NQ-Nyzaltar

Hi everyone! This bug should be fixed now Let us know if any of you continue to have this problem. Best regards Nyzaltar.

Hi everyone! To answer your questions: @MinerMax555: The Novark is the 17th Arkship to be launched. Correction in the Lore Bible: "2510-2536: The first Arkships leave Earth" becomes "2510-2536: The Arkships leave Earth." @Aetherios: - To go from Earth to Alioth takes roughly ten millenia. - The Neutron Star reaches our solar system just a half millenia from present day. - In the end, Humanity has no time to send an expedition to Alioth or make extensive research (at least not better than data gathering from a space telescope like the James Webb one). - Before the launch of the Arkships, a list including thousands of potentially habitable planets has been finalized the 15th March of the year 2137. As information about each planet was far from being enough detailed to be 100% sure to find an habitable on first try, the list was uploaded in each Arkship AI memory. As an Arkship approach a potentially habitable planet, a short range scan ("short" compared to the size of the galaxy) is made by the AI to see if the planet is indeed compatible with human colonization or not. So while the coordinates of Alioth were known from before the Arkship Launch, the decision of landing on it was made by Aphelia, while approaching the planet. This also implies that Novark passengers don't know where the other Arkships might have landed. @Smacker: 1) Surprisingly, the atmosphere IS compatible with humans. The similar specs between Earth and Alioth (without terraforming efforts) is nearly miraculous. 2) Cryo-pods and Resurrection nodes are two completely different things: the first preserve the physical body on a long period. The second could possibly resurrect a possibly dead (or recreate a destroyed) physical body. 3) As said in the Lore Bible, the Arkship speed can approach Light speed. There is no other data on the topic as the Arkship engines are undocumented. @Kurock: The decisions for the remaining temporary names/placeholders should be announced before the end of the week. @Stark: Who knows? Best regards, Nyzaltar

The four political movements are just for lore purpose: it's not planned (at least for the moment) to tie these political movements to some specific gameplay. To get the final version quickly, it was planned to decide the remaining temporary names internally. But we never know: if you have suggestions to make, feel free to do so. It's just we can't promise you it will be selected. Yes, Aphelia will be Accessible away from the Arkship. It will be probably her who give tips and advices in the tutorial phase (but this might change as the development of the game evolves). However, keep in mind that the fan fiction must take place before the Arkship landing on Alioth. Yes, side-effect to very long cryogenic sleep can be: partial / total / temporary / permanent amnesia regarding any kind of memories (knowledge, family, etc). Total and permanent amnesia is very rare though. So you can chose whatever you want! There won't be classes in the game. You role / specialization / activity will be defined by the fields of knowledge where you allocate your skill points.

Hi everyone! @Zeal_Iskander, @Archonious: Unfortunately, you will have to write your fan fiction in English to have a chance to be selected: One of the main goals of the fan fiction contest is that all texts can be read by the whole community. Most people in the community are not speaking French and won't be able to read French. So even if a text is really good, it wouldn't make sense to select a text that the majority of people isn't able to read. The fact that Novaquark is a French Company is not relevant on this topic. What matters is what it means for the whole community. That being said, we don't want to close the contest to non-native English writers either: 1) A non-native English writer can seek help from a native English speaker to polish the text in English. 2) The native English speaker must be aware that it can help only on a volunteer basis: he won't be eligible for any reward. 3) If a non-native English writer seek help from a native English speaker, he must submit the complete text before proofreading. Once his text is proofread, he will have to keep both pre-proofread and post-proofread versions of the text available. 4) On a similar topic, we prefer to precise that if several participants write a text together, only the one submitting the text on the forum will be eligible, as there will be only one prize per text. The Contest rules have been udpated accordingly. @Anonymous: Thanks for offering your help to non-native English writers. Much appreciated! Best regards, Nyzaltar.

