Improving the insurance system

[Cyka]

Right now it feels really useless, you get some money back but late game materials are far more important. In Elite once insured you get everything back which is great even if you made a mistake, here it slaps you some money and you have to go back grinding all those materials for hours, you cant even use those money to buy your material back since resource tradeposts have such a low level of stock and does not respawn resources.

 

I'd rather the insurance price be 4x as current and actually get all my materials back so i can rebuild my ship. It'd also make the regular payments a viable money sink.

[Shrooblord]

I like the concept. But how do you explain this? Credits I can see being sent via an "e-mail"; it's literally virtual currency and it's just wired to you, plain-as. Registers updated: boom - the system acknowledges you have more money now. But materials? How do you teleport those aboard through an "e-mail"?

 

Fluff aside, I see value in this idea. It is a bit of a nuisance to go get all the materials back after an unfortunate run-in with a ... giga cannon. Maybe the % of materials you get back should be scaled with the availability of the material? I can imagine Space Insurance Company MK Ultra doesn't stock up on 1,000,000 Avorion to refund you for your all-Avorion build you lost to unfortunate... giga cannon accidents, but perhaps a build with 40,000 Iron could easily be refunded for all its materials. After all, Avorion and the less obviously amazing materials are supposed to be scarcer and harder to come by, and I think an insurance firm that somehow has a massive stockpile of these things sort of defeats the purpose of that idea.

[Cyka]

I like the concept. But how do you explain this? Credits I can see being sent via an "e-mail"; it's literally virtual currency and it's just wired to you, plain-as. Registers updated: boom - the system acknowledges you have more money now. But materials? How do you teleport those aboard through an "e-mail"?

 

Fluff aside, I see value in this idea. It is a bit of a nuisance to go get all the materials back after an unfortunate run-in with a ... giga cannon. Maybe the % of materials you get back should be scaled with the availability of the material? I can imagine Space Insurance Company MK Ultra doesn't stock up on 1,000,000 Avorion to refund you for your all-Avorion build you lost to unfortunate... giga cannon accidents, but perhaps a build with 40,000 Iron could easily be refunded for all its materials. After all, Avorion and the less obviously amazing materials are supposed to be scarcer and harder to come by, and I think an insurance firm that somehow has a massive stockpile of these things sort of defeats the purpose of that idea.

 

You can already send materials via mail from player to player, i don't see why cant they refund us all the materials to remake our ship. I mean elite dangerous is known for its grind but even that gives player EVERYTHING BACK including the modules, where as here your credit is worthless when you have to regrind materials AND find your ship again for those modules. Just send us all the stuff by mail and call it a day.

I mean avorion is scarce sure but insurance company are from factions that shares a huge chunk of the galaxy, their resources would be near limitless if you want to go to lore about it. Make insurance worth it and expensive, but dont just give us credits because unless youre in a tiny iron ship or something, pass the 100k materials and is worthless.

[Shrooblord]

Nah I agree: only Credits isn't enough. But I feel like System Module Upgrades should still drop. After all, there has to be a little fun in killing other players' ships... >:D

[Cyka]

Nah I agree: only Credits isn't enough. But I feel like System Module Upgrades should still drop. After all, there has to be a little fun in killing other players' ships... >:D

 

PVP is just another mess, bottem line is PVP is basically griefing if you dont have a fair system on both sides, which we sadly dont have.

 

Big salvagetable wreckages runs out, claimable asteriods are taken, the older players with their million material avorion ship camp 0.0 so good luck getting anything worthwhile to fight them.

 

By comparison, 4 million avorion ship give you 4 million hull+shield, while 4million Xanion gives barely 2million.

[Sir Charles]

I really don't like this idea.

I know the server problems you're talking of exactly but just giving you money is exactly what an insurance is supposed to do. Where is the risk of approaching into battle when you can just get everything back by your ensurance, especially your modules.

 

Does stealing modules from other players even work? When i tried to loot a players shipwreck i wasn't able to get even a single one because the were all fixed there, waiting for the player who would never ever come back for them.

