Jumpdrives; Leveraging existing game mechanics

[grimzod]

Some sort of FTL will be implemented. I'm a fan of the KISS principle (keep it simple stupid) and in light of recent suggestions for FTL i'll put my 2 cents in:

Concept:

You move instantly from one sector to another using fuel as a consumable (limiting factor for jump distance). Fuel is drawn from a special block that functions like a plex storage block. Once placed on a vessel, filled with raw ore (Level 1 through 5 though only one type at any time - the storage capacity of the fuel bunker shoudl be limited to one item), the fuel bunker should be immobile like a ship core and heavily protected (if the player doesnt want to lose his jump capability in battle). No specific jump drive block needs to be created. The existing drive blocks can be used (as the 'jump drive') and through use of a formula based on mass of the ship, fuel ore mass and ore level available and mass of the drive blocks a maximum distance can be derived. One would tap the N key to open the navigation screen, type in a waypoint and press a 'Jump' button. Delays can be added if the devs or users desire. Adding a chance for a random misjump or a required nav beacon at the destination to limit exploring by jump drive can also be added. Upper limits on jump drive performance cab=n be added as well, based on fuel purity (level of ore) or mass of drives or both.

Pros:

The /change_Sector admin command already exists and works. All the stuff mentioned above is window dressing for its use by the players on a server.

Cons:

With proper limitaitons I don't see any.

 

[Breakfast Buddy]

What if it was even simpler...



I was thinking just energy needed from power blocks relative to ship size. Therefore smaller ships can getaway quicker when forced to fight larger ones. Also, your power would needto be full. That way you can\'t just warp into a sector, spam lasers, and warp away.

 

[grimzod]

having it drain power as well is a great addition

 

[grimzod]

now that i think of it we dont even need a fuel bunker block really - coudl just draw from inventory to keep is simple

 

[FlakAttack]

I would prefer to keep it simple and just draw energy. If it were to be any more complicated than putting coordinates in and jumping, it should be that it takes time to charge capacitors for a jump, relative to your mass vs engine size/amount

 

[grimzod]

to make the universe playable and economies workable some sort of fuel shoudl be used, thats just my opinion but when players are completely free from \'living off the land\' its boring to me and doesnt make for a vibrant in game economy

 

[TwitchENs]

This is a great idea. However I think there may be an easier way to accomplish this. Lets look at what we want to be able to do.

1. Move from 1 sector to another.

2. Have some Requirement to do so.



So lets look at the how.

* Item - Jump Drive - This item could allow a player to move from sector \"A\" to sector \"B\"

Requirements to complete Jump.

1. Power - Hard Power requirement. (variation of \"power=(Distance)*(Mass/2,3,1)
2. Max Jump is 15 sectors
3. Minimum Ship Mass Requirement - ~3500 Blocks
4. Activation - Once activated the Jump Drive would take 30 seconds to Jump.
5. Cool Downs - Power will recharge much faster depending on generator design. So the Jump Drive itself should have a cool down (like weapons). the cool down can be affected by the jump distance. Minimum cool down of 45 seconds. this would cover jumps up to 8 sectors (no relation to power requirements) Jumps beyond 8 add 10 seconds per sector. THis would make the maximum cool down 115 seconds for a 15 sector jump.
6. Destination - Destinations should require that another player/Ship be in that same faction (with Faction Block) to provide a destination point. This means that a person could not just jump to any sector but that someone would need to scout the area prior. or leave an AI ship behind and then jump back.
7. Point of Origin - The point of origin should be stored in the Jump Computer. This would allow for the ship to jump back to the sector it came from after a battle. (does not require anthor ship to jump back).

This was thought to to best help with ballance. You may have a ship jump into an area to start a fight but you wouldnt want it to be able to just jump back away if it was losing. The cool down provides a minimum fight time.

Please tell me what you think.



TwitchENs

 

[MrFURB]

In the game\'s current state some sort of fast travel is needed as going through 10 sectors to get to spawn or to meet up with friends causes a period of stark boredom when compared to the rest of Starmade\'s gameplay. This isn\'t good and should be worked around, I agree.

In the game\'s future, when you have location-specific actions such as salvaging ancient ruins or rare asteroids, resources that are important and only found on certain planets, or even wormhole hunting or something of the sort, a sort of jump-drive capability would need to be limited to only immense ships that serve as a base of operations for multiple players.

I wouldn\'t mind a fast-travel that is universally accesible right now, but as soon as the economy and factional warfare come in we need to severely limit the abiliity to \'jump\' both into and out of situations. It just isn\'t healthy for multi-player battlefields or for exploration-based gameplay to be able to trade energy or meager resources for an entire universe at your fingertips.

 

[Valido]

Have it just use standard power.

Have Jump capacitors that need to be charged to be used. The distance you can jump is dependent on the ratio of energy stored to in the capacitors to the mass of the vessel.

This means you can\'t jump in and jump out instantly, you have to charge your capacitors, really big ships would need to charge for longer.

Have it a point and shoot on the control tab? I want to jump in this direction. Fire. May be hell to program compared to a straight coord based system though. Also a lot laggier.

Maybe add jump drive blocks in stead of using standard engines. Add another layer of complexity and depth to construction.

 

[Ironlixivium]

I think it would be cool if instead of needing a buch of stuff to warp, it just takes an amount of power relative to the size of the ship and the distance you\'re travelling. in addition, it could have have a cooldown time, and before you jump, there should be some obvious signs that you\'re about to jump similar to the signs in this cutscene from halo 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biGF_s6Slbs. and I think there should also be some kind of module that allows you to track someones warp jump. that way, it can only be used for travel, not getting away, unless you had enough power modules to cloak yourself and still have enough power to warp. either way though, there would be a cool down so no one could warp into batle then warp away, and having more modules could just make it so less power would be needed to warp, not effect the cooldown.

 

[Matt_Bradock]

So, the problems with jump drives are:

1. How to make it balanced?

2. What\'s gonna stop people from using it as escape from any hot situation?

3. How will it be viable in the existing game?

http://star-made.org/content/my-take-ftl That\'s how. There are other resources in the game than fuel. The interior space is a resource. The blocks you need to obtain to build the drive, are a resource. Time itself, is a resource. And then there\'s credits. You make a long enough wind-up time, that scales with distance, for the FTL drive, and turns you into a sitting duck while charging it up, and people will be unable to use it as an escape tool. You make it take ALL power for said wind-up time so no one will be able to circumvent it with docked reactors and whatnot. You make it cost space and mass, and people will have to choose what to sacrifice: power, weapons, sublight thrust, or shields, in order to make an FTL capable ship. You make obtaining enough FTL capacitors an economic challenge, to stir the economy up. And for fixed jump relays, you make a procedure that costs MONEY depending on ship size, to jump you, so people will have to measure if it\'s worth jumping or rather take the long way there.

 

[NeonSturm]

Make a warmup of 15 seconds.

Getting your power below 90% or your shield below 95% resets (effectively freezes) the warmup.

Using your thrusters also resets the warmup.

A cooldown of 5seconds per sector for all jumped-over sectors would be ok for me (could be more if you are not in a 80% sun sector and less in a 200% or 666% sun sector).



You should be able to place 2..4 Jump-Cores. Every real world space ship has redundancy.



I agree on +16 sector limit - for now. That would also prevent accidentally jumping into a sun in most cases.

You enter something like \"/jumpdrive + + -\" and jump to the sun 16 sectors away (also default distance if no distance is specified).