What is Novawrimo? Novawrimo is a contest inspired from "Nanowrimo" (National Novel Writing Month, in short) that happens during the month of November (from the 1st November to the 30th of November). The goal of NanoWrimo is to write a 50,000 word story in 30 days. http://nanowrimo.org/ Novawrimo is a contest slightly different: - It's not tied to the month of November (meaning there might be more than one contest of this kind in a year). - To be accessible to a broader range of participants, the minimum size of the text is lowered to 5,000 words (which is already a significant). The ideal would between 5,000 and 10,000 words. But if you are really inspired, There is no real hard limit. The rules: - The current Novawrimo contest starts today, Tuesday, the 15th of November, at 9.30 PM PST Hour. - It will end Thursday, the 15th of December, at 9.30 PM PST Hour. - The story should be compatible with what is known from the Dual Universe backstory so far. For reference: The Official Dual Universe Lore Bible The short story written by Alain Damasio The Backstory Page of the official website (Should you spot an inconsistency between the different sources, consider always the Official Lore Bible as the reference) - The story must happen between 2436 and 12477. (one century prior to the Arkship launch from Earth and before the Arkship "Novark" lands on Alioth) - No alien creature should be involved. - Physical violence should be limited (No gore or similar things). - Verbal violence and cursing is tolerated but must stay limited. - Explicit sexual content isn't allowed. - Hate speeches toward specific people, ethnic group, or religion from the real life isn't allowed. - You must submit your text under the form of a PDF file and you must attach it to a dedicated topic (with the tag [Novawrimo] in the title) you created in the "Novaquark Archives" forum section. The PDF file must not exceed 500 ko in size. - By submitting a fan fiction with the tag [Novawrimo] in the topic title, the poster will explicitly cede author rights to Novaquark. While these texts won't be sold under any form, they might be used (fully or partially) as promotional materials in marketing campaign for the game Dual Universe. For more information on this part, read the "Terms of Use" PDF file attached to this topic. Rules Update (17/11/2016): - The fan fiction submitted must be written in English. - A non-native English writer can seek help from a native English speaker to polish the text in English. - The native English speaker must be aware that it can help only on a volunteer basis: he won't be eligible for any reward. - If a non-native English writer seek help from a native English speaker, he must submit the complete text before proofreading. Once his text is proofread, he will have to keep both pre-proofread and post-proofread versions of the text available. - On a similar topic, we prefer to precise that if several participants write a text together, only the one submitting the text on the forum will be eligible, as there will be only one prize per text. Special Thanks to Yamamushi: As the one who helped us to shape this event and helped on the rewards side of the contest, we thank him deeply for his involvement! As he plans to participate to the contest as well, in order to avoid any conflict of interest, he agreed for not being eligible for any reward. The rewards: 1st Prize: - 1 Digital Gold Founder Pack - 1 key for Osiris: New Dawn - 1 key for Space Engineers - 1 key for Empyrion 2nd Prize: - 1 Digital Silver Pack - 1 key for Space Engineers - 1 key for Empyrion 3rd Prize: - 1 Bronze Pack - 1 Closed Beta Key - 1 key for Empyrion Community Prize: - Unique in-game title: "Famous Writer" How the winners will be selected: - For the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Prizes, the winners will be selected by the Novaquark team. - For the Community Prize, the community members will vote for their favorite fan fiction. If you have any question, just let us know! Good luck everyone! Best regards, The Novaquark Team. Terms-of-Use-DU-Forum.pdf

Before starting to read the Lore Bible, here are three things to keep in mind: - Some names and acronyms (put between brackets) in the texts below are still temporary names/placeholders. The final names will be decided in the following days. The update will be announced on the forum and on the social media. We don't want to keep these names, for different reasons varying for each case. Once in its final version, it will be published on the Community Wiki hosted by Gamepedia in a more structured way. - It was a difficult decision but we have to consider that some parts of the short story written by Alain Damasio will be modified or removed. We all agree in the team that Alain Damasio has made a short story of the highest quality, but this short story was written more than a year ago (July 2015) and at that time, too many points regarding the game universe were unclear or undecided. With all the recent additions to the Lore Bible (those released today publicly and those which remain hidden as "secrets" for the time being), it generated some inconsistencies difficult to solve. We tried to find solutions or workarounds, without success. Some points were also not possible to represent in-game, gameplay wise. While the short story will be updated in the near future to fit with the current Lore Bible, in the meantime here are the specific points