Shaman

Looks very cool! Love all the new FX. glad you are doing something about lag in pvp, I will test that soon

Is NQ working on multiple updates at the same time, or are they doing them one by one? JC stated in the look ahead video that NQ are already at work on a PvP update, and although we can't really trust this source, it does suggest that NQ are working on more updates behind the scenes. It would definitely explain the slow development time.

I beg to differ. Being forced to add PvE is what makes a game the same with every other MMO. In most MMO's , PvE uses the same gameplay loop: Equip equipment (weapons+gear) to assist you take a risk by overcoming a challenge (killing NPC's) using said equipment get loot or a reward (drops) get better equipment (better gear) repeat Are you saying that there are no alternatives with a similar loop? take NQ's idea of asteroid mining for example. Equip equipment (radars etc) to assist you take a risk by overcoming a challenge(finding+mining asteroid in time limit) using said equipment get loot or a reward (ores) get better equipment(better radars) repeat I could think of a million of these, honestly. Open your mind a little. Think outside the box.

why do you want PvE in this game so much? By automatically assuming that every MMO needs PvE, you are putting a really restricting mindset on yourself. This isn't WoW. This is space engineers, but massive and on one server. I do agree we could have passive NPC's like space cows or something, but definitely nothing that fights back, it simply doesn't work on this scale and on this type of game. It might appease a certain playerbase, sure, but at the same time it would damage PvP'ers , haulers and the selling point of the game.

im not bothered to check, ok? ?

even then, its an expensive (and heavy) precaution most people aren't willing to take. commissions might work, but then again you may come across other pirates who didn't know about it.

The requirements to have a good PvP ship is too large. To even have a chance of fighting, you need an L core with a dozen layers of plating, t3+ engines, radars and weapons, very high level skills and a crew of at least 5. As you could guess, basically nobody bothers with this as it adds so much weight and cost to your ship for all the ammo and plating, and it makes PvP less fun. if a hauler comes into contact with a PvP ship, there is practically no fighting back, and you just have to hope that you get into the safezone in time. I think it would be far better if ships had at least a chance against PvP crews, in such a way that attaching guns to your ship isn't such a waste of weight. some methods I have come up with to improve this (and pvp in general) are: adding different identification ranges for radars back into the game (xs ships have to be identified closer than L ships, to accommodate for smaller weapons having smaller ranges) decreasing the damage L weapons deal. getting shot down in 1 hit is unfun, even if this means L vs L battles last longer nerfing hit probability, hitting a 6m2 surface area needle from 2su away is too easy adding penetration so that spaced/layered armour isn't as prominent

ask people on the discord, pretty sure some people know the URL there

Pretty sure there is a way to get one month, actually

Digging and building is incomplete, PVP is literally just a placeholder right now, and missions, territory warfare and asteroid mining are still yet to be finished. Adding PvE would do nothing but delay the time it takes for novaquark to get the core pillars of the game implemented, and with a game like this PvE is not one of them. You call this game a failure, but the game is still 1 and a half years from release. But fine, since it seems like it will be impossible to change your opinion, let's just say NQ does, starting from now. This is what would happen: the next four-six months or so would consist of absolutely no updates because NQ would be using all of their dev time on PvE. This leads to almost everyone in the game leaving to play other games. PvE is finally released; More people log in to test it out, but a large portion of the community have already left the playerbase entirely. Because of how broken PvP is already, the only way to fight is in expensive L core ships, a paywall of about 50-150 Million quanta. Most people don't experience PvE because of this Haulers warp between planets more than ever before, since haulers don't want to take the risk of flying past NPC's while slowboating. PvP essentially dies, because pirates have no haulers to catch since they all warp. after a few weeks of people fighting NPC's over and over again, people get bored of the repetitive gameplay and go back to the much cheaper and safer mining system. We are back at square one. Adding PvE to the game is just another spanner in the works.

