- Joined
- Dec 2, 2013
- Messages
- 232
- Reaction score
- 98
These are all ideas that I've had in my head for some time. With the recent additions to the game, I feel a server such as this would be possible and of interest to players. Everything suggested in this post has been personally tested, and I have found ways to make it all work. These are not suggestion for the game! These are server mechanics that are all possible as the the latest Pre-build. I want to know if people are interested in a server like this.
The ultimate goal of this server is to make StarMade feel more like a living breathing universe rather than an open empty sandbox. When a player logs onto the server they have “somewhere to play” rather than just “somewhere to build.”
I hope to achieve this by putting a focus on Player vs Environment encounters, Role Play and Faction Warfare.
These Change Notes seem very harsh, but please read through them to see how the server will work as a whole. Things won't be hard; they will just be different. The idea is to get people to assume a “role” within the server. You won't be able to be a jack-of-all-trades.
Major Change Notes:
--Credits will be hard to come by and will not be the main way to acquire items. There will be very few vanilla Trading Guild shops and you will only really be able to purchase crew members from them. There will, however, be Admin-run Trading Guild shops that will trade items for other items. The Admin-run shop will trade/sell different things based on what kind of shop it is. The different kinds of shops will be explained later in the post. I plan to create a “bounty block” that will be dropped by NPCs that can be exchanged for credits at the vanilla Trader Guild shops. There will also be Credit chips. These will be non-place able items that can be traded for their exact value. Think of it as a Check or a Credit card. 1000 Credits will be worth (1) 1000 credit chip. It's a great way to keep your credits from getting lost when you die and will make it easier for Admins to give players credit rewards without having to physically meet them online.
--There will be many Admin-generated encounters and events. The goal is to not require the Admins have to be online for these. This is explained further in the post.
--A number of items will be harder to get or be more expensive in order to help balance out the game. These include: AMCs, Shields, Plex Storage, Factories, Build Blocks, Salvage Cannons and several other items.
--Hulls and Ship Cores will have their HP and armor % greatly increased.
--Server speed will be set to 200kph, but friction will be greatly increased.
--If possible, I would like to integrate the “StarMade Warper” add-on.
--There will be a “Black Market” for pirate characters.
Getting Started on the Server
For individuals:
Although the server will be different from Vanilla Star-made it will not be overly difficult, and you will not have to grind for hours alone before you can start to have fun. In fact, as soon as you join you will be given an option to choose a career path. Based on your choice you will receive a RP quality ship and gear that will get you started. Your options are:
--Trader: Receive a cargo/mining ship plus factory and build block. You are neutral to all major and minor empire and hostile to pirates.
--Mercenary: (vanilla start) Receive a capable fighter craft. You are neutral to both major empires and hostile to pirates.
--Military: Receive an advanced fighter craft. You are hostile to one of the major empires, as well as pirates.
--Pirate: Receive a capable fighter craft. You are allied with the pirates, and hostile to everyone else.
For Factions:
Feel free to bring over your whole faction! Factions of 4 or more people can declare themselves a Sovereign Government and will receive an Empire starter kit. This will include a large number of blocks as well as good recipes for hull colors of your choosing. Keep in mind, however, the existing empires don't like crowds and will declare you hostile until you can show otherwise.
Making the Universe feel alive and for once giving players something to do
I want to put a focus on P v E so that players don't have to be the sole generator of role play when Admins are not around. Admins will set up encounters and missions when they log on and post about them on the forums. These can vary from “destroy that base”, “find this ship”, “acquire X amount of a good”, etc. Once a player completes the mission, they will just need to PM the Admin in charge of it and the player will receive their reward. I've developed a system in which Admins will be able to give players rewards without both parties needing to be online.
At some point I plan to create a private server forum page where Admins will offer missions, and players can post what they are selling or what they are looking to buy.
Pirates will be difficult and persistent. There will also be a few hostile NPC factions managed by Admins that players will encounter.
Pirates will drop a very small amount of loot, but they will also contain the bounty block which can be sold at just about any shop for a cash reward. There will be different bounty blocks based on the difficulty of the pirates. An easy pirate may contain a block worth 100k, while a pirate capital ship or station will be worth much much more.
There will be powerful pirate and hostile NPC “stations” (will actually just be ships with no thrusters so they can be easily be re-spawned). These will be filled with lots of loot, but will be very hard for a player to take down alone. All the more reason to work with friends!
If you're a pirate character, you may find Cargo ships floating around space that belong to either the trading guild, or one of the other empires. These ships will be accompanied by escort ships that you can battle and claim their cargo to sell on the pirate Black Market.
If you're a Trader, you may want to fly back and forth from shop to shop and empire to empire exchanging base goods to sell at higher prices to make a quick buck, or to help develop your own recipe and production line.
That's just the stuff you'll be able to do alone. There will also be Admin events and an evolving story for the server. Empires will rise and fall, and surprises will happen!
