6 Reasons Why Prestige Rate MUST Be Improved by Going Rogue
By
Acemace,
Posted on: 2010-07-13 20:11 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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Originally Posted by Sharker_Quint
see, here is where i have to disagree with you sam. while you may not like putting in the man hours to your base, others of us do actually enjoy it. when i13 came out i spent 3 days on just my villian base alone. most of it is still unfinished, but what i do have done is awesome. the only reason it remains undone is because i have several rooms that are empty. i just need themes for the rooms. RL has kept me busy and i just haven't spent time on the bases. i even know some people that base editing is all they do. they even offer their services to help other sg's build their bases.
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Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
It's bases like these that only serve to convince me that the base editor is completely broken as an aspect of a game. Those rooms are beautiful. They're gorgeous. But I know what kind of effort and fidgeting is required to pull this off, and at this point I may as well just fire up 3DS Max and go to town. The editor is hideously complicated, badly uncomfortable and requires so much honest-to-God WORK to put out anything decent it's just not worth the bother.
... If anything ever happens to bases, I hope they introduce a modification to the editor that makes it easier to use for simpler people like me, or outright go into a compound editor that works like an RTS. In fact, you know what? I was just playing UFO Extraterrestrials, the X-Com knockoff of the 2000s, when aliens raided my base. I went about retaking it when I suddenly realised that... Hold the phone! I know this place! And then I remembered that, duh, I built this place! As in the original Enemy Unknown, bases here are built in large chunks of square facilities, but the actual arrangement of the facilities is still as I put it down. That's about enough customization for me, and I sincerely hope we get something simpler if bases are ever overhauled. |
In the end, I think we can all agree is that it needs to be fixed, but how?
Make things too simple and you'll have people like Sam and even myself to a degree, quite happy, we'd finally be able to recreate those rooms from various instanced mission maps we've so sorely wanted and even customize them a bit.
On the other hand, bases like the OP won't be so impressive, indeed they'd become ordinary and every day.
For example, you'll notice just about EVERY SG BASE OUT THERE (built by those who made the effort small effort) have a bar or restaurant of some form, and quite a few have a pool, or pound, or body of water using the slow fields, which can make these things fairly unimpressive, because there's only so many ways you can throw down a bunch of desks, a few tables, chairs, and some cabinets to make a bar.
On the flip side, if you make it more complex and involved to make customization greater, you'd be able to create truly unique wonders that could potentially make Nova Praetoria look like Darwin's Landing during a Tarantula mistress bikini contest. (This would also make me happy)
But then you lock out people like Sam and so forth.
And worse, the copycat problem might only worsen when a bunch of people find something they really like, and we have the Television Programming and JRPG character/plot problem (all the same jar of Jarate in the end), I myself would likely end up guilty of this.
Finally, we have the third problem, any changes made to the base editing system itself risks invalidating all present bases and hours, days, weeks, months, even YEARS of hard work and flushing it all down a binary drain along with countless billions or trillions of prestige.
And so, the problem the Devs face is that they are caught between a rock, a hard place, and have something sharp and pointy hanging over their heads.
And this is all just on aesthetic levels, taking in functional aspects adds an angry mob to their left and a rabid bears to their right.
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Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
City of Heroes is a game about freedom of expression and variety of experiences far more so than it is about representing any one theme, topic or genre.
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Oh, yeah. I wouldn't dream of taking away people's access to the current levels of customizability. And that's not so much out of altruism, but simply because I know that would piss people off indescribably. I think I see one possible solution to make both sides happy:
Add a large set of pre-fab rooms for those of us who don't want to bother. If I want, say, a control room of "this" size, then I pick one from a list of, say, 10-15 ready-made control rooms that someone (developer or player) prepared earlier. I can always edit them by hand if I were so inclined, but I don't HAVE to. This is a major step up from what we have now, because right now if I buy a room it arrives bare and I HAVE to edit it. At least for cosmetic rooms (and that's all I want anyway), having pre-fab options would be swell.
When it comes to a "compound editor," which is something I envision being similar to how C&C games allow you to build bases, I foresee a much lower degree of customization, basically picking which buildings you want to set down and where you want to put them. I guess more customization could be added as to what's actually IN those buildings, but since this will never happen, that argument is pointless.
