18/8/2013 Hindos's Humble Haven Of Hopes
- Thread starter hindos
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Hindos's Humble Haven Of Hopes
Varying from grand to miniscule, from dust to planets; Hindos's haven has everything, alright probably nothing, you'd want with suggestions. Based on personal experience playing Alpha, and relying on my imagination I have compiled this list of suggestions. These are thoughts and ideas as a result of an ongoing brainstorm, and should be treated as such. In order to be implemented some require tweaking or twisting since I do not know the exact nature of the engine and it's limits.
I've made suggestion initiatives before, and the one great flaw I find each time in the community is concentrating on one 'bad suggestion' and thereby completly and utterly ignoring the others, if there is a bad suggestion feel free to give Constructive Criticism but that should not be the sole purpose of your post, also comment on suggestions you like and perhaps give an additional one.
Since this is ongoing it will be updated when I come with new ideas and relevant to patches and such.
Construction
1. Click drag build - pull the mouse between two points and create lovely voxelated lines this is great for diagonals and speeding up construction. This can be combined with advanced build mode for thicker walls/boxes for creative construction. Yet another tool to help builders build. Additionally a single block mode in which the diagonal is made in an exact / without -_-_ pattern we usually have would be a nice additional feature.
2. Build Zones- With the addition of personal weapons comes battles and skirmishes in astronaut mode, to assist in making this more diverse the ability to set build zones in faction ground would be perfect. This allows players to erect walls and forts to hold off the enemy, while sapping(taking down) the enemy structures at the same time. This also allows for more creative options such as building contests, and public places(for instance a spectating booth). Partially implemented with faction control block :D, minus the building though
3. Diagonal Symmetry- Perhaps outside of the engines capability, but would certainly be very useful indeed.
4. Robots- Your own automated mechanical workers, these fellows can do just about anything for you but are generally vulnerable against enemy fire. Their functions include, but are not necessarily limited to: repair, cargo transport(plexchests), boarding defence(can attack hostile robots/players, but are quite generally weak), operate turrets/computers and carry the player(for those power mongers). Customization on robots is key, and they can be tweaked for particular tasks in your robot construction facility; additionaly multiple tiers exist; going from larger bots to simple droids. Perhaps miniture voxel blocks could compose them and be modifiable by the player? (requires numerous performance tweaks)
5. Sittable Objects- The ability to sit down on certain marked objects allows for faction meetings in person as well as lovely spectating areas and general chilling. A great little feature for players to socialise with.
6. Spheres,ellipsoids, and circle. These are a real hassle to build properly, to assist players in this endeavour two options exist. 1) an outline according to their specifications to fill in (recommended) or 2) a instantaneous sphere/ellipsoid/circle builder(lagg/crash alert!)
7. Retractable 'bridge' - Unlike the plex door this is not limited to an on/off function, but instead opens or closes in real time to allow for draw bridges, garage doors, retracting doors and more creative creations. Additionaly a sensor block could automaticly activate it.
8. Display- A holographic display feature that uses up two blocks(vertical), it can show any input item or object that is put in and perhaps can double as the map block to minimize id's. This is great for warehouses, player stores, and decoration. Additionally holographic communication would be a nice but difficult feature to implement.
9. PlexChest access- Having the ability to access the inventories of chests on your vessel/station whilst in build mode could drasticly increase the variety and creativity of structures. Simply because the large majority of people are not going to exit adv build mode, reseting everything but their symmetry, walk all the way to their warehouse/cargobay and then all the way back. Most people stick to what they have in their immediate inventory, and while this usually suffices creativity can be fed even better with this chest acess feature. As a GUI it should be a small button around the area of the advanced build mode, this expands when clicked on to access all chests. Perhaps plexchest naming can also be implemnted to sort this out better. Organization of materials is obviously imperative.
