Velenka

Slowing things down might work, but then I worry about being too long. For two very well defended forces, what's to prevent a battle lasting hours or even days? It would get pretty boring. For a grounded base, running away from a fight isn't an option. Will players be forced to remain on-site as a battle goes on? Several concurrent battles could be going on... That would be too slow of a pace of battles. Unfortunately, there is nothing to distinguish bases from ships. Anything you can put on a base, you can put on a ship. I read a comment of one of the dev blog articles about how a 24hr grace invulnerability period might activate when a base is about to be destroyed. That would allow the time-zone issue to be settled, but then it could give the defender time to repair everything, which would put everything back at square one. Sometimes the issue of time-zones can't be solved. I might be available only between hours w and x while the other guy is only available between hours y and z. If we are made to wait between me and the other guy coming on and offline, battles again may last for a day or longer, which is unacceptable. It wouldn't be a good idea if battles were to take place only on the defender's terms. I can think of the example of two warring factions hiring privateers or assaulting the enemy's inferior forces, or intercepting their supply line. I don't like the idea of preventing this kind of player interaction to save someone else.

I presume you are talking about SGU's Stargate Seeder ships and not MALPs. I would think that for Stargates, this type of thing would be the intended idea. It would be entirely automatic, not requiring months of time. Secondly, the systems shouldn't be months apart, but you never know. Hopefully not. If there's a more reasonable amount of time, say one IRL day, then it could be easily managed. You send the ship out on its journey. When it reaches a planet, it plants a stargate. It opens the stargate and contacts you to inform you of its progress. You send it the materials it needs for another stargate and for the next day-long trip to the next system. Perhaps the stargates will be of a sufficient design to allow ships through, too. So as long as you have a stargate in the months-away-by-traditional-FTL system, you can instantly travel to that system and back. If that seems OP, just remember that it did take a real seeder ship months to get there in the first place.

You do have a point. My worry is that if two forces meet in combat, where both are equally equipped, one will have a decisive victory simply because it was called "defender" instead of "attacker." Bases and ships aren't going to be differentiated. Everything made is just a construct, so how should one be labeled "defender" or "attacker." Instead of labels, what form should this balance take, and how would you balance it?

True, but this doesn't only apply to PVP balance, it applies to other aspects of the game too. The economy comes to mind. A large organization could manipulate the economy, even ruin it. Suppose you even had a PVE organization which ruined the blueprints economy by selling good ships at a super competitive price. This would be an equally negative situation too. My point is that this isn't about PVE vs PVP, it's about ruining the game experience. A sufficiently motivated organization would do whatever it took to achieve its goals, letting nothing, not even defense-favored combat mechanics, stand in its way. I agree that the combat mechanics should not be poorly designed to allow this, but at the same time, it's not the only cause of the would-be problem. Equal scrutiny should be given to all conceivable player and organization interactions to prevent a completely hostile environment. Another solution would be to buff smaller groups or debuff larger groups in some way. Perhaps through "taxes" which would evaporate. I don't know. Suggestions for this?

This would be useful for boring and repetitive tasks. I can't wait to try it out. Perhaps make an auto-miner or auto-freighter.

From Nyz in the "Ask us Anything" thread: So looks like only up to a certain depth. And even if you wanted to, it would be difficult due to heat concerns.

Yeah it wood be nice to make some decorative furniture/log cabins at the start. I think also there was mention of the tree sap being used as fuel. But aside from those, there wouldn't be much use for wood later on in the game. As far as other agriculture goes, food was mentioned in another topic and had mostly a negative response. I think it's just too much of a chore and a worry to keep your character fed to make it fun.

Exactly this. Between the design protection mechanisms and the "military and geopolitical" factors, this ought to be sufficient for protecting intellectual property. As far as resources go, I think that the proper ratio of time spent collecting resources to the time spent genuinely creating something should be fairly low, perhaps 1:10 or 1:20 or whatever fits. High enough that losing said resources would be a set-back, but low enough that having to re-collect the resources wouldn't induce rage quitting. In this way, both the design (the blueprint/snapshot) and the resources can be properly balanced. Although, it seemed to me that from the dev blogs that this was intended.

Permament, death-dealing diseases? No. Temporary, Minecraft-like poisoning? Yes. Definitely don't make it contagious either.

I too would opt for a better physics system than detailed characters. I am not a game designer so I don't know, but wouldn't it be possible to have detailed characters merely as "skins" but then allow for the server to treat everyone as identical physics objects? Sure you may have some clipping, but you would have the best of both worlds this way. Or does it not work like that at all?