For myself, there is one particular aspect of computer gaming I enjoy far more than I do anything in the physical world - I like using a largely superficial editor and then delving in to explore what I have created in greater detail. I draw much more satisfaction from actually discovering how the computer has interpreted my instructions and what has come of it than I do actually making it. In the above-mentioned UFO base raids, one of the coolest aspects is knowing I made these bases and discovering what's what on the much smaller scale. I can see a hangar from afar, but when I'm actually in there, I can see the different barrels, the platforms, the pillars and so forth.
That's also why I LOVE seeing other people's artwork of my characters, but being too poor, I can never actually afford it 
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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Bases are a hidden gem for CoH, but they also have such unrealised potential.
The editor is difficult to handle, what you "need" for your base to function is very confusing and unclear. I had to read paragonwiki and spend a few days playing with it to even get my head around it.
It is made worse by all the artifacts of the PvP base system which are no longer used.
Unfortunately, the UI is also very clunky - a problem which effects the whole game and sometimes something you don't realise till you look at other games. 
Its just another unloved aspect of the game which I think only expert CoH gamers can really use, and unlikely to appeal to the general playerbase. Sad.
To end on a positive though, my little SG on Virtue which is formed of me, my boyfriend and my brother has a very nice base. We always play in super group mode and have slowly been gathering enough prestige to expand it. Been a great pet project. I think the prestige rate is fine - if you want a big base play in a big SG or invest a lot of time.
Currently we have:
1 Energy Room:- Houses a personal vault
1 Control Room
2 Workshops which house:- 16 Salvage Storage, 1 Enhancement storage, 1 invention table, 1 forge.
2 Teleportation Rooms:- 8 Telepads which can take us to the top 16 zones in Paragon City.
We're now working on sticking a Ouro Mission Crystal in the control room and 3 decorative rooms. We will each have our own room and they can customize and it and play basebuilder with it as much as they like.
The problems with bases are many and varied and I quite agree with Sam's post describing them. I find the base presented in the OP to be wonderful, but I also agree with Lord of Time when he says they are essentially pretty but useless.
Anyone who's visited my Alt Alphabet thread knows how much I love to tinker with the character creator. To balance the universe, I hate the base editor with an equal passion. It's clumsy and unintuitive and 9 times out of 10 the result is a fugly kludge. I belong to a few SGs with friends and they enjoy base design, but none are as attractive as the one shown in the OP. Other SGs I belong to don't let me touch the editor, so even if I wanted to get into base design in an SG that's large enough to afford all the geegaws, I couldn't.
That's one of the largest issues I have with bases, in fact: only one person can really design them. Make bases affordable and easier to design, yes, but also allow for one suite (say 3 rooms) per member of the SG. That way an SG can designate an overall base designer, but each member of the group also gets to play around with their own space.
And for God's sake, add windows. Feeling like I've moved back to Mom's basement just doesn't do it for me. A couple of my characters would live in space stations or penthouse apartments, not an underground bunker.
The Alt Alphabet ~ OPC: Other People's Characters ~ Terrific Screenshots of Cool ~ Superhero Fiction
Holy mother of... That is gorgeous!!
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Well, on this point, Ironik, I think it kind of goes into base functionality needs/wants. That's another tricky one to balance since the Devs need to make bases functionality rewarding and appealing without making them feel like a player HAS to use it to be effective and avoid them being uninteresting and pointless. I think I might have gotten something decent in a post of mine in another thread a bit of ways back in the suggestions and ideas thing.|
Originally Posted by Ironik
The problems with bases are many and varied and I quite agree with Sam's post describing them. I find the base presented in the OP to be wonderful, but I also agree with Lord of Time when he says they are essentially pretty but useless.
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Feel free to skip this, mostly my personal ramblings.
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My big list of (hopefully low hanging) suggestions for base functionality and new functional items-
Changes to the existing:
- Control and Power usage of teleporters, medical, and workshop items by half.
- Power and Control buffs.
*To make SGs a bit more appealing without them feeling required, I thought it might be interesting if each tier of power and control granted a 1% buff to certain general stats of all SG members with the third tier at 3%. The Power Systems would grant bonuses to damage and resistance, Control would grant bonus to ToHit and Defense.
- Increase reclaimer re-spawn healing by 15% percent.
- Change the Auto doc to include selling break frees and awakens too.
- Have the Combat logs allow you to buy second tier Heals, end recovery, break frees, and awakes
- Change Raid Telepad to work as a mission door transporter, even to get directly to outdoor missions.
