Starbase Progress Notes: Week 33 - Capital Ship insight (2021)

[J.D.]

A station is open to assault, if someone has a valuable network of mining stations, they are a juicy target.

Miners still need to leave the safety of the station to mine, at worst CCAPs might make moving bulk materials around safer, and we dont have ANY details on how CCAP storage will work. Will it be similar to current ships that need large storage blocks? I don't imagine it will be infinite, so moving materials may be safer but will still require a lot of time to jump around. Small haulers might be able to move things around faster, a few hours compare to potential days for a fully loaded CCAP

Yes, a rich enough company is going to have significant advantages in infrastructure, but that doesnt mean something is going to be able to be widely abused.

As far as storage, all of it is being moved towards being physical storage on everything. glad they did that...

There is this Radiation Technology coming, it serves as a good tool for pvp guys to find targets. But, i was thinking maybe people havent considered it to also be a very useful defense mechanism. you can see them coming well before they get to you. What this means is, if the CCAP is already close to the roids, the miners will see the pirates coming, and flee well before they get there into unbreakable safety. So, in essence, there really isnt any danger as long as they are using this tool. Another reason i disagree with CCAP ships in belts.

 

[Greebo]

As far as storage, all of it is being moved towards being physical storage on everything. glad they did that...

There is this Radiation Technology coming, it serves as a good tool for pvp guys to find targets. But, i was thinking maybe people havent considered it to also be a very useful defense mechanism. you can see them coming well before they get to you. What this means is, if the CCAP is already close to the roids, the miners will see the pirates coming, and flee well before they get there into unbreakable safety. So, in essence, there really isnt any danger as long as they are using this tool. Another reason i disagree with CCAP ships in belts.

This is just more assumption, we dont know how the radiation detection is going to work. Will it be active or will it be passive? If you have backup support scanning for enemies then thats just good planning and you deserve to be safe. I seriously doubt that radiation detection will be a simple "oh enemies are coming"

 

[Cavilier210]

This is just more assumption, we dont know how the radiation detection is going to work. Will it be active or will it be passive? If you have backup support scanning for enemies then thats just good planning and you deserve to be safe. I seriously doubt that radiation detection will be a simple "oh enemies are coming"

Ya, that would be rather lame.

 

[blazemonger]

It's amazing to me how several of you are cooking up all these wild unsubstantiated assumptions and joining in some sort of feedback loop without ever even trying to consider you may be vastly overthinking this. Also, it appears any suggestion to the contrary is either spun to suit your own narrative or simply ignored.

AFAIK, there is no information supporting any of the assumptions any of you are making, not a single sentence. I would suggest you deliver the base on which you make your assumptions as otherwise it's all fabricated to allow yourself to not have to admit you may be incorrect.

Here's the facts as we know them as they have been laid out by FB :

• CCap can't enter a warzone
• CCap or normal ships can't nullify a station's safe zone, it requires a MCap of equal class as the station
• MCap will take considerably longer to charge engines that CCap before being able to jump

By saying you would not want or expect ships carried by a CCap to be able to have guns fitted you basically say those using CCaps will not have any sort of defence EXCEPT to dock up and stay inside, you are effectively creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.

All of you arguing this are creating all these scenarios of which none are supported by information available. Suggestions to potentially mitigate the only factual concern, CCaps being invulnerable themselves, are entirely ignored by yet more fabricated reasons as to why CCaps would be bad. None of these arguments have a basis in fact, none of them are backed by documents or announcements by FB.

None of you are reasonable because it seems none of you care. All you want to do is sit in your echo chamber which is getting so loud you are no longer able to hear anything but your baseless arguments. It's clear that trying to have a conversation about this is pointless as y'all may be hearing what is being said but you sure ain't listening.

 

[J.D.]

It's amazing to me how several of you are cooking up all these wild unsubstantiated assumptions and joining in some sort of feedback loop without ever even trying to consider you may be vastly overthinking this. Also, it appears any suggestion to the contrary is either spun to suit your own narrative or simply ignored.

AFAIK, there is no information supporting any of the assumptions any of you are making, not a single sentence. I would suggest you deliver the base on which you make your assumptions as otherwise it's all fabricated to allow yourself to not have to admit you may be incorrect.