from the short story you should not take into account when writing a Fan Fiction for Dual Universe (if you want it to be eligible for being integrated to the official backstory of the game, of course. If not, you are not bind to such limitation). Unfortunately, Sohan Decker is not a member of the Alpha Team, as he woke up just a few weeks before the Arkship landing on Alioth and do not participate in the neural simulation that will take place more than a year and a half before the landing. Aphelia memory must have had a glitch when talking to Sohan for the first time. When approaching some Kyrium, the matter doesn't reflect human faces aging or growing younger. Sohan Decker has probably some hallucinations, a possible side-effect of the long cryogenic sleep. While probably convinced of it, Sohan Decker didn't communicate with an invisible entity by using elements and he didn't get some schematics of a high-performance reactor in Kyrium as a reward. The proof? When asked to show it, he's not able to find it anywhere! Poor Sohan. Probably another hallucination. Cryogenic sleep seems to have a lasting side effect on him. - The Novaquark might slightly change the Lore Bible over time, but we will try to keep those changes to a minimum, to ensure that it doesn't contradict fanfictions that have been already integrated to the official lore. These changes will occur mainly when an inconstancy is discovered in the official lore. And in this regard, we count on your feedback to track down every little detail that might seem inconsistent (some details may be awkward on purpose though ). As always, we remain open to your feedback on the Official Lore. Let us know what you think about it! That being said... Happy reading! Dual Universe Lore Dual Universe takes place about 10.000 years after the Grand Exodus when humanity left the Earth to establish itself in new star systems. The information below is meant to help answer the most common questions about the game environment and try to set the general framework where fan fiction can be written. Main historical dates 2027: Discovery of the doomsday Neutron Star that is heading towards the Earth. Collision will happen in 498 years. There are margins of error, so we don’t yet know if it means annihilation or simply major disruption in the solar system’s planets, but the end result is the same: the Earth will not be able to host humanity anymore. The event is nicknamed the [“Star Kiss of Death”], or [SKiD]. It’s basically the Armageddon. 2049: Creation of the United Earth Federation (UEF), a transnational institution in charge of coordinating humanity’s efforts and response to the SKiD. After concluding there was no hope to save Earth, the “Rebirth Program” is launched to analyze possible responses and escape strategies. New measures are voted to encourage natality in the population, to fight against a nihilist movement that advocates a “no future” philosophy and maintain a sufficient level of humans in the long run to fuel the Rebirth Project’s considerable needs. 2084: Better measurements have narrowed the margin of error. We are now certain that the neutron star will hit our solar system, and will actually collide with the Sun, turning into a black hole that will ultimately swallow or eject into deep space all the planets, Earth included. There is no hope anymore. Major funding is directed towards the Rebirth Program. All nation states must contribute at least 20% of their resources 2100: Mankind is entering a new era where robotics and AI have profoundly transformed society. Work as we know it has long disappeared, and social influence has replaced money as the currency of value. People do not “work” anymore, they have “activities” that can get them socially recognized. Money is still used, via a Universal Revenue, mainly as a way to control the scarcity in production, and balance the availability of goods against their rarity. 2130: AI have reached a threshold of global sentience. It is active in political, economic and social debates, and, while its benefits are recognized because it allowed the transition to the post-work era, more and more concern is raised about the sentient aspect and the potentially uncontrollable dimension of the AI agenda. Irrational fear rises. The AIs try to reassure the population that they have no rational reason to threaten humanity, but it only increases the level of suspicion within society. 2145: Massive rebellions all around the world signals the end of sentient AI, introducing a permanent universal ban on this technology, enforced by the very powerful UEF. Against all expectations, sentient AIs accept this and willingly shut down without any form of violent action. 2150: Society is reorganizing itself, as many “jobs” that needed sentient-level AI (surprisingly many, including low skill manual work), are once again left to humans to perform. Robots, in general, are banned also, as most of them required sentient-level AI to function properly. Early attempts at designing automated non-sentient robots all failed in the late 21st century, as it was discovered that sentience was a necessary byproduct of any sufficiently sophisticated AI for it to be able to interact with a complex world. 2200: A major summit of the UEF signals the alarming lack of progress on project Rebirth at the dawn of the 23rd century. Debates continue for years afterward about priorities, what technology to use to build Arkships that could help evacuate Earth, who would be eligible if we cannot host the 3 billion people still in the current population. 