Leniver

Hello,
 
I know that for some people it's OK to scam others. But NQ should at least give us tools to filter those scams.
Many people are complaining about the game not having enough player, not sure that this type of gameplay push new player to get interested into the game.

Again, I don't complain for myself but to keep the game healthy and bring in new players.

 @NQ
give us a way to ignore all the buy order below a certain amount in the settings the first time you open the market in the game (for new player) the player has a "help" message telling him that he can set default filters. (maybe also the reason why)  


Kind regards

Hello,
 
I know that for some people it's OK to scam others. But NQ should at least give us tools to filter those scams.
Many people are complaining about the game not having enough player, not sure that this type of gameplay push new player to get interested into the game.

Again, I don't complain for myself but to keep the game healthy and bring in new players.

 @NQ
give us a way to ignore all the buy order below a certain amount in the settings the first time you open the market in the game (for new player) the player has a "help" message telling him that he can set default filters. (maybe also the reason why)  


Kind regards

I am against that, it would lead to people having "space only" ship for mission and negate all the weight management of missions. 

I am against that, it would lead to people having "space only" ship for mission and negate all the weight management of missions. 

I'd like to send a message to people so that they can see it next time they log on.

Idea: Show Applied Buffs to a Construct (Handling and Otherwise)
Maybe for buffs that occur when you "Start" a refining on industry, you could have something at the top that would show the skills being applied to the "run"

true, games should be optimized before adding any content, make a base concept and then optimize until it runs smooth as tetris!
 
completely wrong, it's other way around. think of game engine as foundation for house, if foundation is weak, entire house will eventually collapse. this can be seen on some large buildings, where engineers didn't do proper research, ground started sinking and as result building started sinking. just couple months ago i watched a video on some huge skyscraper that has been sinking for years and now they trying to patch it up by digging into the foundation and adding more support pillars and concrete, but it's big waste of time and resources .. if they would have done it right in first place, it would never have that issue.
 
same goes for games, you gotta optimize game as early as possible, you make basics work and then you optimize and make sure it runs smooth. adding content doesn't make it lag again. for example if 3D models are rendered in optimized way, then it won't change this base algorithm when you're adding more 3D models.
 
i don't write my own code out of scratch, but i know how programming works and i can easily optimize somebody else's code if i see it, i can point out what needs to be changed ..etc.
 
 
it has nothing to do with optimize the build itself, even when looking at nothing with no constructs nearby, i still lag, it's the base game itself that lags. basic environment is already laggy for me. it doesn't matter how big the build is, there's only so much that can fit on your screen, that's the part that GPU has to render, everything inside or other side of ship should never render, until you're about to look at them. this is how optimization works, things that are not visible, should never render in. so having ship with 10000 lights and elements, shouldn't cause any lag as GPU should only load what's visible on your screen. regardless of your POV, there's still only limited amount of stuff that fits on your screen, as soon as something is out of your view, it should no longer put load on GPU.
 
which is one of the problems i noticed fast, DU renders in stuff that is not visible to you, which is WORST thing a developer can do. for example lights go thru voxels, it means graphics card has to do a lot more work if there are lights behind a wall. in fact i see this kind of lazyness in many games nowdays. i remember playing old games such as tomb raider 1 2 3 4 5, doom 2 ..etc and i don't remember any area where lights or shadows were glitching thru walls, that's because back then hardware was very limited and devs really had to optimize every bit, but as result games ran smooth and didn't have many visual glitches that nowday games do have.
 
i never said i run it in 4k, i said it SHOULD run smooth even in 4k. i have to run it in 1080p and it still lags really bad, my average fps is probably 35, it's quite cry-worthy, considering that all other games run quite fine in 1440p (not talking about some extremely badly optimized indie games that lag even in 720p).
 
 
 
SIGNS OF BAD OPTIMIZATION:
1: if i look straight down at floor that has only voxels or terrain, it STILL lags, why? there's NOTHING to render, so why does GPU work so hard to render something that even 15 year old computer would be able to render in 4k 60fps? that's one of the biggest issues, with almost NOTHING on screen or even nearby, it still puts heavy load on your GPU.
 
2: shadows have insanely high distance for no reason, in fact i think shadow range is infinite. i often see shadows from like 10km+ away, altho turning shadows completely off doesn't help much .. so i wouldn't be surprised if shadows are still calcualted and rendered, but they just hide them from view. that's only explanation why messing with shadow quality or turning them completely off has almost no increase/decerase in framerate.
 
