Read by Council Resource gathering suggestion, also gives bases another purpose

[Bkwrm]

Posted this in someones thread the other day and thought I'd stick it in the actual suggestions forum since the more I think about it the more I rather like it.

Basically turn the salvage block and computer into an resource extractor. Think similar to an RTS game like Supreme Commander. It will fire a short range beam a direction and will "gather" appropriate resources from the target it is hitting. NO blocks will be destroyed. You would need to hook up chests for it to deposit the blocks into and power could determine how many resources it gathers each tick. Each entity (asteroid/planet/whatever) could only have 1 resource extractor active on it at a time.

Players would want to build a decent base around this extractor of course otherwise any player could loot from it, especially if it's a rare spawning asteroid. Or to protect it from getting destroyed by an enemy faction wanting to interfere with your factions resource gathering ability.

Piracy would even have a purpose, whoever you are raiding might have been making a run to gather all their resources from those extractors. Could do a stakeout on a resource extractor by building a hidden sensor in that system to detect when one of their ships comes in range or even have a cloaked scout follow them as they make a run.



Dunno, I just like a lot of potential player counter play that could come from this in addition to eliminating server mining lag and providing more roleplay options. Sure time based gathering could kind of suck, but resources required for constructing things could be lowered this way since you can't just go out and destroy a planet or make a monster salvaging ship. Would also give a lot of purpose to defending a home system than just focusing on your singular base or space station.

 

[starhaiden]

Instead of placing a ore mining device on asteroids and planets, a station within the sector could mine it, with ships or something.

 

[NeonSturm]

Basically turn the salvage block and computer into an resource extractor. Think similar to an RTS game like Supreme Commander. It will fire a short range beam a direction and will "gather" appropriate resources from the target it is hitting. NO blocks will be destroyed. You would need to hook up chests for it to deposit the blocks into and power could determine how many resources it gathers each tick. Each entity (asteroid/planet/whatever) could only have 1 resource extractor active on it at a time.

For example:

"[Base income] per [player] per [time]" can be doing TG missions, trades or selling latest map data to the TG.

The mission-reward, trade/stock-limit and map-data acquire-time can put limits on the [base income]
From that base-income, you produce factories and miners and all the stuff.​

To avoid exponential economy [if desired] and reduce the gap between newbies and old players + boost the importance of players independent of play-time:

exp eco limit [if desired]:

Make miners require a component only accessible from [base income]-related things.​

reduce gap : Add opportunity to share. Early gamers should have an abundant of some and old ones an abundant of another.

Trading to get the late stuff should buff the rate at which you get early stuff up to a limit that applies for old too.
This gets newbies into trades if they want to progress a bit faster and old ones to respect newbies accepting these trades over a trusted interface.​

boost importance:

Add the need for new ship designs with "design missions" maybe? or limit exponential economy (a choice per server).
There needs to be something only players can do. And these things has to be worth it.
​

Your perspective on progressing bottom-up:

You gain 1 miner-blocks per completed mission.
Now if you trade with an old player, you make missions faster and 2 miner-blocks per mission sooner.
Another trade for a bigger ship with more jump-drives and you get 3 miner-blocks per mission.
The miner-blocks are useless without an expensive factory, thus you accept the trades until you have 3/mission.

After 4-8 hours, you can build a miner-outpost with enough protection to survive pirates and you enter the mid-game.

Owned planets increase the number of pirates, thus you should avoid that early.​

But I am also open for other ideas.

 

[Bkwrm]

Yeah, pretty much there's a lot of ways you could go with this type concept. I just thought I'd throw out there an alternative method than the typical "physically mine blocks to get resources" method most of these type games use. Maybe as a more advanced faction tech method with the traditional salvage components eating a heavy nerf or something.

I like a lot of your ideas NeonSturm, you took it like 4 steps farther along than I was thinking XD Although I kind of prefer an open ended setup that is more up to player agency than forcing you to trade or do missions, but that's just me.

