Dr Rhubarb

(initially posted on the PTS forums, oops)   Thank you everyone who played the PTS version of the new FTUE and gave your feedback.    It really helps to have fresh eyes on this.
The new FTUE has been over a year in the making, so some of us Level Designers have tunnel vision when playing through it for the thousandth time  
 
A few of you ran into two big bugs:
Those of you that spawned in the middle of nowhere with no lander obviously did not experience the intended onboarding.   That you continued to play and took detailed notes was appreciated, however clearly this is not the path a new player should take.   This happened due to problems with the server, and always requires CS intervention to rectify.  Since server hiccups do happen, I may add a backup step that if players get stuck on the "interact with the pilot's seat" step, after a certain time Aphelia will recommend the Help chat.   That, or another backup. Many of you ran into an issue trying to deploy the Speeder, getting an error message "speeder too far".   This was a bug that has been fixed in the latest update (released today). Aside from that, the rest of you successfully played the golden path of the new FTUE and provided great feedback.
 
Here are fixes we have already implemented. They are live on Athena. (this list is not exhaustive):
Lander section: now no build mode possible, no suicide/force respawn possible Flatten/Blueprint deploy section: added "you can walk around using maneuver keys" F4 map section: added a step to unlock HUD at the end Objective Screen section: added a step to remove currently active tool (skipped if no tool active) Objective Screen section: Added a recommendation to take the Talent mini-tutorial Objective Screen: fixed crash when triggering mini-Construction Lander: infobutton removed Tutorial skip buttons (Shift-PgUp and Shift-PgDn) now have a confirmation popup, to avoid accidental skips Here are our next steps (this list is not exhaustive):
Golden Path: encourage players to join an organisation Golden Path: teach "H" button in screen lock mode and inventory Investigate if "playing with friends" is convenient enough, now that the bugs are fixed Outposts: balance outpost constructs and provide more information on the Outpost Picker page Objective Screen: create the missing mini-tutorials Objective Screen: make the objective screen persistent (hopefully) make the objective screen reactive to the player completing mini-tutorials Tutorials: sort tutorials in the VR Surrogate Station tutorials tab Tutorials: do a polish pass of tutorials in the VR Surrogate Station as many are out of date (btw Golden Path = all the steps from "player spawns in the lander" to the end where Aphelia hands the player off to the Objective screen)
 
The principle goal of the new FTUE is to avoid bloat of the "forced tutorial" by getting a new player to a point where they can have few hours of fun tinkering and exploring before they would need to learn more.  Some people will choose more tutorials right away, but that is their choice, others might visit a bunch of places using VR Surrogate instead, or harvest ore.   This is roughly the blanket answer to the feedback "you really need to teach the player XYZ".    The golden path ignores some DU features by design, hoping that the Objective screen and player discovery fills the gap.
I do agree, however, that getting a player to have a look at organisations as soon as possible is a great suggestion, which is why I'm planning on adding that to the golden path.
 
If your comment or feedback is not listed above, I haven't missed it.  All feedback has been collected and is being considered.
Thanks everyone again for your help.
Cheers,
NQ-AntiGravitas
 
PS. For those who pointed it out, the lander -always- lands safely.  Its geometry and light weight slows it down in atmosphere and it has an autobrake at the very end.  it's impossible to crash (I tried many times).  Well, I'll say "nearly" impossible to crash because I'm sure someone will find a way one day (and no, that is not a challenge to you, dear players).  

Seriously, why are you still here?  You ask for more communication, and you get it, but it's not good enough for you?  There is some truly exciting news about the game in those three posts and you don't have one single good thing to say?  They give you some concrete intentions and plans and you say it's just fluff and filler?  Are you a paid troll? Move on with your life if nothing NQ says or does make you happy.  Can you be more miserable?

So many inaccurate statements here.  6-7 years?  Nope.  The company may have been established for that long, then but you act as if it has been open to players for that long.  There was pre-alpha for a bit then alpha for about a year, and now beta.  NQ has kept a pretty good forward progress roadmap, especially when compared to other large games.  
 
"riddled with bugs that never get fixed"  Apparently you don't read the release notes or haven't been playing that long because that statement is just ignorant. Yes there are still bugs.
 
You say they haven't made changes in 7 months.  Again, you may not be paying attention to what is happening.
 