3: lights glitch thru walls/objects. this is another big issue in many games, if you're behind a wall and looking at light source, then that light shouldn't even render in, it should be invisible and only known to game/server that there is light with xx properties, only when you move so that light is about to become visible, should it be rendered by graphics card. by doing that, GPU doesn't have to do any work until up to very last moment before object is about to be rendered in.
I would rather have some stuff not rendering in-time, than have lag. then they could add option to adjust the hidden objects draw distance, so if you have issue that objects don't render in when you look at them, you can increase that option a bit or vice versa. this can find balance between rendering objects and framerate.
 
4: impossible to have DU on HDD, it has severe stuttering and screen freeze all the time, because game constantly reads/writes from/to HDD, which is clearly bad optimization, that's what RAM and pagefile is for. my pagefile is on SSD, yet DU still uses HDD over RAM or pagefile. Dying Light 2 and Cyberpunk 2077 require massive amounts of data to be loaded too, but they have made it work with HDD. in fact dying light 2 is on my HDD and when i start the game, i have to wait about 2 minutes before i can move, otherwise it will stutter and lag, but after that wait time, it runs smooth with no further stuttering or lagging, same goes for cyberpunk 2077, sometimes it does have issues catching up, but then it just loads very low quality models, like traffic lights or NPC cars are very low quality until HDD can catch up, but it doesn't stutter ... but DU? it just straight up stutters and stops me in my tracks, entire screen just freezes until it can do whatever it's doing.
 
5: turning vsync on causes me to lose about 10fps in most areas. turning vsync on/off shouldn't affect performance in any way, vsync is only designed to prevent GPU from rendering more frames than your monitor can display, which in my case is 60fps (60hz monitor). so with vsync ON, i get about 35fps and with vsync off i get 45fps in SAME exact area. i literally didn't move at all, just pressed ESC, went into menu and changed vsync. i've seen this in some other games too, that having vsync either on/off causes lag. in some games its other way around, that vsync off causes lag, while vsync on works fine.
 
 
IDEA about terrain rendering:
terrain is currently loaded in "default" state and then player changes are loaded, why is this needed? DU is persistent universe, just save the changes permanently. i've had this idea for a long time "dynamic game engine" that re-writes itself as you play, which would be perfect fit for DU.
right now entire DU world is kept in some kind of database, but that's already a big lag maker. instead of keeping things in database, make it render into permanent model. so if someone does work on terrain, then those changes will become permanent part of game, even if they hard wipe, those changes would never get wiped. this method would remove any and all lag that is related to terrain that has been altered.
 
 
but bottom line here, is that early access didn't lag so bad, i'm not talking about in extremely populated areas, i'm talking about like on sanctuary or haven. i was able to play in 1440p 60fps on same PC, no issues. it only lagged near markets cuz they were FULL of builds, way more than now as there was no 7 day park timer, so everything was just abandonded all over, yet it still ran better than now. so what have they done?
 
and don't forget that i had it on HDD before, but full release doesn't work on HDD at all, it stutters so bad that it's not playable. i see no visual improvements at all.
wish i could buy new GPU, but my income is below cry-worthy, i can't even afford proper food. i think its quite important to have optimized games.
 
new GPUs might be powerful, but that's not an excuse to have badly optimized game or just because SSDs are very common nowdays, doesn't mean that game should be unplayable on HDD.
also i wanted to mention that my GPU has 8gb VRAM and game barely uses like 3-4gb, yet i see some textures unloading, like if i switch between 3rd/1st person view, i see some textures unrender, if there's enough VRAM, why not just keep them in VRAM and re-use when needed? that's again more work for GPU and SSD/HDD, it has to reload those textures. if you're flying your ship, it should keep textures in VRAM and re-use them when needed, no need to unload them if there's enough VRAM to go around.
 
If any developers are reading, please focus on optimizing the game. with these basic graphics game should run smooth as silk on GTX 1080.
 
