ostris
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Posts posted by ostris
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@ostris
Actor model. Learn it. It's tied with the background data streaming they do.
Yeah, there is no limit. What you describe applies to CSP, not Actor based programming.
Alrighty twerk
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You do realise that a city with that amount of players is less than the 20KM safe zone in surface area, yes? Also remember that there are timezones, so not everyone will spawn in at once. It is going to be chaos to begin with, but it would be the same when these hundreds of thousands of people have just woken up after they have left their planet of birth.
Only a few 'chunks' radius will be rendered on the client, so the more people/activity nearby, the lower your view distance (due to smaller chunks)
Remember that the devs can learn from alpha/beta world start, so they will have accurate models for how to approach the problem.
All true. I guess my point is instead of having a low view distance because some very cool event is occurring or a huge city/battle that literally cannot exist in any other game to date is trying to load. You will instead have a lower view distance literally walking anywhere in the safe zone and possibly the related performances issues. i have no doubt NQ can handle it. I just think one of the solutions may be to split up safe zones. At least this is a good problem to have it means the game is very popular.
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How does the player number matter? They have a cloud-server. It's the whole purpose of it, more people sign-in, more servers are clustered. The system can scale regardless of how many sign in. If a DDoS attack can't take down a cloud server, you bet 200000 unique sign-ins won't do that either.
I don't think NQ benefits from spliting up the playerbase at start, cause they can capitalise on showing the nubmers of people o nscreen at once and all them graphs PC Gamer and IGN love to showcase.
Now, if the worry was "will the resources suffice", yes, the resources will suffice. People need to get a gripthat a 100km radiu planet has enough resources to take care of 200000 players for the first six months.
Player count matters because you will eventually hit a point where the amount of players just becomes noise and adds no net value. if its no 200k its 500k or 1 million. Eventually you will hit a point where having a certain amount of players in a 20km safe zone to start the game will just look and feel like a complete mess.
Just because the servers can handles the dynamic space splitting mentioned in dev diaries and what not doesn't mean they should force it for no reason. There is overhead with the server architecture and spinning up new vms/containers w/e it is they are doing. If there is a purpose for doing it, like some epic giant space battle between two large groups, then its great they can do it. But there is very little reason to force 200k on to a single planet and force thousands of new vms or changing the region for thousands of vms for very little reason. Simple example if a vm can handle 50k players and there are 50k player on a planet they can all move around and cluster up on that planet with no work needed to be done. If you put 100k on that planet you now have to split which vm is handling what space depending on where the players group. Putting an insane amount of load like 200k players in a small area on a release of a game(releases are always very difficult) just seems needless and will put a huge amount of extra work on the server.
Lets say the servers can handle all the load no problem. You still have the issue of forcing huge player density on players computers. Some computers may have trouble handling this, in fact most will. Once again if there is a purpose to it like some giant fight, people can lower settings to compensate or w/e but forcing this on everyone all the time on the start planet safe zone for no reason is just a bad way to handle the situation.
With the devs saying it wont be THAT long(couple weeks to a month) to get non ftl space travel going there really isn't a dividing of the community as these will be moons and very close to each other.
Ultimately no matter how its looked at there is a player count this will simple add way to much work to servers/local machines and be an overall negative impact on player experience. Maybe its 100k maybe its 200k maybe its a million. I'm not sure how much but I hope they have a plan for it.
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I think the only reason they would have multiple start zones is if the hype train goes out of control and they have 100k-200k players all trying to get in day 1. The best bet in that case would be to have one large (20km) safe start zone on Alioth and then several very close by small moons with smaller start zones and players can pick where they want to start. I think this is kinda unlikely but i hope NQ has planned for such an event.
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Liking the ship building/editing mode so far. Question though, is there a point where a ship or construct becomes locked and not editable anymore?
Reason i ask is that if there is to be a market for selling ships wouldn't that hurt players that want to sell complex and finished constructs if we can just buy it and re-make it however we want? I mean why buy a complex and likely expensive ship if you can just buy a cheap/basic one and add our own additions to it for cheaper? Though I guess thinking about it there will likely be market for both those that want to buy fully outfitted ships and basic ships depending on the player buying it.
So i believe you can add to a blueprint or ship you purchase but not take it apart. You need the master blueprint to do that. Something along those lines.
