Zireaa

Scanning for something other than T1 ore on planets is deadly dull and boring, certainly not at all fun.
So, looks like I won't be mining anything other than on Haven.
 
Industry is not worth the effort, and especially not worth all the time waiting around for Temporary schematics to be produced.
Temporary Schematics are too expensive anyway.
 
This game is far less fun than it was during Beta.
 
I backed this game because it looked like a good game and was a lot of fun during Alpha, and early Beta, even through after update 0.23, right through until mining units and Temporary Schematics.
 
The Permanent Schematics were at least a challenge to fetch.
 
If we stood a chance of finding T2 ore within 30-40 scans it might be okay but 50 scans in and I've had enough of scanning for zero reward.
 
DU is supposed to be a game and games are fun but so much of DU is worse than work, it's dull and boring like working in a factory turning machines on and off etc..
 
Oh well, I've a few DACs left so we'll see if NQ can improve this game before my DACs run out.
 

So to begin I want to state I understand that not everyone will like or agree with what I am saying below, nor do I expect them to. I am in my last year of College for my Bachelors Degree in Video Game Design and Development and taking what I have learned both from my studies and from many many hours playing Dual Universe I brainstormed the following. Again, I do not expect anyone to agree, nor do I think that my chosen field of future Professions makes me any better or smarter than anyone else. This is my opinion, and I am sharing it. Also, this will be a long post. Disclaimer over.

Phase 1
With there already being auto-generated alien ships, alien cores, and shipwrecks that spawn into the game, the mentality of “Everything in Dual Universe needs to be player made” has already been discarded to an extent. The game, while fun in many aspects, lacks content. Both in PvP and PvE. There needs to be an alternative to running missions, or trying to turn a profit by mining or building industry. Those are core aspects of the game, but they only offer so much in the way of “content”.
PvP also offers a style of gameplay, but it is niche and lacking as well in content. You fly around in PvP space hoping to find someone you can kill that won’t kill you, or trying to mine minerals off a valuable asteroid without your ship being exploded.
NPC Ships is a first step in adding content to both.

Phase 1, Step 1: Ships, Safe Zone PvE Combat and Simple AI
The ability to spawn ships and other things into the game already exists and is being utilized by current systems such as Asteroids and Shipwrecks. Using those systems to build off of, it would not be a far stretch to spawn in functioning ships of Varying types. Additionally, since Autopiloting systems are implemented by players via LUA, it also would not be a stretch for NQ to implement simple AI scripts for the generated NPC Ships.
 
How it could work:
The system spawns a ship randomly, no closer than 30su to a Safe Zone Planet anywhere inside the Safe Zone. Then at random the script choses a destination. One of the SZ planets or their moons, and sets course. As the ability already exists for the game, or a construct to know when you are within a certain area of the game, the ship would despawn if making it within 1su of its target.
Before reaching its destination, it is vulnerable to attack from a player who spots it. Upon being attacked the ship would use whatever maneuverability it can to try to escape. If it’s core is destroyed it is of course available to be looted, ownership taken, etc, just like in any other PvP Combat.
Of course attacking an NPC Ship inside of the Safe Zone should not come without consequences, but those are laid out in an additional update. The purpose of Step 1 is to get the system into the game, see how it is working, and work out the kinks.
 
Benefits:
New PvE Content that helps teach simple PvP to people looking to learn.
PvE content for PvPers who may be on at odd hours and have fewer real player targets.
An additional income mechanic especially with component recycling coming into the game, that does not rely solely on grinding and time gating (other than searching out the randomly spawning ships).
 
Phase 1 Step 2: Law, Order, and AI Update 2
With the implementation of NPC Ships, and the ability to attack them in the Safe Zone, mechanics should be developed to give consequences for being a pirate in the SZ. Aphelia designates a safe zone, but how does she enforce it? Currently it is just a circle around three planets where weapons do not work. Much like the poor NPC ships being destroyed, this step would introduce some new ships and mechanics that offer that enforcement, if even in a limited way.
 
How it could work:
The System Spawns peacekeeping ships that travel the pipes, and a few that travel courses around the SZ in general. The ships would vary from smaller to larger obviously, with different types of armaments and difficulty.
When a player attacks a NPC Ship just as it likely would in a Real Scenario, the ship would send out an SoS on the attacker. This flags the attacking player, or player construct as a pirate for a given amount of time. During that time any flagged character, or character construct that comes into contact with a NPC Peacekeeper Ship can be engaged and attacked by the NPC. The combat can result in the player being killed, the NPC being killed, or by out maneuvering and getting out of contact range of the Peacekeeper.
 
