- Joined
- Jul 13, 2014
- Messages
- 2,518
- Reaction score
- 787
Summary:
Starmade should probably have a way to "rent" or loan out a ship to any given player for a specific purpose. For example, for a mining tutorial, the neophyte player should receive a temporary ship that is not his to keep or modify, but only he can enter the core/pilot's seat.
Enforce player behavior:
The game should set several parameters on the ship at the time it spawns or is "entered" for piloting, including maximum time, maximum distance from a coordinate, hostility, mission-critical nav points in the nav computer, and minimum and maximum block counts. The ship should be build-mode blocked, so that it can be repaired or replaced (with the same rental rules and parameters), but not deconstructed, built up into a different ship, or otherwise modified from its core purpose.
Behavior violation:
If the ship violates parameters, it should explode immediately. E.g. If you try to shoot the tutorial NPC, a trade station, or some other friendly or neutral target; if you try to leave the immediate area (leaving the maximum distance from some point), take too long to do the mission (exceed maximum time), or some other in-game mis-behavior, the ship explodes out from under you. This explosion should probably not be harmful to any other entities (to avoid a griefer carefully timing his explosion next to a griefing target at just the right opportunity). It should also go away at the end of the mission, which should include the player flying back to the origin point of the mission.
Player reset:
The game should have a mission spawn point saved when the loaner is built/spawned/offered. Then when the ship explodes after violating the parameters of the mission, WHOOSH, the player finds themselves at this mission spawn point, or in a holding pattern, waiting for the mission spawn point to clear of obstruction. This temporary spawn point is an easy way to restart the mission if something goes sideways, and will generally reduce frustration in new players who aren't paying attention and get themselves blown up for violating the mission rules, get stuck, or simply want to start over.
Reset failure:
Problem: if a spawn point is blocked on purpose, this could cause the player to be stuck, so after some sort of timeout, they should simply spawn at the regular spawn point, the starter station, or their selected respawn point. If they want to retry the tutorial mission, or whatever mission it was, they'll just have to retrace their steps to get to the mission giver.
Unpiloted rentals:
Similarly, the game should be able to spawn un-pilot-able and un-build-able drones for target practice/teaching new players how to use weapons/generally populate a mission that simply needs more ships. These drones should have a timeout parameter, after which, they disappear or fade away. Also, they should go away at the end of their associated mission. (E.g. "This training mission is failed. Removing computer-generated opponents from the field...." or "Primary target disabled. The escort ships are bugging out....")
Starmade should probably have a way to "rent" or loan out a ship to any given player for a specific purpose. For example, for a mining tutorial, the neophyte player should receive a temporary ship that is not his to keep or modify, but only he can enter the core/pilot's seat.
Enforce player behavior:
The game should set several parameters on the ship at the time it spawns or is "entered" for piloting, including maximum time, maximum distance from a coordinate, hostility, mission-critical nav points in the nav computer, and minimum and maximum block counts. The ship should be build-mode blocked, so that it can be repaired or replaced (with the same rental rules and parameters), but not deconstructed, built up into a different ship, or otherwise modified from its core purpose.
Behavior violation:
If the ship violates parameters, it should explode immediately. E.g. If you try to shoot the tutorial NPC, a trade station, or some other friendly or neutral target; if you try to leave the immediate area (leaving the maximum distance from some point), take too long to do the mission (exceed maximum time), or some other in-game mis-behavior, the ship explodes out from under you. This explosion should probably not be harmful to any other entities (to avoid a griefer carefully timing his explosion next to a griefing target at just the right opportunity). It should also go away at the end of the mission, which should include the player flying back to the origin point of the mission.
Player reset:
The game should have a mission spawn point saved when the loaner is built/spawned/offered. Then when the ship explodes after violating the parameters of the mission, WHOOSH, the player finds themselves at this mission spawn point, or in a holding pattern, waiting for the mission spawn point to clear of obstruction. This temporary spawn point is an easy way to restart the mission if something goes sideways, and will generally reduce frustration in new players who aren't paying attention and get themselves blown up for violating the mission rules, get stuck, or simply want to start over.
Reset failure:
Problem: if a spawn point is blocked on purpose, this could cause the player to be stuck, so after some sort of timeout, they should simply spawn at the regular spawn point, the starter station, or their selected respawn point. If they want to retry the tutorial mission, or whatever mission it was, they'll just have to retrace their steps to get to the mission giver.
Unpiloted rentals:
Similarly, the game should be able to spawn un-pilot-able and un-build-able drones for target practice/teaching new players how to use weapons/generally populate a mission that simply needs more ships. These drones should have a timeout parameter, after which, they disappear or fade away. Also, they should go away at the end of their associated mission. (E.g. "This training mission is failed. Removing computer-generated opponents from the field...." or "Primary target disabled. The escort ships are bugging out....")