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I used to think the alpha would be just pure testing and what not. However, the dev diary explaining the delay in alpha seemed to imply the are going for a more early access vibe. JC saying they wanted to have a more satisfying game loop in before alpha as an example. I will just assume multiple wipes and primary focus on testing until its confirmed otherwise but might be more of a real game then I first expected.
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Good for you to ignore the Radar-Cross-Section. You know, the real part of how Stealth Bombers work. I guess that part didn't write "here is paint possible answer" on Wikipedia, right?
You just agreed with me on all the above you copied. It would have helped if you didn't skim over the facts.
Also, the altitude an aircraft can fly and the altitude it actually needs to fly, are not the same. Just as an air-carrier can technically go "forever", it doesn't mean its crew can go forever. That's why carriers, need either to be resupplied or reach a port. And on top of that, do not mix what the Lockheed U-2 planes are equipped with and what Stealth Bombers are equipped with. U-2s are meant to fly and take air-photos, cause they are very, VERY lightweight. Bombers weight 70 tons without payload. Guess which one of those two will fly at a low altitude, cause, you know, it's not fuelled by unicorns' piss. U-2s can afford to reach maximum altitude, Bombers not so much. Yugoslavia downed a Lockeed Nighthawk in 1999 you know. It was perfectly hidden... until it wasn't. I guess that paint didn't do it any good, uh?
U-2s are the main recipient of R.A.M. parts, the stealth recon, not B-2s, the stealth bomber. You know, cause you don't really need a nuke bomber, when drones exist.
Also, you clearly missed the fact RAM paints are coating edges, while the rest of the ship's design does the heavy lifting for stealth. But do go skim wikipedia and copy paste paragraphs out of anything you can. I'll be waiting.
I could go on, but you proven you are a wall of knowledge. Pardon me for not picking a fight with another brick in the wall.
Sigh, shouldn't have bothered. Still no sources, guess links were just to hard. Once again doesn't need to be a debate just post links supporting your original posts statements(not the moving the goal post arguments you put forward later) of:
-"Not really, the paint job is just a visual detection hinderance....."
-"And surprsie, Stealth Bombers only work on "Approach""
-"If the radar beams hit them on the side, they are going to be visible"
-"Stealth Bombers "stealth" comes from the fact they are able to "glide" their way to a target on approach"
That's all i asked for originally, does not matter if I'm wrong or right in anything I said, and all this debating you still have yet to put forward anything of actually proof or source information of any kind to the above statements you made.
- Kurosawa and SegaPhoenix
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lol
Please, give me a link on a source that says stealth bombers' trick is their paintjob. If their paintjob was absorb the radar-waves, it only means the bomber is more easily discerned on thermal scans - you know, the easily accessible tech nowadays. If you confused infrared stealth on frigates with infrared stealth on bombers, you did something terribly wrong. But you do know that FRIGATES in our world are ships and not spaceships, right??? I hope you do.
Radar-Cross-Section reduction means the Bomber won't be seen until a certain range from the radar, NOT that it will be invisible from it full way. It's why the Locheed Stealth Fighters have a lot of speed. And again, they are built for being used with intelligence. They won't approach a position like it's a Battlefield game session. Also, the aircraft's shape? Yeah, it only reduces the signature radius on the radar, possibly confusing radar operators thinking it's a bird, you know, it's Stealth, not Magic.
Now, if you confused Aircraft exterior design for the paintjob itself, you are totally, hilariously, wrong. Stealth Pilots wear bulky suits, cause the stealth bombers are built to trap radiation from radars inside them in order to mitigate reflecting it - for a certain length of time, this is not the MAss Effect space-magic universe, heat-sinks eventually melt. And even then, if the ship is scanned by mobile radars - they exist - or UAVs that fly above them (yes they do), the stealth bomber's wooping 50 meters WINGSPAN is not gonna do it any good. It's gonna stand out like a thief dressed in black in a Pink Panther furry convention.
Look i really didn't want to get into a debate i just wanted some source about your info.