Benefits:
New PvE Content that helps teach a slightly more advanced form of PvP.
Makes being a pirate actually feel like being a pirate running from the PoPo.
Make the Safe Zone a Safe Zone for a reason that makes sense.
 
Phase 1 Part 3: Bounties
NPC Organizations already exist in the game. Aphelia gives missions for them all the time. They also exist in the Challenges. So it would only make sense if you start racking up kills on their NPC Ships that they would start getting cranky with you.
 
How it could work:
When you reach a certain notoriety with a NPC Organization a bounty could be issued by them through the mission system that lasts for a certain amount of time. If a player has a bounty on them, they are free game within the Safe Zone. This, much like the Pirating flag that instructs Peacekeeping Ships that you are attackable, allows you to be engaged by other players, even within the Safe Zone. It would have to come with some features though, and consequences for being a bad pirate and getting yourself killed by a Bounty Hunter.
 
1: If you are killed while you have a bounty on you there would be a cooldown that prevents you from being able to attack the NPC’s in the Safe Zone for a certain period of time. This would help prevent someone spamming the system to let their friends kill them for bounty money.
2: Players in an organization you are in are not eligible to collect the bounty. No gaming the system peoples. 
3: During the cooldown you would also not be available for Special Missions outlined in Phase 2.
 
Benefits:
Eases players into full PvP situations.
Additional Content for PvPers who wish to be Bounty Hunters.
A more realistic universe.
 
Phase 1 Part 4: Beyond the Invisible Safe Wall
Taking everything learned and refined from the first four phases, extend this system to the other outer planets and areas. Higher profile NPC Targets with more goodies and parts. Except these ships are armed. This would provide both a PvE avenue for out of Safe Zone Combat Content, while also allowing for PvP players and Organizations to hunt down, and even fight over the NPC Ships. The same Bounty System would apply to these ships, and likely give a higher reward fee considering the ships taken down were more valuable. Could easily see a Scenario where a few players are fighting over the same ship, while also fighting each other, as the ship fights them as well. Pure Chaos. Love it.
 
Benefits:
PvPvE
More fun content and options
 
Phase 2
Now that we have added some new features and life to the Universe, things are definitely looking up. But we can expand upon the new systems and the old to add more things for players to do and make their place in the Dual Universe.
 
Phase 2 Part 1: Work Orders
With the prices, especially of T1 ores constantly fluctuating in value, generally in the case of T1, dropping like a rock, Work Orders could be an amazing solution to this problem. Many Elements can be made with the cheap ore, such as wings, basic engines, containers, etc, but unless you have mega factories with a generous flow of materials, Life can be rough to build your empire. Works orders a Solution to that problem. Markets can already give you the average value currently being set market, region, or universe wide, so why not integrate that into Work Order Missions.
 
How it could work:
Work Orders for T1 ore can be issued by various Markets or Organizations for delivery. This can be adjusted and valued by averages. In addition to being paid fair market price for your ore at the going rates, you could also cash in on some mission income for delivering to complete the order. Much in line with how missions work now, the missions would require you to deliver OreX to PlaceY.
Work Order for Components can be issued by various Markets or NPC Organizations.  These could range from parts, manufactured materials, or complete elements. (Someone has to make those Ailerons being delivered to Market 12). Again, paying fair market value plus a mission completion reward.
 
Benefits:
* Offers additional ways to make money without having pure bots to buy up ore at the Market, which NQ has said will not come back while utilizing the Mission System.
*Someone just dropped 200 Wing M’s on the Market and undercut you? Fine. Sell the ones you have made to Aphelia for components plus the mission delivery award.
*Stimulates the Economy and helps diversify the monopoly of component manufacturing.
*Give industrialists more incentive to do what they enjoy doing and make an earning off of it.
*With Ore, Components, and Elements being flushed into oblivion, it would help raise the actual value of the Ore used to produce and make T1 more profitable.
 
Phase 2 Part 2: Extended Bounty System
Someone blew you up while you were just trying to run that mission package to Jago? Do you want to return the favor, but aren’t much of a PvPer? Do you just want people to blow up people from Legion?  Is it -worth- it to pay someone to enact revenge on your behalf? Then the Bounty System is for you.
 
