The Power Overhaul Must NOT Happen ASAP

[Qweesdy]

Hi,

One of the reasons for the power overhaul is to encourage interior spaces, and change the balance between system blocks and other blocks. However, most of the problem has nothing to do with power and everything to do with the fact that NPC crew is completely unfinished and unusable.

Note: I am NOT talking about NPC factions. I'm talking about the crew you can buy/hire at advanced trade stations (the ones that fall out of your ship when you fly anywhere, that have a mostly non-existent crusty only menu system, that can't be given names properly, and that can't be dismissed without causing "NPC not here" bugs).

Players don't need interior spaces because there is no point (beyond decoration). However, if/when NPC crew actually worked there would be a reason to have interior spaces - somewhere that NPC crew members can do their jobs. You'd encourage ship designers (even the "PvP people" and the "min/max" people) to create interior areas by giving their ship bonuses (better speed, better damage, better shields) when NPC crew are present and happy.

Imagine if you could promote a generic NPC to "shield engineer" and added a "shield management console" to the game; and gave a ship a 50% boost to shields of a shield engineer was manning the shield management console. It would take less than 1 week before all medium or larger PvP ships had an interior space for their shield engineer and their console.

Now imagine if the NPC crew needed sleep; and gave less bonus when they didn't/couldn't sleep. It'd take less than a week before all medium or larger PvP ships had one interior space for their shield console, plus enough bedrooms for 2 shield engineer NPCs (so that while one NPC sleeps the other can give the shield 50% bonus).

Now imagine if relaxation areas effected the bonus. All medium or larger PvP ships would have gardens or lounge rooms or entertainment areas or something.

Now imagine if there were "weapon engineers" and "thrust engineers" and "cargo engineers"; each with their own bonuses (for damage, and speed/manoeuvring, and salvaging).

Now imagine if there was food that also effected NPC happiness and the bonuses NPCs give to a ship; plus cooks and dining areas, and maybe even farmers to produce food (I'm thinking "mushroom machine operator" not "field of dirt farmer").

How long would it take before all medium or larger PvP ships have various engineering rooms, and bedrooms, and gardens/lounges, and kitchens, and dining areas, and farms ("mushroom machine rooms")?

NPC crew needs to be implemented before you can know if there is or isn't any actual problem for a power overhaul to fix. If you do the power overhaul then implement NPC crew, it's likely that you're going to have to overhaul the power again after NPC crew is done anyway, and I don't think anybody wants that.

 

[NeonSturm]

You forgot just 3 things

1. The Cookie-Backer
2. Schema-Caretaker
3. requirements for "larger than military-style" interior.

 

[Captain Fortius]

This is a good idea. I know at least one person who would start playing if the player and crew needed to eat, sleep, etc.

Also, I think it'd need to be X number of assigned npc per Y amount of system blocks ( ex; Bigger shield generator needs more technicians to operate it ) - Otherwise "efficient" players will get away with building a tiny rabbithole in a still-mostly-solid ship.

And it could be more drastic, like suffering serious penalties if there is no crew manning the posts, perhaps even to the point of complete shutdown of the involved system; Boarding parties would be a viable form of disabling a ship!

A life support system could also be introduced. Flavour wise it'd regulate air filtering, oxygen recycling, temperature and pressure - but that's a whole lot of code that doesn't need to be written ( SE still has trouble with their "airtightness" checks ) ;
In practice, there wouldn't need to be anything so complex, only " X amount of people on board needs Y amount of life support blocks " ; if there's less, or offline, they start losing HP - the rate of which would depend on how far is the system over it's capacity ( 200 people in a ship that can support 100 = some kind debuff. 300 people on the same ship = slow loss of hp. No active life support = Dead in 5 minutes. )
I guess spacesuits would also need to be able to sustain people for some duration, but that's not important right now.

However this and the power overhaul are two different issues, related only because both would require some interior space that isn't full of system blocks.

As for which of the two will come first, there's no question. One is already announced, the other is just being suggested, right now. I'm just hoping they won't mess it up. The original idea, after carefully reading it through, actually seemed quite smart.

But the two would compliment each other nicely indeed.

 

[Haalon]

Imagine if you could promote a generic NPC to "shield engineer" and added a "shield management console" to the game; and gave a ship a 50% boost to shields of a shield engineer was manning the shield management console. It would take less than 1 week before all medium or larger PvP ships had an interior space for their shield engineer and their console.

Now imagine if the NPC crew needed sleep; and gave less bonus when they didn't/couldn't sleep. It'd take less than a week before all medium or larger PvP ships had one interior space for their shield console, plus enough bedrooms for 2 shield engineer NPCs (so that while one NPC sleeps the other can give the shield 50% bonus).

Now imagine if relaxation areas effected the bonus. All medium or larger PvP ships would have gardens or lounge rooms or entertainment areas or something.

Now imagine if there were "weapon engineers" and "thrust engineers" and "cargo engineers"; each with their own bonuses (for damage, and speed/manoeuvring, and salvaging).