New functional items (and badges) I would like to see:
- New aesthetic styles for all existing functional items to fit themes of Modern-Tech Paramilitary, Martial Arts/dojo (probably with blacksmithing themes for workshop stuff), Modern Office and Home (This theme does not need to quite cover every item), Bio-Organic/Nature, Rikti, and allow for all existing medical reclaimers themes to be usable. (Vanguard, Ouroboros, Arachnos, Midnighter/Cimeroran, Hero, etc.)
- Large storage rack.
*Requires at least Craftsman badge to create tier two workbenches.
>Takes up twice the size of normal salvage racks, requires double upkeep, stores up to 50 salvage items.
- Mega-Telepad.
* Requires at least 4 zone Beacon Badges to be available for crafting at a second tier workbench.
> Requires double the power and control to set down, Double sized(?), allows for up to six zone beacon hookups.
- Ultra-Telepad
* Requires 8 zone beacon badges, crafts at tier 3 workbench. (This was kind of a balancing idea since heroes have so many more zones they might need to connect to and while it's possible for villains to get it, it just means you'd need a coop-zone beacon)
> Triple power and control requirements, automatically is hooked up to all zone beacons you presently have the badges for, no limit for how many zones it hooks up to.
Purely aesthetic items, styles, and changes I'd want to see:
-Too many to list.
Other things I'd like to see:
-Offline promotions/demotions
-SG name changing
-Prestige bonus for number of coalitions you've formed.
-Multiple SG membership, sorta personal coalitions.
* I think this could basically work with you having a Primary SG, and then secondary, third, etc. and however many the devs would want to cap it with. "honorary members"/"Liaisons" would be allowed to change their SG mode for one of their other groups to gather prestige and badge credit for them and leaders of the SGs would be able to decide just what privileges these folks have. They would not have access to SGs not Coalitioned to their primary SG.
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Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
City of Heroes is a game about freedom of expression and variety of experiences far more so than it is about representing any one theme, topic or genre.
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That actually reminds me of another problem that's always eaten me, but I've always failed to put into words: bases are the result of cumulative character efforts. In essence, if I want a base that I'm not leeching off other people to fund, I have to make one myself, but that requires the cumulative effort of a lot of characters, and often not enough room in the base to give something to them all. Not to mention that not all of them make sense to share a communal space.|
Originally Posted by Peacemoon
To end on a positive though, my little SG on Virtue which is formed of me, my boyfriend and my brother has a very nice base. We always play in super group mode and have slowly been gathering enough prestige to expand it. Been a great pet project. I think the prestige rate is fine - if you want a big base play in a big SG or invest a lot of time.
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Here's the thing - I have as many costume slots as I can get unlocked on all my characters, give or take the free one here and there, and they're all filled with something I've given thought to and put work into. Each costume for each character is a piece of work in itself, but because each character has many, I feel accomplished at the end of the day. A base is just one large entity, and often shared between not just one and two, but between MANY characters, both mine and other people's.
As far as I'm concerned, bases will be useless for my purposes unless I can make, fund and develop one by myself, with a single character. Call it personal housing, call it personal bases, call it what you will. If my character needs a one-room apartment at the top floor for him to look depressingly out the window, an underground bunker in a space with 20 other people will not do. If my character needs his cave of solitude where he can be emo all by himself because no-one understands him, then a bed in the super group ward will not cut it.
Bases are, in essence, meta-game. They're an achievement for the PLAYER, not for the CHARACTER. A costume is a character thing. I made it, but I made it FOR HIM, to express his personality, his story and possibly his powers. A base is a player thing. The design belongs to the architect, the property deed belongs to the leaders, the other members are credited, but any way you look at it, it's something made by players for players with the help of players. It's meta-game, and therefore inherently much less interesting.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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Nail. Head. Hammertime.
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Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
That actually reminds me of another problem that's always eaten me, but I've always failed to put into words: bases are the result of cumulative character efforts. In essence, if I want a base that I'm not leeching off other people to fund, I have to make one myself, but that requires the cumulative effort of a lot of characters, and often not enough room in the base to give something to them all. Not to mention that not all of them make sense to share a communal space.