 

I'm just wondering, will dual universe ever get optimized? my pc specs are not important, what IS important, is that my pc can run games like dying light 2, forza horizon 5, resident evil village, cyberpunk 2077 ..etc in 1440p or even in 4k @ 60fps, but DU i have to run in 1080p with lowest possible settings and i get only 15 - 40fps at best. if i look straight into the sky, i get 50-60fps, but even then it sometimes lags below, it's extremely unstable and i don't understand WHY?
 
this is clearly serious optimization issues, why is it running so bad? also i dont remember having such bad lag in early access, i remember getting 60fps in most areas, i see NO visual improvement to graphics, so what is going on?
 
if i'm correct, DU has been in development for about 8 years, so technically it's 8 years old game and my PC used to be best possible about 5-6 years ago, so DU should run like a dream on my pc, but instead it lags like a broken bag.
i mean just look at the graphics, du graphics are nothing amazing, it's very basic. trees, grass and generic 3D models are very basic. there are other games with similar graphics and i can run them in native 4k maxed out settings in 60fps. dirt rally 2 is one of them, it has much better graphics and runs like a dream in 4k. snowrunner has quite complex terrain physics and amazing graphics and it also runs like dream in 4k, so why is DU lagging so bad even in areas with very few constructs? even my M core ship lags down to 20-30fps over the ocean, WHY?
 
first thing i noticed about DU, is that graphics settings lack any actual settings, for example you're not able to change shadow distance and shadows are real FPS killer in any game, i did turn shadows off, but it doesn't really improve fps, so i keep them on low as without shadows it looks horrible. some said try changing CPU threads, but that won't change anything, because my CPU is not under 100% use, my CPU barely gets 30-50% use while playing and that's with other stuff running on background, so CPU is not the issue, while my GPU is under constant 100% use, so clearly the issue is with graphics.
 
PlanetSide 2 has about similar graphics as dual universe and i can run ps2 in native 4k maxed out settings, so what's the deal with DU? why can't i run DU in 4k with such basic graphics?
will you (the developers) ever going to optimize it so you dont need 2000eur graphics card to run it?
 
there must be some SERIOUS optimization issues, because DU literally runs worse than any other game i have ever played and i've played over 1000 games for sure. ok ok .. not entirely true, i've seen some cheap indie games that have even worse graphics and lag, but DU is definetely in the top 5% of worst optimized games.
 
can you please work on optimization? re-work how graphics are rendered, because it's so demotivating having constant 20-30fps.
 
Suggestions:
+ add AMD fidelity upscaler, because not all graphics cards support DLSS. DLSS is only for latest nvidia cards, so AMD and lower nvidia cards can't use that. AMD fidelity however, also works on nvidia cards, i've used it in other games and it works quite nice without ruining quality too much.
 
+ add option to reduce shadow distance and resolution.
 
+ add other graphics settings that other games have, such as anti-aliasing.
 
+ fix vsync (I noticed that turning vsync OFF increases me fps by a good 5-15 fps, depending on areas and NO, i'm not talking about frame lock, i'm PC expert and i know what vsync is and how it works. my monitor is 60hz, so i know going over 60fps won't have any effect as my monitor is only able to show 60, i'm talking about increasing fps from like 40 (vsync on) to like 50 (vsync off). so instead of using vsync, i used nvidia settings and locked du framerate to 60 and turned vsync off. vsync should not cause lag, it should actually make things smoother and better.
 
+ optimized the way graphics are drawn, because clearly there's something wrong if basic graphics require 10x more power than they should require. such basic graphics should run 60fps even on GTX 680. in fact i have GTX 680 in one other PC and that can still run most games on acceptable level.
 
 
If anyone has any other suggestions how to make DU run better, let me know (i'm not talking in-game settings, cuz obviously i have tried them all as i'm pc expert, i'm talking if there's some tricks with some config files somewhere, like some games make some config files and you're able to mess with them to change things that cannot be changed inside game and they can greatly improve performance, so maybe DU has something similar?)
 
thanks and i really hope DU devs will optimize graphics!

HQ tiles already abandon after 3 months unsubbed iirc.
2 weeks would be far too short.

As long as DU ships have 3 lifes the pvp in this game will be dead. A group of 5 guys cant do any economic damage to a bigger org, even if they manage core 6 ships before themself getting cored they have achived absolutly nothing, the big org will get their ships back plus be 5 ships richer. So not only did u achive nothing u actualy made bigger org bigger.
That means guerilla warfare in DU is completly impossible. Theres basicly absolutly no elemnt bleed in pvp. 

I'm more upset with the random Dmg that is suffered when landing a ship.  
 
I have a Lg core ship that autopilot slow lands with gears down, no dmg.  Then one day doing the same landing.  I have a catastrophic blow out that destroys one whole side of the ship.   What gives.. 30+ elements gone.   No difference in landing.    