Now imagine if there was food that also effected NPC happiness and the bonuses NPCs give to a ship; plus cooks and dining areas, and maybe even farmers to produce food (I'm thinking "mushroom machine operator" not "field of dirt farmer").

How long would it take before all medium or larger PvP ships have various engineering rooms, and bedrooms, and gardens/lounges, and kitchens, and dining areas, and farms ("mushroom machine rooms")?

The Sims, but in Starmade.

 

[kupu]

NPC crew needs to be implemented before you can know if there is or isn't any actual problem for a power overhaul to fix.

The power system is one of the most core mechanics of the game. It should be robust enough to allow secondary mechanics to feed into it, not be defined by non-existent secondary (or superfluous) features.

Seems to me like you're asking for the carriage before you have the horse.

The Sims, but in Starmade.

Yea, there are entire games based around some of the suggestions made on the dock. Personally speaking, Starmade could not, nor shouldn't chase absolute depths in such secondary features or micro management.

 

[kingreol]

rotation speed change would be one factor in allowing interior to be less painful
armor changes will allow the same. also standard hull should be balanced better with weight/armor. that would help since more interior means more outer hull. but i should feel happy using standard over advanced for broadside hulling.

personally using basic hull for exterior is always hard for me. cause man that stuff dont look on outside hulling.

the power overhaul i doupt was simply thought of as a means to force interior design. as mentioned ai does have issues with it. and over 100 entities i could imagine we would get a performance boost with the change

 

[splatthecat]

My only problem with the overhaul is that no timescale seems to be announced. This puts the game in limbo for many players as they decide whether to finish a project they are working on or start a new one.

I think it should be embraced. The developers have obviously looked at the power system and taken the bold move to rip out everything that they have built so far and improve it. Yes, it will mean that current ships will need to be updated, but how many times have you updated a ship? I have a favorite that is currently undergoing an update. It is currently in the second update of the sixth version of the ship. My skill at building ships has improved since version one and every time it needed an update it improved. I will probably consign some of my ships to the scrap yard and some I will modify using the new system.

I believe that this update is vital for both PvP and PvE/RP players. I want more room for RP interiors but I do have a couple of PvP fighters that will benefit from this update.

Yes, it is a bit of a choker to have to rebuild a lot of what I have worked on for the last year but some of my earlier ships could be made better. If I want an archive of my old stuff, I will have a separate install fixed at the last version before the update and use that if I ever want a nostalgia trip.

 

[Comradecolonel]

It's really hard to work on something that you KNOW you are going to have to rip apart and rebuild. The entire way that you build will change so all systems will most likely have to be remade. This is very true of designs that are precise in bringing out their fullest potential. As long as we have an idea the true scope and timeframe then we can plan according. Right now many are assuming the worst, so players serious about systems performance are just not investing time into it right now.

 

[-Moose-]

Yea, there are entire games based around some of the suggestions made on the dock. Personally speaking, Starmade could not, nor shouldn't chase absolute depths in such secondary features or micro management.

Thank you so much for speaking out about this! These suggestions get posted all the time and people don't seem to grasp just how these mechanics will kill the game and make it nothing more than tomagachi astronauts! (cough No Mans Sky /cough)

 

[NeonSturm]

The Sims, but in Starmade.

Yea, there are entire games based around some of the suggestions made on the dock. Personally speaking, Starmade could not, nor shouldn't chase absolute depths in such secondary features or micro management.

This might be a goal for the modding community if enough mod support is added.
Perhaps we can make a Regex-AI (regai) cpu with logic which executes the Sim's thoughts (for RP servers ofc).
​

But regardless, it would be nice if Shine looks over sims and tells which features from it it wants to use in StarMade.
So that peoples get an idea of the dev-teams priorities.​

 

[thatothermitch]

It's really hard to work on something that you KNOW you are going to have to rip apart and rebuild. The entire way that you build will change so all systems will most likely have to be remade. This is very true of designs that are precise in bringing out their fullest potential. As long as we have an idea the true scope and timeframe then we can plan according. Right now many are assuming the worst, so players serious about systems performance are just not investing time into it right now.

It's hard for me to imagine a worse way to introduce these sorts of breaking changes than to basically poll the entire community for core game ideas, and then not really take a firm stance on direction. This is especially bad since the history of power and thrust have been pretty full of ill concieved, and timid false starts (softcaps, aux reactors, docked stuff, what have you).

It's your game Schine, be bold and commit; decide what it should be and make that. Some people will stay some people will go. Design by committee is not generally a good idea, and you don't need community approval for big decisions.

PS: This surprise power system overhaul mess just reaffirms my fears that this game will never be finished, and makes me regret putting so many hours into it already. I feel like much of this game only half-works and the rest is just going in circles.

 

[Comradecolonel]

thatothermitch A lot of people are already fed up with the way things have been handled so far. I thought that when they had things planned out in the timeline it would be a tough but steady march to the finish line. Now I'm am seriously starting to doubt how well planned everything actually is. I agree that the devs need to commit. It seems like anytime something goes wrong, Schine rips up the old and brings something totally new. I honestly don't care if this game is every finished, I'd just like to really play it for real.

