8/15/2017 Topic: We pushed Orbital Megastructures for Testing Hutton	That was me. I timed out while writing it. Another thought, and this probably won't be very popular because people hate it when you pare back options they already have, is that Monolith's and Dreadnaughts should be taken away from planetbound shipyards and be exclusive to orbital shipyards. Maybe even seperate that function out from starbases which sound really powerful already. Atmospherically it would make sense that the biggest ships can't land on a planet and should have to be laid down in an orbital yard. (And maybe only get a repair bonus in an orbital drydock). This would also make running a bussiness as a shipyard more viable because corps that wanted an oversized fleet would have to turn to a third party. Remember when Xenotech was trying to run a shipyard buissiness in the first month. I think that started to fall apart as everyone got more established with their own shipyards and research stations.
8/15/2017 Topic: Options for "Raiding" Items/Artifacts Hutton	I think you are on the right track. The civilian structures SHOULD take damage while there is defensive military present because you expect the defenders to use those civilian structures for cover and to set up ambushes in. But once they retreat or get wiped out the the civilian structures should stop taking collateral damage because there are no primary target for the raiders to keep shooting at. If the attackers goal is to destroy the civilian structures they should just mount a regular assault instead of a raid. The idea of taking over structures makes sense from the immersion perspective. Game balance-wise though that seems like a real pandora's box. If this were still pre-launch I would say go for it, that sounds like a better game mechanic than not having it. Now I'm hesitant to encourage you to do something that might incentivize a lot of chaos that could disrupt the experience of a bunch of players that are only a month in and are just now getting comfortable managing their little empire.
8/15/2017 Topic: We pushed Orbital Megastructures for Testing Hutton	Another idea to make orbital shipyards a viable bussiness venture: allow ships parked at the megastructure to be mothballed. This would allow a corp that is trying to make a go as a ship builder to maintain a stock of ships to sell without getting killed by the upkeep of idle ships.
8/17/2017 Topic: We pushed Orbital Megastructures for Testing Hutton	Maybe it's just me, but it seems to me that the starbase and orbital gun as described are redundant. They do essentially the same thing, just calculate the bonus differently. The rail gun might be more efficient if you are spreading your forces to guard a lot of positions without allies across a planet, and the starbase will be more efficient if between you and your allies you have units concentrated at the important positions. One will probably get built nearly all of the time and the other barely at all, depending on how the meta shakes out. (My guess would be star bases most of the time). I think your missing an opportunity to make star bases a real tool for planetary sovereignty rather than just a higher end orbital gun.
8/17/2017 Topic: Artifacts and ships Hutton	I would say that Scouts, Corvettes and Freighters should be A1 and Frigates, Destroyers and Carriers should be A5s. The only thing you would put a metaphysical on a carrier for is hitpoints, and that would only add a thousand hitpoints. 1000 hitpoints doesn't justify an AX. Maybe you would put an upkeep bonus on a Warp Carrier, but after looking at the cost of producing a single AX Metaphysics artifact from a level 10 Research Base on Coppell (just shy of half a billion $) I can see that it would take 39,323 turn to recover that investment by installing it on a level 10 Warp Carrier. It would only take 7865 turns to recover your investment if Carriers used A5s.
8/17/2017 Topic: We pushed Orbital Megastructures for Testing Hutton	If it was used as a platform to project power by deploying your forces to protect the entire planet at once, that would be a tool an Emperor could use to exert control and assert sovereignty over a planet. The Emperor would still have to maintain a powerful force on the starbase because it wasn't getting a bonus from the base (although a bonus would be had if orbital guns were deployed in a different quadrant) but they would be able to use that force to either defend the entire planet, as opposed to stationing a few units in every city they wanted to protect. Alternatively, if there was a trouble maker bouncing around the planet, the emperor wouldn't have to guess what city they where going to harass next and could just attack that corp on the whole planet. The Emperor could also intercept artifacts of mass destruction if they knew a certain corp had a ship barreling towards their planet with one on board by ordering units on the base to attack that corp over the entire planet. (That mechanic right there could be the blockade mechanic if you could apply it with a checklist of corps instead of only being able to attack a single corp or guild. Rather than a chase down mechanic you just let the units stationed on the base attack and defend as if they occupy the whole planet coordinate, which I assume would be easier to implement than a chase). The utility of that force would still be limited by how much damage it could absorb under normal circumstances, because even though it might be intercepting a lot more threats it would still be taking the same damage from all of them. Assuming good the Emperor is the one that owns the star base. It might be an ally of the Emperor or a private corp building it as part of their campaign for Emperor. I'll reiterate another proposal I had that offices like Mayor or Emperor get a pool of military logistics to go with them. The office holder can transfer units into that logistics pool, but if they lose the office the units go to their successor. That way you can end up with assets like starbases or fleets that essentially belong to the planetary government.
