Read by Council Reward mining efficiency, not size

[Erth Paradine]

Request:
Reward design skills and build efficiency, not raw size.

Currently:
Generally speaking, the larger a ships mining array, the faster a player collects resources.

Suggested Method:
When mining, no consideration is apparently given to how "mining lasers" affect the entity itself. For instance, in Vendetta Online, mining heats an asteroid. The hotter an asteroid gets, the slower its resources can be mined. Larger lasers heat faster. Multiple smaller lasers heat slower. Therefore, multiple smaller lasers actually retrieve more resources.

Result of proposed:

• Super-large mining arrays would become less useful, with a stronger emphasis upon leveraging creative talents to build smaller and/or multiple, salvage arrays.
• Fleet mining, using drones, or even teaming-up with multiple players, could become more useful than solo mining.
• Shifting mining emphasis towards smaller, more efficient designs, could help lighten overall server loads.

Rationale:

• Reduce overall server load.
• Discourage super-massive planet mining ships, in favor of entities that perhaps a server can better handle.
• A mining/salvage mechanic that rewards teamwork, now that would be nifty.

Defects/Workarounds:

• Still thinking about this point.

 

[kiraen]

Have you seen this thread?
How to make efficient salvage beams and lower lag

 

[MDJinRoh]

People will make a lot of 1 block Salvageblock Drones with your system i guess.

 

[JNC]

Keep in mind that mining in Vendetta is a much different process than in Starmade... in SM we're actually gathering pieces of what our game world is made of. An asteroid in Vendetta is more comparable to the mean of an entire SM asteroid turned into one block... if my understanding is correct (i dont play Vendetta)

Small miner example

Planet harvester example

What advantages does one have over the other?
1. mobility (defense could be affected here)
2. precision (less unwanted materials - currently n/a as stations will buy everything)
2.5 the planet harvester is only useful if the materials you want are distributed throughout the stratum or you are strip mining (or mining a planet)
3. infrastructure (mostly n/a in Starmade atm except for planet / station facilities... well there's shipyards too now so nvm, ha)
4. cost / feasibility (there are no downsides to having large vehicles in SM aside from system performance and cost / build time)
5. manning (n/a but planned)
6. structural limitations (i.e. design challenges... n/a ?)
7+ ?

I agree that teamwork should be rewarded but, considering these few comparisons between the different miners, would the planet harvester not be the ultimate in mining tech? If you had 10 people all flying smaller miners, or 9 flying smaller miners and 1 flying a giant capital...? System limitation aside, because that can be expected to improve over time.

 

[Erth Paradine]

Have you seen this thread?
How to make efficient salvage beams and lower lag

I have, and basically: the bigger and hotter the miner, the faster it sucks things up (although you really have reached a point of diminishing returns after ~50/stack).
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People will make a lot of 1 block Salvageblock Drones with your system i guess.

Why is that? It's not like I'm proposing we change existing mechanics around cannon usage - I'm suggesting that we consider how mining affects the entity itself too.
[DOUBLEPOST=1465044671][/DOUBLEPOST]

Keep in mind that mining in Vendetta is a much different process than in Starmade... in SM we're actually gathering pieces of what our game world is made of. An asteroid in Vendetta is more comparable to the mean of an entire SM asteroid turned into one block... if my understanding is correct (i dont play Vendetta)

Nope - VO mining produces a variety of different ores, each having their own rarity and values. Various ores are also necessary for constructing ships, powercells, addons, weapons, etc. VO's mining setup is a bit more mature than SM's, for instance, different mining turrets specialize in various ores; providing a bonus when mining specific types.

Small miner example

Planet harvester example

What advantages does one have over the other?
1. mobility (defense could be affected here)
2. precision (less unwanted materials - currently n/a as stations will buy everything)
2.5 the planet harvester is only useful if the materials you want are distributed throughout the stratum or you are strip mining (or mining a planet)
3. infrastructure (mostly n/a in Starmade atm except for planet / station facilities... well there's shipyards too now so nvm, ha)
4. cost / feasibility (there are no downsides to having large vehicles in SM aside from system performance and cost / build time)
5. manning (n/a but planned)
6. structural limitations (i.e. design challenges... n/a ?)
7+ ?

I agree that teamwork should be rewarded but, considering these few comparisons between the different miners, would the planet harvester not be the ultimate in mining tech? If you had 10 people all flying smaller miners, or 9 flying smaller miners and 1 flying a giant capital...? System limitation aside, because that can be expected to improve over time.

[/QUOTE]

I'm having trouble understanding your point here.

 

[JNC]

My point was to show why large and small miners are both good and bad, it just depends on what the goal is. I disagree that large mining vehicles, in general, should be penalized unless it's an indirect result of some game mechanic. But i do agree that teamwork should be encouraged... how im not sure, but i bet we see more of that in the future as that seems to be what's in work now (factions, fleets, etc).

Nope - VO mining produces a variety of different ores, each having their own rarity and values. Various ores are also necessary for constructing ships, powercells, addons, weapons, etc. VO's mining setup is a bit more mature than SM's, for instance, different mining turrets specialize in various ores; providing a bonus when mining specific types.

Sounds like the only difference in asteroids is that they have more than 1 or 2 ore types, and aren't made of individual blocks. Since SM world is made of blocks, mining lasers that focus on certain ores are a bit unnecessary as you can easily only mine the ore blocks you want, if you're using a small mining array. But i understand you aren't pushing to change asteroids, just the mining process.

 

[Erth Paradine]

My point was to show why large and small miners are both good and bad, it just depends on what the goal is. I disagree that large mining vehicles, in general, should be penalized unless it's an indirect result of some game mechanic. But i do agree that teamwork should be encouraged... how im not sure, but i bet we see more of that in the future as that seems to be what's in work now (factions, fleets, etc).

Sounds like the only difference in asteroids is that they have more than 1 or 2 ore types, and aren't made of individual blocks. Since SM world is made of blocks, mining lasers that focus on certain ores are a bit unnecessary as you can easily only mine the ore blocks you want, if you're using a small mining array. But i understand you aren't pushing to change asteroids, just the mining process.

Thanks for clarifying.

Ores vary from 1-3 per type of asteroid - this method seems to work well across a number of games, so I didn't see any reason to suggest a change in SM's approach.

Another possible approach to team-building could be fleet bonuses.

I wasn't suggesting we necessarily penalize large ships, my thought process was more along the lines of encouraging less brute force, and more strategy/skill. As a large planet miner really should be much more "expensive" and rare than they currently are; more things could break (although SM doesn't really have a breakdown mechanic), they require more power (although SM has no recurring costs here), and being less maneuverable. There's also an effect on the mined entity that SM completely ignores; hence the "heat" suggestion.

 

[MDJinRoh]

What you forget in my opinion is that a large Miner is build up with ressources. So you start small and go over to build bigger and bigger.
It´s a way of efficiency, some people like to start with small miners and then directly start building a small battle ships, like some friends of me.
But i prefer to build my mining ship bigger and bigger , as your progress later is faster.
So when you boost small miners, there is no need anymore to spend in bigger systems and your progress is even faster with less ressources spent.