I would like to thank NQ for being reverse-toxic enough to finally break through my DU addiction and make me quit! I can't thank you enough, another game/publisher will also really appreciate the €500/year that will go to them instead of NQ...
 
I've been unhappy with DU (and specifically NQ) for a while now. The 180 degree turnarounds on things they announce/say in an official capacity, the wipe... My gawd the wipe! The wipe announcement! The 5+ months of 0 motivation due to the wipe announcement... The talent points after wipe. The 2.5 years of downgrading DU instead of introducing new interesting stuff... But even with the lack of actual enjoyment and the constant feeling that all I've build in DU will be taken away again, I was still here, probably because I was addicted enough to DU to keep coming back. I've done the asteroid mining thing again and that was kinda disappointing with the 5000L-6000L nodes, but maybe if I gitgut the experience might be more enjoyable (like in the old days)... Every time I need to extend my subscription I think more and more about the option of quitting, but I can't do that because reasons... (addict reasoning)
 
But this morning I got a ticket from NQ support... But I didn't submit a ticket and the email I initially got wasn't clear about it either (system not designed for reverse tickets). So I log in and I see the claim that my Airdock at Alioth Market 6 is above the 1000m limit. And I get a REALLY negative feeling, not specifically because I need to move my airdock to a lower altitude, the person at NQ that submitted the ticket to me could probably do that for me (and they can, I just need to move the dynamic cores)... But because of, why the heck could I deploy that there in the first place? That 1000m height limit didn't feel correct, I thought it was 1000m above ground level (but that was wrong as well). Why didn't that 'feel' correct? Because we get blasted with a TON of conflicting information all over the place and I loose track of what the 'current' rules are... So I went digging, this is what I found:
 
 
The 1000m height limit was posted during an Ask Aphelia sessions (by NQ-Deckard) and it was 1000m above sea level (5th of August):
 
Then we have NQ-Deckard's announcement (23rd of November):
"We will allow these constructs to remain for two weeks beyond the implementation of the new height restriction system."
 
Patch notes (24th of November) state:
https://www.dualuniverse.game/launcher/patch/release-1014
"Alioth: 1300m"
 
The 'new height restriction system' hasn't been implemented yet, so structures placed should be OK (according to NQ-Deckard) two weeks after the 'new height restriction system' has been implemented, which again, it isn't.
 
Even IF that did happen in the last two weeks, that was never mentioned in the patch notes, heck the whole issue was not mentioned in patch notes known issues section. The patch notes actually say that the limit is 1300m (which I'm still above) and not a 1000m as the support person mentions and wasn't changed in later patch notes, it's also the most recent height limit that NQ mentions and I could find.
 
The issue for me is not the having to move the dynamic constructs so the support person can move it to the proper height. But that this isn't the issue, it's the issue that I have to dig through all kinds of NQ publiced information and even the lastest info there (1300m) doesn't conform with what the support person is saying (1000m). That says a couple of things to me: It's a mess internally at NQ as they can't even coordinate among themselves the proper values that things should be and they can't communicate with us correctly either (known issues), as I was under the assumption this issue was fixed a while back. So that was pretty much the straw that was breaking the camels back for me. But maybe I'll calm down before tonight, the deadline to extend the subscriptions for two of my accounts....
 
Then I get the support ticket back... Which it short, doesn't address my issues and pretty much states "Thank you for you detailed response, it's appreciated. Now you have 24 hours to move those dynamic constructs away or we have to delete (the static constructs?) as they violate the rules. Thank you."... Yeah, I'm out, no waiting for this evening.
 
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

First of all, thanks a lot for the feedback.

This is going to the right way!

First of all, thanks a lot for the feedback.

This is going to the right way!

First of all, thanks a lot for the feedback.

This is going to the right way!

Hello, everyone! I'm Mark van den Heuvel, known to many of you as NQ-Deckard, a member of the Production team here at Novaquark.
 
First, to those of you who celebrated your new year recently, I wish you a wonderful new year, and I look forward to seeing all of your creations in-game. As we step into 2023, I want to bring you all up to speed on where we're at with Dual Universe and where we are going.
 
After our launch last September, we have all worked hard to squash remaining bugs and improve balancing. We also delivered the promised digital Kickstarter rewards to our backers.
 