Transportation/Movement
1. Trams/Hoverpads, great for large stations and horizontal travel(or perhaps diagnol too!) basicly a ground-locked ship which is limited to the size of the track. This issue came along for me when designing my Ecumenopolis, where travelling in astronaut mode takes ages and ship cores are inpracticale and silly. Note: Not possible in ships
2. Mounts- With the planned release of critters(citation needed) being able to use these strange alien creatures for ground travel would be a wicked feature; and perhaps allow for zoos and such. Moreover space critters, like Star Trek's jellyfish-like alien entity encountered in TNG in Encounter at farpoint. This is quite a vanity feature, and should by no means be a priority of any sort.
3. Star Gates- Construcable giant portals which allow fast between dimensional shifts to cover vast distances in a relatively minimalistic time. These fellows are very expensive, energy hungry and require a well defended space station(cant be placed on home base). They also are scalable, meaning large ships cant enter through small star gates, and larger ones obviously have higher maintenance costs. This makes them key fighting points for faction control since it gives great travelling capabilities. Moreover it allows for faraway bases to allow for wider spread civilizations. (Note that similar suggestions exist, I just thought I'd give my two cents to balance it out). A rename is recommended to stop lawsuits
4. Crouching/prone- With the personal weapon system, the ability to hide behind objects and pop out using crouching is imperative. Additionally in split-second decisions without the possbility fo cover prone allows you to limit your size at the expense of movement speed(making your prone[hehe] to flank attacks). Besides this also looks amazing.
5. Escalators/horizontal or diagnol transport-These can bring you up across a pyramid or down along like an airport, speed can be toggled at the connected block (allowing for 'scenery trips') they cant be connected in one long stream like hoverpads, making them better at short range transport like the interior of ships.
Exploration
1. Map Markers - Mark off your home base on your radar, pop one down on visited shops. Mostly these modify the main existing marks with small clauses to indicate that A) you've been there before or B) It's an important location(e.g. faction home base). Additionally you can place markers in empty space (e.g. for fleet rendeaveuz) and share it with your faction members. Great for teamwork and marking off enemy positions, making scouting a more viable option. Possible additional feature: if you die near the enemy faction perhaps the markers should be wiped.
2. Gas Nebula - Is a large cloud of dust or ionized gases which are the basis of the formation of stars, these are true beauties but also have the advantage/disadvantage(depending on your circumstances) of limiting visibility. This makes them great hiding points for vessels since it gives free radar jamming(sensors cant pierce through it). More turbulent plasma nebulas are dangerous and volatile places with explosive consquences and sometimes 'space lightning'(for lack of a better word) , so if you're a small fighter low on shields you might be able to escape the enemy in there; at a high risk of death for yourself though.
3. Moons- Sattellites that orbit around their host planet, these can come alone; with more buddies or perhaps the host planet has none at all. They vary in size and make-up, and are very rarely habitable. In terms of explorative incentive occasional moon bases can be found on them as well as deep craters from asteroid impacts(if it has no atmosphere). An extremly, note extremly, is a moon that has a moon, this requires a particularily large main moon at a far distance from the host planet for it to be able to retain it's own exoplanet.
4. Shipyards- These collosal structures are operated by an A.I. created by some long lost but technologicly advanced civilization. Here you can save your ships on blueprints and import your own. The twist is that shipyards make your ships in real-time, reducing lagg from importing large ships tremendously, making it take a while before you can get your imported ship ready to go. Moreover the ship is very vunerabl in this state and can be interrupted by enemy skirmishes, fortunately the generated shipyards have some turret defenses(and the original body is invunerable like shop), but players can also make their own ship yards if they please.(suggested before, expanded on with my own ideas)
5. Enhanced Map- Zoom in(higher detail but short visibility) or out(lower detail but further visibility) on the map and open it as a popup with the 'm' key. Very zoomed in maps can roughly show the general block build up of e.g. a planet, while zoomed out versions show single pixels to mark shops,stations,etc. Additionaly a map block could suspend this in space for players to stand around and ponder their decisions. Finally a route marker with a galaxy view(sector-based, can't distinguish planets, bases or anything[aside from markers you set maybe] to set your navigation to avoid a particular hazard(e.g. a known enemy base) or to go to two destinations in one route(e.g. shop then factory).