 

[Nocturna]

Yea, there are entire games based around some of the suggestions made on the dock. Personally speaking, Starmade could not, nor shouldn't chase absolute depths in such secondary features or micro management.

And it's very sad. It would be something like Dwarf Fortress for the each current big ship.

 

[Qweesdy]

Hi,

The power system is one of the most core mechanics of the game. It should be robust enough to allow secondary mechanics to feed into it, not be defined by non-existent secondary (or superfluous) features.

Seems to me like you're asking for the carriage before you have the horse.

Quite the opposite.

Putting the cart before the horse would be changing the power system (to work around problems caused by things like not having NPC crews implemented properly), then implementing NPC crews properly later, then realising that the reasons for the earlier power system changes no longer exist (and caused more problems than they solved), and then probably changing the power system again after you realise how short-sighted the original changes were.

Yea, there are entire games based around some of the suggestions made on the dock. Personally speaking, Starmade could not, nor shouldn't chase absolute depths in such secondary features or micro management.

"Micro-management" is constantly having to deal with minor details. For NPC crew you'd just board a ship and the crew would take care of themselves.

What NPC crew would do is add some much needed depth to building (larger) ships, and add an actual reason for interior spaces, and make it sane for the role playing people to have multiple players on a ship (real people at various stations instead of NPC crew); but it's more than that.

For most games there are things happening all the time that make the world seem more alive and more interesting - things like birds flying around in the background, or the sound of police sirens in the distance, or a bug the crawls around a cave floor. For Starmade there's almost nothing like that. Especially for single-player; larger ships, space stations and planets are all dead/sterile places devoid of anything to add any interest. NPC crew moving around doing their own thing would make the game more interesting.

The other thing is that NPC crew is a stepping stone that enables a massive amount of future possibilities. Maybe eventually NPC factions could involve actual "non-player characters" rather than just empty/unmanned stations and ships without pilots being controlled by a hidden/unknown force. Maybe eventually the cities that are generated on some planets could have people living in them so that they're more than just different blocks to salvage. Maybe eventually the game will finally have a "pilot seat" (instead of "pilot magically shrinks to a fraction of their size and disappears into a ship core block" insanity) and NPC crew will replace bobby AI by being able to sit in a pilot seat. Maybe eventually players would have the ability to create and manage a large population if they want. Maybe eventually there might be a risk of a very unhappy NPC deciding to leave you and join the pirates (and steal a small ship when they leave). Maybe eventually there might be "NPC tourists" that hitch-hike across the galaxy. Maybe eventually there's might be a kind of quest system, where players can pick up odd jobs like taking NPC passengers to their destination, or collecting a bounty for using their sniper rifle to shoot an NPC while the NPC is relaxing in a station's lounge.

 

[NeonSturm]

has a good game if the universe gets more interesting (npc encounters, minecraft-beauty for planets) and the game more stable (bugs+balance+compatibility).

A little bit of depth to space would help too (some games have fog or a skybox with asteroids) along with immersion (from a npc+player's perspective) and environment details (bigger planets, trade/npc-faction system).

But maybe just holds it back until beta, so that peoples have to pay for these features?

 

[Lecic]

Seems to me like you're asking for the carriage before you have the horse.

A power system that forces a need for interior for crew that don't even exist yet is asking for the carriage before you have the horse.

 

[sayerulz]

Making interiors viable is only part of the reason for the overhaul (which I strongly support). Filling your ships with power tetris and shields is also NOT fun. Some people I'm sure find it less tedious than I do, but I really doubt that anyone actually enjoys it. The new system, at least as I imagine it, will reduce tedium and increase depth of ship design decisions.

 

[Az14el]

There's a ton of implications of a new power system, while they could probably roll crew out now and have it function similar to buffs/repairs/maluses in FTL (any FTL players here will know how important crew micro is, and keeping them moving around the ship unhindered). It would pretty much guarantee a revisit to crew mechanics after the power changes as well. Why make it twice basically.

 

[johno1928]

One of the biggest problems is i have to choose between aesthetic value and actual function. Since i want my ships to have a balance between these every interior i design is hindered by the constant reminder "shields could be going here". Having power require empty space gives me an excuse to build bigger without the voices in my head telling me to make a doom cube

 

[KaRe]

I agree with Az14el. It seems extremely backwards and wasteful to fix crew, then fix power, then refix crew to fit that new system. It's not really hard to understand. Sure, these things have been announced for quite a while now, and sure we are getting tired of finding need to be fixed flaws in the game. But then again, the engine itself has been in development for atleast a decade. (Or atleast from what I've seen.) You've waited that long for a removable playable version of the game, so what's a few more months for a better power system, provided it does happen?

To put it simply, or at least a slight bit clearer, imagine there are six pillars: Power, Weapons, Support, Decor/armor blocks, NPC, and Galaxies. There are lesser pillars as well, and all the pillars have cracks and bumps and will never be perfect, but nevertheless hold up the building called Starmade. What you're asking for is to destroy a part of NPC and fix it, then absolutely redo Power, then destroy that same part of NPC and again rebuild it. It's a waste of mortar, energy, and time.