 

I would like to suggest another idea: What if shipyards would have the option to build a ship for an insane amount of money, but only money. Then you could simply take the money from your insurance and make a shipyard build a new ship, wich you could then transform into the ship you lost in building mode. The result would be the same, but this way it would just feel a little more realistic to me. It would also fix the ressource depot issue since you could just buy a ship and then delete it in building mode to get the ressources, transforming money into ressources. Because of this the cost should be really high i think so minig and salvaging will still be more profitable in the long run. Mabye this could even be avaiable only if you lost you ship and got insurance...

 

I hope this fits with your wishes :)

[Cyka]

I really don't like this idea.

I know the server problems you're talking of exactly but just giving you money is exactly what an insurance is supposed to do. Where is the risk of approaching into battle when you can just get everything back by your ensurance, especially your modules.

 

Does stealing modules from other players even work? When i tried to loot a players shipwreck i wasn't able to get even a single one because the were all fixed there, waiting for the player who would never ever come back for them.

 

I would like to suggest another idea: What if shipyards would have the option to build a ship for an insane amount of money, but only money. Then you could simply take the money from your insurance and make a shipyard build a new ship, wich you could then transform into the ship you lost in building mode. The result would be the same, but this way it would just feel a little more realistic to me. It would also fix the ressource depot issue since you could just buy a ship and then delete it in building mode to get the ressources, transforming money into ressources. Because of this the cost should be really high i think so minig and salvaging will still be more profitable in the long run. Mabye this could even be avaiable only if you lost you ship and got insurance...

 

I hope this fits with your wishes :)

 

If shipyard can actually spend the money we got from insurance to actually rebuild our ship then i agree. But the purpose of insurance is exactly as it suggest. Right now materials trump credits because you cant spend credits to get adequate amount of materials from resource depots, which becomes obsolete late game when your carrier mining is mining 40k materials a minute and a single fighter cost more than what resource depot can offer.

 

Just by giving money but no use to anything else fails the fundamental aspect that is insurance - to ensure player's investment is rewarded. When you pay just 50 million out of your late game 2 bil bank, your ship thats made of millions of material is worth at least 10x the money insurance pays you. In elite they make insurance expensive but worth it, not a noob trap, you'd be stupid to not fly without one, but it gives EVERYTHING BACK should you die, this would ensure PVP happens on occasions because players wont chicken out because they'd lose nearly everything and have to grind again, not to mention PVP isnt a big thing in the game anyway.

 

I dont understand how is it a risk vs reward when you are purposely gimping the player with the insurance system, why should i bother to pay 50 mil when it is easier to just switch to a different server or start a new game when i wont get anything back if i die? i might as well spent that money on 2 miners who will get me those resources. Whats 200 million to me when you can do that in one trade run late game? but getting millions of material is another story...

 

If you insist on somehow it only give us pure credit, make resource depot actually worth a while to purchase materials from, it'd be an excellent credit sink too, make shipyards cost only credits (but in large-amount) to build ships as an option, so we aren't so punished when we lose our ship. Remember, this is just ONE ship, ideally in a faction war you'd lose a few of those in a large battle, the current insurance system does not support that in any sense, nor is it functioning as "an insurance".

 

If you need difficulty, gimping the player is not the way to go. You offer difficulty by making challenging and engaging enemies and giving player plenty of options to chose from, so gimping insurance is a bad way to balance the game. What this game needs is stronger enemies and endgame, where faction wars would definitely cost player a lot of investments and strategic thoughts, but not so punishing it makes the player want to give up from trying.

 

[Nachtu]

Whats 200 million to me when you can do that in one trade run late game?

 

A bit off topicky here but... How?

 

I think insurances should be more specific. Insurance against asteroid collisions? Basic trader insurance against pirate ambushes? An insurance for your trade goods or system upgrades/turrets? But really, if were talking about insurance working as a real insurance would, then what kind of an insurance company would issue even the current kind of insurance if it's meant for a whole battleship? How profitable could that be would depend on factors the insurance company cannot possibly know. Will the player take the ship to endgame battles at sector 0,0 or just assign it to endless and safe defending duty in a friendly sector?

 

Essentially insurance is the company and client betting against each other, so the conditions and chances in the bet would have to be considered somehow.

