Update: Added Summaries of longer sections. If you can't spare the time to read the whole thing, try reading a section that sounds interesting.
Most of these ideas are designed to benefit large scale faction combat, and encourage an organized play style with others, as well as encouraging the construction of space stations (which, currently, no one has to do since massive ships are simply more effective).
Note: Some changes also encourage fighter squadrons, or large numbers of players working together at once. Right now, I think this is a good thing. However, if the average server population is under 40, approaching release, I would encourage ignoring, or modifying, these features. If you don't have the people to take advantage of fighters, don't balance game mechanics around it.
So, I kinda forgot about this game for a month. I'm still looking back through the "news" section of star-made.org, so I don't know if anything on here is still applicable. If it isn't, feel free to leave a comment mentioning it.
Table of Conents (It's for your own good!):
1. Basics
1a. Movement: Max Speed
1b. Movement: Turning-Deleted, because I don't care about it anymore.
1c. Systems: Missiles
1d. Systems: Radar and Jamming
1e. Systems: Cloaking
1f. Systems: Docking
1g. Systems: Shielding (Tweaks)
1h. Block: Faction Block
2. Long Term
2a. Environment
2b. Planets
2c. AI/NPC
2d. Shielding (Advanced)
2e. Warp/Hyper/FTL drive (Fast-Travel)
2f. Structures
2g. Ship Building
2h. Life Support
1. Basics (Mostly reworking current mechanics/the way things work)
This section mostly exists because there are certain things in the current version which I disagree with, and think should be changed. I do not propose many of these being done before the game is made stable enough to play.
1a. Movement: Max Speed
It has now been explained to me why the max speed cannot easily go higher than it is, and I have experienced the problems that occur when it does. I leave the basics of this section up in case we somehow find a workaround, but otherwise you might as well ignore it.
FTL travel/hyperspace/warp drive would be a much better way to make ships faster (all of them ignore the collisions which cause the problem), I suggest all of you change your focus to making that work. I have a section on that here.
I will add something in this section though: There should be a requirement that thrusters have no blocks behind them (ship orientation). Really, do you think thrusting massive amounts of fuel/energy/whatever the thrusters use INTO YOUR OWN HULL is a good idea? It isn't. Say goodbye to your armor. I'm fine with multiple thruster blocks being behind one another, but no other blocks
1b. Movement: Turning
Deleted section due to my no longer liking it. I left the section header, however, so that the section numbers/letters would remain the same, and prevent future confusion.
1c. Systems: Missiles (Tweaks to stats)
Missiles are pretty much fine now. One suggestion for them:
In addition, I'd like to see lock on missiles be smart enough to seek to the nearest block when flying straight through the radar marker they've locked on to doesn't allow them to detonate, or at least detonate on reaching the marker whether or not they hit something. For examples of why this is an issue, try firing a few at an asteroid.
1d. Systems: Radar and Jamming
Most of this section was inspired by a section of another post, at this page (section 2A: Radar)
Radar right now is a bit obnoxious. It means that you can fly through the depths of space, and find everything within thousands of blocks. It makes hiding as a player incredibly hard, especially as the radar jamming devices must be activated from the ship screen, making it impossible to do something cool like jamming the signal from a space station.
My suggestions to fix this: Either make it so that, when pressing M to create a station, instead of placing a Grey Hull Block at the location, place a block which can be interacted with as with a ship core, and has a hotbar OR make it so that jammers are active ALL THE TIME (or groups can be toggled by pressing R on them).
Okay, so, that sorts out jammers. Mostly. My final suggestion for jammers is related to how they work: Make radar jammers AOE, not ship specific. Make it so that the jammers will project a field (box to be simple, though a sphere would certainly look nice), and if the field covers more than 3/4 of ANY FRIENDLY SHIP in its radius, that ship is removed from radar (fraction is subject to argument. Perhaps make it so the field has to cover the entire ship it's on, and a fraction of nearby ships). This is also another solution to the problem of not being able to radar jam space stations.
Intermission: If you're still reading at this point, thank you for your time! Please remember to comment on something if you wish to discuss it.
Now on to actual radar controllers. The link from far above, to the other forum post, suggests a good way to make radar work. I have taken some of his ideas, modified them, and will now present them:
This would greatly increase player reliance on support ships, units which may prove to be nothing but a massive radar dish with thrusters on the back, generators and a few shields. This would also mean that small ships are unlikely to be able to function by themselves outside the range of large allies (makes sense, you never see a fighter flying through space alone do you?).
You're all incredibly lucky! I screwed up, and lost about 5 paragraphs of text, so now you get to see the condensed version of the Cloaking section because I'm too lazy to rewrite everything.
1e. Systems: Cloaking
Basically, I see no reason that cloaking should be used right now. It's energy expensive, it MUST be activated from a ship core, and it doesn't block your radar signal.
The way I would change it: make it similar to radar jammers. To summarize for those who didn't read the radar section (I don't blame you, though if you get the time you might want to take a look):
Why did I allow cloak to cover allies? Well, I'm currently torn on the subject. Currently, I'm leaning towards the cloak working on allies for a reason which I will show in an short story/description:
A battleship flies through the asteroid field, searching for the enemies known to be in the area. The Omnidyne Corporation had been moving ships in and out of the sector for many solarmonths. His bosses wanted to know what was going on. He had been sent to find out
Radar systems at full strength, targetting computers ready to blast, he flew by asteroids and planets, derelict shells and other floating wreckage. Where were they? There was no sign of them anywh- wait a second, where the hell did that drone come from?