2200-2400: Major political events keep slowing down humanity and the UEF in its attempts to advance the technologies needed to build functional Arkships. Many wars, economic crisis, and nihilist terrorism are plaguing the progress. 2400: A period of calm and peace opens up. Major progress is suddenly made in the technologies needed to build the Arkships. Some are scheduled to be built within the next decade. 2440: Several key technologies are unlocked: cryosleep modules, nanoforming technology, nanopack condensers, resurrection nodes (it is unfortunately too late to use this to save humanity, as we would need to install billions of them out of the solar system, on a hospitable planet. There is not enough time for this). 2450: The Arkship technology is now mastered. Mass production begins. The race is on to produce as many as possible. 2500: Terrifying high-resolution images of the neutron star are provided by our most powerful telescopes. Riots break out all around the world over the selection process that dictates who gets to board the Arkships. The process was created by a scientific committee from the UEF, aimed at gathering the maximal amount of genetic diversity, plus a lottery to offset the fact that not everybody could go. Massive euthanasia programs were organized for those who had to stay, in order to provide them with a painless death at the time of their choosing. 2510-2536: The first Arkships leave Earth. Each Arkship is heading towards a particular part of the galaxy. One of them, the Novark, is heading towards the Scutum-Centaurus arm. 2538: The neutron star annihilates the solar system. Arkships are on their way, heading towards different regions of the galaxy. 12477: The Novark arrives on Alioth with a mighty thud as it deploys itself into the planet surface. From afar the planet shows many similarities to that of Earth, a blue and green marble sitting in the goldilocks zone of its star. Large continents surrounded by equally large oceans define the planet's appearance. Mountain ranges suggest continental drift, and large forests have taken hold over most of the planet. Primitive lifeforms are abundant. There are no obvious signs of advanced lifeforms. Year 0 after arrival (0 AA): It will be your turn to write History in-game. The world in 2500 In the century that preceded the Grand Exodus, the Earth’s population had dropped considerably, down to something less than 1 billion people. The “no future” movement had gained a considerable momentum. people were simply trying to tend to their immediate needs; losing any vision for the future or any concern for the consequences of their actions. Natality had dropped to an all-time low, crime had been continuously rising, and nation-states, as we know them, had long disappeared. The UEF was the last large-scale social structure still holding, among a myriad of medium to small sized city-states. UEF representatives and offices, research centers, production units, etc, were scattered all around the world within the largest city-states. The UEF’s role now extended far beyond its initial goals, including a feared and powerful armed force to maintain order and ensure that the proper funding was collected from all city-states, in order to fuel the Rebirth Program. A global language shared by all people on the planet started to emerge at the end of the 21st century. By the end of the 22nd century, almost everyone was speaking at least two languages: the global language (the “common”) and their local native language, each city-state having somehow evolved a variant from their original country’s language. Economy During the first half of the 21st century, the Internet quickly decentralized the economy, removing intermediaries and frictions. Anyone was able to open their own marketplace online, with powerful central aggregators to help integrate available offers. This was both true of goods and services. This highly distributed model of economy stood the test of time, both during the sentient AI era, and even after, up until the last century. One of the main challenges of the last century, after the city-states model had become the norm, was logistics. Transporting goods over long distances carried the risk of being attacked by pirate hordes living outside of the city-states. The UEF and other independent security groups were in charge of ensuring protection, but still, the risk made inter-city trade dangerous, and local markets were the preferred method for basic commerce. A global currency, the [U2] [(Universal Unit)], is installed by the UEF at the beginning of the 22nd century. It has acquired a growing support over the years and is still used as a reference currency on Alioth to help organize the exchanges of goods and services between colonists. Culture & Society At the moment of the Grand Exodus, humanity, and more precisely the UEF, was divided into four main political movements, essentially different from each other in the way they decided to answer one simple fundamental question: what is the main driving force in the development of humanity? Behind this question lies the promise of a political agenda on how to best rebuild civilization after the Grand Exodus and where to put priorities. The [Luminous] are the first group. They consider the main driving force