6. Wormholes- Rips in space and time, these are incredibly unstable and if the player attempts to fly through it they are transported across the galaxy to some random sector(within 50 sectors). This makes it an unreliable form of transport, and it has a higher priority of putting you into some sort of danger zones(e.g. plasma nebula) hence its more of a last resort of if you're new and want to move out from the spawn quickly.
Combat:
1. Patrol Mode- An AI function which makes the ship routinely, with configurable pauses) go along a specific path(can be set with markers, nav points(e.g. between two shops) or just the arbitary sector to sector patrol(must be explored). Great for protecting faction or base borders against pirates or players, a wise player keeps tabs on which ships they have out on patrols; hence they can see if someone snuck into their base if one is down(perhaps this can be done by an alarm system but that is rather complex).
2. Personal Weapon suggestions:
a, Melee weapons(knives/plasma blades)
b, Personal cloak(short duration/long recharge, still slightly visible if the other player is attentive)- enhances melee
c, Grenades- only one version necessary, can get many enemies at once if they are close together. Short supply though so use sparingly(much weaker then missiles against blocks but still does some damage) This would also work in space, but it has a shorter range(disipates quickly, no shockwave effect)
d, Limit the personal weapon variety, otherwise it becomes too complicated; astronaut combat should be simple but very diverse. Customization of weaponry is a good idea, but this shouldn't create OP combinations( every gun has a balancing downside)
3. Sniper- Very long distance, accurate, ship/turret-mounted weapon which does very large damage but has a very large recharge and is uneffective against large expanses of hull, takes A LOT of chipping before you get any real hull weakening. Great for taking on a far away enemy, only weapon that has a zoom function
4. Flamethrowers- Large spread, low damage weaponry; great for wearing down hull and taking on small annoying targets at close range. They work by sending out both oxygen and flammable material and having them mix precisely outside of the weapon, allowing it to function in a vacuum. Whilst they can fire for a long duration, once this is up they have a long recharge time. Other options could be a magma-propelling weapon which spreads out upon contact in a 'splash'.
5. Laser- A varient of beams that is intended to deal damage, these are medium-range and precise and do continual damage without needing a recharge. This makes them good to tunnel to the enemy core. However, they are very energy dependent and are relatively ineffective against shields. Hence it is more of a 'finishing-off' weapon, unless you have huge energy production and have it in very large quantities.
6. Latcher- A timed drone that latches on to the enemy vessel, if aimed correctly, and gradually inflicts harm on it by skirming around. It is suseptible to being zapped off by shields and robots(see other suggestion) but can be effective, especially in large quantities. However to rebuild them takes some time and they are hard to aim correctly.
7. MIRV(multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle)- A missile that splits into numerous smaller ones, allowing for a large spread but less damage. This is perfect for large vessels to take out oncoming fighters, but is virtually useless against well-shielded targets. Locking and heat seaking is an option, but is not a recommended feature.
Miscelaneous:
1. Weapon Co-ordination block- This creates a set amount of bursts from specific weapons and computers for a pre-designed barrage, besides the obvious strategic advantages this can also be used to create brilliant 'weapon shows' which use co-ordinated bursts to create shapes and patterns.
3. Expanded Modding Capabilities- Currently we can create some custom blocks and edit their basic functions, texture and description. However for the modding community to properly kick off greater tools are required, I'm looking at tools like forge for minecraft. This allows for mods to create many of the feature-heavy suggestions made in this thread and others, lifting lots of pressure of schema and allowing for many possibilites. At the getgo this should work to minimize compatibility(conflict) problems between seperate mods by automaticly assigning Id's and finding if similar classes have been modified. Perhaps someone in the community can make this?!
