Give us Our Daily Bread... er Blocks

[Jake_Lancia]

Watch as some hardcore pvper enter this thread just to disagree with it.

Heeeey, I find that offensive ;-;

I've been waiting for the "Well how are we supposed to completely win if the other guy can just go pick up new stuff and start over?" people for a while now, actually.

Because they always pop their heads up. Anything that would prevent someone from being completely erased off the face of the universe usually gets at least a few "hardcore pvp" types out saying how its an attack on their way of life or some such nonsense.

IMO there should never be a way to completely erase a player from the universe via conflict. There should always be a way to come back, else the game loses all of its fun and replay-ability, especially in survival servers. This suggestion goes a long way to helping that.

 

[Scypio]

Though honestly, I can see the issues with inactive factions getting members to log in once a day to collect their stipend which is a consistent issue with stipend systems to begin with. That being said, I am not opposed to getting handouts if it means solving the issue with disturbing pvp ethics.

If that's the starting blocks (and credits too) you can farm them if you want, using that time to log in and collect the surface ore on some asteroids would be way better.

 

[Dr. Whammy]

I've been waiting for the "Well how are we supposed to completely win if the other guy can just go pick up new stuff and start over?" people for a while now, actually.

Because they always pop their heads up. Anything that would prevent someone from being completely erased off the face of the universe usually gets at least a few "hardcore pvp" types out saying how its an attack on their way of life or some such nonsense.

...and these are the kinds of people who take away from StarMade in the first place. The mean spirited and blood thirsty, who want the thrill of the kill, (even the target is defenseless) have no place in a creative society. Any points they make will fall on deaf ears.

While I'm personally willing to pull a splatthecat and 'rough it' to the next asteroid if I have to, I don't think such a dire situation should be forced on anyone. I agree that it shouldn't be so hard to start over that continuing the game seems pointless. After all; this game is supposed to be fun.

My two cents...
- If you get killed and you have no cores, power or thrusters in your inventory, you should get one of each.
- If your credits fall below 20,000 upon death, your credits should bump back up to 20,000 so you can buy what you need to start over.

If you can't make it to someplace safe with a core, power, thruster and 20,000 credits worth of gear from the nearest shop, you shouldn't be playing StarMade outside of single player. Just saying...

 

[Edymnion]

I've seen server mods that would let you use !core to spawn in a free core every hour. It was very handy.

 

[Madman198237]

Yeah, Edymnion. All we need is to build in the tools that allow you to get a core, power reactor, and thruster. Instead of making admins make the tools, give them the basic tool.

 

[Mr.Steam]

My guess is when the new starting trade station is introduced their will be several ways to earn money. Maybe the Trade Guild will hire you to fly their ships for freight delivery. How about just being hired as a security guard on a freighter to protect against pirate attacks. Or perhaps you could work for a mining guild. In fact I hope the game becomes flexible enough that you could play for a long time working for NPC's that you really don't need to ever build. I really like games with multiple paths to victory.

 

[Madman198237]

This is a sandbox.

There is no victory.


But you are still correct. Multiple paths are good.

 

[Dr. Whammy]

Wait a minute... The Trade guild? That might be a solution. Get stranded? Call the trade guild for help.

- Add a distress beacon function to astronaut mode for when you get blasted to the stone age or stranded in space with no blocks/credits.

- Activate the beacon and an acknowledgement prompt will flash saying a rescue is coming.

- After a few minutes, a trade guild ship will spawn (like a pirate station response fleet) come within 30-50 meters of you, stop and wait.

- Move to the trade ship and when you align to it, the ship will fly to the nearest shop where a core, power and thruster will spawn in your inventory along with say 25,000 credits so you can start over. The trade ship will also restock the shop so you can buy what you need.

Under default prices, 25,000 credits will get you a jump drive and module(s) along with a radar jammer (to sneak past the guys who pwned you) and some building materials (build block, faction module, capsule refinery etc.)

This gives players a way to continue without 'charity' from other players while still maintaining a bit of a challenge. The amount of materials you're given would allow for a successful restart but would be so minor that thay probably won't be worth 'alt farming'.

What do you guys think?

 

[Endal]

Wait a minute... The Trade guild? That might be a solution. Get stranded? Call the trade guild for help.

- Add a distress beacon function to astronaut mode for when you get blasted to the stone age or stranded in space with no blocks/credits.

- Activate the beacon and an acknowledgement prompt will flash saying a rescue is coming.

- After a few minutes, a trade guild ship will spawn (like a pirate station response fleet) come within 30-50 meters of you, stop and wait.