to be knowledge and wisdom. They value science, industry, and technology as the main sources of progress, and were heavily involved in the Rebirth Program, which led to the construction of the Arkships. They are, of course, very much respected for this even if some may criticize them for their all too rational take on things. The Alphas are the second group. For them, the main driving force is, well, … force. They believe that people will respond mostly to strength and balance of power. They favor military action as a way to control and orient the evolution of the world in an attempt to avoid chaos and prevent instability. Their intentions are good, but they often fall to scandals involved with their expeditious way of handling subtle situations. The [Ethereans] constitute the third group. They believe in the power of culture and arts. For them, humanity needs to be driven by dreams, beauty, and ideals before anything else. This is what gives us meaning. They are not against more practical endeavors but like to see these activities as a way to expand and support their vision. They have many supporters but are also often criticized for their lack of pragmatic action. The [Emporium] is the final group. They believe in the power of money and commerce. They think that this has been the life and blood of human societies for millennia and, even if they will gladly regret it in private, they think this is nevertheless what gets the job done and can really set people in motion. Some point to them as a cause of an ever greater inequality, but they know how to silence critics and make people happy. None of these movements are inherently good or bad, they all value human life and sincerely want to help drive humanity to success again. Science & Technology After the early 2400 years, science and technology suddenly advanced very rapidly. Incredible innovation occurred, becoming the foundation of the industrial, societal and economical program of Project Rebirth. Here are some of the most prominent breakthrough: Nano fields: an expected advance in theoretical physics led to the discovery of a new force in nature, called the nano force due to its scale, that allows the fine control of the molecular dynamics of matter with incredible precision using high-frequency nano fields. Nano fields can be focused and modulated in a very precise way to destructure, collect or deploy and assemble matter in a short range radius. This is the core technology that gave birth to the nanoformer that every colonist is now equipped with. Calabi-Yau Compactification: the science behind CYC has been inexplicably lost in the Arkship archives. It is the technology that powers nanopacks, which are extra small containers (that colonists wear on their suit), capable of amazing volume and weight reductions of almost anything contained in them. All we know is that it seems to work based on the possibility of storing matter within the extra dimensions of space-time allowed by String Theory, inside what is called the Calabi-Yau space. The exact science and understanding behind them have been lost and attempts at reverse engineering have all failed. Due to the limited number of Nanopacks available and their considerable value, further attempts to reverse engineer them are discouraged. Nano fields displacement: this is a direct application of nano fields, used to collect, store and maintain matter within containers. The matter constituting objects is analyzed and de-structured first then stored using stable nano fields and can then be retrieved later via a reverse process that reconstructs the original object. Unlike with CYC, only limited volume gain can be obtained, and no weight reduction is possible. Nano 3D printing: based again on the versatile nano fields, advanced 3D printers became possible. They are capable to assemble matter from reservoir sources to build small sized technological parts; from electronic to industrial units. Coupled to the automated assembly, this quickly became the basis of the industrial chain. Quantum branching: Quantum Branching is at the heart of the Resurrection Node technology and is based on the “Many Worlds Interpretation” of quantum mechanics. At any moment, in particular, when you die violently, several versions of the universe coexist in parallel. Scientists working on EPR pair experiments unexpectedly found a way to instantly switch one universe with another, and in particular to switch the universe where you die with another one where everything would be exactly the same, except that your body position would be inside a Resurrection Node. The amount of matter to switch increases the energy cost of the operation, so RN teleport only the minimal set of mass to get the desired effect, which is... your naked body. A Resurrection Node is paired with your body and cannot be used by somebody else. It will make you virtually immortal, even if natural aging will probably get you out of the loop at some point. Propulsion Engines: the conquest and exploration of the arrival star system, as well as nearby other stars, is a clear objective of the UEF for each arkship colony. Several engine technologies have been perfected as part of the Rebirth Program to allow for various flight modes, either within the atmosphere or in space. Warp drive technology was near completion and should become available a few years after the arrival, and even stargate instant transport has been