4. Minigames- This is a very broad topic and is only limited by the player's creativity, already things like the thunderdome, soccer and racing exists but these ideas are limited by the tools availible. The build zone suggestion is one addition that can help minigames, but features like falgs(for ctf), personal-weapon armed turrets and HQ's(heal and return flag here) would be a great addition. If this is too heavy a simple reseting of a specified area (by admin command) would be great for destructible areas.
5. Communication- Contact your faction via highly compressed interstellar radio signals, these can give vital information or give a distress signal. Additionaly you can drop a beacon if your radio tower is down, or you want them not to come directly into the fight. These come in main messages including "enemy spotted", "Mayday! Mayday!"/"SOS", "Intercepting enemy vessel", "Twenty vessels in enemy fleet", "Enemy moving to sector X,Y,Z","Enemy engaging allied ship",etc. As a possible additional feature, communication interception could be implemented; meanign that stealth ships should use it sparingly and move quickly and also allowing factiosn to predict the enemy's movements or fall for their bluff(e.g. you could purposefully communicate for the 20 cruisers to attack the enemy base from sector 16,4,0 while you actually have a bunch of stealthed fighters guerilla their undocked vessels at 10,4,0)
6. Space lichen- Any captain must take good care of his ship, getting rid of spacial lifeforms clining onto the vessel's obvious warmth is one of these tasks. These lichen can slow down the ship, but offer very slight protection at their location(although in the long run they can weaken your original hull). Visit your shipyard, or get some cleaning robots to take care of this infestation.
7. Libraries/better logbooks- Expanding logbooks to have more characters and lines allows players to write their complete faction manifest on them, adding printer block can copy this for mass distribution(publishing company anyone?) and libraries can store all these novels, unique and popular alike, for the public to access.
8. Auto-sort- Inventory(both player and object) sorter that rearranges all stacks of items in a logical order based on the set mode. For instance alphabeticly, by type, in colums or rows, in order of value, etc. This would be great for organizing the current chaos of plexChests.
More to come! Stick around to find out.
Varying from grand to miniscule, from dust to planets; Hindos's haven has everything, alright probably nothing, you'd want with suggestions. Based on personal experience playing Alpha, and relying on my imagination I have compiled this list of suggestions. These are thoughts and ideas as a result of an ongoing brainstorm, and should be treated as such. In order to be implemented some require tweaking or twisting since I do not know the exact nature of the engine and it's limits.
I've made suggestion initiatives before, and the one great flaw I find each time in the community is concentrating on one 'bad suggestion' and thereby completly and utterly ignoring the others, if there is a bad suggestion feel free to give Constructive Criticism but that should not be the sole purpose of your post, also comment on suggestions you like and perhaps give an additional one.
Since this is ongoing it will be updated when I come with new ideas and relevant to patches and such.
Construction
1. Click drag build - pull the mouse between two points and create lovely voxelated lines this is great for diagonals and speeding up construction. This can be combined with advanced build mode for thicker walls/boxes for creative construction. Yet another tool to help builders build. Additionally a single block mode in which the diagonal is made in an exact / without -_-_ pattern we usually have would be a nice additional feature.
2. Build Zones- With the addition of personal weapons comes battles and skirmishes in astronaut mode, to assist in making this more diverse the ability to set build zones in faction ground would be perfect. This allows players to erect walls and forts to hold off the enemy, while sapping(taking down) the enemy structures at the same time. This also allows for more creative options such as building contests, and public places(for instance a spectating booth). Partially implemented with faction control block :D, minus the building though
3. Diagonal Symmetry- Perhaps outside of the engines capability, but would certainly be very useful indeed.
4. Robots- Your own automated mechanical workers, these fellows can do just about anything for you but are generally vulnerable against enemy fire. Their functions include, but are not necessarily limited to: repair, cargo transport(plexchests), boarding defence(can attack hostile robots/players, but are quite generally weak), operate turrets/computers and carry the player(for those power mongers). Customization on robots is key, and they can be tweaked for particular tasks in your robot construction facility; additionaly multiple tiers exist; going from larger bots to simple droids. Perhaps miniture voxel blocks could compose them and be modifiable by the player? (requires numerous performance tweaks)
5. Sittable Objects- The ability to sit down on certain marked objects allows for faction meetings in person as well as lovely spectating areas and general chilling. A great little feature for players to socialise with.