Here's the thing - I have as many costume slots as I can get unlocked on all my characters, give or take the free one here and there, and they're all filled with something I've given thought to and put work into. Each costume for each character is a piece of work in itself, but because each character has many, I feel accomplished at the end of the day. A base is just one large entity, and often shared between not just one and two, but between MANY characters, both mine and other people's. As far as I'm concerned, bases will be useless for my purposes unless I can make, fund and develop one by myself, with a single character. Call it personal housing, call it personal bases, call it what you will. If my character needs a one-room apartment at the top floor for him to look depressingly out the window, an underground bunker in a space with 20 other people will not do. If my character needs his cave of solitude where he can be emo all by himself because no-one understands him, then a bed in the super group ward will not cut it. Bases are, in essence, meta-game. They're an achievement for the PLAYER, not for the CHARACTER. A costume is a character thing. I made it, but I made it FOR HIM, to express his personality, his story and possibly his powers. A base is a player thing. The design belongs to the architect, the property deed belongs to the leaders, the other members are credited, but any way you look at it, it's something made by players for players with the help of players. It's meta-game, and therefore inherently much less interesting. |
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And my response to that is - IN GOD'S NAME WHY? With but few, specific exceptions, the elements inside a base are as game-affecting as the color of your characters shoe soles and should therefore be as free, yet as loaded with possibility as designing your characters costume.|
Originally Posted by Liz Bathory
Bases like this must be earned.. by hard work and playing.
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What items in a base could affect gameplay? Recipe crafting tables, enhancement and inspiration storage, teleporters, med bays? These can remain SG-purchasable items, or perhaps more preferrably items that must indeed be earned by hard work and playing. But adding a second floor? Adding an interior wall? MAKING room for the teleporters you've EARNED. Why are these things that must also be earned by hard work and playing?
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That's always been where the major disconnect between me and a lot of people who love bases seems to be. There's a belief that bases should be earned by the hard work of many people and so express their toil and achievement. But then that in itself makes bases useless for my purposes, as my purposes are creative expression, concept extension and the comfort that comes from having something in the game that's truly mine.|
Originally Posted by MrNotorion
And my response to that is - IN GOD'S NAME WHY? With but few, specific exceptions, the elements inside a base are as game-affecting as the color of your characters shoe soles and should therefore be as free, yet as loaded with possibility as designing your characters costume.
What items in a base could affect gameplay? Recipe crafting tables, enhancement and inspiration storage, teleporters, med bays? These can remain SG-purchasable items, or perhaps more preferrably items that must indeed be earned by hard work and playing. But adding a second floor? Adding an interior wall? MAKING room for the teleporters you've EARNED. Why are these things that must also be earned by hard work and playing? |
I don't know what it says about my own mental state when I derive so much enjoyment from having things that are truly mine and nobody else's spirited away in some place safe and that I'd sooner have a little corner all mine than a large space shared with other people. But craziness aside, putting a steep price on the pieces effectively puts a boat anchor around the freedom of expression of the final product.
When I sit down to make a costume, I don't worry about what costs how much, which costume piece is the most prestigious or what I can afford. I tab through the options, I look for the best combination and I go with whatever catches my eye. The bigger the pool of available options, the greater the chance that I'll spot something which makes me go "This! This is what I was looking for! This pulls it all together!" is. If I were restricted to just a couple of pieces per category and had to work and toil for the rest, chances are I'd never come up with anything decent, and so never really be motivated to get much more.
Personally, what I'd like to see, and what I've suggested before, is the notion of a personal, cosmetic base. In this base, you could still put in teleporters and crafting tables and generators, but they don't do anything. They're just cosmetic. Your generator is just there to look cool, your storage racks just add ambience as shelves, your control room's computer just looks like a kickass computer. Such a base would have no utility, but would also have no rent and would be payable for out of your own pocket. Possibly be cheaper, too.
If this comes with ready-made rooms, then my likelyhood to make use of bases would go up SIGNIFICANTLY.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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Significantly, as in "Increased from Zero to a Real Number"?|
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
If this comes with ready-made rooms, then my likelyhood to make use of bases would go up SIGNIFICANTLY.
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I seem to remember you saying that you had no interest in base building until Rent was removed, with your unhappiness being based on the idea of having to work to maintain a virtual item in a game, as it would decay, in a fashion, if you didn't. Correct me if I'm wrong, of course.
It's kind of a shame, though. I've seen your attention to detail and you seem to have a perfectionist bent. I'd love to see what you could do with a base editor. I'm @BBQ_Pork ingame and if your schedule meshes with my very sporadic one, I'd give you free reign over a redside base on Virtue if you would be interested.