He watched as the drone flew past him, obliviously going off to harvest scrap from the surrounding space. He scanned the surrounding sector further and, right in front of them, another drone appeared, its docking ports still retracting. "The bastards are cloaked! OPEN FIRE"
(Disclaimer: yes, the story is bad. I don't write good stories, but it gives you the idea of how rediculous not cloaking allies could be. On the other hand, makes stealthing a bit more interesting...)
Anyway... If you undocked from a station/carrier, and immediately appeared, then everyone would know where the station was. However, if you came out... say, 500 meters away, the station is probably fine to some extent.
This would make using cloak more viable by bringing in the idea of support ships carrying cloaking devices. Fairly straightforward.
Two possible tweaks: Raising cloak drops shields, or acts as a weaker alternative to shields (half power shields+invisibility? Invisibility dissapears when shields go down? Seems balanced to me). Also, make the space around cloaked units ripple when they are hit. Just a bit of a cool feature.
1f. Systems: Docking
Docking right now is, quite frankly, obnoxious. You have to fiddle around with a block until you get the right direction and size for your ship, and then you might decide "I want to upgrade" at which point you realize you need to fiddle around with it more just to make it fit your new ship size.
I suggest an alternative that makes docking significantly easier: Instead of requiring a block to dock (hehe, it rhymes) to, change the docking module to a series of blocks, and a docking computer. When a docking computer is used, and all of the docking blocks it connects to which are within a block of one connected to the other entity, the blocks will allign and connect to each other. The two objects will be treated as one entity, meaning that shielding and power are shared.
Example: You set up 12 docking blocks in a rectangle on your ship, and do it again on the station you're trying to dock with. For those of you who play MC, think the design of a Nether Portal. The ship aligns these blocks with the station's blocks, uses the docking computer, and the two objects are connected. You can freely walk through the open space
This would not require that there be some minimum number of blocks, you could still just use 1, but it would work well with much larger ships, allowing the creation of cool docking systems. I'm still working out how Turret docking, AI modules and Entering the ship core would work.
1g. Systems: Shields (tweaks)
This is the section on minor alterations to shields. See the section under Advanced for overall changes to shields
Updated section.
Mostly, I'm fine with the way shields work right now. I would suggest a decrease to the time it takes to recharge them, making the time closely related to the mass of the ship (same applies to damage being dealt which drops the shields, and the time before they come back up) as well as making the time decrease slightly (VERY slightly) depending on number of shields. I like the changes to capacity and recharge otherwise
1h. Block: Faction Block
Currently, I'd like to see a few more features out of the faction block. Mainly, these have to do with permissions. Right now, I'm often worried about letting someone into the faction, because they could just take apart anything I make, with no way of easily repairing, and kicking them from the faction not solving the problem. I'd like faction blocks to have options to allow/deny interaction (pressing R), and modifying of blocks, on a faction group-by-group basis specific to a given structure.
For example, say I've put a great deal of work into making a faction home, and I want to make the faction public. From the faction block, I make anyone of Member Groups 1-4 able to interact, letting them go around the station and use systems when necessary, but only allow the founder (me) to edit blocks. I feel that that would be useful to have at some point.
2. Advanced: I don't expect these or anything like them to appear until late in the development, perhaps 2 years time. I would just like to see them worked towards. If devs actually read any of this: Don't let feature creep get to you. I'd rather see a stable game, with features intended, and an unstable game with tons of cool stuff. NOTE: This section is currently very sparse on description, I will add more when I have time
2a. Environment
I would like to see a more populated universe. Not necessarily with people, but certainly with some kind of block. I have 2 major suggestions for this:
I recognize that the first 2 ideas could be EXTREMELY laggy on servers, due to the number of blocks it could leave just floating around, and the third would make numbering sectors significantly harder. I'm still working on a way of making that work which wouldn't be annoying.
2b. Planets: Oreo planets are the way to go. Delicious and interesting. I would say put a 1-5 block width of no-gravity, to prevent people from getting stuck down there (and, if not that, they can still just walk out the side... I'd just like to mess around with no gravity down there.)
2c. AI/NPC: Make NPCs a more prominent factor in the game. Not absoultely necessary to interact with, but do more with them than have them as enemies to be squashed.
2d. Shielding (Advanced)
Updated: This section still stands. I like the ideas in it, and though they may require some balance with recent shield changes, I would still like to see it in the game. More thought will be put into this at a later date. This is still balanced around suggestions from the Systems: Shielding (Tweaks) section
[*]Bonus for placing multiple shield generators next to each other
[*]Apply all suggestions from the Systems: Shielding (Tweaks) section, unless they conflict.
Instead of shields projecting across the entire ship, make them project in a cube. All damage taken inside the cube is absorbed by the shields, and damage calculations work as normal. If a cube of shielding takes enough damage to put it in the negative, ONLY the shield generators in that cube go down. If a shield generator's cube overlaps another shield generator, their shielding pool is connected across the covered region. This effect continues: If the new shielding "cube" (probably a very different shape now) covers more shield generators, the shield pools connect. Shield-hit effects on ships (the blue grid) will stop at the edge of the shielding cube.
Several people commented on this, so I've decided to make it more clear: the shield itself would not be AOE, it would not block all incoming fire in the region, only that which managed to hit the shield-generating ship (and possible docked allied ships, allowing for turrets being less pathetic).