6. Spheres,ellipsoids, and circle. These are a real hassle to build properly, to assist players in this endeavour two options exist. 1) an outline according to their specifications to fill in (recommended) or 2) a instantaneous sphere/ellipsoid/circle builder(lagg/crash alert!)
7. Retractable 'bridge' - Unlike the plex door this is not limited to an on/off function, but instead opens or closes in real time to allow for draw bridges, garage doors, retracting doors and more creative creations. Additionaly a sensor block could automaticly activate it.
8. Display- A holographic display feature that uses up two blocks(vertical), it can show any input item or object that is put in and perhaps can double as the map block to minimize id's. This is great for warehouses, player stores, and decoration. Additionally holographic communication would be a nice but difficult feature to implement.
9. PlexChest access- Having the ability to access the inventories of chests on your vessel/station whilst in build mode could drasticly increase the variety and creativity of structures. Simply because the large majority of people are not going to exit adv build mode, reseting everything but their symmetry, walk all the way to their warehouse/cargobay and then all the way back. Most people stick to what they have in their immediate inventory, and while this usually suffices creativity can be fed even better with this chest acess feature. As a GUI it should be a small button around the area of the advanced build mode, this expands when clicked on to access all chests. Perhaps plexchest naming can also be implemnted to sort this out better. Organization of materials is obviously imperative.
Transportation/Movement
1. Trams/Hoverpads, great for large stations and horizontal travel(or perhaps diagnol too!) basicly a ground-locked ship which is limited to the size of the track. This issue came along for me when designing my Ecumenopolis, where travelling in astronaut mode takes ages and ship cores are inpracticale and silly. Note: Not possible in ships
2. Mounts- With the planned release of critters(citation needed) being able to use these strange alien creatures for ground travel would be a wicked feature; and perhaps allow for zoos and such. Moreover space critters, like Star Trek's jellyfish-like alien entity encountered in TNG in Encounter at farpoint. This is quite a vanity feature, and should by no means be a priority of any sort.
3. Star Gates- Construcable giant portals which allow fast between dimensional shifts to cover vast distances in a relatively minimalistic time. These fellows are very expensive, energy hungry and require a well defended space station(cant be placed on home base). They also are scalable, meaning large ships cant enter through small star gates, and larger ones obviously have higher maintenance costs. This makes them key fighting points for faction control since it gives great travelling capabilities. Moreover it allows for faraway bases to allow for wider spread civilizations. (Note that similar suggestions exist, I just thought I'd give my two cents to balance it out). A rename is recommended to stop lawsuits
4. Crouching/prone- With the personal weapon system, the ability to hide behind objects and pop out using crouching is imperative. Additionally in split-second decisions without the possbility fo cover prone allows you to limit your size at the expense of movement speed(making your prone[hehe] to flank attacks). Besides this also looks amazing.
5. Escalators/horizontal or diagnol transport-These can bring you up across a pyramid or down along like an airport, speed can be toggled at the connected block (allowing for 'scenery trips') they cant be connected in one long stream like hoverpads, making them better at short range transport like the interior of ships.
Exploration
1. Map Markers - Mark off your home base on your radar, pop one down on visited shops. Mostly these modify the main existing marks with small clauses to indicate that A) you've been there before or B) It's an important location(e.g. faction home base). Additionally you can place markers in empty space (e.g. for fleet rendeaveuz) and share it with your faction members. Great for teamwork and marking off enemy positions, making scouting a more viable option. Possible additional feature: if you die near the enemy faction perhaps the markers should be wiped.