How it could work:
A bounty system added to the current mission system. You offer up a Bounty, choose the target, and place the bounty. When/If someone kills the target with the Bounty mission, they get the payout, minus Mission Fees of course. Of course they will know who put the bounty out on them... So might want to watch your own back!
 
Benefits:
Sweet Sweet Revenge.
More content for players wanting to be Bounty Hunters.
 
Phase 2 Part 3:
With the implementation of the mechanics in Phase 1, a dark opposite to Aphelia has emerged, just on the edge of the Safe Zone and PvP Space. A Rogue AI working for who knows who or what, has missions available at its station. These missions send you after specific targets for specific things, and none of it could be considered legal.
 
How it could work:
Taking a mission would provide you a general location where the target will spawn, and a general time frame of when to expect the target to be passing through. The missions could range from just destroying the target and pirate what you want, or maybe the mission requires something from the cargo hold of the ship you just blew up for cash. What it would ever want with the Terran DNA samples, who knows. Value of the mission reward would depend on the difficulty of the mission. Some targets may be armed, or not, or maybe there is a very brief window in which you would be able to find the ship. Regardless, you like getting your hands dirty and as long as you haven’t failed recently being successfully hunted for being a pirate, these missions are for you.
Benefits:

PvE Pirate Missions in both Safe Space and PvP Space.
More Content = Things for players and new players to do except grind = Good.

------
 
So as stated previously, this is just a thought experiment based on my own opinions and things I think would bring some much needed content and life to the game. What are your thoughts? Would you like to see these types of things implemented? Are you hardcore ZugZug stay the course? What do you like, what do you dislike? Please discuss.

As a org of 4-6 people who own several flowers of t1 to t5 tiles, I hate the change and everything around it. Communication was bad.
 
We worked hard to obtain our tiles and trained talents to be able to make full use of them, now they barely produce enough to keep the factory running. We have 5 or so characters  with no where to dump our extra charges unless we wanna do it once every 24hours. In a game where travel can take hours, putting a 24 hour cooldown on stuff like this is just a big FU to everyone, honestly. Sure i can see how it was probably exploitable for people with multiple accounts, but that's not how EVERY other person plays. And those people can still spam missions for massive quanta. PVP still dominated by like what.. 3 or 4 major orgs? Gonna make plasma a gated resource as well. There's just so many other things that need fixing than worrying so much about the markets. One major fix that would level out a whole heck of a lot, is connecting the markets.
 
To me, i'm finding it harder and harder to stay ingame, because i don't want to have to spend 6 hours to do ANYTHING. I'm likely cancelling my sub unless the 29th shows some good will towards players of all kinds.

Just once I would like to see NQ add something fun to the game instead of taking things away.

The game's downward pointing charts continue to point to a future where the game may not even survive 2022, never mind 2023. 
 
There's currently more people playing "Coin Flipper" -- a single player game about flipping coins. 
 
Flipping coins is more engaging than every game concept DU has struggled to implement...it has better reviews and literally has more people playing it right now than a new MMO that took 8 years to build.
 
There's over twice as many people playing "PC Building Simulator" right now. 
 
I'm not (just) saying this to be mean...but to drive home the point that NQ needs to be making drastic changes. They need to actually engage with the players that are leaving and fire the devs or managers that insist that player feedback is useless.
 
Their CEO needs to actually seem like they are doing something other than posting about web3 and crypto on LinkedIn and talking about NQ's other projects...
 
Yet...I think it'll be business as usual up until the end. So much for NQ's post-update cycle fixing oh so many things and adding all the many things that are missing. At this rate, I truly would not be shocked if the game didn't make it past 2022. 

Basically... but their initial idea was sound. and it showed promise after the kickstarter... I remember having a blast making my hovercraft fly when I first played in 2016 or whenever the first play session started.
 
I remember thinking I was cheating by putting the wings on the sides and flying OVER THE TREES.
 
such a sense of naughty trepidation was so intoxicating I upgraded to 300 dollar tier or whatever it was back then... Basically five Cyberpunk 2077s..

making pve easier allows more people to want to take risk into the pvp area in which they can pvp a lot more
higher risk less people want to even touch pvp space because its too risky. Its hard enough as it is without alts but they see us as progressing too fast and it being too easy for us to build up which further limits the pvp gameplay side fo things.

so overall with them wanting to slow down the economy they are slowing down the pace people overall get into pvp and making the entree and consistency in the pvp field harder.
 
so we have 2 choices
either we can have a steady stream of income and constant pvp then have them add more game play pvp aspect like pvp space enemies and bosses that are strong then weaker ones you can choose to engage in pve space that give diff rewards far better in pvp space rewards
 
or we can limit flow of quanta into the game and slow down/limit pvp 

we can either make the game fun engaging consistent and industries turning, or we can make it far less fun dreadful and make pvp space feel too risky for many 
given the limitations

We can either further expand and diversify pvp or limit it and limit the player who get into pvp

Multiple reports of over a 1000 scans being needed to find T2+...
 