As is always the case with Dual Universe, work does create itself in front of us, and we have a great deal to work on and improve. One of our current central goals is to enhance the gameplay experience and catch up with some features and quality-of-life improvements, particularly some of those requested by our community.
 
Let me walk you through some of what we have planned for you both soon and further down the road.
 
Planets

We’ve recently released a new version of Talemai, and we’re continuing work on the others. After reviewing our progress, we've decided to take extra time to make the new planets truly feel different with new art, new terrain, and more exciting features. This means they are coming at a slower pace and possibly in a different order than we had envisioned. Expect new teasers, concept art, and images from us soon™!

Combat Missions

We had decided early in the life of Dual Universe not to focus on a PvE combat system, given other priorities. With all of the feedback we’ve received since the beginning of the game, PvE combat has consistently remained a highly requested feature from our community. We always try to listen to your feedback, and I’m happy to announce that we have begun work on implementing the first iteration of a PvE combat system into the game!
We’re planning the first version to be a PvE mission system that takes players into combat in their ships. The missions will scale in size to allow all players (solo or part of a larger group) to participate.
 
We’re very excited about the PvE combat feature. It will add more engaging gameplay for all Noveans and allow players to try out the rigors of space combat before heading out to battle with other players in Dual Universe PvP.
 
We are still in the early development of this feature, and it will take time, but we are already looking forward to seeing you all trying it in future PTS sessions. Your feedback will be instrumental in our developing PvE combat in Dual Universe.

PvP Improvements

Following a recent and very successful round table discussion with members of our PvP community, we are reviewing all the feedback gathered and our own data to determine what changes we will make. We are considering increasing the importance and/or requirement of having voxel armor onboard successful PvP ship designs, finding ways to encourage multi-crew ship setups, and potentially restricting the ability to remove cargo while in combat. Stay tuned for more exciting developments on PvP.

Contest Winner Constructs

Before launch, we ran the Build Your Legacy Contest for players to design starting outposts and speeders, with the winning entries being added to Dual Universe. We are currently working to make the constructs that the contest winners submitted available as options to select during the first start of the game, and we are also looking to make these available for purchase in the UEF shop. The contest entries were original and impressive. I want to congratulate all of you who took part. 

Maintenance Unit

A complete rework of the repair unit was planned for the 1.2 release just before the holidays. The feature still needed more work, and we decided to delay its release with plans to include it in the upcoming 1.3 update. When finished, the repair unit will be replaced with the maintenance unit, which can repair constructs with scrap and disassemble constructs. However, construct disassembly is the feature that still requires the most work, and we are determining if the feature will make it into the 1.3 release. When added, this feature will remove the pain of finding that one last bit of voxel in a construct and make redesigning builds easier, with the Maintenance Unit taking down constructs for you.

Joystick Support

Dual Universe already has a basic system to connect joysticks to the game. However, these were never cohesively connected with the Lua system. We will change that, allowing players to map analog and button inputs from Joysticks, Throttles, Pedals, and even simple Gamepads into Dual Universe. This will significantly improve the flying experience for non-Lua developing players and open new doors for Lua developers through projects such as Lua arcade games, custom flight control systems, and other nifty things our community creates.

Default Lua Configuration Rework

Once we’ve added Joystick support, we will redesign the default Lua scripts we give to players. Our community has long requested this update, and we want to ensure we deliver it. We will add a full suite of features and improvements. This means new Lua flight control systems, the ability to toggle widgets on and off without requiring Lua code, and integrating several systems not fully encapsulated in current control scripts, such as Anti-Gravity Generators.

Fuel Intake Changes

This has been a popular demand by our players, and we are looking into options to allow players to refuel tanks from another element. Currently, we plan to make a  'Fuel Intake' able to act as a proxy for a single fuel tank. This feature is still on the drawing board and may change as we dive deeper into it.
 
-------------------------------------------

As always, thank you for reading this short overview of some of what’s coming up. I hope you have a clearer picture of the direction we're taking Dual Universe in, and I look forward to hearing your thoughts on the forums. Have a wonderful day.
- Mark (NQ-Deckard)
 

What I like: Freedom of building crazy stuff
What I dislike: NQ communication and making our life harder.

At this point, it's a really bad idea to put a lot of effort into DU in general...there's no reason to invest a bunch of time in a subscription game where there's only a few hundred people playing at a time. 
 