sketched as a not too distant possibility but was unfortunately still not available at the time of the Grand Exodus. Warp drive speed is believed to be in the range of 100 times the speed of light, while super warp probes, that could be used to seed stargates, could reach up to 10.000 times the speed of light Making it possible to cross the entire galaxy in just 10 years. Environment & Alioth Alioth is a rocky planet orbiting a yellow dwarf star, very similar to the Sun. It has been selected due to its very similar Earth-like environment, including oceans, forests, mountains, and lakes. It has a moderate fauna and flora. The temperature during the day is similar to what can be found on Earth, but nights can be extremely cold. The planet underground contains all the usual materials needed for basic industry, but more rare resources may have to be later harvested from one of Alioth’s three moons, or even from more distant planets in the system. The planet day/night cycle is only 5 hours, and its weather pattern is relatively stable. Overall, Alioth is a very life-friendly planet, carefully chosen to facilitate the starting years of colonists. The Arkship The Arkships are a marvel of technology. They can host millions of people in cryosleep for extended periods of time. Made out of Kyrium, they can sustain incredible amounts of deceleration or acceleration, and absorb the corresponding crushing forces for whatever stand inside them. The origin of Kyrium is not well documented, and it seems that the material cannot be produced from a known industrial process, but has probably been found during some mining operations within the solar system. Designed to travel close to the speed of light for extended periods, the Arkship engines are also not part of the colonist UEF documentation and no assembly schema could be found within the archives. There is much debate over why the UEF would intentionally withdraw such potentially useful information. Each Arkship is controlled by a proto-sentient AI that was allowed to be built against the very strong UEF AI ban because it was argued that it would have been to hazardous to let the fate of humanity rest with dumb automatic machinery that would possibly not be able to react to unexpected situations. While being an exception to the AI ban rule, the onboard AI is still however not allowed to take control of any machinery or robot beside the Arkship itself. The Novark AI is called “Aphelia”. Once on approach to the destination planet, the Arkship is designed to literally “plant” itself into the planet, to allow the deployment of deep geothermal energy collectors that should sustain the ship functions for potentially unlimited amounts of time. One of the key functions of the ship once arrived, is to deploy a 20km radius safe zone area where colonist would be free from any form of aggression from the outside, or… from themselves. It was indeed decided that the potentially violent nature of mankind under stressful situations should be mitigated with appropriate supervision. Within the safe zone, Aphelia is in charge of maintaining order and providing support and information to colonists. Regrettably, one known consequence of prolonged cryosleep periods is that the subject will suffer from a loss of episodic memory, as well as most high-level cognitive memory like expertise, skills or know-how. To mitigate this side-effect, the Arkship archive contains large data banks that are transferable to colonists via a wireless data transfer process involving brain implants capable of stimulating neural activity. The process is slow and can take days for the most advanced skills, but is an effective way to re-enable lost knowledge for long time space travelers. The Arkship extreme energy efficiency, designed to allow the ship to travel for millennia, forced trade-offs on what could be embarked in order to minimize the total mass, and of course, human bodies were preferred over any other “mass”. For this reason, and because nano 3D printing would make it possible to easily rebuild them, no ship or industrial machine was included inside the Arkships’ cargo. Humanity would have to rebuild civilization from scratch. A large set of Resurrection Nodes tuned to each registered colonist where however installed inside the Arkship to avoid any loss of precious life once arrived on the destination planet. For these reasons, the inside of the Arkship, besides the propulsion machinery, is mostly occupied by cryosleep pods, as well as Resurrection Nodes. Alpha Team While most of the Arkship passengers will wake up after the Arkship landing, a few thousand among them become half awakened between a few years and a few weeks before the arrival: the Alpha Team. While their bodies are still asleep, their brains are awakened and connected to an advanced neural/computer network that immerses them collectively within a virtual reality that is meant to simulate their first steps on the destination planet, for education and testing purposes. During this simulation, of course, nobody can die (this represents the Alpha phase in-game). They are given easier access to certain resources in order to help them experience various stages of the tasks they will have to face in real life when arrived. The Alpha Team will then be in charge of guiding newcomers and helping to bootstrap the first months of civilization rebuilding on the destination planet. Mysteries The cryosleep