2. Gas Nebula - Is a large cloud of dust or ionized gases which are the basis of the formation of stars, these are true beauties but also have the advantage/disadvantage(depending on your circumstances) of limiting visibility. This makes them great hiding points for vessels since it gives free radar jamming(sensors cant pierce through it). More turbulent plasma nebulas are dangerous and volatile places with explosive consquences and sometimes 'space lightning'(for lack of a better word) , so if you're a small fighter low on shields you might be able to escape the enemy in there; at a high risk of death for yourself though.
3. Moons- Sattellites that orbit around their host planet, these can come alone; with more buddies or perhaps the host planet has none at all. They vary in size and make-up, and are very rarely habitable. In terms of explorative incentive occasional moon bases can be found on them as well as deep craters from asteroid impacts(if it has no atmosphere). An extremly, note extremly, is a moon that has a moon, this requires a particularily large main moon at a far distance from the host planet for it to be able to retain it's own exoplanet.
4. Shipyards- These collosal structures are operated by an A.I. created by some long lost but technologicly advanced civilization. Here you can save your ships on blueprints and import your own. The twist is that shipyards make your ships in real-time, reducing lagg from importing large ships tremendously, making it take a while before you can get your imported ship ready to go. Moreover the ship is very vunerabl in this state and can be interrupted by enemy skirmishes, fortunately the generated shipyards have some turret defenses(and the original body is invunerable like shop), but players can also make their own ship yards if they please.(suggested before, expanded on with my own ideas)
5. Enhanced Map- Zoom in(higher detail but short visibility) or out(lower detail but further visibility) on the map and open it as a popup with the 'm' key. Very zoomed in maps can roughly show the general block build up of e.g. a planet, while zoomed out versions show single pixels to mark shops,stations,etc. Additionaly a map block could suspend this in space for players to stand around and ponder their decisions. Finally a route marker with a galaxy view(sector-based, can't distinguish planets, bases or anything[aside from markers you set maybe] to set your navigation to avoid a particular hazard(e.g. a known enemy base) or to go to two destinations in one route(e.g. shop then factory).
6. Wormholes- Rips in space and time, these are incredibly unstable and if the player attempts to fly through it they are transported across the galaxy to some random sector(within 50 sectors). This makes it an unreliable form of transport, and it has a higher priority of putting you into some sort of danger zones(e.g. plasma nebula) hence its more of a last resort of if you're new and want to move out from the spawn quickly.
Combat:
1. Patrol Mode- An AI function which makes the ship routinely, with configurable pauses) go along a specific path(can be set with markers, nav points(e.g. between two shops) or just the arbitary sector to sector patrol(must be explored). Great for protecting faction or base borders against pirates or players, a wise player keeps tabs on which ships they have out on patrols; hence they can see if someone snuck into their base if one is down(perhaps this can be done by an alarm system but that is rather complex).
2. Personal Weapon suggestions:
a, Melee weapons(knives/plasma blades)
b, Personal cloak(short duration/long recharge, still slightly visible if the other player is attentive)- enhances melee
c, Grenades- only one version necessary, can get many enemies at once if they are close together. Short supply though so use sparingly(much weaker then missiles against blocks but still does some damage) This would also work in space, but it has a shorter range(disipates quickly, no shockwave effect)
d, Limit the personal weapon variety, otherwise it becomes too complicated; astronaut combat should be simple but very diverse. Customization of weaponry is a good idea, but this shouldn't create OP combinations( every gun has a balancing downside)
3. Sniper- Very long distance, accurate, ship/turret-mounted weapon which does very large damage but has a very large recharge and is uneffective against large expanses of hull, takes A LOT of chipping before you get any real hull weakening. Great for taking on a far away enemy, only weapon that has a zoom function
4. Flamethrowers- Large spread, low damage weaponry; great for wearing down hull and taking on small annoying targets at close range. They work by sending out both oxygen and flammable material and having them mix precisely outside of the weapon, allowing it to function in a vacuum. Whilst they can fire for a long duration, once this is up they have a long recharge time. Other options could be a magma-propelling weapon which spreads out upon contact in a 'splash'.
