Possible to fix "build mode cheat" now?

    Edymnion

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    Some people call it a cheat, some don't, but lets be fair. You can go into Build Mode in a ship, then move your viewpoint over to another ship/station/whatever and fly right through it and see everything there is in it.

    However, the latest patch added something interesting. The build mode drone with the light. Aka, we now have something in game that represents our viewpoint when in build mode, something others can see.

    And if its exists in the engine with a no-clipping status, could we possibly finally be able to turn clipping back on for everything other than what you're currently working on (and probably what you're docked to) in order to keep snoops from taking a tour of all your stuff?
     

    OfficialCoding

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    Some people call it a cheat, some don't, but lets be fair. You can go into Build Mode in a ship, then move your viewpoint over to another ship/station/whatever and fly right through it and see everything there is in it.

    However, the latest patch added something interesting. The build mode drone with the light. Aka, we now have something in game that represents our viewpoint when in build mode, something others can see.

    And if its exists in the engine with a no-clipping status, could we possibly finally be able to turn clipping back on for everything other than what you're currently working on (and probably what you're docked to) in order to keep snoops from taking a tour of all your stuff?
    YES! We really need this
     
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    What happens when a build-mode drone slips through an open door or a hole in another ship? Does the drone get pulled away when the ship flies off? Does it anchor the ship in place?

    I think it would be better to just only render the outline of any ship that is not a parent or a child of the entity the player is in build mode on.
     

    Lone_Puppy

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    I think it would be better to just only render the outline of any ship that is not a parent or a child of the entity the player is in build mode on.
    I agree and like the outline idea! This would speed up image processing client side and make building a lot easier.
     
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    Some people call it a cheat, some don't, but lets be fair. You can go into Build Mode in a ship, then move your viewpoint over to another ship/station/whatever and fly right through it and see everything there is in it.

    However, the latest patch added something interesting. The build mode drone with the light. Aka, we now have something in game that represents our viewpoint when in build mode, something others can see.

    And if its exists in the engine with a no-clipping status, could we possibly finally be able to turn clipping back on for everything other than what you're currently working on (and probably what you're docked to) in order to keep snoops from taking a tour of all your stuff?
    I agree that being able to look inside anybody else's ship/station is not a desirable ability, but coming up with a good solution might be difficult simply because it's a sandbox game and the essentially infinite possible structures makes it hard to even define the boundary of a ship, let alone prevent people from checking out your 'interiors'.

    As mentioned by another user, enabling clipping will create problems of it's own, with possibilities of doors /crevices that may later close if another player is building that ship while you do your snooping around. It shouldn't really be possible to trap/ force move the drone around, nor intentionally restrict the drones moving space (I can see players building around other players ships, and preventing where the BM drone can be).

    Making open doors collidable for the drone isn't a good idea either, not just because there still is the question of getting trapped because of another player closing off your entry, but also because then there would be a problem if a ship wanted to dock in the hangar of another station/ship. I assume most players use BM to see where exactly the rail docker is, because turning a ship around in the (relatively) cramped hangar is not possible in most cases.

    What happens when a build-mode drone slips through an open door or a hole in another ship? Does the drone get pulled away when the ship flies off? Does it anchor the ship in place?

    I think it would be better to just only render the outline of any ship that is not a parent or a child of the entity the player is in build mode on.
    I really like this idea, but this still brings up some major issues:
    1. What if players want to look around for (say) asteroids/planets/random space entities? Or maybe judge how powerful the fleet that just warped in is? The fastest way to do this (especially when commandeering a bigger vessel) is to pop into BM and look around, because turning the ship around is too slow.
    2. While trying to dock onto another ship/station, I usually switch to BM to see exactly where the rail docker I have to dock to is. This will not be possible using your suggestion, because all I'll see is a blank outline.
    3. How exactly will this 'outline' be defined? I can imagine making every single block have the same texture. If that is so, maybe we can resolve the rail docker issue by having rail docks textured differently. But this still doesn't completely eliminate snooping.
    4. The problem of players purposefully building their ship is a sphere around yours simply to stop you from being able to see anything in BM is but one of the countless tactics people will come up with.
     

    Edymnion

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    I assume most players use BM to see where exactly the rail docker is, because turning a ship around in the (relatively) cramped hangar is not possible in most cases.
    In my experience, it gets used a great deal to find weaknesses.

    I know I do it to look for things like faction blocks on pirate stations back in the day. Fly around inside the station until I found the block, then I'd know exactly where to hit the station to disable it with minimal effort.
     

    Skwidz

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    The "turn clipping back on" thing will make building your own ship a lot more difficult than it has to be and make it a lot less fun. Technically I'm not sure if clipping can be turned off for a specific entity without modifying a lot of the code which currently exists. I think a better solution would be to simply not render all other entities besides the structure the player is working on and the drones of other players working on that structure. Of course you can just follow common sense and put things you don't want others to see in places where they won't know where they are. Also not rendering the other structures (not connected to it in any way) can reduce build mode lag when building in a sector with a lot of ships.
     
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    Skwidz

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    Another idea would be to move the player and a copy of the ship to a virtual sector as with the shipyard and maybe somehow update the ship in the "physical" sector
     
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    My 2 cents :)

    Sometimes, i use build mode for watching a fight. The camera move is such easyer. I know, that's not the spirit of BM :LOL:. That's why, only rendering outlines could be great for me. The great question for me is : "how this outline will be calculated ?" Just thinking about the coding give me a headache... COol, i'm not a coder :whistle:
     

    jayman38

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    Determining the outer extents of a ship and keeping a build-mode drone from being trapped inside is easy: Use the bounding box of the ship, instead of its actual blocks.