"zero experience in game dev" that statement is just a big middle finger at their accomplishments thus far.  Are you a game dev by the way?  How do you know so much about the devs, and what their employees think?  Are you an ex-employee of NQ?  What is your experience in the industry?
 
I can agree that this game that is still in development is not a finished game and has some issues to work out just like any game that hasn't been released yet, but you are stating a lot of things as facts that simply are false or completely assumed.
 
It always amazes me how much time and energy folks are willing spend to talk and write about something they seem to hate so much.  Like Lethys' comment above, he has been bashing the game in these forums for years, just generally being an ass and counter productive.  I have no idea why he is still here in this game or in these forums.  You think he would be trying find joy somewhere else by now.
 
As to the OP's question, I believe the game is not going anywhere and has great things to come.  I think the Mission system will be one of the biggest transformations to the game that we have seen in a long time and bring some folks back.  It will give some "game" to the game.  I personally am looking forward to making missions for players.  I have witnessed some folks leaving the game out of frustration of some changes which is understandable.  Some will come back at a later date when more features arrive (also understandable considering playing beta phase games are not for everyone).  There is a large core base of players that are not going to leave and are very supportive.  Please take some of these more salty comments with ...well... a grain of salt.  In the end, yes it will take more time and patience to get where the game is going, but history has shown that NQ has listened to players and made changes appropriately, and that is why I plan to keep playing. Some times it does go backwards a bit, but eventually gets fixed.

Despite our recent efforts to expand and clear out Market 6, we are still getting reports about performance and clutter. We want to assure our players that we understand your frustration and are still working to find better permanent solutions. 
 
Meanwhile, we will be addressing clutter across Alioth this weekend. Our plan is as follows:
Dynamic constructs that have not had direct interaction with their owner over a set duration (currently 30 days*) will be hidden.  Constructs at the market that violate our rules,  Code of Conduct and EULA will be removed.
If your construct is hidden, you can unhide (recover) it by using the Fetch tool. To do this, right-click on it in the Construct list on your Map screen. Any constructs that you own, whether visible or hidden, will appear on this list.
 
Fetch functionality now works for organization-owned constructs as well. For hidden constructs that belong to your organization, your legates can retrieve them via that same functionality. 
 
Our customer support team is at the ready if you still need assistance recovering your constructs. Simply ping our Live Support staff in the in-game help chat with “@GM” or file a ticket on our support page and we will dispatch help right away!
 
Please note that this is intended only as a temporary measure to aid performance and improve your experience when visiting these areas. 
 
We look forward to seeing the results from these changes over the weekend.
 
May your frames be plenty.
 
 
*Duration may change based on our findings 

Thank you NQ for the posts recently.  There are several items in there that I am looking forward to.
 
Mining: So I am not a miner in this game, I am a builder.  I didn't really mind the way mining works in this game, but after you get your talents up, that's it, it is still mining.  I have always liked Minecraft's progression with mining (in certain mods) where you dig to get resources, build faster and more efficient tools to dig, then automate mining so you can concentrate on building your empire.  That process always felt good to me, so I look forward to see how the mining units work.  My hope is that they stay balanced and don't get to an end-game level of resources too quick.  Also, searching for asteroids in empty space seems like a good expansion for folks who scan hexes, although they have to be somewhat quick about securing it/mining it if it becomes public knowledge after a bit.
 
Missions: I have been looking forward to missions so players can create jobs, but hearing that there may be some NQ missions is even more exciting.  I am curious as to what kind of specialized missions we can expect.
 
Territory Control: I am a little concerned about how the territory control in space is going to work. I hope that when it gets implemented that, the "pipes" between planets don't instantly get clogged with territory control.  Maybe that is intended, but I hope there is a balance there.
 
Adding some "fun" into the game is definitely desired, but also performance enhancements is what is most needed.  I hope the new screen adjustments do that for everyone.

Seriously, why are you still here?  You ask for more communication, and you get it, but it's not good enough for you?  There is some truly exciting news about the game in those three posts and you don't have one single good thing to say?  They give you some concrete intentions and plans and you say it's just fluff and filler?  Are you a paid troll? Move on with your life if nothing NQ says or does make you happy.  Can you be more miserable?