But ill bite:
Your original statement: "Not really, the paint job is just a visual detection hinderance...."
http://science.howstuffworks.com/stealth-bomber4.htm
The B-2 has two major defenses against radar detection. The first element is the plane's radar-absorbent surface. The radio waves used in radar are electromagnetic energy, just like light waves. In the same way that certain materials absorb light very well (black paint, for example), some materials are particularly good at absorbing radio waves. The B-2's body is mainly composed of composite material -- combinations of various lightweight substances. The composite material used in the B-2 bomber is specifically designed to absorb radio energy with optimum efficiency. Parts of the B-2, such as the leading edge, are also covered in advanced radio-absorbent paint and tape. These materials are very expensive, and the Air Force has to reapply them regularly. After every flight, repair crews have to spend many hours examining the B-2 to make sure it's fit for stealth missions
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stealth_technology#Materials
Radar-absorbing material
Main article: Radar-absorbent materialRadar-absorbent material (RAM), often as paints, are used especially on the edges of metal surfaces. While the material and thickness of RAM coatings can vary, the way they work is the same: absorb radiated energy from a ground or air based radar station into the coating and convert it to heat rather than reflect it back.[33] Current technologies include dielectric composites and metal fibers containing ferrite isotopes. Paint comprises depositing pyramid like colonies on the reflecting superficies with the gaps filled with ferrite-based RAM. The pyramidal structure deflects the incident radar energy in the maze of RAM. A commonly used material is known as "Iron Ball Paint‟.[34] Iron ball paint contains microscopic iron spheres that resonate in tune with incoming radio waves and dissipate the majority of their energy as heat, leaving little to bounce back to detectors. FSS are planar periodic structures that behave like filters to electromagnetic energy. The considered frequency selective surfaces are composed of conducting patch elements pasted on the ferrite layer. FSS are used for filtration and microwave absorption.
Im not sure what your heat sink comment is about, i would assume the amount of heat generated by this approach is not easily detectable as it is probably dissipated into the air. The B-2 is capable of all-altitude attack missions up to 50,000 feet. Air temp at 50k is -70F (http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/standard-atmosphere-d_604.html)
Its not the primary source of radar reduction but it is relevant and important enough that they spend a lot of money developing RAM paints and maintaining them on these plans.
As far as this statement: "If the radar beams hit them on the side, they are going to be visible. It's science, not magic after all"
http://science.howstuffworks.com/stealth-bomber4.htm
The stealth bomber's peculiar shape deflects radio beams in both ways. The large flat areas on the top and bottom of the plane are just like tilted mirrors. These flat areas will deflect most radio beams away from the station, presuming the station isn't directly beneath the plane.
The plane itself also works like a curved mirror, particularly in the front section. The entire plane has no sharp, angled edges -- every surface is curved in order to deflect radio waves. The curves are designed to bounce almost all radio waves away at an angle.
All in all i just asked for where you got this info cause I was mostly curious about it. Maybe my googling is all wrong just asked for source about where you go your info. Doesn't need to turn into a whole debate, just post some links.
- Kurosawa and SegaPhoenix
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Is my name Google?
Well google doesn't agree with anything you say...so that's why i asked for a source
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Agreed. It's either NQ adding the alternative turret models as "cosmetic mesh", or at least, reusing the "Disgarded" models, as some sort of alternative to the standard model, i.e. having some sort of "innovation" system, that allows a person to manufacture the same kind of weapon, only slightly different in some fields - maybe higher tracking speeds or soemthing - represented y a different type of turret model. Experienced players that way can look at a ship's gun and be like "yeah, this thing is a plasma cannon, but it's not the normal one, tihhs one has higher rate of fire cause it has 4 cannons instead of the usual 3 on its model".
Between a cosmetic shop and the latter, I would always choose the latter. It adds to the gameplay. However 3D meshes and Sticekrs (like a Hello Kitty one) are not the same. That's what I'm saying.
P.S. : Not really, the paint job is just a visual detection hinderance, it's already outdated with more and more thermal vision technology being used and becoming more accessible. The Stealth Bombers "stealth" comes from the fact they are able to "glide" their way to a target on approach, with thier shape designed to refract radar beams without reflectign them back (RADARs work by detecting their signal beign reflected). IF you were to look up in the sky, you COULD hear a stealth bomber fly over, or glide over. And surprsie, Stealth Bombers only work on "Approach". They need precise intelligence of where a radar unit is so they can zero in on it to avoid being detected. If the radar beams hit them on the side, they are going to be visible. It's science, not magic after all
The problem with paintjobs on SPACESHIPS, is that on the background of 3 Kelvin in space, ANYTHING stands out like a firework on a thermal scanner or even better and more logically, a LADAR (like a radar, but it can detect all light and obviously twice as fast, as it doesn't have to shine light to detect it).