    Hiding the ship with outlines will still allow the drone to examine hollow spaces inside ships if they are allowed to penetrate the bounding box.
     

    kiddan

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    What if build drones could be shot down, returning them to the build block they belong to? Turrets that aim at Any or Players would aim at enemy build drones, plus, players themselves could shoot the drones down. If clipping was disabled, a self-destruct button could be added to the inventory or as a keybind while in build mode.
     
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    In my experience, it gets used a great deal to find weaknesses.

    I know I do it to look for things like faction blocks on pirate stations back in the day. Fly around inside the station until I found the block, then I'd know exactly where to hit the station to disable it with minimal effort.
    I meant the BM is used to view the position and orientation of the ship and the docking area when trying to dock as well (just having a camera besides the rail docker is not good enough in many cases), and this is something that would suffer if clipping or outlining was turned on.

    The "turn clipping back on" thing will make building your own ship a lot more difficult than it has to be and make it a lot less fun. Technically I'm not sure if clipping can be turned off for a specific entity without modifying a lot of the code which currently exists. I think a better solution would be to simply not render all other entities besides the structure the player is working on and the drones of other players working on that structure. Of course you can just follow common sense and put things you don't want others to see in places where they won't know where they are. Also not rendering the other structures (not connected to it in any way) can reduce build mode lag when building in a sector with a lot of ships.
    Again, you might actually want to see other entities in operations like trying to dock, or simply seeing if multi entity logic works, without having to revert to flight mode or astronaut mode (it really would be a bummer if I couldn't see what ore-rich parts of an asteroid have not been mined yet in BM).

    Although I like how this would reduce lag, especially in crowded sectors (BM itself is more system resource intensive and decreases fps quite a bit even in empty sectors, when compared to astronaut mode), this would create more problems than it solves.

    Determining the outer extents of a ship and keeping a build-mode drone from being trapped inside is easy: Use the bounding box of the ship, instead of its actual blocks.

    Hiding the ship with outlines will still allow the drone to examine hollow spaces inside ships if they are allowed to penetrate the bounding box.
    The bounding box restriction would mean players would be able to build a ship with three long lines of hull along the three axes and 'engulf' your ship (by making their ships bounding box overlap with your own ship), meaning you cannot even go into BM- not cool.

    What if build drones could be shot down, returning them to the build block they belong to? Turrets that aim at Any or Players would aim at enemy build drones, plus, players themselves could shoot the drones down. If clipping was disabled, a self-destruct button could be added to the inventory or as a keybind while in build mode.
    Not a battle I would want to fight lol.
     
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    1. What if players want to look around for (say) asteroids/planets/random space entities?
    <snip>
    2. While trying to dock onto another ship/station, I usually switch to BM to see exactly where the rail docker I have to dock to is.
    (it really would be a bummer if I couldn't see what ore-rich parts of an asteroid have not been mined yet in BM)
    These three are essentially noclip cheats. Build-mode is a creative convenience, not a gameplay mechanic. It currently serves other purposes due to missing features in the game, like proper scanners, intelligent, automated docking control, etc. Just because a hacky way is discovered to make up for shortcomings in the game, doesn't mean that way should be preserved as a feature.

    3. How exactly will this 'outline' be defined?
    The game already has an outline system, used for outlining targeted ships and groups of system blocks. It was previously stated that this system might eventually be used for drawing LoD models of ships.

    4. The problem of players purposefully building their ship is a sphere around yours simply to stop you from being able to see anything in BM
    Being inside the bounding box of another ship while in build mode wouldn't stop you from seeing or building. It would simply stop rendering the other ship. However, I don't think it matters much, as obnoxious behavior is really best left for servers to handle as they see fit.
     
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    Skwidz

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    Also the new camera positioning mechanic can be used to spy like BM but I think that can be partially fixed by limiting the range
     
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    the one think in build mode that should be fixed is the runnaway ship while going into advanced build mode. which makes it impossible to put thrusters on to be able to stop the ship while beeing landed in a black hole system.
     

    Skwidz

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    the one think in build mode that should be fixed is the runnaway ship while going into advanced build mode. which makes it impossible to put thrusters on to be able to stop the ship while beeing landed in a black hole system.
    That would only happen if something bumps your ship if you're not careful or you haven't turned off pirates. Also what are the chances of randomly flying into a wormhole system if you build in a far away void system?

    To counteract these things if they happen, and if you're in the ship which gets moved, add a chunk of thrusters (and reactor if required) to stop the ship. Then you can click the undo button to go back to normal
     

    Sachys

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    What about a simple core / faction block related effect thats scrambles visuals for anybody using build mode thats not in your faction within the parameters of the entity?
    Consider it like tracking on an old VHS tape.

    Edit: I suppose it could work in a similar manner to a build inhibitor actually - a radius from the centre of mass?
    [doublepost=1540052855,1540052578][/doublepost]
    That would only happen if something bumps your ship if you're not careful or you haven't turned off pirates.
    or if you happen to land in a wormhole / sun / pirate station coming out of jump - especially if you've had to flee something else. similar with the lack of system scanning right now.