Sorry, but your post is just the next iteration of you complaining, just to hear yourself complain.

PART ONE: REFINING OUR PROCESSES 
As promised last week, we would like to give you a glimpse at the changes, improvements, and additions we have in store for Dual Universe. 
We’ve learned many lessons since our beta began seven months ago.  Going from a backer-focused game in alpha, under NDA, to a public, wide-open beta with many new players gave us a lot of insight in several areas: processes, economics, and gameplay. In this blog, we’ll focus on processes with the latter two being the topics of subsequent blogs. 

THE LONG HARD LOOK
At Novaquark, we’re still a fairly small team. Given the ambition and complexity of this game, it can be quite a challenge to make the right decisions on how to make the most of our resources. To date, we’ve been focused on bug fixing, stabilization, balancing, scaling, and improving our server and database infrastructure - plus firefighting when necessary - to make the game work better. 
 
Not to say that this is all behind us; it never will be (such is the way of MMOs), and we know some bugs and exploits still need to be addressed - this is a beta after all. Still, we paused earlier this year to ponder what the next phase of development of DU should be, to stay the course of the original plan or adapt to how things have evolved since beta began. After taking a  long hard look at everything we’ve learned from the beta, we decided where we need to focus next, based on what we think will be best for Dual Universe and its community. 

“IF IT’S BROKE, FIX IT”
Maintaining a live game while we continue to develop it ended up being quite the leap from our tightly-controlled alpha environment. As much as we prepared for it, actually doing it was a whole different beast. That’s probably one of the areas where the reality check was the most brutal for us. The world of Dual Universe is a persistent one, and every time we introduce something, it impacts the player and the delicate balance of its economy. There’s no safety net, and player feedback often came once bugs or balancing issues had already impacted the game’s common universe. 

Let’s start with how we plan to improve our processes and quality control, because this is an area where doing something wrong can have a major impact on players. We have three goals in this area: 
 
 
Gather feedback from players earlier in the process, so that when new features and changes are introduced in the game, their impact on the persistent universe is properly measured.  Have a more flexible and collaborative development approach that will allow us  to take player feedback into consideration, modifying plans when we’re able.   Overall, improve the quality of our releases, which means fewer bugs and exploits, and less hot-fixing.
  When it comes to gathering feedback from players earlier, we are evaluating some options on how we might get feedback on game design ideas from players at an earlier stage before they have actually entered the production pipeline. We are already seeing significant improvements in this area since the launch of the public test server (PTS), which lets us test prospective new features, improvements and bug fixes in a non-persistent environment where it won’t impact players’ progress on the Live server. If enough players test features on the PTS, we’ll be able to prevent bugs and balancing problems from making their way to the persistent universe. 
 
When we deployed 0.24 on the PTS first, players gave us invaluable feedback, helping us to identify several issues that we were able to address before they reached the production server. Although  our PTS-to-production process isn’t perfect yet, we are still working to improve it and think it’s getting significantly better with each iteration.  In the future, we will expand the use of the PTS to testing prototypes of features, outside of regular releases, so that all players can give their feedback as early in the development process as possible. 
 
Another major improvement to our processes that we are addressing is flexibility. On our way to beta, we had a fairly rigid roadmap that was dictated by the necessity to lay the foundations for all of the gameplay pillars for beta as well as fulfilling our promises to our backers. While the overall plan and long-term goals for DU haven’t changed, we need to be able to adapt to the feedback of players along the way whenever it’s feasible. For example, if we decide to make a major overhaul of our mining mechanics, we need the flexibility to iterate as much as necessary until we find the right formula before we move on to something else. 
 
Although they may not be visible to players, there are many other things happening internally  that have already proven to improve our releases. First and foremost, our internal release process is undergoing a revamp, based on the learnings from our past launches. We’ve allotted more time for QA than we used to, and we will postpone a release if we think it’s not ready (as we did  with the 0.24 update.) These new processes are still being refined, but we’re seeing improvements already.
 
We remain steadfast in our promise to deliver the best game possible. We feel confident that the changes we’re making now to our processes are a big step toward making that an attainable goal. 

Ready to discuss part 1? Click here.
 

Hello again Noveans!
We have heard your initial feedback on the screens and we want to elaborate on some of your major concerns.
 
Will this affect both screens and content written to the players screen (HUDs)?
No, this technological change will affect only screen units at this time.