If NQ has 10,000 subs (which they likely don't even have that), their employees would make about as much revenue as DU delivering DoorDash 8 hours a workday...likely more.
 
When it comes to picking where to invest your time, I don't think DU is a great place...because there's no way they can hold the current player counts and stay online forever.
 
Yeah the company has made really bad choices that have frustrated and annoyed players like the OP...but even if you put that aside, it would be a weird choice to invest a lot of time in a game that is not sustainable. 

Over the past several weeks, we've been dealing with some pretty significant server issues that have made this (rightly) challenging game into one that's almost impossible to play.
 
On two occasions, while running missions, my ship has completely lost the ability to brake.  This is happening with a ship that I've used for that same mission many times before and after.
 
This has happened to some of my org-mates as well. One said, "I just landed on thades. and instead of landing I shot into the air at 16k kmph and disabled 223 modules".  Another said, "coming down for a landing - brakes are working and then the ship just drops to the ground damaging half the elements".
 
Another said, "yesterday late in the day i was leaving atmo on talemai .  at 16km above surface my ship disappeared and my body floated down. ship got stuck 16 km above me."  -  I know that this same exact thing happened to another player in my org about three weeks ago.
 
NQ knows there is a problem. And I know they're going to fix it. But until they do, I can't run missions. If my ship crashes like that again, it's done.  
 
If it happens again then my ship is broken forever and I'm screwed.
 
I had a cushion of quanta in my account that I've used to pay my tile taxes, but now that money is depleted. If I can't run missions, I can't earn money.
 
So what am I supposed to do here, NQ?  These server issues have been going on for weeks!  I really like this game and I want to play it. Because of these server issues, which are out of my control, I can't earn money.  And so I won't be able to pay my tile tax.  So I'm going to lose my tiles because the server is having problems. 
 
So I'm asking you, NQ.... what do you expect me to do here? This is frustrating and we've been patient. Are you guys going to do anything?  Please just help.

Yea this is frustrating and I feel your pain. My T1 flowers weren't making more money then the taxes on it and paying those kept me in a constant state of broke. I was never more than a few days of missing a tax bill. I was running missions but it takes too long and isnt fun so to survive, I pulled all of my miners, left my flowers to the dust bin of history and have been far richer since. It doesnt solve your problem but it is a bandaid until your issues are finally resolved. 

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year 2023
-k-

Hell no! It's a pure and bland sandbox, it has the potential for us to tell good stories. But the DU setting itself is virtually not existent, at the start of beta there was some hint of something more during events, but that was quickly squashed when the previous CEO left...
 
DU is the equivalent of mom getting a big box of LEGO, yelling "VROOM! This is a spaceship!" turning the box over in the middle of the living room. "You just crashed on a new planet, you need to rebuild!"... "I'll check back on you when you're 18 and I can kick you out of the house."... 😉

DU is lousy sci-fi, since there is so many inconsistencies and hardly any correlation between what you do in the game and the technology available. So a more correct term would be space-opera.
 
For example everything must fly in DU, but there is no advanced technology or Lore or anything in the game that would justify a society based around flying.
 
And one moment you have nano transformers doing hand-wavy magic and resurrection pods that can transfer you across the universe in a split second, and the next you are running around picking up glowing rocks from the ground.
 
Kinda reminds me of Star Wars where people are living in a western movie but then suddenly have all sorts of crazy technology for whatever fits the short term narrative, without any thoughts as to how having access to such technology would impact a society as whole. I mean just take a look at something as simple as the invention of the iPhone, and how much smartphones (and the internet) has changed our society in a relatively short time.

But we have pets now 🤣

Explain how "not giving perms to dishonest people" is supposed to work, though...? How are you supposed to know who is or isn't honest in a game, especially one where there's no repercussions for stealing because NQ insists it is "emergent gameplay"...?
 
Theft isn't "emergent gameplay", because theft is literally just using RDMS as intended -- emergence is an interaction of features, not using one feature exactly the way it was coded.
 
It isn't "gameplay", either, because it has no consequence -- PvP is barely implemented and there is no reputation or legal system of course. There is no gameplay whatsoever around theft. 
 
It's the game's job to manage ownership and property in a way where everyone can contribute to orgs without the org crumbling because a legate gets bored and tears it all down.
 
And let's be honest, when NQ had their market destroyed...they responded with bans...so maybe it's a bit silly to suggest that the end-all answer is "just configure RDMS right" when even NQ has made mistakes.