Faction Point Generators/Replacements - Aka food and fuel

[Zoolimar]

Unlike most multiplayer games, you and your stuff do not cease to exist when you log out, meaning your stuff is sitting defenseless (from a human powered perspective) most of the time.

Isn't that why, for example Eve and other MMOs, have invulnerable NPC bases where you could stash your things and zones friendly to new players where NPCs would punish people who try to PK ?

 

[Nosajimiki]

True, but there are problems going the other way as well.

Unlike most multiplayer games, you and your stuff do not cease to exist when you log out, meaning your stuff is sitting defenseless (from a human powered perspective) most of the time. Large factions can be assumed to have players on all the time, but the problem (especially on PvP servers) is that a large faction can wipe out a smaller one to the point they are incapable of recovering.

And when we get right down to it, this is still a video game people play for fun. Individual players on a server should never have the power to effectively ban someone from a server they don't own. The homebase invulnerability is there specifically to prevent that. That no matter how big and bad the other guy is, they can NEVER push you off the server against your will. They can harass you until you leave, but they can never wipe you out to 0 credits and 0 mats in the middle of deep space with no way to go anywhere.

That is an INCREDIBLY important protection that cannot be undermined, IMO.

Yes, I would not suggest removing HB invulnerability. Many people have suggested getting rid of it, but I think this is a viable compromise to keep it, while not letting people throw verbal stones with complete immunity. Most people will never be put in a position where they can be forced completely off of a server unless they completely alienate themselves. If all the big guys on a server hate you enough to put aside their differences and wipe you out of existence, then I suppose that could eventually drive you off of a server even with HB invulnerability, but the importance of FP would make chasing you to another server far less viable than it was before. I used to be able to abandon my base on one server for a month while I chased someone down somewhere else, but this way, that tactic would stretch you really thin since you'd still need to maintain enough FP on server 1 to maintain your own planets that getting a strong foothold on server 2 may not be viable. (Thus preventing another one of the more toxic elements of this game)

As for defenseless... it could take hours to go through someone's territory every night and blockade their resources, so while this would hard to endure over time, it would be just as much work to maintain as it is to weather so would rarely last more than a few nights unless you really pissed someone off. The more extreme examples of conquest and genocide cost FP. Even if you wipe someone without loosing a single ship, it still stretches a faction thin forcing them to pause between major pushes. This pause while an aggressor recovers their FP would give the defender a chance to retake planets or rebuild new colonies with their own reserve of FP. It would also leave an aggressor vulnerable to attack if they spend all their FP expanding, then if faction #3 comes in and hits them, they won't have the FP to push back

 

[Edymnion]

Isn't that why, for example Eve and other MMOs, have invulnerable NPC bases where you could stash your things and zones friendly to new players where NPCs would punish people who try to PK ?

Most MMO's simply put everything that the player is and has completely outside of reach when they are not online. Classics like World of Warcraft have your character vanish when not being played, and all of your stuff either vanishes with you, or is in a extradimensional bank vault safely inside of a faction city that no one but that player can access. While the other side CAN attack a home city, they cannot actually destroy anything that doesn't immediately respawn.

Of the online games that do allow for total destruction, they generally restart everyone from scratch on a new game. Something like Starcraft for example, win or lose, everybody starts off equal again at the beginning of the next game. Total destruction is okay, because no matter how much you build, you know its all going away at the end of the current game anyway, and then you'll all be handed a fresh start.

Eve is one of the very few games that combines the two, and yes, they have high sec(urity) space and low sec space, and even no sec. The player is then allowed to make the decision if they want to be mostly safe (but where resources are low), or take risks and push further out to better resource zones in less controlled space.

In Starmade terms, it would be like having the Trading Guild automatically go to war with anyone that attacks anyone else in their sectors, but who have ships big enough to absolutely roflstomp virtually anybody dumb enough to try. Those high sec raids are generally suicide missions.

Right now, Starmade has nothing like that. The worst thing that can happen is that you can't visit a shop for a while if you piss off the trade guild, whoop de doo, all the time you are getting a steady stream of pitiful little ships trying to attack you that you can eat for blocks.

If we were to bring something akin to secured space into Starmade, it would basically just turn into the same thing we have now, except instead of everyone turtling in their own 1 man faction base, they'd be turtling in an invincible NPC base.