Will all player created work on screens suddenly become non-functional?
No, this technology will be available side-by-side with the current technology, both first on the PTS in a prototype state, and eventually also on the Live server.
We strongly recommend everyone does test and experiment the new tech on the PTS, as your feedback and testing will help shape this feature.

How will this make a difference on performance?
The main reason being that the current implementation does not allow for much control over the performance impact of screen renderings. Complex 3D transformations using a combination of HTML, SVG and CSS has a significant impact on render times in the client. Adding to the fact that screens are often condensed with multiples of them in close proximity to each other, there is an increasing drop in performance on the client with more screens using the current technology. The new system allows for more precise control over rendering time allowed across screens and allows us to safeguard the level of performance impact the screens have on the client.

So you will be removing HTML support entirely?
Not necessarily, the two techs will run side by side for an as of yet undefined period of time. Eventually we may introduce a phase where we make the rendering of HTML on screens an option for players along with a warning that it can significantly degrade client performance. Players with that option disabled will simply not see any HTML content and not suffer performance degradation because of it.

Why not improve the current HTML implementation instead of the new technology?
This is a complex topic, HTML/CSS/Javascript is a group that forms a UI technology. For reasons beyond the scope of this topic we do not allow the use of Javascript inside the screen units. When you remove Javascript, the group effectively becomes a not so efficient vector image drawing technology which we have very little control over in terms of rendering. We have previously implemented a lot of small limitations here and there to reduce the impact of the screens, but there are (and likely always will be) edge cases which will eventually crop up using that technology. As such, the new technology has built-in limitations on how taxing a screen unit can be, and if a screen unit goes over the limit it will simply stop drawing. This is why we ask you all to go and test this, and help us find caveats and where you run into things you can and can’t do.

What about bandwidth? Are you doing this to reduce data transfer for screens?
The current implementation does not address this, the current implementation is a way for us to collect your feedback on this concept. Eventually we may change the way data transfer for screens is handled, where we may increase the size of the defined “template” inside a screen unit itself. Followed by a lower limit on the amount of data transferred to the screen from external sources. Allowing the screen element to do the rendering and drawing work, using parameters fed to it by a control unit.
For example: You would draw the design of a fancy instrument panel using the screen element, and a programming board or control unit just sends the values for all the instruments to the screen. This is currently not in the current implementation however, but may give you a better idea of why this technology has a lot of potential for more intricate and powerful designs.

What about artists who draw using external programs and import their SVG’s into the game?
One of our hopes is to provide a good enough set of commands in the screens API so that our system can express most SVG graphics converted to these commands through for example a small conversion tool. It is unlikely that we will develop and maintain a conversion tool for this, but this is also why we want your feedback on this new API for you to let us know what commands you really want to see included to make this process easier.

We sincerely hope that this answers many of your initial questions and concerns.
I personally can’t wait to see what you will all come up with in your designs!
 

Hello Noveans!

Currently, screen unit content is an HTML page. We synchronize screen unit content between players by sending the whole HTML; however, screen unit HTML content can be pretty big and uses a lot of bandwidth and frame time to render when updated every frame by a programming board or control unit. This has a significant impact on client performance for players, especially when a lot of screen units are in the same area. 
Performance improvement is of paramount importance to us and an ongoing request we get from players. Consequently, it is something we will continually work to achieve. 
 
To address this, we are bringing a possible solution to PTS so that players can try it out. This prototype involves using a new API to draw screen units with a dedicated Lua script. This will use simple drawing commands like
drawRectangle(a,b,c,d) drawText(“Hello DU”) Simple actions like setTextContent will not be affected. 

In addition to performance improvements, this new tech also allows for some unprecedented possibilities to create even better screen displays than before. Check out this video to get a taste of what it can do! 
 

We realize that this change will mean that players won’t be able to use SVGs on screens anymore, and that SVGs are easier and more flexible than uploading static images. It’s important to note that the new Lua system will still allow you to draw complex images. You don't really need any Lua knowledge, and it’s easier than the DPU system.

Additionally, we added an option to deactivate HTML screen units for players who experience the worse framerate. We expect this to bring significant performance improvements in markets and parking areas.
Once the change is fine-tuned, thanks to your feedback after trying it on the PTS, we will announce a transition period to allow players time to switch over to the new API before we disable support for HTML-based screen units. We will continue to support both techs during this transition period.