 

[Gunseng]

Interesting idea! I think maybe a new block would be better instead of the salvage beam.

Extractor Computer and Extractor Modules - can only be placed on planets (1 computer per each face) and automatically detects which 2 materials are on the face it's placed on then does a set production rate of something like 1 of each material per 5 min. The Modules determine the rate at a max of 5 per 5 min with each module costing 100,000 energy/s. Also maybe the Extractor prevents salvaging of the planet face it is on.

This would require players to build good sized facilities to power it and possibly some creative designs using the power transfer computer/modules to send power to other faces on the planet like "power lines"

I don't see asteroid mining a problem for servers but planet eaters are typically banned and it'd be nice to have an alternative as well as a reason to build on a planet without making asteroid mining obsolete.

 

[Achriel]

I like this idea of resource extractors, it give pirates and the like a reason to exist.

If you add in a caveat that it cannot be located on a HomeBase it makes these outposts vulnerable. Allow a faction block to control permissions but just regular building for the most part and have the output related to the number of extractors and have those extractors require power (like factories). Increasing the size of the base makes it more productive thus more noticeable and finally more profitable to raid.

Now wouldn't you want a scanner blocking/cloaking system on these outposts.. following people stealthy becomes an art form to locate their mining outposts. Miners might build defenses (vulnerable ones) at large really profitable places or maybe they'll concentrate their defense around a single planet or cluster of asteroids.

It will add a good deal of game play without any AI required besides turrets.

 

[The Strategist]

Posted this in someones thread the other day and thought I'd stick it in the actual suggestions forum since the more I think about it the more I rather like it.

Basically turn the salvage block and computer into an resource extractor. Think similar to an RTS game like Supreme Commander. It will fire a short range beam a direction and will "gather" appropriate resources from the target it is hitting. NO blocks will be destroyed. You would need to hook up chests for it to deposit the blocks into and power could determine how many resources it gathers each tick. Each entity (asteroid/planet/whatever) could only have 1 resource extractor active on it at a time.

Players would want to build a decent base around this extractor of course otherwise any player could loot from it, especially if it's a rare spawning asteroid. Or to protect it from getting destroyed by an enemy faction wanting to interfere with your factions resource gathering ability.

Piracy would even have a purpose, whoever you are raiding might have been making a run to gather all their resources from those extractors. Could do a stakeout on a resource extractor by building a hidden sensor in that system to detect when one of their ships comes in range or even have a cloaked scout follow them as they make a run.

Dunno, I just like a lot of potential player counter play that could come from this in addition to eliminating server mining lag and providing more roleplay options. Sure time based gathering could kind of suck, but resources required for constructing things could be lowered this way since you can't just go out and destroy a planet or make a monster salvaging ship. Would also give a lot of purpose to defending a home system than just focusing on your singular base or space station.

I used to play Supreme Commander a lot, this appeals to me a lot because of that, but also mining as it is now is horribly tedious. This would make it more automated and less of a concern for factions.

 

[Keptick]

A good suggestion (something I'd like to see personally), but it's already been suggested in the past. (The core concept is the same)

An analysis of the relationship between planets, faction interactions and resource acquisition.

Also, devs have some form of passive ressource extraction/production in mind, no details yet though. But knowing that it's not rejected is pretty nice :D

 

[Pacific_Jim]

I would keep salvage beams as they are, for quicker but limited resource gathering, and have a slower but less limited option using an extractor method. That way you could use planets for long term sustainable resource production and asteroids for a quick and easy method. Adding a bit of variety,

 

[Gunseng]

I would keep salvage beams as they are, for quicker but limited resource gathering, and have a slower but less limited option using an extractor method. That way you could use planets for long term sustainable resource production and asteroids for a quick and easy method. Adding a bit of variety,

Exactly what I was aiming for. Something slow but automated with asteroid mining still needed.