memory loss side effect and the apparently incomplete archive has given birth to several mysteries for which colonists have developed many “theories”: Kyrium is an absolute mystery. Nothing is available in the Arkship archives about its nature, how it was found, how to create it or even manipulate it. No colonist have the slightest memory about the Kyrium. If Aphelia is asked for information on Kyrium, the Novark’s AI will just give an elusive answer, explaining its lack of information as memory loss. Obviously, this is not a satisfying answer. Aphelia is in charge of the Novark and the well-being of all the passengers. She seems as caring as invasive in the private life of the colonists. While she doesn’t seem brutal, hostile or coercive by default, her behavior is perceived as if she monitors every action of each human that has been aboard the Novark. She also seems to avoid disclosing information on some specific topics - at least that’s the feeling of some passengers - despite the fact she always says if she doesn’t give a satisfying answer, it’s because the answer is beyond its capabilities. For these two reasons, many colonists think the AI is not trustworthy. Aphelia seems to have incredible defenses against hacking, far higher than anything the most experienced colonists in hacking have ever seen, reinforcing the feeling that the AI might hide a lot of things. The Arkship light speed engine is completely undocumented. No schema is available to rebuild one using 3D nano-printing, or by any other means. There seems to be no trace of the records pointing to the destination of the other Arkships within the galaxy. Best Regards, The Novaquark Team

No, that means that not following these rules will prevent a text to be integrated in the official lore. However, if the rules violated are also mentioned in the forum chart, then yes, it could lead to the text removal and possible sanctions (we hope it won't be necessary to go that far). Best regards, Nyzaltar.

Putting the [Fan Fiction] tag is only necessary in the case you post your text outside the forum (for example: on a devblog), to avoid generating confusion, and separating it clearly from official lore. This has been clarified in the post above. Best regards, Nyzaltar.

As you may already know, Dual Universe will be different from many MMORPGs due to its Sandbox aspect. One of the particularities is to make the evolution of the storyline directly tied to what happens in-game. This might include the integration of fan fictions in the official storyline. However, it won't be possible to make it happen without a few rules that will preserve consistency and equity among players. Of course, it's totally possible to write a Fan Fiction without strictly following the official lore. In that case, keep in mind a few things: - You cant' use Dual Universe nor Novaquark in the tittle of your fan fiction. - You must put the tag [Non-Canon] in the title of the Fan Fiction - You must put the tag [Fan Fiction] in the title if you publish the text anywhere else than the official forum. - Do not expect to see the Fan Fiction integrated to the official storyline. - Expect many players to ignore it in their roleplay, as for keeping consistency when roleplaying with each other, it's only natural that players aim to have the same lore references. Now about the necessary rules to follow if you want to see your fan fiction integrated in the official storyline: - Please read the official storyline first. - The fan fiction should be compatible with what is known from the Dual Universe backstory so far. Nothing in the fan fiction should be contradictory with what has already been published. Note: an important Lore update is planned for Tuesday 15th of November 2016. This might give you answers to a lot of questions you migh have until now. It's highly recommanded to not set into stone what you have imagined for your fan fiction before having read this update, if you aim to see the fan fiction integrated. - The content of the fan fiction must not include content from another game of fiction universe. - The fan fiction should not give any status advantages on specific Player Characters over others. Example: a Player Character involved in a fan fiction can't become the captain of an Arkship or the Prime Minister of a country prior to the Arkship Launch, just because the author of the fan fiction has decided this. - No alien creature should be involved. - Physical violence should be limited (No gore or similar things). - Verbal violence and cursing is tolerated but must stay limited. - Explicit sexual content isn't allowed. - Hate speeches toward real people, real ethnic groups, real religions isn't allowed. - Real politics proganda isn't allowed. - If the fan fiction is integrated to the official lore, you accept to transfer to Novaquark the right of using the fan fiction content for promotional purpose of the game, without expecting any additional reward or financial compensation in return. - Ultimately, Novaquark staff reserves the right to validate or not a fan fiction in the official storyline. That being said, we will try our best to integrate as many as possible, and will help writers in this direction if they ask for help. Of course, we remain open to the community feedback and suggestions to improve these guidelines! These guidelines will be updated on Tuesday, 15th of November 2016. Best regards, The Novaquark Team.