- Move to the trade ship and when you align to it, the ship will fly to the nearest shop where a core, power and thruster will spawn in your inventory along with say 25,000 credits so you can start over. The trade ship will also restock the shop so you can buy what you need.

Under default prices, 25,000 credits will get you a jump drive and module(s) along with a radar jammer (to sneak past the guys who pwned you) and some building materials (build block, faction module, capsule refinery etc.)

This gives players a way to continue without 'charity' from other players while still maintaining a bit of a challenge. The amount of materials you're given would allow for a successful restart but would be so minor that thay probably won't be worth 'alt farming'.

What do you guys think?

I think the distress beacon is an absolutely splendid idea. However, there should be a catch; your last entered ship must be damaged (SHP) by an enemy or neutral to at least x% (in the 30-50% range)/ further than x sectors from you/ destroyed by an enemy or neutral, and no allied ship is within jump range/ no shop is within 1 sector from you; so that alt-farming would be stupendously difficult. In addition, for the 4th part, I think the rescue ship should only give min(0,25 000-Player.CreditBalance) credits so you can't just stock credits like a freeloader without having to pull off some ridiculous stunts.
Now, this will only help the player get off their asses when they flop, it doesn't exactly stop the player/faction that blasted the player. So along with the distress beacon feature, there should be an optional Reputation feature, so that killing/ severely damaging the ships or players of neutrals/ factions (and those that auto-declared war on you for hostile action) will decrease the player's/faction's reputation with friendly NPC factions (ie Trade guild) and said NPC factions will start to act aggressively against these players/ factions, which keeps them busy from blasting the poor player back to the stone age again.

 

[MossyStone48]

On NASS you just say !core in chat and the script drops a shipcore in to your inventory. The timeout is about 10 minutes. The cost for a core is about 300 credits. Hang out by a shop in a protected zone and ask for 2 cores. You'll have enough credits after you sell 2 for a few thrusters and reactors. Plus a spare core to slap them on. 30 minutes roughly.

I don't see many users having a problem with donating a ship to a less fortunate player. Especially one being griefed as long as they are chill about it. Hysterical and whiny users just get ignored.

 

[Scypio]

What do you guys think?

The distress signal is cool but what if there is players around to shoot down the savior ? What if the trading guild have been destroyed from the current galaxy ?

Also, the distress signal is cool but would need some testing and a lot more code than just giving the few blocs instantly by pressing a button. The button might be the bandage needed and the distress signal will be the future of it when the time will come ?

 

[Edymnion]

Just came up on my server this morning.

New player made their first ship, went out to find territory, and apparently a pirate fleet was hanging out just outside of spawn. Blew him away.

Luckily I was on and went in to donate him a newbie brick miner so he was okay, but he was basically screwed otherwise.

 

[Lukwan]

Starmade is not a survival game. As such there is no good reason to leave a ship-wrecked new player stranded. Period.

The amount of free resources that a care package would need to get a player going again would be insignificant to any veteran who is already established. Opposing this idea on the basis that it would exploited is...baffling. Anyone with even a crap mining vessel they made out of pocket lint (staring resources) could gather 1000 times more resources in the time it would take to get picked up by the coast guard and re-supplied.

Denying this aid to a newbie is just mean-spirited.

Regarding 'winning' Starmade. There are no victory conditions in SM so anyone who feels they have to crush all that exists is doing so for their own reasons. I have no issue with a good old faction war on a server that is made for battle but spawn campers and noob stompers are gutter-slime in any game. They are also hard to prevent since some people have such low self esteem they must destroy other's (and their work) just to feel good about themselves. That is pretty sad but I don't pity those kind of jerks. They are spreading their negativity to other people rather dealing with their own unresolved issues. That is why I play the role of White Knight when possible, not because I am against a good brawl but because I hate bullies.

 

[Dr. Whammy]

This thread reminds me of how I became allies with several factions in multi-player.

I was visiting another faction's base when they came under attack by some pretty beefed up custom NPC pirates. Judging by the in-game chat, the others were kind of unprepared and started scrambling to dock their ships and get defenses online. I was in a lightly armed scout ship with a decent amount of point defenses so I tried to use my speed and maneuverability to draw the enemy's fire to buy them some time. I moved into position, picked a target and started to light it up with my cannons.

That was when ALL of the pirates turned around and fired their damage pulse missiles in my direction... Bye bye, scout ship...