We strongly encourage everyone to check out this change when it’s available on PTS and share your constructive feedback with us on the forum. 
 

So many inaccurate statements here.  6-7 years?  Nope.  The company may have been established for that long, then but you act as if it has been open to players for that long.  There was pre-alpha for a bit then alpha for about a year, and now beta.  NQ has kept a pretty good forward progress roadmap, especially when compared to other large games.  
 
"riddled with bugs that never get fixed"  Apparently you don't read the release notes or haven't been playing that long because that statement is just ignorant. Yes there are still bugs.
 
You say they haven't made changes in 7 months.  Again, you may not be paying attention to what is happening.
 
"zero experience in game dev" that statement is just a big middle finger at their accomplishments thus far.  Are you a game dev by the way?  How do you know so much about the devs, and what their employees think?  Are you an ex-employee of NQ?  What is your experience in the industry?
 
I can agree that this game that is still in development is not a finished game and has some issues to work out just like any game that hasn't been released yet, but you are stating a lot of things as facts that simply are false or completely assumed.
 
It always amazes me how much time and energy folks are willing spend to talk and write about something they seem to hate so much.  Like Lethys' comment above, he has been bashing the game in these forums for years, just generally being an ass and counter productive.  I have no idea why he is still here in this game or in these forums.  You think he would be trying find joy somewhere else by now.
 
As to the OP's question, I believe the game is not going anywhere and has great things to come.  I think the Mission system will be one of the biggest transformations to the game that we have seen in a long time and bring some folks back.  It will give some "game" to the game.  I personally am looking forward to making missions for players.  I have witnessed some folks leaving the game out of frustration of some changes which is understandable.  Some will come back at a later date when more features arrive (also understandable considering playing beta phase games are not for everyone).  There is a large core base of players that are not going to leave and are very supportive.  Please take some of these more salty comments with ...well... a grain of salt.  In the end, yes it will take more time and patience to get where the game is going, but history has shown that NQ has listened to players and made changes appropriately, and that is why I plan to keep playing. Some times it does go backwards a bit, but eventually gets fixed.

So many inaccurate statements here.  6-7 years?  Nope.  The company may have been established for that long, then but you act as if it has been open to players for that long.  There was pre-alpha for a bit then alpha for about a year, and now beta.  NQ has kept a pretty good forward progress roadmap, especially when compared to other large games.  
 
"riddled with bugs that never get fixed"  Apparently you don't read the release notes or haven't been playing that long because that statement is just ignorant. Yes there are still bugs.
 
You say they haven't made changes in 7 months.  Again, you may not be paying attention to what is happening.
 
"zero experience in game dev" that statement is just a big middle finger at their accomplishments thus far.  Are you a game dev by the way?  How do you know so much about the devs, and what their employees think?  Are you an ex-employee of NQ?  What is your experience in the industry?
 
I can agree that this game that is still in development is not a finished game and has some issues to work out just like any game that hasn't been released yet, but you are stating a lot of things as facts that simply are false or completely assumed.
 
It always amazes me how much time and energy folks are willing spend to talk and write about something they seem to hate so much.  Like Lethys' comment above, he has been bashing the game in these forums for years, just generally being an ass and counter productive.  I have no idea why he is still here in this game or in these forums.  You think he would be trying find joy somewhere else by now.
 
As to the OP's question, I believe the game is not going anywhere and has great things to come.  I think the Mission system will be one of the biggest transformations to the game that we have seen in a long time and bring some folks back.  It will give some "game" to the game.  I personally am looking forward to making missions for players.  I have witnessed some folks leaving the game out of frustration of some changes which is understandable.  Some will come back at a later date when more features arrive (also understandable considering playing beta phase games are not for everyone).  There is a large core base of players that are not going to leave and are very supportive.  Please take some of these more salty comments with ...well... a grain of salt.  In the end, yes it will take more time and patience to get where the game is going, but history has shown that NQ has listened to players and made changes appropriately, and that is why I plan to keep playing. Some times it does go backwards a bit, but eventually gets fixed.