Why do this? Simple: This allows for shielding of allies. Currently, the shields of a given ship only benefit themselves. At the very least, this will allow any turrets on a ship to also be protected (if set up correctly). This can also lead to a very interesting result: Directional shields. This gives a MASSIVE advantage to small ships, allowing them to all focus on a single weak shield and bring it down, though they may not have the firepower to take down the entire shield capacity of the ship
Note: It would still be possible to set up a ship's shields to work in every direction. I have yet to find a way to discourage this, aside from possibly giving a flat decrease on the regeneration and capacity of connected shields (So, for example: The capacity and regen of two generators, minus some flat (or scaling) amount per shield generator in the connection)
Note 2: If, eventually, any bonus is added to shields for being grouped together, I do not suggest that simply being within eachother's cube should be enough to gain said bonuses.
2e. Warp/Hyper/FTL Drive (Fast Travel)
I brought this idea up on another recent topic.
The general idea of this is fast travel from one sector to another. Personally, I wouldn't see this as a free "/home" command, I would look on this as something expensive. Something which allows quick, safe, movement from one controlled area to another.
The idea is something similar to warp rings, from various series like Star Wars, Star Trek, and Babylon 5. You have a warp beacon block. Placing them grants "warp capacity", with adjacent blocks granting bonus capacity. On launch, the player can move as far as current energy stores (actual energy) allows, and a distance which is determined by taking the distance (for simplicity sake, let's say the distance value increases by 1 per 100m traveled) time the number of blocks/the weight of the ship in question. The ship will be teleported to a warp beacon of their choice (chosen from a list of beacons within range, possibly allow for locking by placing a faction module on the structure) at the cost electricity.
This is what I want it to look like: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XKRKihnxs4. Of course, with a more blocky feel to it.
Example: a 5 block ship wants to move from one warp beacon, to another one 500 meters away. Using the current values, it will take 25 (1/100distance(5)*#blocks(5)) as well as a substantial amount of energy. With larger ships, moving over a great distance (like, for example, 15km) this could take a rediculous amount of energy, but still allow for a powerful group to move units across great distances. In addition, allow the possibility of protecting these gates for a faction, but still allow neutrals through, making trading and mobility for friends much easier.
It has been suggested by others that an on-board "hyperdrive" system is incorporated, allowing ships to double their normal speed after being out of combat for 10 seconds, and activating the drive requiring a huge amount of energy, as well as dropping shields upon exit.
This is an interesting idea. However, there are problems with it: Let's say a ship manages to back out of combat, allowing an ally to take their place, for 10 seconds. They hyperdrive out of the sector, get repairs at the ship/station waiting far outside the combat, repair, and jump back in. This would mean that a near-infinite source of large ships could be created, far outside of combat, and be jumped into the sector of battle on request. Whether this is a problem or not depends on the way the game goes.
However, the system also does have good points: Fast travel without requiring a complicated setup, the balancing point of the player having to stop the ship (at the right point), as well as adding the possibility of taking damage in flight (collision damage). This system could work for fast-travel in one direction, without very much cost.
2f. Structures
Note: This is not a section to suggest changes to structural integrity for ships. This is a section to suggest changes to naturally spawning structures.
In addition to the asteroids and wreckage suggested earlier, the current space stations need changes in general design. I simply propose, eventually, that the stations have some form of protection, as well as more variety in design (taking nice player designs would be enough, easily). Then, the stations need Shields, Faction Modules (with factions set, different ones for pirates and trade guild). On the neutral stations, set the factions to "consider enemy on hostile action", and add automated turrets to them, to prevent people from just walking up and harvesting the entire thing for resources.
These changes are only proposed once it is possible to get money some way other than ripping apart space stations/planets, this is why they're in the "long term" section. In addition, make the stations more used by AI factions. Make there be some point to them.
2g. Ship Building
I would like to see this sooner than some other suggestions in the "Long Term" section of this post, but I don't expect it any time soon.
Currently, I see no way build mode can really work out well. It's simply too powerful in most cases. However, I like the idea of it a lot. Therefore, I suggest an alternative: Some kind of construction block/factory/whatever. Essentially, it replaces the catalogue from the store. It will work like most docking blocks would (really, why not just add this to the docking blocks), but interacting with it allows entering of build mode. It will still have the same AOE projection area as docking modules, limiting the size of the ship being built. It would also have a construction size enhancer, allowing for larger ships to be built. I would suggest not requiring that the entire space be free, but have the device check for overlapping blocks before placing one, and simply skipping it if blocked.
The block would be able to access the catalog, and can be commanded to build a ship from a blueprint using blocks from a connected Plex Storage container. It would use a flat amount of energy (probably high) per block, and could be left alone to produce ships for you. Building could also be manual, using the current Build Mode.
Why do this? Well, simply, it allows for Build Mode to still exist in the game, for those that like building large ships, while preventing abuses using it in Ship Cores. Another way to do this would simply be to add the above ideas as functionality of the Docking blocks, meaning that whenever a ship is docked you can edit it freely, and perhaps require a different (but connected) block for auto production.
This would allow several things: Mass production of AI fighters (if they ever become worth using), balanced re-creation of ships that you could design in SP, and use in MP, stopping the abuses with large ships easily being buyable by requiring that you have the resources on hand to make the ship, while not requiring the painful block-by-block recreation of the thing.
