting to ensure job security with this crap. I hate it, and if it continues to expand, I shall go back into retirement until agency disappears…

I’d dropping any further effort, due to the agency

3 Likes
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Thanks for taking the time to check this out, guys. We really appreciate the effort and feedback.

4 Likes
27

I had to get it to the DEVs somewhere but did not know were if there is a place tell me for next time. I would prefer that the bug with the Omega/Alpha should stay and be aloud for all to use as it is one thing that could be used if used right (for example 2 Alphas for every 1 omega on) to help in the same way other restrictions have.

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Did you fix the agency before getting this idea?

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Industry 5 - I think Aura should suggest new players to get Mexallon from either Plagioclase or Kernite instead of just Plag. Amarr highsec don’t have it and I can imagine some newbies could get a bad impression because of that.

Industry 7,8,9 - I second fellow tester’s concern that telling new players to wait for 12 minutes is not a good way to keep them playing.

Aura could’ve suggest them to do something else in the meantime, or alternatively, let new player make civilian modules with production time of 2 minutes or so, then reward them with Miner I or whatever they meant to produce in current builds.

Also, Aura should point out if the station that player currently docked in don’t have factory, or people would have to constantly do it in Rookie Help :confused:

1 Like
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I agree, I have no complaints about the integration into the agency. It was very good.

I think I took the test too literally. Were it was more of a UI test of the integration of new things into the agency.

Thanks for clearing that up

1 Like
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I already got stuck in a bugged loophole in combat mission 1b. After having to repair, it wouldn’t let me rewarp to the mission location, although UI said I could. On the second try Aura incorrectly claimed all waves defeated while I had bug off to repair, which is just confusing as hell.
And if you’re a SP maxed-out alpha you can’t finish mission 2, which requires you to train skills, which is end of the line of the tutorial.

Very poorly thought out and very mediocre NPE I must say. Dry, boring, buggy text missions that simply don’t belong in a triple A game in 2018. Why-oh-why isn’t there at least a voice-over for Aura to make all this ultra-dry stuff at least somewhat engaging for the average newbro?

2 Likes
32

I’m going to try not to repeat a lot of what has been said here, but with the combat missons there are definitely some bugs with mission completion (the requirement to dock at the end of each mission in order to complete seems like a lot of unnecessary travel, but I can see the benefit of drilling the habit of docking-up for new players.

Yes, as experienced players one of the first things we’re going to do is too fit better modules and blitz through these sites. But new players aren’t going to know how to do that from the get-go, unless they spend a lot of time doing research before hand.

I have made a YouTube video of my attempts through the mass-test on SiSi, which can be seen here: https://youtu.be/ylIfJqkoHE8

My general feedback points are:

  • Good pace, overall, and good practice.
  • Introduce armor repairers or shield boosters a little earlier, for survivability
  • I would accelerate the introduction to fitting by introducing fitting concepts as part of the combat chain (maybe build out an additional set of these kinds of Agency mission chains to teach these fundamentals)
  • I actually like that these missions aren’t voice-acted, if only for the fact that when I’m recording I don’t need to tell Aura to STFU while I’m talking
  • Make it so you don’t have to dock to complete the individual sprints

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Cheers,
Jurius Doctor

1 Like
33

Industry gone

1b did not complete

2a completed but after the first wave but did not update on the agency until agency closed and re-opened

3b completed – no completion by aura (tried twice) – says different sizes of ships too, but all are cruiser size (sleeper medium wrecks) and how can a newbie tell the difference of weapon damage in a corvette? Might be better with stationary targets of different size

part 4 – says warp to training site, not clear you are changing system - upon killing the fast moving target, aura says dock at home station. But we have just changed system – poorly written and no explanation of where your home station is.

4a and 4b seem optional as you are told to dock I did so and got redeemable items for part 5 is about fitting ship

4a get them to dock to repair damage before going to 4b

part 5 just says fit the guns, nothing about unfitting afterburner from old vessel and fitting on new

part 6 – need afterburner – loot from NPC resist 1 to 4 each dropped civilian afterburner I – seems kinda pointless loot

6a killed all targets - did not complete. If you restart it it does not give you a site to warp too

6b killed all targets – did not complete – completed when I docked in my home station. If this is needed, it needs a clearer explanation.

1 Like
34

To me, that sounds like asteroids and their locations need reworked. Something, I think miners have been asking for for a while in one way or another.

35

Please mirror the server so new accounts can join. Thank you!

36

Damn you CCP Habakuk for making me learn how to post on the forums.

Ok, now that that gripe is out of the way. A few issues with the NPE.

1: The Seeker Retainer enemies are too hardcore for a rookie fit corvette in groups. They try and keep at a distance well outside civilian rail range, and have pretty good application. Moving into range of them causes them to split up and thus you will take a lot of damage running them all down. This is most obvious in the tutorial mission 1b, though it can happen in others (3a comes to mind)

2: The popup hint box that highlights certain mission items (run NPE combat mission 2 to get an idea of what I mean) is highly irritating and blocks a large portion of the view. There needs to be some way to close these, since they slide around the screen as you move and turn the camera, and they get extremely irritating.

3: I am not sure sleepers are the lore friendly way to run these sites. The sheer number of sleeper facilities, and sleeper drones in these sites would be suggestive of a larger issue except in wormhole space where they are to be expected. Perhaps it would be more thematic and fitting to replace these assets with “Agency Training Drones” or “Orphan Space Puppies” or some such.

4: You should provide an afterburner with the frigate you give the player in mission 5. 6, 6a, and 6b all have a lot of slowboating.

1 Like
37

If you need additional information about EVE. F12 - Tutorial videos tab.

Add this somewhere in NPE.

2 Likes
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@CCP_Sledgehammer

NPC’s are still doing insane amount of damage (from rookie perspective)
Main perpetrators in those hard missions are these NPC’s:

NPEAdditionalWeakFrigate aka Seeker Retainer
NPEAdditionalCruiser aka Seeker Escort

I’ve recorded short demo in 1b mission (build 1364574) and, as you can see, if new player wont use AB all the time (and he learns about AB usage only in mission 4) or hesitate for a second, he will die.

https://youtu.be/2zJtriDM6w8

2 Likes
39

Just wanted to drop in and thank you all for your efforts and feedback!

2 Likes
40

Just wanted to note that I reran 1b after I noticed that there had been a patch to the test server, and the balance of that encounter is now much better. My rookie fit Ibis didn’t get below half shields.

I am also glad that the big blue popup hint-box goes away when Auras tutorial message does now.