Changes to the Economy
The goal is to make an economy that is primarily based on trade and manufacturing rather than selling loot to the Trading Guild shops. I would like players to focus on interacting with other players rather than manufacturing things for their own use and making their own personal economy.
The Trading Guild shops will include:
--Refinery: Exchange generic resources like rock for minerals at a high ratio
--Bio-domes: You can buy plants and terrain with credits for your recipes
--System Fab: Buy computers, and manufactured goods like paint, processors, expanders, etc... for credits
--Med Fab: Exchange minerals for hull blocks and other generic items
--Advanced Fab: Exchange higher lvl minerals for thrusters, power, weapons, AI, Shields and other higher tier items
--Ship Yards: Sells everything ship related for credits, including ships!
Factories and manufacturing
A role play element will be required for factories. Setting up a factory will require you to build a physical structure on a station or plant. You can't just hide your factory block under a rock.
For every item category (as listed in the shop) you will need to build a separate add-on to your main factory structure. For example: Your factory produces Hulls (listed under “General” in the shop) and you want to start making thrusters (listed under “Ship” in the shop), you will need to build a little add-on to your factory to make it look like you have multiple assembly lines running. NOTE: you DO NOT need to have multiple factory blocks, it just needs to look like you have multiple factories. Your factories don't need to be large or extremely detailed; they just need to look like something. You will be able to see examples of factories near spawn.
Ships on the Server
There will be Ship classes based on the overall cost of a ship (including anything docked to it). The goal is to keep ships from becoming a big one-man death machine. Based on the cost, you will have certain crew requirements (not actual AI crew, imaginary ones). The number of crew determines what interior commendations your ship will require. There will be a full list of ship classes and requirements to come, however there will be no hard restrictions on ships. Ships that follow the RP guidelines will be considered “Insured”. These ships will be re-spawned at no cost to the player if heavily damaged or destroyed. Ships are going to be a big investment. If it exceeds the cost tier, it won't be a big deal, but it may make you a target of pirates who would like to get a hold of your vessels. So build big at your own risk.
To extend the role play and combat experience, both regular and hardened hull will have a significant armor percentage increase. It will most likely be set around 70% for hulls and 90% for Hardened hulls. This is to hopefully make missiles, rather than AMCs the weapon of choice. AMCs should be used to suppress shields while missiles are used to punch through the hulls. As a rule of thumb, if your ship has turrets you cannot have an AMC array as your primary weapon on your ship.
When building or repairing a ship you will need to build a ship yard. Examples of which can be seen at the spawn station. ALSO you can find Shipyards in protected sectors on the server where you can build a ship and safely dock when offline.
These are all of the changes/features I am going to share at this point. I have many others, but I will not bore you with them. I'm interested in knowing if this a server that the community would like to see or if I should let these ideas go.
The ultimate goal of this server is to make StarMade feel more like a living breathing universe rather than an open empty sandbox. When a player logs onto the server they have “somewhere to play” rather than just “somewhere to build.”
I hope to achieve this by putting a focus on Player vs Environment encounters, Role Play and Faction Warfare.
These Change Notes seem very harsh, but please read through them to see how the server will work as a whole. Things won't be hard; they will just be different. The idea is to get people to assume a “role” within the server. You won't be able to be a jack-of-all-trades.
Major Change Notes:
--Credits will be hard to come by and will not be the main way to acquire items. There will be very few vanilla Trading Guild shops and you will only really be able to purchase crew members from them. There will, however, be Admin-run Trading Guild shops that will trade items for other items. The Admin-run shop will trade/sell different things based on what kind of shop it is. The different kinds of shops will be explained later in the post. I plan to create a “bounty block” that will be dropped by NPCs that can be exchanged for credits at the vanilla Trader Guild shops. There will also be Credit chips. These will be non-place able items that can be traded for their exact value. Think of it as a Check or a Credit card. 1000 Credits will be worth (1) 1000 credit chip. It's a great way to keep your credits from getting lost when you die and will make it easier for Admins to give players credit rewards without having to physically meet them online.
--There will be many Admin-generated encounters and events. The goal is to not require the Admins have to be online for these. This is explained further in the post.
--A number of items will be harder to get or be more expensive in order to help balance out the game. These include: AMCs, Shields, Plex Storage, Factories, Build Blocks, Salvage Cannons and several other items.
--Hulls and Ship Cores will have their HP and armor % greatly increased.
--Server speed will be set to 200kph, but friction will be greatly increased.
--If possible, I would like to integrate the “StarMade Warper” add-on.
--There will be a “Black Market” for pirate characters.
Getting Started on the Server
For individuals:
Although the server will be different from Vanilla Star-made it will not be overly difficult, and you will not have to grind for hours alone before you can start to have fun. In fact, as soon as you join you will be given an option to choose a career path. Based on your choice you will receive a RP quality ship and gear that will get you started. Your options are:
--Trader: Receive a cargo/mining ship plus factory and build block. You are neutral to all major and minor empire and hostile to pirates.
--Mercenary: (vanilla start) Receive a capable fighter craft. You are neutral to both major empires and hostile to pirates.