8/19/2017 Topic: Negative products Hutton	I somehow have -20,682 Precious Minerals in New York right now.
8/19/2017 Topic: Negative products Hutton	Might have been selling it when it went below. Not sure.
8/21/2017 Topic: Spaceport Hutton	Also, the power of air units in your hanger isn't counting towards blockading the orbital location.
9/10/2017 Topic: Galactic News Network Hutton	Where do I send my subscription?
9/10/2017 Topic: Daily quests Hutton	Maybe community goals, like in Elite: Dangerous.
3/19/2018 Topic: Spaceport mechanic overhaul Hutton	This proposed mechanic might provide a buffer against the wild booms and busts that still seem to be plaguing Earth.
3/20/2018 Topic: Spaceport mechanic overhaul Hutton	Hello, City Manager. About six months, I think.
3/26/2018 Topic: Violation by Sore Cogs & Dragons Gear Hutton	The above “guest” remark is from me.
3/27/2018 Topic: Violation by Sore Cogs & Dragons Gear Hutton	I want to parse out a couple of things. Baldur should play the way he wants and, as players, we shouldn’t try to undermine his fun by saying he’s doing it wrong. Maybe you find this loophole he’s found to operate off the radar is a little unsettling and feel like you need to throw a monkey wrench into his growth to hedge against the threat he might become to you. (That’s the kind of a risk/reward decision making opportunity that makes a game interesting). That is how you choose to play and no one should yuck your yum either here in the forums when we are communicating with each other as players. I think it’s acceptable to fling insults and even mount nonsensical criticisms in the Comms when trying to justify your attacks in character. Case in point: that Baldur is not being a good corporate citizen because he is hoarding his wealth instead of investing in the economy. One of the abstractions of the BoE economy is that spending money in a city is acutually detrimental to it’s growth, so the suggestion that he’s somehow doing harm by hoarding his wealth is absurd on its face. But that doesn’t mean it’s not a good excuse in character in the Comms because it rings true. The politicking and saber rattling in Comms is a lot like the Baron Munchausen game, (https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/2470/extraordinary-adventures-baron-munchausen), where we are all making up pretexts to justify our belligerent actions and trying to trip up each other’s pretexts with exquisitely contorted logic. The better you are at inventing a good pretext, the more slack the rest of the player base will cut you when you start acting up. The problem with proxy accounts is that the guidelines are nebulous, so everyone has their own interpretation. I understand why they are nebulous. People will figure out loopholes in any list of do’s and don’ts that Dr. Dread tries to set in stone, and he doesn’t want to be draconian with players screwing around occasionally. (Even if he did start swinging a ban hammer around, that would only take away their progress. How do you stop someone from opening a new free account or borrowing their mom’s credit card for another paid account). So the guideline is abuse; which ,like pornography, isn’t easily defined by specific actions but most of us will know it when we see it. It’s someone having their fun at the expense of someone else’s fun. (That doesn’t mean beating someone else in a fight is abuse. The danger of losing your corporation in a fight and tension that comes from fear of bigger corporations is an important ingredient for your fun, whether you realize it or not). It’s engaging in behavior that is going to harm the game because it is alienating players who would not rage quit after a fair fight. But your metric for abuse might be different if you’re the one that just lost a fight you should have won or should have been close because the other guy pushed the envelope farther than you did. It reminds me of a George Carlin bit about driving on the freeway. Everyone in front of you going slower than you are is an idiot, and everyone passing you is a maniac. But of course no one is going the exact same speed you are so the world is just full of idiots and maniacs. I had said earlier that I thought that the pirate faction would be a cool mechanic, but not as a substitute for proxy wars. After thinking about though, I realized it might kind of legitimize the whole mechanic. If I can anonymously send pirates after you, why would you complain about the more labor intensive and probably less efficient act of building and running a proxy corp to attack you. It would just be a more roundabout and interesting way of doing something built into the mechanics.
4/6/2018 Topic: Violation by Sore Cogs & Dragons Gear Hutton	I agree. If it’s going to be left up to the community to set it’s own standards by consensus, there needs to be tools to enforce that consensus. Something a little more fair than “might makes right.” Although I think a better solutions would be to figure out some balance mechanics so that running a proxy doesn’t provide you with a strategic advantage other than a veil of secrecy. Are reparations gone now? Did anything take their place? Reparations were an incentive to wage proxy wars because they insulated your corporation from reparations against your total net worth. Is their any other reason to run a second corporation other than subterfuge now? I guess it expands your logistics if you invest the time and money into leveling up the second corporation, but that is going to be a lost investment, assuming you are going to disband the Corp once it’s cover is blown and your war is over.

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