 

And battleship insurance gets pretty unprofitable real fast  ;D

[Cyka]

Whats 200 million to me when you can do that in one trade run late game?

 

A bit off topicky here but... How?

 

I think insurances should be more specific. Insurance against asteroid collisions? Basic trader insurance against pirate ambushes? An insurance for your trade goods or system upgrades/turrets? But really, if were talking about insurance working as a real insurance would, then what kind of an insurance company would issue even the current kind of insurance if it's meant for a whole battleship? How profitable could that be would depend on factors the insurance company cannot possibly know. Will the player take the ship to endgame battles at sector 0,0 or just assign it to endless and safe defending duty in a friendly sector?

 

Essentially insurance is the company and client betting against each other, so the conditions and chances in the bet would have to be considered somehow.

 

And battleship insurance gets pretty unprofitable real fast  ;D

 

a gigantic military outpost cost around 50 million credit and 1 million resource to build, it will hold countless expensive commodies for sale, easily giving you 150 million per run, on top of a few max upgraded Noble mines which gives around 500k per cargo hauler. Factory chain is also good for that money too.

 

It seems alot but it isnt if you maintaining multiple ship and factories.

[Sir Charles]

 

I think insurances should be more specific. Insurance against asteroid collisions? Basic trader insurance against pirate ambushes? An insurance for your trade goods or system upgrades/turrets?

 

That is a great idea, there should be a menu to chose what kind of insurance you want, adjusting the cost accordingly. Like suggested before, cost should be permanent intervalls added to crew payment or something like that.

 

An insurance giving you back your materials wouldbe fine for me in that case since the problem with shipyards building ships for just money makes it just to easy to get materials, like "Hey, i need 20 million xanion, lets just trade some body armour and by this shit!"

 

If a mechanic like that is added to the game, balance will be broken forever...

[Shrooblord]

the problem with shipyards building ships for just money makes it just to easy to get materials, like "Hey, i need 20 million xanion, lets just trade some body armour and by this shit!"

If a mechanic like this would be implemented, an obvious way to balance it would be to not have Shipyards own infinite materials of every type. They'd have a stock, like a Resource Depot - but they would probably have a little more stock than a RD considering they're constantly building ships (in theory - in practice right now, they do nothing much until a player moseys on by). Material inventory could also depend on the region in the galaxy and the current state of that Faction's economy.

 

Honestly I like the idea. And there are plenty of ways to balance it to make it not broken to the core.

[Sir Charles]

Just another idea:

 

It would be great to have the insurance rise up its cost everytime it is actually paid to the player, getting lower again if there is no incident for long time, like a real insurance would do.

[Cyka]

To be honest the insurance valuation system is seriously broken right now, if it is fixed as intended and paid as intended then rebuild from shipyard wouldnt seem so OP then.

 

My current ship has 4million avorion, 1million Xanion and 75 million credit to build with a few thousand elite crew. Together this will worth about 1.1 billion credits easily, yet how much does my money get back from insurance? 250 million, thats just pathetic, that doesnt even cover my materials. The ship's worth is vastly higher than what current insurance pay back can offer. Now if the pay back does scale properly, then rebuilding that ship should cost at least 1.1 billion credit and an hour from shipyards using the rebuilt from shipyard idea, and 1.1 billion credit is HECK alot to grind, so this doesnt seem to be too op then.

[Sir Charles]

Hm...

sounds good in my oppinion.

 

So should we open a suggestion thread for this?

[Cyka]

Hm...

sounds good in my oppinion.

 

So should we open a suggestion thread for this?

 

I dunno, suggestion section seems pretty dead so im posting here for some visibility.

 

Tbh alot of stuff in this game seems broken right now because the economy doesnt have many credit sinks that helps player's convenience. I installed Rusty server's mods and is having a blast right now, those permanent mines cost a heck (800milion lmao) but gives alot of materials passively. Also since traders are finally fixed, i can build a factory without the pre-requisite which makes it another credit sink for turret materials. If we can fix insurance and make it actually matter then it should cost at least 250mil + for my current avorion ship, which makes periodic payments alot more attractive.