I know what code I would use: 1 - 7 - 3 - 4 - 6 - 7 - 3 - 2 - 1 - 4 - 7 - 6 - Charlie - 3 - 2 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 7 - 7 - 7 - 6 - 4 - 3 - Tango - 7 - 3 - 2 - Victor - 7 - 3 - 1 - 1 - 7 - 8 - 8 - 8 - 7 - 3 - 2 - 4 - 7 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 7 - 6 - 4 - 3 - 7 - 6 - Lock I mean... uhhh..... nevermind! Hacking could involve simply revealing what that code is. Don't limit it to 4 digits though.

And to combat this, you could install an extra "cure" module in the life support systems to distribute a cure to your entire ship. The enemy would combat that with a more "virulent" strain. Bio-weapons could be really fun indeed. >

The inventory size could be an issue, but I remember that having the right to build at least on planets is a thing. So maybe you can't build, but there would be a "plant" mechanic for small bombs. The largest being not that large at all. Sure you could take a lot of them, but if you do, then the enemy would have a higher chance to find them. Just balanced enough to make it a tactical advantage in a fight, but not so much that it would win the fight.

I like Archer's idea. It works pretty well for Space Engineers. As for clankiness, SE's default conveyor system sometimes doesn't load your rocket launchers fast enough, but it's easy enough to write a script to load it. This is one possible way to balance things. Reloading probably isn't an issue for energy based weapons, but cooling probably is. Faster "reload" times could be accomplished via more radiators/cooling device.

Arkification tokens would have protect only a very small volume to avoid being abused. I say volume an not area because with say with only 10,000 m^2 of area swept from ground down over 1 km is tons of space. The point about supply lines is also a good one, since (hopefully) everything will require power of some kind, forcing all operations to cease. Solar energy, if implemented, would need a lot of space to function, hence my suggestion to limit said space severely. This way, an arkified base could be attacked, although indirectly. However, there should be some mechanic to undo an arkification, balanced with a very long deconstruct timer or something. The idea of a bunch of abandoned, indestructible bases littered everywhere unnerves me. I need to be able to clean up or renovate!

Welcome and have fun!

This. It would allow a spy or infiltrator role to be in DU.

It might be interesting to have a mix of lock on and cone of fire. You can lock on to the enemy behind you, but your forward mounted cannons can't fire behind you. But your full range turrets can. Your forward mounted cannons can't fire at the enemy directly behind you, but it can fire at a secondary target in front of you that was marked earlier.

The nanoformer is a piece of very advance technology already attached to your arm. Perhaps it could be weaponized. I can already see it being used to hurl pebbles at supersonic speeds. As to explosives, perhaps we will have access to a common unstable mineral which could be used for advanced construction or.... blowing your way into bases.

I'd like to see all kinds of predefined weapons based on kinetic, nuclear or pure energy and anything else that seems legit. And of course, player made weapons are pretty much limitless. Reconfiguring predefined weapons also sounds like a good idea. It needs a good balanced mechanic but I would hope that isn't difficult.

Absolutely. We don't want to turn away either kind of player. What I think most people are worried about is the PvPers taking advantage of the PvEers protection mechanics in some way. I would say that the 20km safe area around the arkship and the VR solution are sufficient to protect everyone's interests. In an emergent society, mutual protection is one of the benefits. There is risk, but it's much less than in an "each man for himself" situation.

Seen in trailer: Cockpit Thrusters Weapons Implied or mentioned: Gyroscope Control Unit/DPU Containers Energy shielding FTL like Star Trek or Star Wars Stargates Reactors Probably others... I would like to see: (a lot coming from Space Engineers) Antenna Wheels & suspension Other kinds of chairs and cockpits with various functionality Ship size nanoformer for building large constructs and mining Ore detector Usable motors, pistons, hinges and sliding surfaces Different kinds of reactors or power sources Different kinds of thrusters Lights of various designs Various decorative objects Sensor devices And as a stretch goal, perhaps an interplexing subspace beacon? Yes? Please?

This order doesn't sound much like Voth, that theology is a little different. But I do find a kind of religious cult-like organization interesting. Maybe someone will create a faction with opposing viewpoints... Imagine the holy wars!

Very cool. Excellent work on the acronym! :D

I'm not saying I'll be that guy, but... *cough* hehehe *cough*