Here's the facts as we know them as they have been laid out by FB :

• CCap can't enter a warzone
• CCap or normal ships can't nullify a station's safe zone, it requires a MCap of equal class as the station
• MCap will take considerably longer to charge engines that CCap before being able to jump

By saying you would not want or expect ships carried by a CCap to be able to have guns fitted you basically say those using CCaps will not have any sort of defence EXCEPT to dock up and stay inside, you are effectively creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.

All of you arguing this are creating all these scenarios of which none are supported by information available. Suggestions to potentially mitigate the only factual concern, CCaps being invulnerable themselves, are entirely ignored by yet more fabricated reasons as to why CCaps would be bad. None of these arguments have a basis in fact, none of them are backed by documents or announcements by FB.

None of you are reasonable because it seems none of you care. All you want to do is sit in your echo chamber which is getting so loud you are no longer able to hear anything but your baseless arguments. It's clear that trying to have a conversation about this is pointless as y'all may be hearing what is being said but you sure ain't listening.

as for my claims, ive backed them up with lauri quotes dude. You really like to hear yourself talk alot. You by the way are the only one in this forum who doxed an employee at novaquark because you got mad at a decision they made. You crossed a line. Now, that is amazing. Everytime you make a patronizing comment, that action of yours comes to mind. dont come at us with that crap on your high horse pointing your finger at us like we are ignorant children. you sound like you like people bowing down to you, even a developer team, man. Seriously chill with this im better than you stuff, like you know something we dont. Ill remind you that i was part of Closed Alpha, and i only say that because ive been fed alot of info for a year now about what is to come. We have discussed with the development team as to what mechanics will come, and how they will work. So, with all the info i have, im putting 2 and 2 together, on top of what info the devs have given us, just like everyone else here they you keep on patronizing. Im not trying to be an ass. But, you are really coming off as one. if your opinion is different, thats fine. Just dont act like you are the be all end all.

 

[J.D.]

This is just more assumption, we dont know how the radiation detection is going to work. Will it be active or will it be passive? If you have backup support scanning for enemies then thats just good planning and you deserve to be safe. I seriously doubt that radiation detection will be a simple "oh enemies are coming"

Nah, i talked to the devs about it a while back when we were talking about mechanics as to how to find people. the generators give off a radiation signature that we pick up on to give us a strength in signal, and direction, and all that. as to what exactly itll look like, yea i dont know. But thats the basic idea right now. Kinda like the nav yolo systems we have right now. im kinda thinking itll be customizable via yolol kinda like the gps systems we have. but Im not sure. But, you are right too. it could end up something completely different, its not even out yet. so what do i know? lol as far as active, or passive, i think its most likely something you turn off and on, just like everything else. Just a guess. then again, who knows, maybe itll be like a transponder. As for identification, you have a good point too. how do we know whos coming? not sure. All i know is unless the generator is encased with a material that insulates radiation (lukium) then you give off a signature.

 

[Vanidar]

It's amazing to me how several of you are cooking up all these wild unsubstantiated assumptions and joining in some sort of feedback loop without ever even trying to consider you may be vastly overthinking this. Also, it appears any suggestion to the contrary is either spun to suit your own narrative or simply ignored.

Ironic, I've made several points that you have conveniently sidestepped or spun yourself. I've also made plenty of concessions and acknowledged my own biases.

AFAIK, there is no information supporting any of the assumptions any of you are making, not a single sentence. I would suggest you deliver the base on which you make your assumptions as otherwise it's all fabricated to allow yourself to not have to admit you may be incorrect.

This makes zero sense. Every argument or point I've made is based in fact. I've pointed to potential issues specifically with CCAP being allowed to enter the belt and situations that *may* arise, but since none of us can really test in it's totality, you're just as ill-equipped to tell me I'm wrong as I am to say I'm right.

Here's the facts as we know them as they have been laid out by FB :

• CCap can't enter a warzone
• CCap or normal ships can't nullify a station's safe zone, it requires a MCap of equal class as the station
• MCap will take considerably longer to charge engines that CCap before being able to jump

I addressed your first point in my last post and the second two points aren't especially significant here.

By saying you would not want or expect ships carried by a CCap to be able to have guns fitted you basically say those using CCaps will not have any sort of defence EXCEPT to dock up and stay inside, you are effectively creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.

All of you arguing this are creating all these scenarios of which none are supported by information available. Suggestions to potentially mitigate the only factual concern, CCaps being invulnerable themselves, are entirely ignored by yet more fabricated reasons as to why CCaps would be bad. None of these arguments have a basis in fact, none of them are backed by documents or announcements by FB.

