A griefer is someone whose pure intention is to bully someone to quit the game.
Unhealthy pvp is where the intention is not to get the targets to quit but they do so nevertheless.
Unhealty pve is where pvp'rs quit (due not being able to pvp at all). Some games have enough pve content to sustain pve only, but Starbase does not, so SB can have unhealthy pve as well.
Healthy pvp and pve feed from the mix and no-one quits since they understand and agree the risks. Note that in a healthy situation a lot of toxic players, especially griefers, need to be banned or otherwise shut out of the community. So healthy game may also see a lot of unhealthy people to leave first, but often when the healthy pvp starts to work the unhealthy pvp players return too, despite that they have promised to never return.
Those who have negative or no effect to the development often use personal experience and very demanding tone, personal attacks and calling out the devs for any negative experience they might have had, or even lack of experiences. They know everything as a fact and can tell how the game is dead beyond revival. They also take everything I say or do personally, which doesn't make sense since I'm definitely not developing the game with one person in mind. So I do my best to ignore such people, as they are only hindering progress, not contributing to it.
By your definitions:
We can all agree, using your terms, griefers are not good for the game. Also, by your definitions, people engaging in PvP inside the acceptable in-game design are not griefers by virtue of attacking people, their reasons for doing so --outside of an explicit attempt at getting someone to quit-- being irrelevant. Again, by your own definition.
Unhealthy PvP being where the intention isn't to make someone quit, but the targets quit regardless. Is that the fault of the game / attacking players or the people being attacked? If you get sieged, lose your station, and quit the game because of it -- I suppose station sieges are "unhealthy PvP," by your definitions? If someone just ends up quitting because they get mad beacuse they realize they aren't very good at PvP, is that unhealthy? It's concerning that the definition here kind of correlates to, in essence, making sure people's feelings don't get hurt / they don't have a bad time. The highs and the lows -- risk and reward -- isn't that a big point of gaming, and PvP in general?
Unhealthy PvE being where PvP players quit due to being unable to PvP at *all* is a reach. I'd actually define unhealthy PvE as mechanics that hamstring PvP to the point of relegating it to a red headed stepchild, or a little backroom arcade mini-game. Overly protecting people and being helicopter parents and holding their hands constantly. Design elements or features that are unnecessarily suppressive and rigid, making the ability to PvP become prohibitive outside of a few select channels ala a WoW battleground: that's unhealthy PvE.
If Unhealthy X is correlated to players leaving, the question is, outside of missing mechanics, is it unhealthy PvE or unhealthy PvP that has playercounts down from 9k to 1k? Is PvP viable, feasible, have impact, and widespread? Is it suppressed, difficult to find, rare, and of little substance? Which one of those two statements are true, while we've seen nearly a 90% player count loss? Naturally, unhealthy elements of both are contributing, but my attempt here is to give counterbalance to the vibes I'm getting in this thread, that
@Vanidar has called out as well.
The most important part of your post:
Healthy pvp and pve feed from the mix and no-one quits since they understand and agree the risks
People will quit. You will lose players. Defining what's "healthy" and quantifying it by whether or not people quit is odd. I think you mean "financially viable," not "healthy." A lot of people play Clash of Clans, is that healthy game design? P2W interaction is healthy because numbers were high for a long time? Regardless, your point that people should be informed and educated about risks before making them, absolutely. That's why there are safe zones and warnings when you leave it and alarms and little boxes you need to uncheck before leaving the safe zone. That dynamic is already present in game, and understandably so.
The entire tone of the OP, the way "griefers" or "basement dwellers" seem to be used interchangeably and synonmously with players who prefer a risk vs reward PvP playstyle, and gatekeeping "real" PvP, and your relative level of agreement, is interesting, to say the least. I've seen posts like this before, and it seems like people seem to think "real" PvP is basically arranged duels, or large roleplaying fleets, where everyone shows up with stuff they don't care about losing -- then, you shoot for a bit, and go home. No real risk, no real threats, no real loss. That certainly is *a* way to design things. We'll see what path you guys choose, but the general vibe in this thread seems like the play here is an adoption of the mechanics that ensure there aren't very many lows -- but without lows, the highs aren't the same.
I'm not one to call out issues and not propose solutions, though:
A gradient system is something I hope gets to be considered. Other games, like Eve, have successfully used this to appease all groups and make sure people don't quit -- which seems to be the goal here. Eos --> Elysium --> Moon X --> Moon Y --> etc, a gradient of available and desireable materials and resources that correlate with smaller and smaller safe zones, until eventually there are none, and safety comes from your Company and your power projection. If you want "epic" battles, politics, things like that, as well as the ability to appease multiple groups and let them decide where they feel comfortable falling on the gradient instead of this childish back and forth, it's something to consider. This approach, however, doesn't work if we keep giving people who want to be safe 100% of the time access to basically everything. There needs to be a reason to go out, to risk, to adventure past safety.