5. Laser- A varient of beams that is intended to deal damage, these are medium-range and precise and do continual damage without needing a recharge. This makes them good to tunnel to the enemy core. However, they are very energy dependent and are relatively ineffective against shields. Hence it is more of a 'finishing-off' weapon, unless you have huge energy production and have it in very large quantities.
6. Latcher- A timed drone that latches on to the enemy vessel, if aimed correctly, and gradually inflicts harm on it by skirming around. It is suseptible to being zapped off by shields and robots(see other suggestion) but can be effective, especially in large quantities. However to rebuild them takes some time and they are hard to aim correctly.
7. MIRV(multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle)- A missile that splits into numerous smaller ones, allowing for a large spread but less damage. This is perfect for large vessels to take out oncoming fighters, but is virtually useless against well-shielded targets. Locking and heat seaking is an option, but is not a recommended feature.
Miscelaneous:
1. Weapon Co-ordination block- This creates a set amount of bursts from specific weapons and computers for a pre-designed barrage, besides the obvious strategic advantages this can also be used to create brilliant 'weapon shows' which use co-ordinated bursts to create shapes and patterns.
3. Expanded Modding Capabilities- Currently we can create some custom blocks and edit their basic functions, texture and description. However for the modding community to properly kick off greater tools are required, I'm looking at tools like forge for minecraft. This allows for mods to create many of the feature-heavy suggestions made in this thread and others, lifting lots of pressure of schema and allowing for many possibilites. At the getgo this should work to minimize compatibility(conflict) problems between seperate mods by automaticly assigning Id's and finding if similar classes have been modified. Perhaps someone in the community can make this?!
4. Minigames- This is a very broad topic and is only limited by the player's creativity, already things like the thunderdome, soccer and racing exists but these ideas are limited by the tools availible. The build zone suggestion is one addition that can help minigames, but features like falgs(for ctf), personal-weapon armed turrets and HQ's(heal and return flag here) would be a great addition. If this is too heavy a simple reseting of a specified area (by admin command) would be great for destructible areas.
5. Communication- Contact your faction via highly compressed interstellar radio signals, these can give vital information or give a distress signal. Additionaly you can drop a beacon if your radio tower is down, or you want them not to come directly into the fight. These come in main messages including "enemy spotted", "Mayday! Mayday!"/"SOS", "Intercepting enemy vessel", "Twenty vessels in enemy fleet", "Enemy moving to sector X,Y,Z","Enemy engaging allied ship",etc. As a possible additional feature, communication interception could be implemented; meanign that stealth ships should use it sparingly and move quickly and also allowing factiosn to predict the enemy's movements or fall for their bluff(e.g. you could purposefully communicate for the 20 cruisers to attack the enemy base from sector 16,4,0 while you actually have a bunch of stealthed fighters guerilla their undocked vessels at 10,4,0)
6. Space lichen- Any captain must take good care of his ship, getting rid of spacial lifeforms clining onto the vessel's obvious warmth is one of these tasks. These lichen can slow down the ship, but offer very slight protection at their location(although in the long run they can weaken your original hull). Visit your shipyard, or get some cleaning robots to take care of this infestation.
7. Libraries/better logbooks- Expanding logbooks to have more characters and lines allows players to write their complete faction manifest on them, adding printer block can copy this for mass distribution(publishing company anyone?) and libraries can store all these novels, unique and popular alike, for the public to access.
8. Auto-sort- Inventory(both player and object) sorter that rearranges all stacks of items in a logical order based on the set mode. For instance alphabeticly, by type, in colums or rows, in order of value, etc. This would be great for organizing the current chaos of plexChests.
More to come! Stick around to find out.