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bunzancard

Proposal
Since A New Dawn I’ve been spending a lot of time on the adventure planets doing bounties and farming Scrappers, and one thing keeps bugging me: the density of dynamic spawns. The adventure planets are where I notice it most, so that’s what this post focuses on, but I think every planet would benefit from more intentional spawning and static POIs.

The suggestion


Three parts:


1. Fewer, larger spawns.
Cut down how often procedural spawns appear, and make the ones that do appear bigger: larger lairs, more creatures around them, and visually more noticeable. A big lair you can see from a distance feels like an actual place in the world. It’s something you choose to engage with, not something you constantly bump into.


2. Move some of the population into themed static POIs.
Hand-placed spots with set spawns that fit the planet and the lore:


  • A Scrapper junkyard, scavengers working a pile of wrecked speeders and parts. It makes more sense than Scrappers spread evenly across a desert, and it makes farming components deliberate instead of random.
  • Camps, lairs, hideouts and villages that fit each planet: smuggler caches, poacher camps, creature dens, native villages.
  • Hidden, unmarked POIs like the Blue Leaf Temple, places you find by exploring or by asking around. I’d keep them unmarked on purpose. Finding out where the Scrapper junkyard is should come from exploring or from another player telling you, not a map icon. That’s how I found the Blue Leaf Temple, by asking in Discord, and that kind of word-of-mouth knowledge is exactly what a social MMO should run on.

And sure, eventually the locations will end up on the wiki with waypoints, and that’s fine. Even then, it still concentrates players in the same places, which is the real win. Somebody has to discover them first, and a lot of people will still learn about them by asking around.


Static POIs would also bring players together. Right now, everyone farming the same mob is spread across an entire planet and never sees each other. If Scrappers live in a known junkyard, the people farming them end up in the same place. That’s where you run into other players, team up for tougher pulls, trade, or just say hi. It would make the planets feel more populated and a lot less lonely, without adding a single player.


3. Pull faction NPCs back to places they make sense.
Instead of Imperials and Rebels scattered across the whole planet, concentrate them at outposts, bases, patrol routes near those bases, and contested areas. Seeing a squad of stormtroopers should mean you’re near something, an Imperial outpost or a contested zone, not just that you’re outside. It would make the GCW presence on these planets feel intentional instead of random.


Bonus idea, if you wanted to get fancy with it: treat creature types differently. Keep procedural spawns for solitary creatures so the wilds still feel alive, and give herd, pack and family species big, rare lairs that are spaced far apart.


What about the other planets? The adventure planets are where this hurts most, but the inner planets would benefit from the same approach: fewer scattered spawns, and more intentional lairs and static POIs that fit each world. The danger level would obviously stay lower on the safer planets. The point is placement with purpose, not making Tatooine scarier for new players.
Justification
The problem


On the adventure planets, driving to a bounty target usually means pushing through hundreds of NPCs between me and the waypoint. It’s less “dangerous frontier” and more a constant gauntlet. Because spawns are spread evenly everywhere, a few things happen:


  • The danger doesn’t mean anything. On a speeder, I just drive past all of it. I pick up a trail of aggro from mobs that can’t catch me, and none of it is actually a threat. It’s just noise and annoyance. When everything is hostile but nothing matters, the wilderness stops feeling dangerous at all.
  • It breaks immersion, especially the faction NPCs. On the way to bounties I drive past hundreds of Imperial and Rebel NPCs scattered across these planets. These are supposed to be remote frontier worlds: a jungle moon, a forest full of Ewoks, a planet of witches and rancors. Faction troops spread evenly across the wilderness doesn’t fit. It makes the planets feel less like wild places and more like crowded spawn tables.
  • Specific targets are hard to find. Some of this is probably by design, and I get that. Scrappers hit really hard, which I think is the right way to make their parts valuable. But the difficulty should come from the fight, not from the search. I spent 15 minutes driving around the Endor plains looking for Scrappers and found nothing, then ran into two by accident on the way back to the starport. When something can spawn anywhere across a huge area, finding it is mostly luck.
  • There’s nowhere to stop. With hostiles everywhere, it’s hard to find open space to drop a camp, rest, or just catch your breath between fights. With the camp improvements in A New Dawn, it’d be great to actually have room to use them out in the wild.
  • It’s hard to enjoy the planets. The DX12 update made these worlds look incredible, but every drive is a constant stream of aggro pings and mobs chasing me for no reason, instead of a chance to actually take in the scenery.
  • It probably adds a lot of server load. I don’t know the backend, but on the way to a single bounty I drive past hundreds of NPCs, creatures and faction troops both. Every one of those is running AI and line-of-sight checks, even when nobody’s fighting it. Now multiply that by every bounty hunter, harvester and quester crossing these planets at the same time. Fewer, more concentrated spawns could take a real load off the server.
Motivation
Why I think it’d help


  • Travel gets quieter, and the dangerous spots actually mean something.
  • The planets feel like frontier worlds again, with faction presence where it belongs.
  • Players gather at the same places, which encourages grouping and makes the world feel more alive and less lonely.
  • Word-of-mouth discovery gives players a reason to talk to each other.
  • There’s open space for camping and resting between fights.
  • Big lairs become landmarks and choices instead of constant background noise.
  • Farming specific mobs becomes something you can plan instead of a random search.
  • Exploring gets rewarded again.
  • Likely lighter server load, especially during busy hours with lots of players traveling, which could free up resources for things like collision and line of sight.