This might require some modifications to the way shops keep track of items, and possibly the restocking of them to deal with some resources being unbelievably scarce. I am currently in the process of working out how that might go.
I have no good way of dealing with this on space stations right now. Just keeping the build block around, and only allowing its use on space stations seems like the easiest way out, though maybe adding the requirement of energy for blocks placed. The sole reason for this is to prevent people from building too quickly, that's it.
2h. Life Support
I find the idea of requiring some form of life support, however it raises a question: How do you deal with it on smaller ships?
I outline it with three simple ideas:
1. The player's space-suit can only remain in space for a limited amount of time (air), and exceeding that length of time will cause them to take heavy damage (resulting in death). This time period should be somewhere between 2-5 minutes.
2. Entering a ship-core will reset the player's timer, allowing smaller ships to function completely as normal. The timer does not start running again until you exit the core. This also occurs when you enter the bubble formed by a planet's atmosphere.
3. A life support system of some sort is put in. Air vents or something. They check all blocks radiating outwards, stopping at solids (not plants, open plex-doors or other part-blocks). There should also be a maximum range/volume, at which it will stop checking. If the spread stops because it has encountered solids as far as it can go, it will fill that area with air after a period of time dependent on the number of blocks being filled (something like a second for every few blocks). Opening the area resets the air in it, requiring that it be refilled. This means that air locks and such would be required
Why put this in? Well, it's fun. That's pretty much it. Adds a little sense of realism, which can't hurt, and I don't see that it will be all that difficult to do.
What, you're still reading? Have you no life? Well, thanks for not being distracted by a passing beam of light and persevering to the end. Please comment if you object/support! And get yourself a cookie, you deserve it.
Major Edit 1: Added sections on Shielding, update to all sections under Long Term to flesh them out more, addition of note about fighter-related mechanics at top of page, added section on Fast-Travel
Major Edit 2: Updated section on Advanced Shielding, hopefully it's clearer now. Fixed some of the Table of Contents links, they weren't taking you to the right point on the page.
Major Edit 3: Updated all sections to better meet the new Suggestions Section requirements. Added section on Structures.
Major Edit 4: Updated to better suit Shielding changes, added section on ship construction, added section on Faction Block uses.
Major Edit 5: Shortened/Removed sections due to lack of relevance, added bullet point descriptions for docking section. Shamelessly bumped post. Notable: Edited Cloaking and Radar sections. I previously had a very weak understanding of those systems.
Major Edit 6 (10/13/13): Removed Movement: Turning section, because I considered it now worthless.
Most of these ideas are designed to benefit large scale faction combat, and encourage an organized play style with others, as well as encouraging the construction of space stations (which, currently, no one has to do since massive ships are simply more effective).
Note: Some changes also encourage fighter squadrons, or large numbers of players working together at once. Right now, I think this is a good thing. However, if the average server population is under 40, approaching release, I would encourage ignoring, or modifying, these features. If you don't have the people to take advantage of fighters, don't balance game mechanics around it.
So, I kinda forgot about this game for a month. I'm still looking back through the "news" section of star-made.org, so I don't know if anything on here is still applicable. If it isn't, feel free to leave a comment mentioning it.
Table of Conents (It's for your own good!):
1. Basics
1a. Movement: Max Speed
1b. Movement: Turning-Deleted, because I don't care about it anymore.
1c. Systems: Missiles
1d. Systems: Radar and Jamming
1e. Systems: Cloaking
1f. Systems: Docking
1g. Systems: Shielding (Tweaks)
1h. Block: Faction Block
2. Long Term
2a. Environment
2b. Planets
2c. AI/NPC
2d. Shielding (Advanced)
2e. Warp/Hyper/FTL drive (Fast-Travel)
2f. Structures
2g. Ship Building
2h. Life Support
1. Basics (Mostly reworking current mechanics/the way things work)
This section mostly exists because there are certain things in the current version which I disagree with, and think should be changed. I do not propose many of these being done before the game is made stable enough to play.
1a. Movement: Max Speed
- Maximum move speed is based off of the #thrusters divided by #blocks total, multiplied by 200% (placeholder number)
- This section was previously very confusing. Credit to Mercur1c for helping me simplify the equation
It has now been explained to me why the max speed cannot easily go higher than it is, and I have experienced the problems that occur when it does. I leave the basics of this section up in case we somehow find a workaround, but otherwise you might as well ignore it.
FTL travel/hyperspace/warp drive would be a much better way to make ships faster (all of them ignore the collisions which cause the problem), I suggest all of you change your focus to making that work. I have a section on that here.
I will add something in this section though: There should be a requirement that thrusters have no blocks behind them (ship orientation). Really, do you think thrusting massive amounts of fuel/energy/whatever the thrusters use INTO YOUR OWN HULL is a good idea? It isn't. Say goodbye to your armor. I'm fine with multiple thruster blocks being behind one another, but no other blocks
1b. Movement: Turning
Deleted section due to my no longer liking it. I left the section header, however, so that the section numbers/letters would remain the same, and prevent future confusion.
1c. Systems: Missiles (Tweaks to stats)
- Missiles are mostly useless. Buff move speed, improve AI for seeking/lock on missiles slightly
Missiles are pretty much fine now. One suggestion for them:
In addition, I'd like to see lock on missiles be smart enough to seek to the nearest block when flying straight through the radar marker they've locked on to doesn't allow them to detonate, or at least detonate on reaching the marker whether or not they hit something. For examples of why this is an issue, try firing a few at an asteroid.