Safe zone Roids being mobbed by 26+ ships with 75 minutes left before being "Discovered" (during the weekday, weekends must be worse)
 
High risk of being ganked if you try an mine other Roids with just a couple of people and no PVP protection pilots.
 
Shields that don't protect you, just reduce the damage taken (? based on description ? Rather unclear about that)
 
Mass based speed limits that guarantee a ganker can close on a loaded hauler. 
 
Seems like we are forced to have someone man guns to fend off lone raiders, and hope that we can sting raiding packs before they inevitably kill us.
 
Wondering if there is a Universe Patrol org that focuses on hunting down raiders and killing them, repeatedly???
 
If so, what do their ships look like?  e.g.  Is there a difference between a ganker ship and a anti-ganker ship?
 
and who is going to be left to build ship parts for the PVPers after they force us from the game for not being like them?

In under two months!
 
NQ is laughably slow at almost everything, but the one thing they do unbelievably fast is run a game into the ground. They got some mad skillz.

If you want to get a head in DU then build a guillotine?  DU is classified as a game, not a job.  If NQ wants players to build their game world then we need to be able to PLAY and time gated chores don't count.  

Just because it is an MMO, doesn't mean that everyone should magically HAVE to play with others. 
 
The game was always designed around the fact that a solo or small group will never be able to compete to larger groups or orgs (which is fine). However, in recent times, the facilitation and mechanics revolving around solo play meant that playing this way has become almost impossible to make any headway at all. A solo player should always be able to make progress albeit at a slower pace than larger more organised groups.
 
That is the problem. 
 
It's a personal choice to be a lone wolf even in an MMO game. Forcing the solo lone wolves into game mechanics such as PVP or into large orgs to be swallowed into their machine is a one way ticket to players leaving.

Yeah, I agree. I'm in the same place. Long ago NQ nerfed the ability to mine manually on planet, so the game became pretty boring. You don't really have anything to do while literally WAITING on skills to train other than building valueless little constructs waiting to make enough money to get off-planet to higher tier resources.

Then they nerf calibration exploit so DU is now really just an Idle Clicker.

The ideology behind the economy has driven it into the ground. Base, unrefined resources have more value to sell than high-tier industrial element, and even the base resources are so cheap they are hardly worth idle-mining.

Alioth is a prison with nothing interesting or challenging to do. I'm part of one of the larger orgs and it's still a prison.

I have been a supporter since Kickstarter, but NQ really has done just about everything they can to reduce the value and fun of the game. It seems like such poor decision-making with such great potential. I still have more than a year's worth of DAC just from supporter rewards, and it's not even worth playing for free anymore.

Maybe I'll jump back on in a year or two if it hasn't continued to ride the rocket down into a ghost-town shell of obscurity.

I think the game version on beta release was superior to current version overall. Even with all it's bugs and issues it felt more fun. 

We should scrap mining units a good system would be if you could explore new planets  for higher tier mine in the ground  with both ships and by hand  😀 lol  and the planets would regenerate over time so you don’t have everlasting holes and tunnels 

There are no plans for another wipe at this time. The reset described in this thread is referring to the one that already occurred during the initial release of the game on September 27th. If you arrived here following the recent announcement of Update 1.1 coming on the 29th of November then please note that it was specifically the other gameplay features, systems, and improvements that were being referenced. The plan going forward is to continue check off the items listed of in the letter by NQ-Kyrios but rest assured the reset mentioned here has already been applied.

"Polishing a turd" was the expression that came to mind while reading..

This feels like you are only releasing to drum up more money. You have lost so many subs over the last 2 years because of poor decisions and indecision. Im sure most people remember the mass exodus after the schematics were introduced. And you have lost alot of players over the indecision around the wipe. As much as you say you listen to the community your actions have always shown other wise (and even when forced to listen, you only half listen and still plow on with what you want to do anyway)
 
Wipes on other games drums up lots of new players so you will probably be happy with that extra income. But I will not be coming back until a further decision is made around this topic. And I have seen the same sentiment echoed on Organisation discords I am a member of.
 