Biggest problem we have right now is that a single base can do everything. We're starting to change that a little bit with reactor chambers, but its not nearly enough. We need an incentive to be the carrot, to give a suitable reward that makes players want to take the risk of expanding. And yet, it has to be balanced against the idea that the game still has to be playable for those who don't want to take the risk.

High risk, high reward. Low risk, low reward. And I have to admit, I don't have a perfect answer for that beyond something like in the OP, some kind of resource or objective that cannot be achieved with a single base, but doesn't cripple your ability to build if you don't have it.

 

[Nosajimiki]

...High risk, high reward. Low risk, low reward. And I have to admit, I don't have a perfect answer for that beyond something like in the OP, some kind of resource or objective that cannot be achieved with a single base, but doesn't cripple your ability to build if you don't have it.

I feel like my idea meets this goal perfectly... Clearly we are on the same page about end goals, but if feels like you have apprehensions about it.

• High risk/high reward vs low risk/low reward is measured by how many planets your try to control
• HB = offline storage & safe zone
• Planets become your "multiple bases"
• Planets do not cripple you to not have, but you would need them to reasonably maintain a force past a certain size.

 

[Edymnion]

I feel like my idea meets this goal perfectly... Clearly we are on the same page about end goals, but if feels like you have apprehensions about it.

I'm just not fond of non-block based answers here. Its a sandbox voxel game, I feel like it needs to have a block based answer. That there should be something the player has to build to gain the reward, not just simply sit on a specific location. And then the location can become important indirectly in that it either provides the means to fuel whatever you build, or it makes whatever you build better.

Having a planet be a glorified toggle switch that either gives you free stuff or it doesn't (even one where the amount changes based on how long you control it) doesn't feel right to me.

Despite what people have said about me, I actually really do enjoy constructive PvP. I personally want it to be where swooping in and destroying an installation in one place can actually hurt an empire as a whole, so that players who can't face a faction's fleet head on has the option of going guerrilla warfare and trying to bring the big empire down from a death by a thousand cuts.

I personally want to see supply lines, where you either have to have super long supply lines to get materials where they have to go, or build outposts to stockpile or create said supplies closer to where you need them. Simply saying they have a planet that is super tough to blow up doesn't do much for me, I want to see buildings on those planets that have to be defended. Orbital batteries set in place, a defense fleet, etc.

I want players to build and destroy, with things like planets offering resources (direct or indirect) that will make multiple factions want the same specific place to the point that they will fight over it, while at the same time still letting them have a homeworld or home station that they don't feel like they have to babysit 24/7.
[doublepost=1530827011,1530826561][/doublepost]To expand on the above, I'd like to see something like automated mining drones that can gather resources for you while you're not actively around. But, I'd want them to have a limited range, so that you'd need to build a processing station near the resources you are gathering. The drones mine, bring raw materials back to the station. Station could be set up to automatically unload the drones, process the raw mats, and transfer them to storage. Then after so much storage gets built up, have the ability to send out a cargo transport ship to move the materials to a more centralized location.

All of which I'd like to see run entirely on block based logic. I wouldn't want ANY of this to happen by itself. I would want to have to build the station with docks for my mining drones. Logic pulls from drone storage to the smelters, then logic pulls from smelters to storage, sensors on storage that can activate the cargo ship's storage to pull mats out, logic to launch the ship from rails, whole nine yards.

I don't want the game just doing it for me, I want to have to build it all with my own two hands.

 

[Nosajimiki]

I'm just not fond of non-block based answers here. Its a sandbox voxel game, I feel like it needs to have a block based answer. That there should be something the player has to build to gain the reward, not just simply sit on a specific location. And then the location can become important indirectly in that it either provides the means to fuel whatever you build, or it makes whatever you build better.

Having a planet be a glorified toggle switch that either gives you free stuff or it doesn't (even one where the amount changes based on how long you control it) doesn't feel right to me.

Despite what people have said about me, I actually really do enjoy constructive PvP. I personally want it to be where swooping in and destroying an installation in one place can actually hurt an empire as a whole, so that players who can't face a faction's fleet head on has the option of going guerrilla warfare and trying to bring the big empire down from a death by a thousand cuts.

I personally want to see supply lines, where you either have to have super long supply lines to get materials where they have to go, or build outposts to stockpile or create said supplies closer to where you need them. Simply saying they have a planet that is super tough to blow up doesn't do much for me, I want to see buildings on those planets that have to be defended. Orbital batteries set in place, a defense fleet, etc.