1d. Systems: Radar and Jamming
- Change radar jammers to be always on, or otherwise make it activatable for a space station
- Change radar to be reduced for base players, allows nearby radar stations or ships to significantly increase radar range
- Make Jammers AOE, and be able to hide the radar of allies within the radius
- Make an option in N menu to hide docked turret radar signature (clearing up screen)
Most of this section was inspired by a section of another post, at this page (section 2A: Radar)
Radar right now is a bit obnoxious. It means that you can fly through the depths of space, and find everything within thousands of blocks. It makes hiding as a player incredibly hard, especially as the radar jamming devices must be activated from the ship screen, making it impossible to do something cool like jamming the signal from a space station.
My suggestions to fix this: Either make it so that, when pressing M to create a station, instead of placing a Grey Hull Block at the location, place a block which can be interacted with as with a ship core, and has a hotbar OR make it so that jammers are active ALL THE TIME (or groups can be toggled by pressing R on them).
Okay, so, that sorts out jammers. Mostly. My final suggestion for jammers is related to how they work: Make radar jammers AOE, not ship specific. Make it so that the jammers will project a field (box to be simple, though a sphere would certainly look nice), and if the field covers more than 3/4 of ANY FRIENDLY SHIP in its radius, that ship is removed from radar (fraction is subject to argument. Perhaps make it so the field has to cover the entire ship it's on, and a fraction of nearby ships). This is also another solution to the problem of not being able to radar jam space stations.
Intermission: If you're still reading at this point, thank you for your time! Please remember to comment on something if you wish to discuss it.
Now on to actual radar controllers. The link from far above, to the other forum post, suggests a good way to make radar work. I have taken some of his ideas, modified them, and will now present them:
- Base Player ships (including astronauts) have a seriously reduced radar range. To something in the vicinity of 300m
- Being within range of a faction base's radar, or the boosted radar of another ally nearby, allows the player to see everything they can see on radar.
- Radar blocks are added, allowing for increase of radar range (perhaps a special block to allow benefitting allies with this information, but maybe not)
This would greatly increase player reliance on support ships, units which may prove to be nothing but a massive radar dish with thrusters on the back, generators and a few shields. This would also mean that small ships are unlikely to be able to function by themselves outside the range of large allies (makes sense, you never see a fighter flying through space alone do you?).
You're all incredibly lucky! I screwed up, and lost about 5 paragraphs of text, so now you get to see the condensed version of the Cloaking section because I'm too lazy to rewrite everything.
1e. Systems: Cloaking
- Cloaking right now seems hideously underused. Suggest changes similar to radar jammers
- Cloaking also AOE, also covers allies in the region
Hate-worthy writing to demonstrate why it should cover allies
Basically, I see no reason that cloaking should be used right now. It's energy expensive, it MUST be activated from a ship core, and it doesn't block your radar signal.
The way I would change it: make it similar to radar jammers. To summarize for those who didn't read the radar section (I don't blame you, though if you get the time you might want to take a look):
- Cloaking is AOE, affecting a cube centered on the emitter (with multiple blocks, make an effort to determine the center block, determine radius from there). For simplicity: If the cloak field covers 3/4 of any ally within the range, they are also cloaked.
- Cloaking is ALWAYS ON, or can be toggled by pressing R on a cloaking block (effects all connected blocks, including docked units, this would allow for cloaked stations/planets/asteroids. **** YEAH!)
- Connecting more OC cloaker blocks would increase the cloak range. Similar to the way docking works right now. Perhaps make 2 blocks: OC Cloaker Emitter, and OC Cloaker Enhancer
Why did I allow cloak to cover allies? Well, I'm currently torn on the subject. Currently, I'm leaning towards the cloak working on allies for a reason which I will show in an short story/description:
A battleship flies through the asteroid field, searching for the enemies known to be in the area. The Omnidyne Corporation had been moving ships in and out of the sector for many solarmonths. His bosses wanted to know what was going on. He had been sent to find out
Radar systems at full strength, targetting computers ready to blast, he flew by asteroids and planets, derelict shells and other floating wreckage. Where were they? There was no sign of them anywh- wait a second, where the hell did that drone come from?
He watched as the drone flew past him, obliviously going off to harvest scrap from the surrounding space. He scanned the surrounding sector further and, right in front of them, another drone appeared, its docking ports still retracting. "The bastards are cloaked! OPEN FIRE"
(Disclaimer: yes, the story is bad. I don't write good stories, but it gives you the idea of how rediculous not cloaking allies could be. On the other hand, makes stealthing a bit more interesting...)
Anyway... If you undocked from a station/carrier, and immediately appeared, then everyone would know where the station was. However, if you came out... say, 500 meters away, the station is probably fine to some extent.
This would make using cloak more viable by bringing in the idea of support ships carrying cloaking devices. Fairly straightforward.
Two possible tweaks: Raising cloak drops shields, or acts as a weaker alternative to shields (half power shields+invisibility? Invisibility dissapears when shields go down? Seems balanced to me). Also, make the space around cloaked units ripple when they are hit. Just a bit of a cool feature.
1f. Systems: Docking
- creation of a docking block, and docking computer.
