MalReynolds

I think this game NEEDS a wipe on launch - honestly. 
 
The people (myself included) who paid for early access have gotten plenty of value from this; hours of enjoyment, opportunity to influence development, knowledge of good tactics, and so on - plenty of benefit over any late comers.
 
I think we should definitely retain blueprints for everything we have created - because these are not simply a matter of time/gameplay to recreate.

At most, we could have a small quanta boost - so we can get started without having to do the very first initial grind to get going.  This will place us as the first contributors to the market, for the late comers to benefit from.
 
Because of the knowledge we have, the slight boost in quanta, and our blueprints, we will be the seed that kicks the market into gear for late comers (if you're worried about this WRT a wipe).

Hi NQ
 
Nobody can dispute making everything in megafactories was too easy, linear, and out of balance. But there are so many issues with your approach to fix it.
 
 
PROBLEM 1) You are putting yourselves in quite a position with treating the game as a beta and non-beta whenever it works. On one hand, with the promise of keeping our wealth into the release, we're expected to treat the game as it's an actual launch to compete with other players and organizations. But then there is no support, mechanics can change dramatically, etc. You're also putting at least a 6-months gap between those who could exploit the unbalanced mechanics early and accumulate wealth, and those who couldn't.
 
SOLUTION: I don't really have a solution to this. Perhaps the best way to operate right now is to announce a full wipe at the end of beta if you can financially handle it.
 
 
PROBLEM 2) This update leaked to lots of people for several weeks. The knowledge put those people further ahead.
 
SOLUTION: Either enforce your NDA, or do not disclose (economically sensitive) details of how you'll change things.
 
 
PROBLEM 3)  Completely unhelpful talents just to unlock elements are a bad idea. Eve Online learned this lesson over the years and they are doing away with artificial prerequisites to start playing the game. Industry is one of the rare domains where talents actually GREATLY matter. Most production will eventually become unviable overtime without respective talents. It's bad analysis if you thought the lack of talents was an issue.
 
SOLUTION: If you want to wall element usage behind talents, you should do so behind the existing talents. This way at least people get a benefit alongside element access. A sense of actual progression and no waste of days of training.
 
 
PROBLEM 4) I am quite worried whether the game actually has enough quanta supply recipes for sufficient production.
 
SOLUTION: The game needs isk faucets besides the honeycomb NPC order businesses. I have low-cost proposals for that in the idea box.
 
 
PROBLEM 5) Machine-based recipes create lots of issues. It'll be quite tedious to teach the recipes to every single element and to keep tabs on them even in non-megafactories. Moreover, how will our investments be saved? I hope (but am not certain) the recipes will be saved under "dynamic properties" of a machine. But then we won't be able to deploy the same factory from a blueprint. It'll be impossible to move factories. So you're not only investing in the machine, but also in the location of the factory. That'll have even greater repercussions with territory warfare. 
 
SOLUTION: You should have at least made the recipes character-based. Given that you don't tolerate account sharing and ban those who do, this would still achieve specialization, yet make it way less tedious.
 
 
PROBLEM 6) Cost is an artificial and unsustainable way to motivate people to specialize. Once people accumulate enough capital, megafactories will begin popping again. Then those who can afford them will be miles ahead of others.
 
SOLUTION: To achieve truly sustainable differentiation and specialization, there needs to be differentiation in the ways the source materials are acquired. Ore is equally available to every individual. It should take organizational level effort to access some building materials; it should take outside-the-box intelligently developed systems to access others. Moreover, it should make more sense to make one product somewhere and to make another elsewhere (geographically). 

They're made in an Assembly Line L and require more resources than the industry units which actually produce something. They only allow one item type to be moved at a time. They can pull from multiple containers/hubs, and place into one.  
My biggest issue with industry is running out of sockets on containers.  For example, the container with my basic connectors has no more output sockets and I want to connect another electronics to it. 
So.. I could create another container, and electronics, and then connect to that.  Or, I could use a transfer unit to spread the output from the first (which is keeping up with demand just fine) to two containers.  The former solution is a lot cheaper than the latter.. but it irks me because it's less efficient in terms of space and optimised production.
 
If transfer units were cheaper, it would be ok.
If transfer units could handle multiple resources, it would be ok.
But, as it stands, it's just plain annoying.
 
I realise that if reached the point where I needed 2 electronics producing basic connectors full time it would cease to be a problem, .. for basic connectors.  But the same issue will simply happen again for something further down the chain.
 
For me, the fun here is building a well oiled machine and to do that I need a bit more flexibility with things like this.
 