Kinda off topic but do you have any source on the info about stealth bombers....
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Slight miscommunication here. Ostris means DAC are not required for DU to be financially viable and therefore, according to his definition of p2w, does not constitute as p2w. (Ostris can correct me if I assume incorrectly)
Having DAC being required to combat gold farming is a completely separate and unrelated point.
Correct.
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The DAC/PLEX system is there to combat gold farmers and reward people who sink a lot of time into the game, which in the context of a sandbox, means those players are CONTENT themselves. NQ is more or less paying people who take on the role of NPCs in the game - given those players are actually doing job stuff, like mining, manufacturing, hauling etcetera.
Not really sure how this related to what i said but i agree.
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Well a subscription service or games that use Plex/DAC would not be "financially viable" if they stop using that method of payment...
I don't consider DAC to be P2W.
The skill system is something I like with DU. It rewards players for the time they've patronized NovaQuark. It doesn't matter how much money you dump into the game, you'll never match the skill level of someone who has been there from the start. (skill wise)
If your definition of "win" is "who has the most stuff" then DAC IS P2W.
It all depends upon how the player defines "WIN".
The game would be financially viable with a subscription it does not need to sell dacs/plex. If they start this game and people purchased 0 dacs they would still pay the monthly sub and the game would still survive and be successful.
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A big thing to me on if a game is or isn't pay2win is: does the developer or company require this "pay2win" mechanic to be used to be financially viable. If the answer is yes usually those games become what i would consider pay2win. If the answer is no the game is usually not pay2win. Doesn't always hold true but to me its a very good indicator.
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So my 2 cents:
Should a single person be able to pilot a large ship: Yes
Should a single player be able to have a combat effective large ship: Yes, but automation should not be free. Meaning a 10 gun automated ship should always be more expensive then the 10 gun manned ship. Automation should require elements that require power. More power would mean a larger generator, more fuel and more weight. The ship would be slower and less maneuverable unless you add more engines. All of this would increase the cost and operating cost of the automated ship compared to the non automated ship.
Should a 10 gunned ship need 10 players: NO. I personally think that would be kinda bland game play for gunners, always shooting just 1 gun forever. It also has serious risk of creating 1 or 2 bad situations.
Situations 1: its always better to have 10 weaker/smaller ships with 10 players then 1 powerful ship with 10 players.
Situation 2: Player count is more important then strategy, ship design, player "level" or skill and the game becomes about how many noobs can you recruit to shoot guns.
Personally i think large ships should be most efficient with multiple players but not 1 per gun or element. I would love in NQ came up with a system where how trained you are and skills you have in certain trees determines what elements you can use and the number you can use. I have some ideas about a point system determining what you can/cannot use in a ship but it is just too complicated. In theory after years and years of playing the game someone could fly a strong ship by themselves but it would always be far worse then a multi crew or heavy automated equivalent ship.
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I think a healthy level of skepticism is perfectly fine to have. However, i would just say to make sure to educate yourself on the game as well. Saying things like there are tons of these games on steam to me seems misinformed. While there are several space survival games, none of them are mmos, most are single players with multiplayer added later, many run on a traditional server solution at no monthly cost to the player, and many are using the wrong technology/solution because of the reasons listed. Space engineers is a great example of this.
As far as performance goes I know some of the interviews were done with footage from JC's laptop that was also hosting the server as twerk mentioned. When i look at this game i do not have a lot of concerns about the technical plausibility of the game. I know most/all of what they are claiming is possible. My only concern is if its financially a good investment for NQ. That is why i was happy to hear about the monthly fee for this game. if they had said it would be f2p I probably would have called BS on their claims.
Mostly I think if this game does not do well it will be because of:
Game play design or loops not feeling fulfilling
Missing the mark on difficulty to reward or speed(takes 10 years to gather enough to build a ship)
Lack of pvp balance with the vast amount of freedom of ship building and game world modification
Or as i mentioned before the game not being financially viable with the tech claims made
- ForlornFoe and Anaximander
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I like circular style trees better. I think it can give new players a better idea of where to go with their skills as the devs can place related trees near one another or branch to each other. However these type of trees can be harder to implement.
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I think it was the newest build, they said so in an interview but I'm not sure on that one. Maybe some attendees can enlighten us.