When the docking blocks on a ship are matched with the same shape on another ship (brought to within a block) and the computer activated, the two entities are connected. Shielding is shared, power is shared when required by one, - Turret docking unresolved
Docking right now is, quite frankly, obnoxious. You have to fiddle around with a block until you get the right direction and size for your ship, and then you might decide "I want to upgrade" at which point you realize you need to fiddle around with it more just to make it fit your new ship size.
I suggest an alternative that makes docking significantly easier: Instead of requiring a block to dock (hehe, it rhymes) to, change the docking module to a series of blocks, and a docking computer. When a docking computer is used, and all of the docking blocks it connects to which are within a block of one connected to the other entity, the blocks will allign and connect to each other. The two objects will be treated as one entity, meaning that shielding and power are shared.
Example: You set up 12 docking blocks in a rectangle on your ship, and do it again on the station you're trying to dock with. For those of you who play MC, think the design of a Nether Portal. The ship aligns these blocks with the station's blocks, uses the docking computer, and the two objects are connected. You can freely walk through the open space
This would not require that there be some minimum number of blocks, you could still just use 1, but it would work well with much larger ships, allowing the creation of cool docking systems. I'm still working out how Turret docking, AI modules and Entering the ship core would work.
1g. Systems: Shields (tweaks)
This is the section on minor alterations to shields. See the section under Advanced for overall changes to shields
Updated section.
Mostly, I'm fine with the way shields work right now. I would suggest a decrease to the time it takes to recharge them, making the time closely related to the mass of the ship (same applies to damage being dealt which drops the shields, and the time before they come back up) as well as making the time decrease slightly (VERY slightly) depending on number of shields. I like the changes to capacity and recharge otherwise
1h. Block: Faction Block
Currently, I'd like to see a few more features out of the faction block. Mainly, these have to do with permissions. Right now, I'm often worried about letting someone into the faction, because they could just take apart anything I make, with no way of easily repairing, and kicking them from the faction not solving the problem. I'd like faction blocks to have options to allow/deny interaction (pressing R), and modifying of blocks, on a faction group-by-group basis specific to a given structure.
For example, say I've put a great deal of work into making a faction home, and I want to make the faction public. From the faction block, I make anyone of Member Groups 1-4 able to interact, letting them go around the station and use systems when necessary, but only allow the founder (me) to edit blocks. I feel that that would be useful to have at some point.
2. Advanced: I don't expect these or anything like them to appear until late in the development, perhaps 2 years time. I would just like to see them worked towards. If devs actually read any of this: Don't let feature creep get to you. I'd rather see a stable game, with features intended, and an unstable game with tons of cool stuff. NOTE: This section is currently very sparse on description, I will add more when I have time
2a. Environment
I would like to see a more populated universe. Not necessarily with people, but certainly with some kind of block. I have 2 major suggestions for this:
- Asteroid fields. It's nice to have the occasional asteroid, but there's simply not enough of them somtimes. This would also synergise well with my ideas for cloaking and radar, allowing a good place to hide a long range radar sensor/jammer, or a sector wide safe zone thanks to cloaking. When I say asteroid field, I mean... Oh, say, several thousand per sector? Not in every sector of course, but in some of them. Perhaps in all sectors "x" distance from the sun.
- Wreckage. When a part of a ship greater than 10 blocks is disconnected from its core, don't just leave it following around as though it were still connected, or destroy it. Make it float around in space. If a faction protection was present, maintain it until the original core is destroyed, or leaves the sector. After this point, definitely allow harvesting of it... I'm unsure how allowing building on it would work. It seems like it would be buggy/hard to work.
- Sectors: Make the sectors actually rotate around the local star. Would make inter-stellar combat extremely interesting. Also, make sure travelling between them
?This... Seems to be true now/in the process of becoming true. I didn't quite understand the news section post about it, I'll need to mess around with it a little.
I recognize that the first 2 ideas could be EXTREMELY laggy on servers, due to the number of blocks it could leave just floating around, and the third would make numbering sectors significantly harder. I'm still working on a way of making that work which wouldn't be annoying.
2b. Planets: Oreo planets are the way to go. Delicious and interesting. I would say put a 1-5 block width of no-gravity, to prevent people from getting stuck down there (and, if not that, they can still just walk out the side... I'd just like to mess around with no gravity down there.)
2c. AI/NPC: Make NPCs a more prominent factor in the game. Not absoultely necessary to interact with, but do more with them than have them as enemies to be squashed.
- If this is already present, sorry, but it's hard to tell. It would be nice to see trade guild ships make routes to shops, and restock them. Also, I would like to see less advanced stuff like weapons, plex undeathinators, shields etc and more basic supplies: Rock, Plants, Purple Vine Stuff (Yum), etc. and a fair amount of things for building: Hulls (especailly the slopes and stuff), glass, lights (significantly reduce their price as well).
- Pirates: Make them not suck. Currently they can be easily taken down by a few SD-BB missiles. Their bases are rediculous. Firstly: They need shields that aren't garbage/nonexistant. I probably could have put this in the "basics" section, but I don't think it's necessary right now.
- AI in general: The ability to lead some targets, the ability to use weapons other than AMCs, the ability to stop firing when an ally is in the way, and perhaps the ability to get around something in the way. An idea of how to get out of the way of missiles would be nice, though could be difficult.