You need to stop fence sitting on this issue.

I honestly feel the number one change that needs to happen is that the servers need to close, and people need refunded whatever % can be refunded. (unpopular opinion)
 
Why would I say such a horrendous thing?!
 
1. Novaquark intentionally released a game, not ready for full release.
2. Novaquark upped the price of subscription to prey on community FOMO (fear of missing out), so they could get a pre-launch cash injection.
3. Novaquark obviously seems to have other projects in the pipeline based on their CEO talking about the metaverse.

4. Novaquark isn't applying that cash injection for Dual Universe, instead it seems to be going to another project or worse directly into investor pockets.
(I say this because, customer support has been cut, development staff has been cut, upcoming updates are anemic at best.)

5. Novaquark "improvements" actually make gameplay less enjoyable, almost with every recent update. Essentially killing all fun in the last places fun hides.

Overall the game is dead/dying/zombified/self mutilating, something, but obviously has no sustainable future, and the Dev's should be honest about this, but the won't.
Instead I believe we are in the same waiting period, when rumors began of a wipe, then later an announcement about staff thinking very hard for 6 months about a wipe, and then a wipe.

☠️ Except, right now rumors of game death, in 3-6 months, an announcement of scaling back even more, deciding if they will leave server running and no longer update game, or just close server, and then another half year of them collecting subscriptions while they look for new jobs before announcing an unfortunate end to Dual Universe. ☠️

You don't have to trust me on this, I would love to be wrong, time will tell, but I say take the horse out to pasture and just get it over with, don't let it suffer.

I always return here and read the forums. Daily almost. I realized some time ago that something is wrong with me.
Obviously, its because of Dualuniverse - the game - and the fact that I loved to play it and I still like to play it !
 
But I'm missing that bloody underground mining game. Finding ore using the scanner and these things - I always felt alive, hungry and satisfied when successfully finding and winning the good ores. OMG, like some of you too, I was a freaking mole. 
 
My friends did the shiny part. Building tons of things, which are there no more.
I did the digging and the industry, but that's as well .. there no more.
 
What the game has become to me, totally cut off the cord. 
 
Steam does not look so good. Its sad, I really wished NQ can do a wealthy restart. I'm sorry for that.
My prediction for "the Future of DualUniverse" is very bad, to answer the thread.

absolutely YES
It is very clear, keeping all the data from every hole once dug out is just insane. Data for nothing but a reality patch.
Since there isn't many planets anyways, why not re"seed" some of the "didn't touched tiles since 3 months". Who cares ? Immersion ? Well .. I'll take it for the sake to have something I can chew on. With a little addon to a very smart [NQ well thought out and brainstormed - plus hard and fair calculated] energy-management, to adjust excessive industry-breakouts - I'd be so happy with anything. Schematics then easily can go to the bin and I can go and dig my holes.

We should scrap mining units a good system would be if you could explore new planets  for higher tier mine in the ground  with both ships and by hand  😀 lol  and the planets would regenerate over time so you don’t have everlasting holes and tunnels 

+1 please remove. It is an incredibly bad change. No point in 2L/h tiles. There are not enough T2/T3 tiles for everyone. The "sharing" of tiles between players was just killed.
The amount of calibration is already limited by charges/player and day.
Make more T2/T3 tiles
Make more asteroids.
There are SO MANY things you NQ can do to actually improve game quality and this thing you're trying to kill. It's called "fun".
 

So if u find a t4 tile u can calibrate all ur charges on it with multiple accounts and dump the ore into the market. Does that seem fine to you?

There's no place in this game for solo miners. No way to mine T2 - T5 ores. I tried to get one plot on Madis for 2 long days with no result. All already occupied because they were easy to find at the beginnign as they were one next to others. As a result all Madis is ocupied by only few people and there's nothing left for new gamers. Tried to get more luck on asteroids. Your 120 min free time for digging after long time of asteroid search and reach is a stupid man wish. Your hard earned ship with expensive Asteroid Scanner will be blown some tens of minutes when your cargo is already filled with precious ores. Fun for pvp pirates and easy gain and definetely not for you. Ther's no motivation in the game.

Currently NQ are trying to reduce server load.
Their #1 method to do so is to dissuade new players from signing up and clogging the servers with their noob activities.
Their #2 method is apparently to do everything in their power to reduce the number of current players renewing 
 
Basically there is so little fun left in this game that NQ are on course to achieve their ultimate dream of zero server load within a year of release.