Categorically untrue. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying I want to avoid a situation where a CCAP is being used as a base for a military operation and I cannot retaliate against it since it is unsiegable and invincible. You should not be able to deploy any kind of aggression from it if it is truly a *civilian* capital ship for purposed for exploration. Please tell me where the "wild unsubstantiated claim" here is that this could certainly be an issue? Where even thematically a civilian ship shouldn't be able to potentially carry thousands of armed fighters?

As far as creating the self-fulfilling prophecy, you're making assumptions that people won't just use the safezone of the capital ship as the *first* line of defense anyway when the real shit hits the fan and they are actually feeling lots of pressure. I acknowledge the assumption in this particular part of the argument, but I think it's fair to say most people will follow the path of least resistance and want to protect their pixels if they are actually feeling threatened, so the argument that CCAP client fighters are necessary for safezone abuse to not be a thing is kind of weak as far as I'm concerned and the bigger concern is they are used more for attack than defense.

None of you are reasonable because it seems none of you care. All you want to do is sit in your echo chamber which is getting so loud you are no longer able to hear anything but your baseless arguments. It's clear that trying to have a conversation about this is pointless as y'all may be hearing what is being said but you sure ain't listening.

No need to get personal. I could just as easily say you're being unreasonable, imply you're ignorant, and say you don't care just the same back at you. I could say you aren't hearing me either because you quite literally ignore most of what I think are strong points.

I do agree with you there are some here that are very persistent and loud and do make some big assumptions. However, don't sit there and lump everyone you don't happen to agree with into the same group and make it personal.

 

[blazemonger]

@Vanidar
I have no intention to get personal, unlike some others here, and if perceived so I do apologize for that. None of this is addressed to you as a person, it is addressed to you as a group who are feeding of their echo chamber arguments and yes, some more than others so again, sorry if that kind of dragged you into that when not applicable.

I am not and have never said I see no potential concerns with Capitals in general. At the same time I do also think that ringing alarm bells without any actual information seems to me to be overreacting based on nothing but personal opinion. The mentioned post by Lauri really says nothing to support any of the concerns raised in the previous few posts.

Now, to ask some direct questions as despite what some seem to think, I would actually be interested to understand where these concerns come from and I do see some merit in a few points raised, even when I think they are premature. Maybe it would also be good to ask @LauriFB to chimes in and provide some more detailed clarification, where possible, to settle some of this.


So here goes;

I do not see how your argument that not being able to enter a warzone is not the issue as seen here:

Here you are incorrectly assuming that all meaningful pvp will be done in a "warzone". Plenty of it will happen organically around POIs, more "minor" stations without a siege currently occurring, or large skirmishes between rivals in random spots.

This is precisely where the second point I raised in my last post applies, if a CCap arrives at a POI, it will not be able to enter it's SZ, nor will the ships it carries and it would not be able to nullify that SZ. At best it could set up a blockade of sorts. In that respect I could see how a station should get a notification of a any Capital arriving as it starts charging up for a jump, that way if the arriving Capital is not a known friend, precautions can be taken. But here as well, it is currently not known with certainty how this will work (out).

I could see a potential concern here if the CCap travels as a carrier with a MCap and adds its fleet to that of the MCAP. But even if that has not yet been addressed, I'm sure that would be. That is a point which is interesting to get an answer to.

The argument that an exploration mission does not need to travel to potential hostile territory with defences seems unreasonable to me. A CCap itself can't have armament fitted, at least as far as I know, so how will crew defend themselves if attacked? What other option would they have but to dock up and sit it out in that scenario, which I thought was exactly the argument many make against CCaps?

Yes, a CCap could potentially deliver several armed ships to a specific location but at the same time, denying this option would practically make using a CCap too dangerous as you'd not be able to defend whatever operation you deploy. Also, that would work both ways, pirates can use the same functionality to move/deliver their ships deeper into space. And from that, how would you not be able to retaliate or engage such ships? If they stay docked, they pose no threat, if they deploy you can engage without the CCap being able to engage you.

Now, if a CCAP can fit armaments and be invulnerable at the same time I'd say that is a concern which needs to be addressed. But to my knowledge that is not the case. Here as well, clarification from FB would be nice.


In general I really feel some are way too much "up in arms" (yes.. pun intended there) over something that we really have very little factual information about. I honestly y think it would be more productive to let FB deliver their initial iteration, test it and then give them feedback.