- Pirate raids: Organized raids on known player encampments, including structures that don't have players inside. Right now, it seems that they only target player controlled Ship Cores, and I would like to see them shoot stations as well
- BOBBY AI module: Currently, this is very weak. I know that there are plans to make it more versatile, and I simply list abilities I'd like to see from it: "On sighting enemy, interact with adjacent block" could be useful for automatic cloaking/jamming systems which only activate when an enemy is near. Being able to set up turrets to use different weapon types would be good (It'd be really nice to have a hanger with repair beams that automatically repair blocks on docked ships). AI that wouldn't shoot allies would be nice.
2d. Shielding (Advanced)
Updated: This section still stands. I like the ideas in it, and though they may require some balance with recent shield changes, I would still like to see it in the game. More thought will be put into this at a later date. This is still balanced around suggestions from the Systems: Shielding (Tweaks) section
- Shields project in an AOE, protect all blocks in the region which are part of the ship, or connected via docking
- If shield cubes encompass another shield generator which is not part of the same group (connected), the shield pools of the two regions, and the blocks protected, are connected (at reduced power, to discourage connecting all shields on the ship)
In general, encourages small units: causes directional shielding on larger ships, which can be taken advantage of
[*]Bonus for placing multiple shield generators next to each other
[*]Apply all suggestions from the Systems: Shielding (Tweaks) section, unless they conflict.
Instead of shields projecting across the entire ship, make them project in a cube. All damage taken inside the cube is absorbed by the shields, and damage calculations work as normal. If a cube of shielding takes enough damage to put it in the negative, ONLY the shield generators in that cube go down. If a shield generator's cube overlaps another shield generator, their shielding pool is connected across the covered region. This effect continues: If the new shielding "cube" (probably a very different shape now) covers more shield generators, the shield pools connect. Shield-hit effects on ships (the blue grid) will stop at the edge of the shielding cube.
Several people commented on this, so I've decided to make it more clear: the shield itself would not be AOE, it would not block all incoming fire in the region, only that which managed to hit the shield-generating ship (and possible docked allied ships, allowing for turrets being less pathetic).
Why do this? Simple: This allows for shielding of allies. Currently, the shields of a given ship only benefit themselves. At the very least, this will allow any turrets on a ship to also be protected (if set up correctly). This can also lead to a very interesting result: Directional shields. This gives a MASSIVE advantage to small ships, allowing them to all focus on a single weak shield and bring it down, though they may not have the firepower to take down the entire shield capacity of the ship
Note: It would still be possible to set up a ship's shields to work in every direction. I have yet to find a way to discourage this, aside from possibly giving a flat decrease on the regeneration and capacity of connected shields (So, for example: The capacity and regen of two generators, minus some flat (or scaling) amount per shield generator in the connection)
Note 2: If, eventually, any bonus is added to shields for being grouped together, I do not suggest that simply being within eachother's cube should be enough to gain said bonuses.
2e. Warp/Hyper/FTL Drive (Fast Travel)
- Allows creation of Warp Beacon blocks. When placed, grant "warp capacity" to a specific region (perhaps a docking unit)
- Teleports to another warp beacon setup within range (allow placing a faction block on a beacon to prevent some factions from passing through) chosen from a list.
- Warp capacity cannot be exceeded; required warp capacity is determined by distance travelled and size of ship. Larger ships have a harder time going long distances. Warping also requires a huge amount of energy.
Encourages factions to set up strongholds which they can teleport to. This is not meant to support exploration, as this is very powerful and should be expensive.
I brought this idea up on another recent topic.
The general idea of this is fast travel from one sector to another. Personally, I wouldn't see this as a free "/home" command, I would look on this as something expensive. Something which allows quick, safe, movement from one controlled area to another.
The idea is something similar to warp rings, from various series like Star Wars, Star Trek, and Babylon 5. You have a warp beacon block. Placing them grants "warp capacity", with adjacent blocks granting bonus capacity. On launch, the player can move as far as current energy stores (actual energy) allows, and a distance which is determined by taking the distance (for simplicity sake, let's say the distance value increases by 1 per 100m traveled) time the number of blocks/the weight of the ship in question. The ship will be teleported to a warp beacon of their choice (chosen from a list of beacons within range, possibly allow for locking by placing a faction module on the structure) at the cost electricity.
This is what I want it to look like: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XKRKihnxs4. Of course, with a more blocky feel to it.
Example: a 5 block ship wants to move from one warp beacon, to another one 500 meters away. Using the current values, it will take 25 (1/100distance(5)*#blocks(5)) as well as a substantial amount of energy. With larger ships, moving over a great distance (like, for example, 15km) this could take a rediculous amount of energy, but still allow for a powerful group to move units across great distances. In addition, allow the possibility of protecting these gates for a faction, but still allow neutrals through, making trading and mobility for friends much easier.
It has been suggested by others that an on-board "hyperdrive" system is incorporated, allowing ships to double their normal speed after being out of combat for 10 seconds, and activating the drive requiring a huge amount of energy, as well as dropping shields upon exit.
This is an interesting idea. However, there are problems with it: Let's say a ship manages to back out of combat, allowing an ally to take their place, for 10 seconds. They hyperdrive out of the sector, get repairs at the ship/station waiting far outside the combat, repair, and jump back in. This would mean that a near-infinite source of large ships could be created, far outside of combat, and be jumped into the sector of battle on request. Whether this is a problem or not depends on the way the game goes.
However, the system also does have good points: Fast travel without requiring a complicated setup, the balancing point of the player having to stop the ship (at the right point), as well as adding the possibility of taking damage in flight (collision damage). This system could work for fast-travel in one direction, without very much cost.