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Actually, being a perfectionist can be EXACTLY what causes the most frustration with based editing. Like how I REALLY don't like it when you get the flicker from two merged item surfaces attempting to overlap one another with rare exceptions.
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Originally Posted by BBQ_Pork
It's kind of a shame, though. I've seen your attention to detail and you seem to have a perfectionist bent.
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Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
City of Heroes is a game about freedom of expression and variety of experiences far more so than it is about representing any one theme, topic or genre.
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From nothing to something, yes. Currently, if I don't put functional items in my base, I don't have to pay rent, and since I don't want functional items, that's not a problem. But that also means I don't get to have control rooms or generator rooms, because those are functional items I can't use in a purely cosmetic context.|
Originally Posted by BBQ_Pork
Significantly, as in "Increased from Zero to a Real Number"?
I seem to remember you saying that you had no interest in base building until Rent was removed, with your unhappiness being based on the idea of having to work to maintain a virtual item in a game, as it would decay, in a fashion, if you didn't. Correct me if I'm wrong, of course. |
But you are correct. I WILL NOT mess with anything which requires upkeep. This is not what I play games for. However, fixing the editor so I can use it with less than hours of time investment would make it much more likely for me to care to try.
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| It's kind of a shame, though. I've seen your attention to detail and you seem to have a perfectionist bent. I'd love to see what you could do with a base editor. I'm @BBQ_Pork ingame and if your schedule meshes with my very sporadic one, I'd give you free reign over a redside base on Virtue if you would be interested. |
I had to count the free space in squares and calculate how much room would be on which side. I had to move the ******' things around a zillion times because I couldn't centre them along the podium access, I had to consider going three columns or two, I had to fit in pillars, I had to fin in stairs, I had to fit in lighting, and then I realised that most "lights" don't illuminate. I had to lay a double-width path of false tiles that ended up something like 30x2 tiles big, and each tile had to be centred so as not to jot out or overlap, I had to fix the podium with enough lights, flags and machines to make it look pretty, I had to put flags here and there, only there weren't any small wall-mounted flags...
All in all, that one single room took me a full work day. And don't get me wrong, it looks pretty. I'm very proud of it. But it taught me a valuable lesson - I DO NOT want to go through this ever again. No base is worth this. I can make good things with this editor. I can, I'm not denying this. I'm no saying "I can't, so neither should you!" I can. But I'm not going to, because it's far too much work for far too little benefit.
What I do as a hobby is I write stories. Nothing great, noting amazing, just for fun. The entire time I've been writing them, I've been looking for a format and writing style that best allows me to write with the flow of thought and which requires the least fiddly technical work and the least stopping to get the details straight. I would sooner take a lower-quality end product if making it is fun than an extremely high-quality end product if making it is blood pressure, swear and tears.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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*shrug* Well, there goes my evil plan to get my workshop remodeled for free. |
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
All in all, that one single room took me a full work day. And don't get me wrong, it looks pretty. I'm very proud of it. But it taught me a valuable lesson - I DO NOT want to go through this ever again. No base is worth this. I can make good things with this editor. I can, I'm not denying this. I'm no saying "I can't, so neither should you!" I can. But I'm not going to, because it's far too much work for far too little benefit.
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Well, if you're ever interested in seeing that, it's villain-side Pinnacle. Give me a ring and I'll take you on a tour of my one room |
Originally Posted by BBQ_Pork
*shrug* Well, there goes my evil plan to get my workshop remodeled for free.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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This sort of thing makes me wonder why something from EQ2 hasn't caught on here. In EQ2 there are a number of people who enjoy designing the guild houses, so charge an in game fee for their services. They get to spend days mucking around with sims while the house owner gets to do fun stuff.
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That sounds like paying someone to design your costume. I've previously gone on about how one of the greatest parts of City of Heroes is that my characters feel like they're mine and mine alone, because I made their costumes and played them up to their level. I COULD ask someone to make costumes for me, but then that would be little better than just picking from a list of developer-made costumes, in that it would no longer feel like it's truly mine.|
Originally Posted by Death_Badger
This sort of thing makes me wonder why something from EQ2 hasn't caught on here. In EQ2 there are a number of people who enjoy designing the guild houses, so charge an in game fee for their services. They get to spend days mucking around with sims while the house owner gets to do fun stuff.