 

They're made in an Assembly Line L and require more resources than the industry units which actually produce something. They only allow one item type to be moved at a time. They can pull from multiple containers/hubs, and place into one.  
My biggest issue with industry is running out of sockets on containers.  For example, the container with my basic connectors has no more output sockets and I want to connect another electronics to it. 
So.. I could create another container, and electronics, and then connect to that.  Or, I could use a transfer unit to spread the output from the first (which is keeping up with demand just fine) to two containers.  The former solution is a lot cheaper than the latter.. but it irks me because it's less efficient in terms of space and optimised production.
 
If transfer units were cheaper, it would be ok.
If transfer units could handle multiple resources, it would be ok.
But, as it stands, it's just plain annoying.
 
I realise that if reached the point where I needed 2 electronics producing basic connectors full time it would cease to be a problem, .. for basic connectors.  But the same issue will simply happen again for something further down the chain.
 
For me, the fun here is building a well oiled machine and to do that I need a bit more flexibility with things like this.
 
 

I think radar detection and lock time should also depend on the averaged cross section over time with range factored in. e.g.
 
Imagine that each ship within the max range of a radar is given a score based on their cross section, distance, whether they're thrusting (per engine), braking (per brake), or firing guns (per gun).  If the ship score is below the first threshold, they are not visible on radar at all.  If it exceeds that first threshold, then they are detected, and the can be targeted for a lock.  The amount of time a lock takes, depends on how many points below a second higher threshold the ship is, the further below this threshold the longer the lock takes.  Once at, or over this threshold the lock takes a flat amount of time (perhaps based on the size of the radar), being well over the threshold might make the lock take less time (optional).
 
The lock time would be dynamic, as the ship score increases the lock time drops in real-time.  If a ship is being locked, but drops below the first threshold then the lock fails.
 
This would allow some stealth gameplay and would allow for skilled pilots (well timed thrust/braking) and well designed ships (smaller cross-section, fewer engines/brakes etc).
 
Radar quality (via talents) could be introduced to reduce the thresholds, making a radar more effective.
 
Talents or variants of engines/brakes/guns could reduce the score these elements add to the ship score.
 
 

Man guys, be real. They didnt expose a bug. They broke down a market including its link to the market system which was never intended to be deleted. They never reported, they only intended to break and remove. 

Hilarious would've been leave it intact but add something funny to it like a meme.

Grow up. All they had to do was report the bug. If you use bugs for gain without reporting I have no sympathy for those banned. Good riddance. 

Hello Noveans, 
 
By now, some of you may be aware that unlucky number Market 15 has been stripped bare and left to create ugly memes for generations to come. We’re trying to look at this in good humour as, from the front, it appears to be an issue that was created when we moved the markets, making it editable by players. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist (though we know there are a few of you out there) to understand that the markets are not a community construction, and as such not intended to be handled by players on this level. The destruction of the build isn’t a quick fix, and was clearly done knowing it shouldn't be. 
 
An important aspect we are considering in all cases and investigations is intention. The intention behind this destruction is very clear to us. The players involved did not report this bug to us, but instead simply filled their pockets. Had this stopped with a single voxel removed it would be a different story.  This is, at its core, a violation of the EULA and against the intentions of beta. We have been as understanding as we can until this point, but there must be a line.
 
Let us be clear, we will not tolerate this kind of behaviour during any phase of the development of Dual Universe.
 
The players responsible for the destruction of the market have been permanently banned from Dual Universe, and all salvaged materials and assets gained will be removed without compensation.
 
Sincerely,
The Novaquark Team
 
Follow up statement: 
 

Hello Noveans,
 
We realize that the districts currently represent a performance bottleneck, as they are a choke point between markets, institutes and the starting zone for new players. Even though we have identified performance improvements that should help solve these issues, we have decided to make some immediate changes to prevent these issues from affecting the performance for new players, until we are able to roll out these improvements.
 
So we are making some temporary changes such as relocating many of the services you have come to know and expect in the districts: 
New Stand Alone Markets will be moved approx. 2km from the associated district.  All pending orders will be transferred to the new market building.  All institutes will be removed from districts on Alioth and Sanctuary.  A new single Institute will be created near the Arkship.  Transport stations will be placed at all Districts to be able to get to the Institutes.   
The institutes appear to be a heavy driver of performance issues, by removing them from higher traffic areas we hope to provide a better market experience for players overall. 
 
Players who log out on one of the affected construct buildings may find themselves in a new location when returning post maintenance. We recommend bookmarking important places and construct locations. 
 
As always, we appreciate your patience while we work, and welcome your feedback on the changes and performance improvements once complete.  We expect these changes will occur over the next few update cycles during October. 
 
Sincerely,

The Novaquark Team