I want players to build and destroy, with things like planets offering resources (direct or indirect) that will make multiple factions want the same specific place to the point that they will fight over it, while at the same time still letting them have a homeworld or home station that they don't feel like they have to babysit 24/7.
[doublepost=1530827011,1530826561][/doublepost]To expand on the above, I'd like to see something like automated mining drones that can gather resources for you while you're not actively around. But, I'd want them to have a limited range, so that you'd need to build a processing station near the resources you are gathering. The drones mine, bring raw materials back to the station. Station could be set up to automatically unload the drones, process the raw mats, and transfer them to storage. Then after so much storage gets built up, have the ability to send out a cargo transport ship to move the materials to a more centralized location.

All of which I'd like to see run entirely on block based logic. I wouldn't want ANY of this to happen by itself. I would want to have to build the station with docks for my mining drones. Logic pulls from drone storage to the smelters, then logic pulls from smelters to storage, sensors on storage that can activate the cargo ship's storage to pull mats out, logic to launch the ship from rails, whole nine yards.

I don't want the game just doing it for me, I want to have to build it all with my own two hands.

Yes, I understand that. I think in the perfect world planets should have to be built up with blocks, but there's not really a realistic way of doing that in a way that doesn't massively favor slapping giant cancerous chunks of blocks on planets or other inane tactics. Especially if planets are used as points of interest for conflict (which we desperately need).

All the other stuff like fleet mining, supply lines, etc. would not necessarily be exclusive of this. I fully envision the planets I was discussing to have their own weapon systems you can build on them, defensive fleets, or even RP cities you could add if you so chose. The FP would just be a way to make sure that the eb and flow of resources and loses has some kind of restraint on it to prevent the catastrophic collapse of the balance of power.

 

[Edymnion]

that doesn't massively favor slapping giant cancerous chunks of blocks on planets or other inane tactics.

I don't think we need to worry about that as an issue.

Not because it doesn't exist, but because there is no way to stop it. If other people want to be lazy and make doomcubes and cancer planets, they're the ones who are missing out on arguably the main reason to play this game. It doesn't really affect the rest of us. And if you are in a faction with one of these types, you can always redo their work to make it more visually appealing. If you're not, then only they have to suffer seeing it.

 

[Nosajimiki]

I don't think we need to worry about that as an issue.

Not because it doesn't exist, but because there is no way to stop it. If other people want to be lazy and make doomcubes and cancer planets, they're the ones who are missing out on arguably the main reason to play this game. It doesn't really affect the rest of us. And if you are in a faction with one of these types, you can always redo their work to make it more visually appealing. If you're not, then only they have to suffer seeing it.

If it were just aesthetic, I'd agree, but it is a matter of investment of time. If you spend 30 hours building a pretty city that I can nuke in 2 minutes, but then you come nuke my same sized city cube that took me 30 seconds to place, then you've lost thousands of times as much work as I have. Sure, at first people will make big pretty colonies, but once wars start happening players will keep losing all that hard work, and eventually give up on visually appealing colonies in favor of cancer cubes (or more likely, deep subterranean cancer cubes that you can't see anyway so you might as well not be using a block system at all), and everyone will be pissed because it would be the only viable tactic.

My idea is to make planets focus on a different sort of investment. If you want to build a city you can, but the planet does not take "damage" from orbit; so, even if a world changes hands a few times, all that hard work you put into designing your city stays.

That said, perhaps these systems may be compatible. IE: faction points would level the planet up by making it more productive and resistant to conquest as I previously outlined, but what you build on a planet would be able to modify these values. For example:

• adding reactor blocks increase planets base income
  
• adding salvager blocks reduces income but produces raw materials instead.
• adding factory/refinery blocks would allow you to turn those raw materials straight into processed goods.
• adding shield blocks would be added to the planetary shield's abilities.
• adding armor blocks would increase the FP cost of conquering the planet.

Everything you build on a planet would but invulnerable to orbital fire, but would become disabled for a day if the planet's shields ever get taken out. If you conquer a planet, you take the whole infrastructure and everything docked to it as is. If you wipe a planet, the whole planet reverts to its seed state, and all docked entities are destroyed.

While this does not make planetary architecture completely invulnerable, it does make it persistent enough to encourage ornate design, and the FP limit would be enough to prevent a single troll with a good ship from flying all around wiping out every noob colony he can find.