Freelancer - The Void

What makes a good Freelancer MOD?

I have played on many different Freelancer servers running many different MODs for probably 4 years now including Evolutions in it’s many forms, TNG, WTS, Nightstalkers, Freeworlds, Asylum 51, vanilla, and others that I can’t remember their names, and of course the Void. I have had the pleasure of playing both sides of the Police/Pirate thing.

First let me start off by stating what I think makes The Void such a great hit. The 2 main things that I think make this server so successful are:
This statement in the rules:
“Pirates
Pirates are allowed to undertake their business on this server, subject to the following:
All pirates will be tagged [X]
Any players not tagged [X] and conducting piracy activity and unwilling/refusing to be correctly tagged, will be banned.
Maximum tax allowed is 200k. There are no exceptions
• Rogues
All rogues will be tagged [R]
Rogues may not be in a clan and may not tax
Rogues by their nature and activity should be deemed KOS (kill on sight) by other players.
The only thing I would change in the rules is to state reloading during PVP is or is not allowed. When I jump a pirate I shoot first ask questions later.

Also having the jumps in Alexandria to the good trade routes and limiting massive payouts on missions keeps traders trading and pirates pirating.

So bravo to The Void Team.

Here is what I found good and bad about some of the other MODS I have played:
TNG: Massively battleship focused to the point that there was no point in having pirates and good guys. They did have some cool battleships.

WTS: This was the firs MOD I played. Huge array of ships, cool ships from every Sci-Fi genre. The balance was totally whacked. Basically too much junk piled on a heap.

Nightstalkers: Again nice array of ships, totally re-done Freelancer. I think it is too Battleship centered doesn’t work for me.

Freeworlds: Totally redone Freelancer for Star wars. This was sooo cool in it’s prime with countless people on and very strict role play.  I really don’t think this mod works very well unless there is massive amounts of people. Having a guy in a Tie fighter and a trader online doesn’t leave much room for role play.

Asylum 51: This mod had some of the coolest ships I have ever seen. You could fly a Bender from Futerama or a doughnut. They had this real cool ship that was a bathtub of meat. Anyway they had pretty good role play except for having clans of Mercs. (like what do they do…… nada) The problem with that mod was the owner was a Moding genus but the server had issues with civility and they were openly hostile to people of national origin they didn’t like, and the profanity seemed to flow freely also. Totally crazy by hey it was Asylum 51

I just thought I would throw this out there.

Dirk
DogZero

Thank you for the compliments Dirk  :D

Regarding your comment here ....

Dirk wrote:The only thing I would change in the rules is to state reloading during PVP is or is not allowed.

The idea of "balance" in a modded FL server is, in our opinion, the most overlooked
aspect of all servers in general.
We have strived to achieve the best balance that we feel we can.

The temptation to add this or that object into the game...  and even more importantly..
The temptation to write a book of rules in need of enforcement....
are the two things we have realized would choke any server.

To this end, we have always practiced a policy of having what I call
"A small yet sane set of simple rules"

The [X] and [R] tag rules are embraced and enforced by the players to the point of
a virtually self policing environment.
Every player's in game activity is subject to scrutiny by their own peers.
This is good in too many ways to attempt to list.

The use of botts and batts must remain a player controlled element.
This is due to the fact that enforcement of any such policy would be virtually impossible.

We would have even less rules if we feel we could.

What makes the Void such a "hit" in my opinion is the Players themselves.
We have a long history of applying common sense to situations as they arise.
We want players to interact yet be respectful of each others fun.

We are not a role play server.
We are a true multiplayer server with role play elements.

Thanks again for being here  :D

Happy Holidays to Everyone !!

Scream On !
Frac

Thanks for making this space for us all to play. It takes much dedication to do this and you are much appreciated for your hard work. I think you have a great set of rules, and hey this is the best Web site in Freelancer.

Many many thanks!!

What makes this mod great to me are a few things you can't get on other servers.

1. It's shipsa are balanced pretty well, there is no ship in the mod thats that has total domination under all circumstances. Most of the ships are very specialized, and have design flaws that are very interesting to overcome.

2. The centralized trade routes force interaction of eveyone on the server. Traders don't fall asleep at their PC because of threats and they also have someone to talk to 24 hours a day.

3. The server is not a complete RP server, allowing politics and free will to be the motivation for our actions, adding those two variables allows for unlimited dynamics on the server.

4. Constant admin staff with the power to solve issues on the spot rather than just reporting you to someone else keeps order on the server.

5. last but not least, the people on the Void are diverse, crazy, funny, idiotic, fanatical, challenging... you name it we have it on the Void

Great posts guys!
It can never be said enough but thank you to all the good folks who have turned a game platform that I never realy quite got into into a fantastic game that has kept me for one glued for a good few years now!
LONG LIVE THE VOID!
SCREAM ON!!