There are so many other games out there with spaceships and PVE. If you want a game like that, check put the thousands of other games with that out there which do. Having none of that is what makes DU unique. I think JC not adding PvE at the very start wasn't a design oversight, nor was it a bad decision. JC wanted to make a game in a world with one server, that can handle lots of players at once, and he succeeded. Adding PvE is just a third wheel, and makes the whole game feel less like a player experience. Novaquark doesn't have to jump on the whole 'if it's and MMO, it must have PvE' trend. DU has always been about the players, and it should stay that way.

I disagree. PVE isn't really that essential for DU imo, as it kinda ruins the whole "everything built by the players" aspect to the game. plus; it's way more exciting if every battle is player made and not just some scripted sequence. I definitely think that schems were added at the wrong time, but I don't necessarily think it should be removed altogether, after all it is a huge nerf to those megafactories.

pretty sure this changed in 0.23, hit detection is taken into account now

There is a burning question on my mind that I need answering, which both discord and the in game help section have failed to answer. how does hit probability work? everyone knows that it is based on cross section, but how does it work exactly? take this beautiful tie fighter I drew in 10 seconds with MS paint (fig.a). is hit probability worked out by: fig.b) a square around the ship, being more likely to hit if the square is larger fig.c) the area of the ship from the direction you are hitting from, being more likely to hit the more area there is. fig.d) shooting a raycast; if it hits, it deals damage. second off, is this only calculated from the front, or from other angles as well? you may not think it, but this makes a HUGE difference. for example, if DU uses figure b, having ships with wings like a tie fighter would be a severe disadvantage, because it would have the same hit probability as a cube the same size. Anyone who has knowledge about this/ is willing to test this out would be a great help to me and the community in general. This is the kind of stuff that needs to be documented but isn't.

Sorry to hear this, you have been a real help to everyone on the discord. hope things turn out OK.

uhhhhhh.... you have heard of the repair unit, right?

So many people forget how hard it must be to run, moderate, manage and develop a game like this. Just because you made a space game in unity once doesn't mean you should become CEO of DU. I mean, do you guys have the slightest idea how hard it is to make a multiplayer game? imagine that, but the servers move, and people try to destroy the game with exploits and EULA breaks every 10 seconds.

JC really did throw a spanner in the works, huh.

now that 0.25 is out, will we start to see some actual gameplay updates? I'm itching to do something other than building or mining.

although this feature probably isn't intended, I gotta say it makes building wings much easier. the only time I don't like it is when engines are stuck in it and stuff.

XL engines are an absolute must. having these walls of engines is totally inpractical, same goes for xs brakes, xs space fuel tanks, and xs hovers. would be even cooler if XL atmo engines were shaped much taller and thinner than XL spaces (a bit like giant xs engines) to encourage people to build cooler looking ships other than a big box with engines on the back.

Has productivity increased now that JC has stepped down from CEO? It's hard to tell now since they are doing a lot of backend changes, but I would imagine under a new investor they would want to speed things up a little.

lol this page is actually quite new, I edited it a few months ago? . But yeah, basically everything else on that website is completely outdated. Every page was made before beta release, and lots of stuff is speculation or unconfirmed, even on released features.

imo they should have kept it that way. now that weapon sizes are limited by core size and there are cross sections it would be a great feature to add back in.

This is the lock differences for core sizes on an L radar, but it is the same for every core size. having this in the first place implies this is possible/was a feature, but right now all the values are the same so it makes no difference. Imagine if this actually was implemented, it could change the meta completely and maybe even make smaller cores viable. If the lock distance for XS ships was at 40,000m instead of 300,000 , people would reconsider using L cores, since XS ships could hit and run around them easily. Perhaps to counter this, fleets would bring their own XS ships to fight back, or use an M core, or have a fleet of S cores, or use XS weapons, the possibilities are endless. and yet, the feature lays in the dust. NQ, why isn't this implemented? if it was it could finally break the L core meta, and actually make combat exciting!