Its also very possible I'm mistaken about the whole beam from hand thing.
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I am curious how old the footage from that video is. I was under the impression from somewhere(cant remember where) that they had removed the beam coming from your hand when you place blocks. I thought that was changed awhile back. I guess they could have used an older more stable build for demo at GDC but i would be curious how up to date the build in the footage is.
Edit: How old some of the footage is.
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Falstaf i honestly feel like your entire post went right above twerks head....
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Yes that crossed my mind as well.
The speed bonus was more an idea to incentivise people to build and use roads.
Hovercrafts move faster on roads because...science?
Not sure if NQ istrying to encourage road building but if they are could always have a mechanic where engines are more efficient on roads or road somehow transfer energy to a hovercraft engine. This way it would be cheaper to transport goods from two points connected by roads or you could have more engines at the same fuel cost so you could transfer larger amount of goods.
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I'm sure it will be possible to do at least some basic repair work with the voxel tools, so people can repair the damage.
The thing about these planets is that they are going to be HUGE. I don't think anyone here (including me) really comprehends how big they will be. The official figure is that the planets will be 100km in radius. That gives a surface area of 126,000 square kilometers. If we assume 50,000 players at launch that's about 2.5 sq km per person. And that's just surface area. If we look at volume, since we can dig around as much as we want underground and that is where most of the resources are, then we are looking at 4,190,000 cubic km, or 84 cubic km per person. And that's just on the first planet. Going off of what NQ has stated, it will likely be only a few weeks until people start to go to other planets in the solar system. There will most likely be between 5 to 10 other planets in the starting system so that's between 12.5 to 25 sq km per player, not including moons and asteroids. And then after that we will be able to move to other solar systems, expanding infinitely into the galaxy.
Players are really going to have to try if they want to be able to deface all of that space faster than new space is discovered.
Keep in mind that jc has stated we will only be able to dig some small amount into the planet 1.5 km is what i recall so its much much less cubic/km of actual usable space. Its still a lot of space but i still think it will probably grow to look like crap in a semi short amount of time. Things like water not being counted in usable space for harvesting and if plants do or do not grow back on ground that has been lowered and then fixed. characters seem to be able to harvest large amount of dirt pretty fast so large holes that can scar a large area and things like water not flowing(so hovering lakes) and hovering mountains breaking immersion. These things could happen pretty easy and it would be great if there was some way to make it so at least a player has to care enough to try to maintain making the planet look like crap. At least make it so if players want to repair the planet they can do so semi easily.
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See, the issue with your idea is that a mining unit needs to be constructed.
Mining as it is right now at the basic level doesnt need anything beyond your nanoformer. You start the game you can start mining your way up. You lost everything in some high stakes game, go dig a hole. It is a self contained loop that doesn't need external help to get a player started.
I'm not saying it couldn't work your idea for a unit to freeze the auto refill script. Though resources are finite as a design rule, that includes planets as a whole.
And me personally, if someone digs a big hole I want it to persist until another player fills it back up.
Alioth as a starter planet is huge, I dont think swiss cheese will be that big of an issue.
I guess im just jaded. I have seen so many of these free build, free edit games and they all end up looking like crap so quickly. Sure the starter planet is huge but there may also be 50k people on it at launch. I honestly don't care if the mining unit is free. It's not supposed to be about the investment cost to make it. Its about having to carry a thing and place it if you want to edit. So someone can't just run from point a to b digging a line in the dirt just cause they are bored. Maybe make it heavy or have a small activation time to edit like 5 minutes. The goal in my eyes is to make it that if you are trying to mine or edit the planet you are not slowed down or burdened by this at all. But if you are just running around you cant edit the planet.
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Im kinda hoping NQ ends up doing something with a mining rights unit. Basically a territory unit that allows you to edit the planet voxels/mine. It would be very cheap, can be picked up and placed again perhaps with some cooldown, and multiple units can be placed in a singe territory. It doesn't reserve rights or anything. It would also be deactivated if a Territory unit is placed in the territory. I just think its in the best interest of the game to have at least some minor level of effort needed to modify the planet.
To falstafs comment it could also work as a trigger for planets to fill up holes. If no mining unit is present then start this planet self repair process.
Suggestions for release day experience
in The Gameplay Mechanics Assembly
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Thanks for giving everyone at my office a good laugh!