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It's the same with bases. I could have someone design a base for a SG I own, but what would be the point? I'll have a base, but it's a base I can't be proud of. Yes, it looks good, bit it's not MY design. I can respect the skill and dedication of whoever made it, but it's not mine, and thus is much less impressive to have.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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There's too much prestige in the system as is. No sinks. A mid-size SG can earn more prestige than they'll ever be able to spend way too fast.
What shall claim a Sky Kings' Ransom?
PPD & Resistance Epic Archetypes
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This reminds me of the people that complain about the Vet Rewards and how it isn't fair for those that just started playing the game ( and which the Devs seems to have bought and made the Vets a worthless reward). |
Originally Posted by BrandX
Because it's not easy to afford all that from casual game play.
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That "something for nothing" mentality.
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What effect does "too much" Prestige in the system have? |
Originally Posted by SkarmoryThePG
There's too much prestige in the system as is. No sinks. A mid-size SG can earn more prestige than they'll ever be able to spend way too fast.
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Bases get too large too fast and members get lost? Excessive base sizes take up too much server memory?
Please elaborate.
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I seem to recall paying money to play this game at some point, I think. That ought to count for something. I mean, I thought I worked to make my money, but I guess it makes sense that I'd pay to do even more work to make a totally different kind of money with which to pay to do even more work. That sounds reasonable.
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Originally Posted by MarDun
That "something for nothing" mentality.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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It removes any incentive to gather Prestige for the group because it'll never get used anyway|
Originally Posted by BBQ_Pork
What effect does "too much" Prestige in the system have?
Bases get too large too fast and members get lost? Excessive base sizes take up too much server memory? Please elaborate. |
This is also why I want appreciable rent back. Just let me auto-pay it.
What shall claim a Sky Kings' Ransom?
PPD & Resistance Epic Archetypes
Ah. "Why be in SG mode when the base is already full of stuff and there's enough Prestige stored up to pay the rent until the year 4000?"
Yeah, I can see that. I just stay in SG mode to see the little number by my name get bigger. I'm easily distracted, I guess. And maybe a little competitive. I dinged 50 in my old SG at 500K Prestige, but didn't train until I hit a million because I wanted the big round number before the SG gratzed me.
Auto-pay the rent? <expletive> YEAH!!
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You are confusing Prestige with Influence. There is no runaway inflation with prestige. Everything you can spend it on has a fixed price.|
Originally Posted by SkarmoryThePG
There's too much prestige in the system as is.
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| No sinks. |
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| A mid-size SG can earn more prestige than they'll ever be able to spend way too fast. |
The only time an SG may feel they "need" to knuckle under and earn more prestige is when they decide they want to buy something expensive like a Dimensional Vortex as a power source.
The only thing the devs need to get rid of now is that stupid feature that lists SG's by the amount of prestige earned. That thing is the last thing people use as an excuse to farm prestige.
Years ago, they tried to sell us the base editor as the next step after the costume editor. This has NEVER been the case. I spent a good work day working on just one single room, and while it looked good at the end, that's still one room, done in, what... 3-4 hours? Probably more. I don't spend 3-4 hours working on my gloves, because I don't HAVE to. Even when I've no idea what I want, I can still put together an entire costume in half an hour to an hour. Less if I can get my mother (yes, seriously) to help out.
The bases people produce are always really cool, but that kind of effort is just unworkable, and not because of prestige costs, but because of man-hour costs. Yes, people with a lot of skill, a lot of imagination and A LOT OF TIME ON THEIR HANDS can put together AMAZING things. But the rest of us ten-thumbed knuckle-draggers are basically locked out of the system, because it REQUIRES all of that stuff. Even Spore, a game that's basically ABOUT making things out of smaller things, doesn't have that kind of effort and skill requirements to work it. I can knock together a space ship or a three-legged monster or an impossible building in 15 minutes in Spore without having to spend a day refining every minute detail.
If anything ever happens to bases, I hope they introduce a modification to the editor that makes it easier to use for simpler people like me, or outright go into a compound editor that works like an RTS. In fact, you know what? I was just playing UFO Extraterrestrials, the X-Com knockoff of the 2000s, when aliens raided my base. I went about retaking it when I suddenly realised that... Hold the phone! I know this place! And then I remembered that, duh, I built this place! As in the original Enemy Unknown, bases here are built in large chunks of square facilities, but the actual arrangement of the facilities is still as I put it down. That's about enough customization for me, and I sincerely hope we get something simpler if bases are ever overhauled.