 

[LauriFB]

I'll chime in for a few random snippets

First and foremost, all development for us is a ongoing process. Capital ships are so massive feature, especially with station siege, that it's impossible to get everything right at the start. This means that we will add features, change features and also go back with our previous decisions if it's needed to make them fun for most of the players.

Currenly, the main feature of capital ship is to act as a mobile base and a fleet carrier. So even military capital ships their strenght is not in the direct weapons but being a massive fleet carrier. While military capitals have some direct weapons planned, they are mainly for close point defese rather than direct attack (although we will also explore direct attack weapons at a later date).

Civilian capital shield prevents firing to both ways, so there is no point having civilian capital ship armed. Also the shield allows only certain number of friendly ships to pass it per hour. This means that while civilian capital ship can carry a fleet, that fleet can't exit the ship at once, making civilian capital pretty bad for any larger operations.

Furthermore, civilian capitals can't enter warzones, and if they are stuck inside one, they can only leave, but no-one can leave or enter the ship while it's inside a warzone, at least not thru the shields (reconstruction machine transfer inside is possible).

 

[Cavilier210]

I don't know why military capitals would be used any more often than titans in Eve. so much investment to be poofed, and on the other endm invincible civilian caps that are invincible. I'm nearly convinced you guys don't want us to actually fight @LauriFB. In order to fight we have to dump resources into something ridiculously expensive.

Why are we not projected to get the ability to build up a massive fleet of regular ships and take out other groups territories? I think the dev teams priorities are rather goofed up, because the stations themselves barely operate properly. I could see capitals making seiging easier, but if its the sole method of taking on other groups and taking territory, those fights will be far and few between.

 

[blazemonger]

Thank you @LauriFB for that clarification. For me it does show you guys are on this and have a prettyy solid plan for Capitals. The clear signals that this is both a first iteration of a massive mechanic and you will not hesitate to go in any applicable direction to make it work is good to hear and reassuring.

I also like the idea that MCap will only carry short range/point defense weapons.

 

[Tomasz]

I'll chime in for a few random snippets

First and foremost, all development for us is a ongoing process. Capital ships are so massive feature, especially with station siege, that it's impossible to get everything right at the start. This means that we will add features, change features and also go back with our previous decisions if it's needed to make them fun for most of the players.

Currenly, the main feature of capital ship is to act as a mobile base and a fleet carrier. So even military capital ships their strenght is not in the direct weapons but being a massive fleet carrier. While military capitals have some direct weapons planned, they are mainly for close point defese rather than direct attack (although we will also explore direct attack weapons at a later date).

Civilian capital shield prevents firing to both ways, so there is no point having civilian capital ship armed. Also the shield allows only certain number of friendly ships to pass it per hour. This means that while civilian capital ship can carry a fleet, that fleet can't exit the ship at once, making civilian capital pretty bad for any larger operations.

Furthermore, civilian capitals can't enter warzones, and if they are stuck inside one, they can only leave, but no-one can leave or enter the ship while it's inside a warzone, at least not thru the shields (reconstruction machine transfer inside is possible).

You seem to be focusing on adding features That sums up in "means of pvp" - but at the same time your rules and desing of space take away any reasoning for making the conflist (there are no reasons to wage war and game proceeds in a way of removing posibility and reaosn to control territory).
I've never seen any plans to add anything that would hint any points of interest for companies to fight over.And rules seem to prohibit companies from blocking others form territories.I'd appreaciate if you give us information what incentives are pvpes supposed to have ? And I'd like to point out that there is some urgency in creating Pvp congregation points to have economy runing.

 

[blazemonger]

IMO, the idea of a MMO sandbox is that, over time and once the game is feature complete, players create and play out their content. In that context, it is not FB's role to provide content or "things to fight over". I'd expect it is their plan and intent to provide tools and means to introduce functionality and options for players to do that ove rthe next 2 years as they have indicated at the start of this Alpha Early Access stage. The existing roadmap also very clearly shows no immediate plans are on the table to work on PVP, at leats not in a public facing way/sense.

Expecting fleshed out PVP to happen short term is basically implying not understanding the concept of EA and/or Alpha stage game development from my perspective.