--Military: Receive an advanced fighter craft. You are hostile to one of the major empires, as well as pirates.
--Pirate: Receive a capable fighter craft. You are allied with the pirates, and hostile to everyone else.
For Factions:
Feel free to bring over your whole faction! Factions of 4 or more people can declare themselves a Sovereign Government and will receive an Empire starter kit. This will include a large number of blocks as well as good recipes for hull colors of your choosing. Keep in mind, however, the existing empires don't like crowds and will declare you hostile until you can show otherwise.
Making the Universe feel alive and for once giving players something to do
I want to put a focus on P v E so that players don't have to be the sole generator of role play when Admins are not around. Admins will set up encounters and missions when they log on and post about them on the forums. These can vary from “destroy that base”, “find this ship”, “acquire X amount of a good”, etc. Once a player completes the mission, they will just need to PM the Admin in charge of it and the player will receive their reward. I've developed a system in which Admins will be able to give players rewards without both parties needing to be online.
At some point I plan to create a private server forum page where Admins will offer missions, and players can post what they are selling or what they are looking to buy.
Pirates will be difficult and persistent. There will also be a few hostile NPC factions managed by Admins that players will encounter.
Pirates will drop a very small amount of loot, but they will also contain the bounty block which can be sold at just about any shop for a cash reward. There will be different bounty blocks based on the difficulty of the pirates. An easy pirate may contain a block worth 100k, while a pirate capital ship or station will be worth much much more.
There will be powerful pirate and hostile NPC “stations” (will actually just be ships with no thrusters so they can be easily be re-spawned). These will be filled with lots of loot, but will be very hard for a player to take down alone. All the more reason to work with friends!
If you're a pirate character, you may find Cargo ships floating around space that belong to either the trading guild, or one of the other empires. These ships will be accompanied by escort ships that you can battle and claim their cargo to sell on the pirate Black Market.
If you're a Trader, you may want to fly back and forth from shop to shop and empire to empire exchanging base goods to sell at higher prices to make a quick buck, or to help develop your own recipe and production line.
That's just the stuff you'll be able to do alone. There will also be Admin events and an evolving story for the server. Empires will rise and fall, and surprises will happen!
Changes to the Economy
The goal is to make an economy that is primarily based on trade and manufacturing rather than selling loot to the Trading Guild shops. I would like players to focus on interacting with other players rather than manufacturing things for their own use and making their own personal economy.
The Trading Guild shops will include:
--Refinery: Exchange generic resources like rock for minerals at a high ratio
--Bio-domes: You can buy plants and terrain with credits for your recipes
--System Fab: Buy computers, and manufactured goods like paint, processors, expanders, etc... for credits
--Med Fab: Exchange minerals for hull blocks and other generic items
--Advanced Fab: Exchange higher lvl minerals for thrusters, power, weapons, AI, Shields and other higher tier items
--Ship Yards: Sells everything ship related for credits, including ships!
Factories and manufacturing
A role play element will be required for factories. Setting up a factory will require you to build a physical structure on a station or plant. You can't just hide your factory block under a rock.
For every item category (as listed in the shop) you will need to build a separate add-on to your main factory structure. For example: Your factory produces Hulls (listed under “General” in the shop) and you want to start making thrusters (listed under “Ship” in the shop), you will need to build a little add-on to your factory to make it look like you have multiple assembly lines running. NOTE: you DO NOT need to have multiple factory blocks, it just needs to look like you have multiple factories. Your factories don't need to be large or extremely detailed; they just need to look like something. You will be able to see examples of factories near spawn.
Ships on the Server
There will be Ship classes based on the overall cost of a ship (including anything docked to it). The goal is to keep ships from becoming a big one-man death machine. Based on the cost, you will have certain crew requirements (not actual AI crew, imaginary ones). The number of crew determines what interior commendations your ship will require. There will be a full list of ship classes and requirements to come, however there will be no hard restrictions on ships. Ships that follow the RP guidelines will be considered “Insured”. These ships will be re-spawned at no cost to the player if heavily damaged or destroyed. Ships are going to be a big investment. If it exceeds the cost tier, it won't be a big deal, but it may make you a target of pirates who would like to get a hold of your vessels. So build big at your own risk.
To extend the role play and combat experience, both regular and hardened hull will have a significant armor percentage increase. It will most likely be set around 70% for hulls and 90% for Hardened hulls. This is to hopefully make missiles, rather than AMCs the weapon of choice. AMCs should be used to suppress shields while missiles are used to punch through the hulls. As a rule of thumb, if your ship has turrets you cannot have an AMC array as your primary weapon on your ship.
When building or repairing a ship you will need to build a ship yard. Examples of which can be seen at the spawn station. ALSO you can find Shipyards in protected sectors on the server where you can build a ship and safely dock when offline.
These are all of the changes/features I am going to share at this point. I have many others, but I will not bore you with them. I'm interested in knowing if this a server that the community would like to see or if I should let these ideas go.