So many inaccurate statements here.  6-7 years?  Nope.  The company may have been established for that long, then but you act as if it has been open to players for that long.  There was pre-alpha for a bit then alpha for about a year, and now beta.  NQ has kept a pretty good forward progress roadmap, especially when compared to other large games.  
 
"riddled with bugs that never get fixed"  Apparently you don't read the release notes or haven't been playing that long because that statement is just ignorant. Yes there are still bugs.
 
You say they haven't made changes in 7 months.  Again, you may not be paying attention to what is happening.
 
"zero experience in game dev" that statement is just a big middle finger at their accomplishments thus far.  Are you a game dev by the way?  How do you know so much about the devs, and what their employees think?  Are you an ex-employee of NQ?  What is your experience in the industry?
 
I can agree that this game that is still in development is not a finished game and has some issues to work out just like any game that hasn't been released yet, but you are stating a lot of things as facts that simply are false or completely assumed.
 
It always amazes me how much time and energy folks are willing spend to talk and write about something they seem to hate so much.  Like Lethys' comment above, he has been bashing the game in these forums for years, just generally being an ass and counter productive.  I have no idea why he is still here in this game or in these forums.  You think he would be trying find joy somewhere else by now.
 
As to the OP's question, I believe the game is not going anywhere and has great things to come.  I think the Mission system will be one of the biggest transformations to the game that we have seen in a long time and bring some folks back.  It will give some "game" to the game.  I personally am looking forward to making missions for players.  I have witnessed some folks leaving the game out of frustration of some changes which is understandable.  Some will come back at a later date when more features arrive (also understandable considering playing beta phase games are not for everyone).  There is a large core base of players that are not going to leave and are very supportive.  Please take some of these more salty comments with ...well... a grain of salt.  In the end, yes it will take more time and patience to get where the game is going, but history has shown that NQ has listened to players and made changes appropriately, and that is why I plan to keep playing. Some times it does go backwards a bit, but eventually gets fixed.

Hello Noveans, 
 
We realize there is some confusion regarding whether certain scenarios occurring within the game world are permitted or not, and would like to clarify these points for everyone.  In short, we’d like to ask our community to use common sense when encountering issues in the game;  If it looks like an exploit, smells like an exploit (do pixels smell?), or sounds like an exploit, chances are it is an exploit. Don’t DU it! Report it. (support.dualthegame.com)
 
We are in a testing phase, and reporting these bugs/issues is important. Abusing them may lead to sanctions against accounts, up to and including removal from the game. We will not take ignorance as an excuse, especially in the following list of scenarios. Please note this is not an exhaustive list, and we will continue to expand upon it as needed: 
 
 “ALT + F4 Emergency Brake”: We acknowledge this is not an intended game play loop that is being intentionally used by players. We do plan to counter this action in the future but do not consider it high priority at this time. At this time, we will not take action against an account for using such. [Allowed]  
Parenting Ships - Dragged to PVP Space: This is a hot topic and one we wish to be very clear on. Intentionally parenting any construct without permission of the owner is not intended for game play. A fix has been rolled out that will address the ability to parent constructs together via the maneuver tool. As we have not previously clarified this point, we will not retroactively punish this abuse, as of this moment forward abusing similar bugs/tools to replicate this maneuver in its current state can result in disciplinary actions on an account. [Not Allowed]  
Attacking PVP Zone from Safe Space: Our team has been investigating complaints of ships being attacked in the PVP zone from ships outside of the zone. Our investigations strongly point to sync issues between clients. We will continue to work with this feature, but recommend players consider the zone lines for PVP to be somewhat fluid and not absolute. Our version of the neutral zone! We ask that you continue to report cases with positions, but will not action accounts at this time, unless an additional exploit is discovered. [Allowed]  
Overlapping engines with other elements (obscuring): A fix will be rolled out that will prevent this from occurring. No action will be taken, unless additional abuse is occurring. [Allowed]  
Theft Via RDMS: RDMS permissions and settings are the sole discretion of each player. We advise you take the time to get to know and understand the system and be cautious when making a construct or element usable by unknown players, including the use of your friends list. Not every player has your best interest at heart. We can not get involved with permission based theft, whether as an individual or an organization. We encourage you to review your friends list each time you add or remove someone and ensure your construct permissions are set accordingly. The context menu options that set public access currently do not have a confirmation prompt, be careful as setting public access to said construct will allow every player in Dual Universe to go into build mode and remove/place elements and voxels.  [Allowed]
   
Environmental Walls/Creations: Use of the environmental and voxel tools allows the manipulation of terrain on owned and unowned tiles. You may build walls or other structures up to the allowed height, however, said constructions must not:  Block access to market places or tutorials Must abide by our Community Standards (phallic/sexual, political, religious or otherwise offensive shapes are not permitted) Must not be placed with the intention of interfering with neighboring players. When players can not agree, the final decision on what is and is not acceptable is decided on a case-by-case basis by Novaquark staff.
   