 

[Oobfiche]

(there are no reasons to wage war and game proceeds in a way of removing posibility and reaosn to control territory).
I've never seen any plans to add anything that would hint any points of interest for companies to fight over.

there are some mentioned plans of special territories. things include: rare material gas pockets (they are infinite so not like asteroid mining) deep moon core drilling of certain resources. more gas cloud stuff, i forget the others but lauri will pop back in here to tell the rest

 

[Vanidar]

I'll chime in for a few random snippets

First and foremost, all development for us is a ongoing process. Capital ships are so massive feature, especially with station siege, that it's impossible to get everything right at the start. This means that we will add features, change features and also go back with our previous decisions if it's needed to make them fun for most of the players.

Currenly, the main feature of capital ship is to act as a mobile base and a fleet carrier. So even military capital ships their strenght is not in the direct weapons but being a massive fleet carrier. While military capitals have some direct weapons planned, they are mainly for close point defese rather than direct attack (although we will also explore direct attack weapons at a later date).

Civilian capital shield prevents firing to both ways, so there is no point having civilian capital ship armed. Also the shield allows only certain number of friendly ships to pass it per hour. This means that while civilian capital ship can carry a fleet, that fleet can't exit the ship at once, making civilian capital pretty bad for any larger operations.

Furthermore, civilian capitals can't enter warzones, and if they are stuck inside one, they can only leave, but no-one can leave or enter the ship while it's inside a warzone, at least not thru the shields (reconstruction machine transfer inside is possible).

Thanks for taking the time out to give us some information, @LauriFB. I do appreciate that things change over time and you guys will work to get it right. I think I speak for everyone when I say we're all impressed with both the ambition and progress of the game so far.

For what it's worth, to me it sounds like you guys are balancing the general offensive capability of a CCAP strictly from the lens of the largest scale pvp. It does sound *somewhat* limiting in a large scale engagement to only be able to deploy X fighters/bombers/military units per hour, but the assumption there is the most meaningful pvp encounters are the large ones. I'd argue that small and medium scale will happen more often than large, and for a good percent of the playerbase, the smaller encounters are more enjoyable anyway. The limitation of only being able to deploy X offensive ships per hour sounds extremely difficult to balance for 250 v 250 encounters at the same time as 20 vs 20 encounters. It seems like a whole lot of headache for you guys and exploitation opportunities for us to insist that CCAPs must be able to deploy offensive or military assets when contrasting the civilian variant against the military variant. Further, I am concerned about the frustration it's going to cause in situations where CCAPs are deploying military vessels and I cannot take the capital ship out, the root of the problem, only the ships it decides to slowly launch and harass us with. If I am at war with another company and they move a CCAP forward as a FOB that isn't in a warzone but still can strike at important areas, it is a tool with which they can fight from and I cannot dislodge it. I think that's a pretty clear issue.

Would love to be proven wrong and my concerns never come to fruition.

 

[J.D.]

Thanks for taking the time out to give us some information, @LauriFB. I do appreciate that things change over time and you guys will work to get it right. I think I speak for everyone when I say we're all impressed with both the ambition and progress of the game so far.

For what it's worth, to me it sounds like you guys are balancing the general offensive capability of a CCAP strictly from the lens of the largest scale pvp. It does sound *somewhat* limiting in a large scale engagement to only be able to deploy X fighters/bombers/military units per hour, but the assumption there is the most meaningful pvp encounters are the large ones. I'd argue that small and medium scale will happen more often than large, and for a good percent of the playerbase, the smaller encounters are more enjoyable anyway. The limitation of only being able to deploy X offensive ships per hour sounds extremely difficult to balance for 250 v 250 encounters at the same time as 20 vs 20 encounters. It seems like a whole lot of headache for you guys and exploitation opportunities for us to insist that CCAPs must be able to deploy offensive or military assets when contrasting the civilian variant against the military variant. Further, I am concerned about the frustration it's going to cause in situations where CCAPs are deploying military vessels and I cannot take the capital ship out, the root of the problem, only the ships it decides to slowly launch and harass us with. If I am at war with another company and they move a CCAP forward as a FOB that isn't in a warzone but still can strike at important areas, it is a tool with which they can fight from and I cannot dislodge it. I think that's a pretty clear issue.

Would love to be proven wrong and my concerns never come to fruition.