The planets don’t need to feel empty. Hostile doesn’t have to mean evenly packed. A planet with big visible lairs, faction presence where it makes sense, places where players naturally run into each other, and calmer routes between them would feel more alive than one where everything is equally crowded.


Thanks for everything with A New Dawn. The game’s in a great place, and I think this would make every planet feel as good as it looks now.
see above
 
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It breaks immersion, especially the faction NPCs

This piece is yes it could be cleaned up and redone some so good idea on this aspect.

I am not sure about the rest of this. It seems that having to hunt for them and having them scattered is a good thing. Take the Scrapper Junkyard for instance. Within a day or two it will be on a wiki and everyone who is scattered looking for them will now be all in one place competing against each other in that one place. Having them spread is out good. It makes you hunt for them, makes you deal with other npcs and creatures and encourages exploring by making you drive around. Putting them all in one place is just opting for easy street method.

Players gather at the same places, which encourages grouping and makes the world feel more alive and less lonely.
Word-of-mouth discovery gives players a reason to talk to each other.

Yeah word of mouth goes out the window after a day or two and the gatherings really won't encourage grouping unless you force it to be only groups can do it.

Specific targets are hard to find. Some of this is probably by design, and I get that. Scrappers hit really hard, which I think is the right way to make their parts valuable. But the difficulty should come from the fight, not from the search. I spent 15 minutes driving around the Endor plains looking for Scrappers and found nothing, then ran into two by accident on the way back to the starport. When something can spawn anywhere across a huge area, finding it is mostly luck.

Thyis is a you issue in a way. I have no problem finding scrappers once I got the hang of it and learned when/where they would appear. You just have to learn. Ask some other people who do it and they will tell you. Ask in the Discord and they have in the past told people the how and where to find them.

Overall good intent but a no on some of this from me.
 
Tyr said:
It breaks immersion, especially the faction NPCs

This piece is yes it could be cleaned up and redone some so good idea on this aspect.

I am not sure about the rest of this. It seems that having to hunt for them and having them scattered is a good thing. Take the Scrapper Junkyard for instance. Within a day or two it will be on a wiki and everyone who is scattered looking for them will now be all in one place competing against each other in that one place. Having them spread is out good. It makes you hunt for them, makes you deal with other npcs and creatures and encourages exploring by making you drive around. Putting them all in one place is just opting for easy street method.

Players gather at the same places, which encourages grouping and makes the world feel more alive and less lonely.
Word-of-mouth discovery gives players a reason to talk to each other.

Yeah word of mouth goes out the window after a day or two and the gatherings really won't encourage grouping unless you force it to be only groups can do it.

Specific targets are hard to find. Some of this is probably by design, and I get that. Scrappers hit really hard, which I think is the right way to make their parts valuable. But the difficulty should come from the fight, not from the search. I spent 15 minutes driving around the Endor plains looking for Scrappers and found nothing, then ran into two by accident on the way back to the starport. When something can spawn anywhere across a huge area, finding it is mostly luck.

Thyis is a you issue in a way. I have no problem finding scrappers once I got the hang of it and learned when/where they would appear. You just have to learn. Ask some other people who do it and they will tell you. Ask in the Discord and they have in the past told people the how and where to find them.

Overall good intent but a no on some of this from me.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the feedback, and glad we agree on the faction NPCs! On the junkyard, I don't think it'd need to be one per planet. That's just one example. If crowding is the concern, there are easy ways around it: several sites per planet, rotating spawns between locations, or a mix of static sites with some roaming spawns still in place. I'd rather figure out a version that works than throw the idea out because the worst version of it has a flaw. If you've got thoughts on what would make it work, I'm all ears.


Fair point that it wouldn't force grouping, though. It's not about making anyone group up. Solo would still be completely viable. It's about creating more chances to run into people in areas where players share the same goals, which is where SWG's social side is at its best.


On learning the spawns, in my experience they don't really hold. Spots that are productive one day dry up the next, so what you learn doesn't stick. Scrappers are just the example I happened to use, though. The bigger point isn't about any one target. It's about how the planets feel. Hundreds of scattered spawns you just drive past don't add danger or exploration. They make the world feel less atmospheric, immersive, and all those NPCs running at once probably aren't doing server performance any favors either. If there's a spawn pattern I'm missing, I'd genuinely like to know it.


Even if static sites aren't the answer, maybe spawn rates are worth a look. Fewer, more intentional spawns would make finding specific targets less of a gamble, make the planets feel more like real places, and likely ease the load on the server.
 
Hundreds of scattered spawns you just drive past don't add danger or exploration.

I don't know if you played early Live but they changed things. You used to get aggro and have your vehicle blown out from under you quite often if you were not careful. So it used to be dangerous until they changed it.
 
Tyr said:
Hundreds of scattered spawns you just drive past don't add danger or exploration.

I don't know if you played early Live but they changed things. You used to get aggro and have your vehicle blown out from under you quite often if you were not careful. So it used to be dangerous until they changed it.
Click to expand...
Live was over 20 years ago (for pre cu) and I vaguely remember getting dismounted.

Real danger from high level mobs but still a lower spawn rate so you can atleast get from point A to point B, even if you have to give more distance to more dangerous creature, would be reasonable and make the planets feel more dangerous. I would be supportive of that.
 
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