2f. Structures
Note: This is not a section to suggest changes to structural integrity for ships. This is a section to suggest changes to naturally spawning structures.
In addition to the asteroids and wreckage suggested earlier, the current space stations need changes in general design. I simply propose, eventually, that the stations have some form of protection, as well as more variety in design (taking nice player designs would be enough, easily). Then, the stations need Shields, Faction Modules (with factions set, different ones for pirates and trade guild). On the neutral stations, set the factions to "consider enemy on hostile action", and add automated turrets to them, to prevent people from just walking up and harvesting the entire thing for resources.
These changes are only proposed once it is possible to get money some way other than ripping apart space stations/planets, this is why they're in the "long term" section. In addition, make the stations more used by AI factions. Make there be some point to them.
2g. Ship Building
I would like to see this sooner than some other suggestions in the "Long Term" section of this post, but I don't expect it any time soon.
- Add some kind of construction facility/block
Has the ability to construct ships by itself, provided power and the appropriate blocks in a nearby linked Plex Storage. Can be entered to gain something similar to build mode, but still requires power per block placed and removed to use. - Takes blueprints from the server/client, same as the normal catalogue.
Currently, I see no way build mode can really work out well. It's simply too powerful in most cases. However, I like the idea of it a lot. Therefore, I suggest an alternative: Some kind of construction block/factory/whatever. Essentially, it replaces the catalogue from the store. It will work like most docking blocks would (really, why not just add this to the docking blocks), but interacting with it allows entering of build mode. It will still have the same AOE projection area as docking modules, limiting the size of the ship being built. It would also have a construction size enhancer, allowing for larger ships to be built. I would suggest not requiring that the entire space be free, but have the device check for overlapping blocks before placing one, and simply skipping it if blocked.
The block would be able to access the catalog, and can be commanded to build a ship from a blueprint using blocks from a connected Plex Storage container. It would use a flat amount of energy (probably high) per block, and could be left alone to produce ships for you. Building could also be manual, using the current Build Mode.
Why do this? Well, simply, it allows for Build Mode to still exist in the game, for those that like building large ships, while preventing abuses using it in Ship Cores. Another way to do this would simply be to add the above ideas as functionality of the Docking blocks, meaning that whenever a ship is docked you can edit it freely, and perhaps require a different (but connected) block for auto production.
This would allow several things: Mass production of AI fighters (if they ever become worth using), balanced re-creation of ships that you could design in SP, and use in MP, stopping the abuses with large ships easily being buyable by requiring that you have the resources on hand to make the ship, while not requiring the painful block-by-block recreation of the thing.
This might require some modifications to the way shops keep track of items, and possibly the restocking of them to deal with some resources being unbelievably scarce. I am currently in the process of working out how that might go.
I have no good way of dealing with this on space stations right now. Just keeping the build block around, and only allowing its use on space stations seems like the easiest way out, though maybe adding the requirement of energy for blocks placed. The sole reason for this is to prevent people from building too quickly, that's it.
2h. Life Support
I find the idea of requiring some form of life support, however it raises a question: How do you deal with it on smaller ships?
I outline it with three simple ideas:
1. The player's space-suit can only remain in space for a limited amount of time (air), and exceeding that length of time will cause them to take heavy damage (resulting in death). This time period should be somewhere between 2-5 minutes.
2. Entering a ship-core will reset the player's timer, allowing smaller ships to function completely as normal. The timer does not start running again until you exit the core. This also occurs when you enter the bubble formed by a planet's atmosphere.
3. A life support system of some sort is put in. Air vents or something. They check all blocks radiating outwards, stopping at solids (not plants, open plex-doors or other part-blocks). There should also be a maximum range/volume, at which it will stop checking. If the spread stops because it has encountered solids as far as it can go, it will fill that area with air after a period of time dependent on the number of blocks being filled (something like a second for every few blocks). Opening the area resets the air in it, requiring that it be refilled. This means that air locks and such would be required
Why put this in? Well, it's fun. That's pretty much it. Adds a little sense of realism, which can't hurt, and I don't see that it will be all that difficult to do.
What, you're still reading? Have you no life? Well, thanks for not being distracted by a passing beam of light and persevering to the end. Please comment if you object/support! And get yourself a cookie, you deserve it.
Major Edit 1: Added sections on Shielding, update to all sections under Long Term to flesh them out more, addition of note about fighter-related mechanics at top of page, added section on Fast-Travel
Major Edit 2: Updated section on Advanced Shielding, hopefully it's clearer now. Fixed some of the Table of Contents links, they weren't taking you to the right point on the page.
Major Edit 3: Updated all sections to better meet the new Suggestions Section requirements. Added section on Structures.
Major Edit 4: Updated to better suit Shielding changes, added section on ship construction, added section on Faction Block uses.
Major Edit 5: Shortened/Removed sections due to lack of relevance, added bullet point descriptions for docking section. Shamelessly bumped post. Notable: Edited Cloaking and Radar sections. I previously had a very weak understanding of those systems.
Major Edit 6 (10/13/13): Removed Movement: Turning section, because I considered it now worthless.
) however for walking around the inside of the ship you actually need oxygen, otherwise your astronaughts oxygen level will slowly deplete). This then gets around the fact that very small ships (such as fighters) do not require additional oxygen producing blocks, whilst larger ships and space stations that you actually walk around do require it.