Insta-kill!!! After the first volley of missiles hit, I was ejected from the core and the ship overheated. Somehow, I didn't die from all the explosions so it was time for Plan-B; GTFO of there. Fortunately, I always bring a ship core, power blocks and thrusters in my inventory and quickly made an 'escape pod' to abandon ship. I flew away as fast as I could then changed course to head for the nearest shop to build a light warp ship. Just as I was finishing up, one of the player's from the base I tried to defend came and picked me up. We've been die hard in-game allies and Skype buddies ever since.

I guess my point is; while I support the idea of an automated care package system for distressed players, I'm hoping that generosity and cooperation won't suddenly stop because of a feature like this being added to the game.

I think that while not universally practiced, our tendency to share and assist less experienced players is a big part of what adds to the community as a whole.
[doublepost=1479401430,1479401311][/doublepost]Also, I agree that any supplies generated by "The Coast Guard" are not substantial enough to warrant concern when everyone else is flying around in battleships and planet eaters.

 

[Edymnion]

I would also point out that dedicated griefers already abuse the system for unlimited blocks as is.

I've been on servers where coordinated griefer attacks happened. They got about a dozen people together, logged into the server, transferred all of their blocks and money to one person to hold. Everybody else logged out, changed their login name to get a new batch of starter supplies, transferred it all over to the hold guy. Did that for the maximum amount of accounts they could use.

Together they ended up being able to build a warship that could take out pretty much anything that wasn't a faction home. So yeah, no, people "abusing" a care package like this won't be an issue, because the people that would abuse it can already abuse the current system as is.

 

[Lukwan]

I guess my point is; while I support the idea of an automated care package system for distressed players, I'm hoping that generosity and cooperation won't suddenly stop because of a feature like this being added to the game.

Good story. I had my first 'Ride' on someone else's ship when I was being rescued by an admin after being stranded. It was a memorable experience because it came at the end of an epic adventure and led me to make friends with that admin. I'm pretty sure that these things will keep happening because most people are awesome and want to be sociable. Most of the anti social behavior I have seen (non jerk related) has come from inadequacies in the game mechanics; like no faction-member trust until the faction-permission block was released...then fixed.

Also, helping stranded players could be included in the game mechanic if doing so was recognized by SM and rewarded with XP or something.
[doublepost=1479402137,1479401980][/doublepost]

They got about a dozen people together, logged into the server, transferred all of their blocks and money to one person to hold. Everybody else logged out, changed their login name to get a new batch of starter supplies, transferred it all over to the hold guy.

Did they do that with the crappy default starter supplies or was that server generous with the starting goodies?

 

[Edymnion]

Did they do that with the crappy default starter supplies or was that server generous with the starting goodies?

Default starting supplies.

Took down one of my warp gates that had a million shields and enough guns to take out a decent sized cruiser. Along with everything else on the server they could find.

Just had to get a ship big enough to take out other ships, then cannibalize them, and pretty quickly were able to get big enough to go on a full rampage. We all woke up to a ravaged server. Pretty much anything that wasn't a home base or docked to a home base was gone.

 

[Megabulb25]

I used to run a noob friendly faction, it was actually surprisingly fun and I met some nice people. Although i'd be happy to help a stranded player, i do think that the rescue ship idea is a very good idea, but it needs a limit to when you can activate it, because some people might just kill the ship to farm resources. I don't think kind-hearted players would dissapear either, because I can't be the only one who enjoys helping newbies learn the game.

 

[Wolverines527]

I think this would be a great feature for new players as the game stands it isnt as forgiving to newer players so a care package would come a long way to helping players

 

[splatthecat]

I posted a simple shuttle in the community content section recently and carry a ready to spawn blueprint in my inventory. That way, I have a ready to use ship with a radar jammer, some cargo space if required and a 2.5 thrust to mass ratio so can zip away from a danger zone if the need arises. I also have a simple salvager and could use this if I am still trying to gather resources to progress.

I was forced to use this to get back to my ship after a server glitch exited me 20km away. I buzzed back to my ship, passing within about 4km from a pirate station (glad I included a radar jammer) and then dismantled my little shuttle and bought the blueprint again at the next shop I found.

True, you don't need anything as fancy as that, just a few blocks of power, thruster, core and maybe a radar jammer. This escape pod could be the difference between getting back on your feet again or a very long space walk to the nearest asteroid, derelict, shop or homebase.

The distress beacon reminds me of Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. Maybe the devs could use the wormhole visuals and move you to the nearest "friendly" base or shop.

Additionally, I think it is a bit of a hindrance that only your own shops can take money deposits. It would be great if you could deposit or withdraw cash from any shop. Shops owned by other players could take a "cut" perhaps?

I'm sure many of these "tweaks" will eventually make their way into the game, especially with the NPC factions moving about.