I completely agree. I do believe this will be exploited from my experience in many many other pvp games. Especially from even the more skilled pvpers. those guys who have ships that are very well designed, and their combat skills are greater than the average endo, so their limit as to how many they can deploy isnt that big of a deal.. No, they cant siege a station, but they can milk one of its resources from failed attempts to swat them away with less skilled fighter pilots, then after the carnage, they finish up with a military capital ship.... Any decent pvp player group is going to contemplate on minimizing risk, and maximizing reward by understanding the mechanics to know what tools are at their disposal. CCAP ships will absolutely, without a doubt be used as leverage in a pvp fight. even if its just to disrupt the beginning phase before removing, and bringing in the military cap ship to sweep up the rest. Just like @Cavilier210 said, why would anyone risk all that investment, when they have another that cant be destroyed? i would push that thing to the very end of its boundaries to gain even the smallest of advantage, then i would warp my civi ship out, and then bring in my military ship to nullify the base, and continue. . it would be foolish not to if we are given that opportunity. So, with that being said, i think it would be obvious to see that is a pretty undesirable meta.

 

[J.D.]

I completely agree. I do believe this will be exploited from my experience in many many other pvp games. Especially from even the more skilled pvpers. those guys who have ships that are very well designed, and their combat skills are greater than the average endo, so their limit as to how many they can deploy isnt that big of a deal.. No, they cant siege a station, but they can milk one of its resources from failed attempts to swat them away with less skilled fighter pilots, then after the carnage, they finish up with a military capital ship.... Any decent pvp player group is going to contemplate on minimizing risk, and maximizing reward by understanding the mechanics to know what tools are at their disposal. CCAP ships will absolutely, without a doubt be used as leverage in a pvp fight. even if its just to disrupt the beginning phase before removing, and bringing in the military cap ship to sweep up the rest. Just like @Cavilier210 said, why would anyone risk all that investment, when they have another that cant be destroyed? i would push that thing to the very end of its boundaries to gain even the smallest of advantage, then i would warp my civi ship out, and then bring in my military ship to nullify the base, and continue. . it would be foolish not to if we are given that opportunity. So, with that being said, i think it would be obvious to see that is a pretty undesirable meta.

But you guys are awesome, and I’m sure you’ll figure it out. Thankful for this great game with a lot of potential.

 

[Vanidar]

IMO, the idea of a MMO sandbox is that, over time and once the game is feature complete, players create and play out their content. In that context, it is not FB's role to provide content or "things to fight over". I'd expect it is their plan and intent to provide tools and means to introduce functionality and options for players to do that ove rthe next 2 years as they have indicated at the start of this Alpha Early Access stage. The existing roadmap also very clearly shows no immediate plans are on the table to work on PVP, at leats not in a public facing way/sense.

Expecting fleshed out PVP to happen short term is basically implying not understanding the concept of EA and/or Alpha stage game development from my perspective.

It is not FB's role to provide content to spoon feed us content at this stage (or any other stage) in development, I agree.

It is my opinion, however, that it *is* FB's responsibility to, at some point, implement simple systems that funnel players together and encourage organic player interaction in the sandbox. Whether this interaction is conflict or cooperation, successfully implemented it will foster and encourage some level of the player-generated content you are referring to. The most compelling content is not the roleplaying done inside Origin all of the time, it is the dynamic events and even politics that happen outside where anything can happen. Sieges are part of that, but in my opinion, sieges sit on top of this layer and those sieges will occur and be tested at a significantly higher rate with said layer. I don't expect it to be fully fleshed out, no, and I don't expect it be a bullseye when they start testing and tweaking it. FB can choose to work on these mechanic(s) and subtleties at any point, sure, but I think it makes sense to at least take a token pass at such a deeply fundamental concept to a sandbox sooner rather than later.

I acknowledge that FB likely has their own internal plans for a great many things here we are not privy to, but you yourself commonly talk purely in expectation and assumption. We can either not discuss anything at all and just point to the ever-changing nature of an EA title and shrug because, well, we just don't know what's going to happen, or we can exercise ideas and take them to extreme sides of the spectrum and hopefully arrive at a reasonable spot in the middle that just may contribute to the development along the way. Maybe we'll even point out a potential exploit or oversight early in a forum and we'll never actually have to endure in-game and FB won't have to incur the cost of fixing it later. Just maybe.

PSA:
You don't get to tell people they don't understand EA or alpha game development, even qualifying that it's "from your perspective". It's not constructive and doesn't add anything aside from condescension. There's plenty of different perspectives and priorities during an alpha for any software project and those come on a shop-by-shop and project-by-project basis.