Marketplace Construct Parking: Players are permitted to park at marketplaces with their transport vehicles so long as they are not preventing use to other players or obstructing entry or exit points. Vehicles whose purpose is advertising (organization, service or otherwise) must abide by the following rules.  Organizations and individuals wishing to advertise at markets may have one advertising construct per district maximum Constructs may not be larger than “Small” sized Constructs may not block access to any building, entry points or dispensers Advertisements must not be placed/parented on constructs that don’t belong to you Constructs that violate these terms will be removed from the game without warning or compensation.
  Mass Manipulation in Transportation:  Players who utilize bugs to bypass the weight penalty of their inventory, other players, other constructs, etc to move mass through the game are not permitted. This includes: Adding additional mass to an already piloted ship [Fixed] Docking mass to an already piloted ship [Fixed] Circumventing linked container range [Fix Pending] [Not Allowed]  
Item Duplication: Any method of duplicating items or resources (including quanta) is not allowed at any time. Any incidents of bugs of this nature must be reported to the support team at support.dualthegame.com [Not Allowed]
  Boarding without permission: As the deployment of the docking update is pending, the boarding of other players' constructs without consent will be considered an exploit. [Not Allowed]
 
Offenders will be teleported away; repeat offenders may be subject to more serious repercussions.

If you are boarded by another player and wish to have them removed, please report it either by creating a ticket here or by messaging @gm through the in-game Help channel.

We do recommend you keep regular backups of your constructs in the form of blueprints in the case you lose a ship (through intended means (sale, give away etc),or undesired results such as in PVP, you can still recreate it later.    
 
How to Blueprint (to save your ship/build):
Enter build-mode on the construct, right click anywhere on the construct and click “Create Blueprint”. The blueprint will then be generated inside your currently active inventory. It is wise to keep hold of a copy of any of your blueprints inside your personal nanopack, as these are safe and not lost upon respawning.
 
We realize this is not an exhaustive list, and we will expand upon it as time goes on. We also understand some members of our community feel that using a bug or exploit prior to acknowledgement by Novaquark is considered okay. We’d like to state that any intentional use of a  bug or exploit will be treated harshly going forward. This is the one and only warning we will issue on this topic. Please just don’t DU it! 

On behalf of the entire team, we thank you for helping us make Dual Universe a better place! 
 
Sincerely,
The Novaquark Team
 

Weekly Update - December 16th
 
Four rescues were made during the past test, that makes 31 rescues for Alpha 2 and 45 overall.
 
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@maxamized started out strong and notched his first rescue early Friday morning by running some scrap out to @Reaper07 on Alioth.
 
@Dr Rhubarb also scored their first rescue after 283 days in the organization. A lack of being in the right place at the right time both in-game and in real life made his first rescue so elusive. Nonetheless, he was able to aid @Context with what our logs say is a "full ship repair". Not sure how big, but I hope the service was appreciated!
 
Haunty came to @Erquilenne's aid on Sicari with a resupply of fuel on Sicari.
 
Finally, maxamized rounded out the rescues this period with another fuel run to @TheMaGoth on Alioth.
 
The first three rescues were notably in a span of only six hours, more or less with me being totally stuck at work thanks to a change in scheduling. I will say that I was quite happy to turn up during my lunch hour to see the team had handled themselves well during my absence. While this is more or less all individual work, I hope that this is a trend that can continue into the future as the organization and team grows and develops.
 
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This is another short and frank update since it's late in the day for me and I wasn't able to attend testing over the weekend due to some conflicts between my old and new hardware (think it's RAM), hopefully that will be resolved soon though!
 
That's all for now, until next time, fly safe everyone!
 
- DarkHorizon