Hi everyone! @ghoster: Despite how you might feel, we are not going in radio silence mode. A few points that we want to clarify here: - We never expected either to have a success as large as Star Citizen for many obvious reasons: we started to really communicate about the game a few months ago, we had no celebrity in our team and no big brand to put in front. That alone were legitimate reasons to keep our expectations realistic. We are already amazed to see how far we went in a such short amount of time and we are not going to stop there! - As Pang_Dread mentioned it, we communicated in the last Kickstarter update that the communication now won't be as intense as it was during the Kickstarter. - A few things are coming soon: 1) new forum sections will be opened on Wednesday 2nd of November 2) a newsletter for the end of the week (with some stuff that might interest more than one ) 3) a fan fiction contest that will take place from Tuesday 15th November to Thursday 15th of December! (more info very soon!) @Anonymous: We can understand that you are concerned about our current lack of presence. However, you should understand in return that you can't expect the same presence from a Community Manager in a big company or being a part of a big structure than one in a small company. Why? Because in small companies (like indie studios), people are generally brought to do more than the exact job written on their contract. If not, then the company might quickly run into some problems to work properly. Just a few examples: - Apart the communication from JC, all the comm from the devs is handled by the CMs (who are doing the link between devs and the community). - Managing discussions on Facebook and Twitter is totally within the job of the CMs (it's really disturbing to say the contrary). - This might be shocking but yes, Customer Support can be something a CM has to do (and right now, this is also part of our job). - Internal, invisible tasks related to Kickstarter and hugely time consuming are also among the things we currently have to do. - Despite what you're saying, Reddit can also be an appropriate place where a CM might have to interact with people interested in the game. All in all, we would love to interact a lot more with you guys than what we are currently doing. We will do our best to increase our presence in the coming months. A few replies are coming soon to some important topics. Best regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi everyone, The Kickstarter Update we released last Friday (21st of October) should have answered a few questions already. (the update is available here) So in a nutshell: 1) Community portal and Devblog are reachable by a "mouse over" action on the "Community" section on the website. But if it was said for making these more visible, we are currently looking into it. 2) Regarding an option to receive news from devblog to your e-mails, you can already "follow" the devblog to be kept informed when a new post is released. Maybe making it more visible where you can follow the devblog? 3) As said in the Kickstarter update, we are more for the "we release an update when we have something new worth to show". But we can try to make a short recap in each newsletter (which is meant to be monthly now ) Let us know what you think about all this! Best regards, Nyzaltar.

This is something that have been answered in the Kickstarter Update #15. You have also more details about our way to define the priority order in the comments of the same update Best regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi everyone, As the topic is derivating seriously in the last pages, it's going to be closed. To all those who are wondering if the current level of funding already include the pledge withdrawal, the answer is yes: The pledge amount is updated in real time. If someone unpledge, it's immediately reflected to the amount pledged on the Kickstarter page. @ChipPatton: To sum up your point of view: 1) Our communication is canned because we didn't reply directly to your community's experience. 2) You didn't try to discuss with us because the previous reply was canned in your opinion. 3) You said the PLEX is inefficient against goldfarming. 4) You assume that I'm convinced DAC is the perfect too and that, apparently, only my opinion counts in the Novaquark Team. 5) You consider that globally we are non-caring. So to address this (very) subjective declaration: 1) We read your community experience and we understand that your experience with PLEX hasn't been fun. However, just looking by the prism of one experience, and refusing to look at the bigger picture is something we can't do as game developers: The problem you encountered is something that you would have encountered sooner or later even without the PLEX existence. Why? If unfair players want to harass a specific group and they have money for it, yes, the official staff can close as many accounts as possible if those use gold farming sites to get a lot of in-game money, but the unfair players will come back again and again, as money is not a problem for them. This is a neverending story. As an EVE veteran player, you probably won't refute the fact that you can harass anyone with fresh new toons, only a few hours old, in Tech1 ships in EVE Online. Again, even without the PLEX/DAC system, the problem remains as a whole, only less visible. So what you consider as a "canned reply" is just a different opinion from yours. 2) Avoiding to start a discussion just because we have a different opinion from yours, and that there are chances it wouldn't go your way... It has indeed no chance to convince the Novaquark Team. Self fulfilling Prophecy here. But you have no right to complain if you didn't even try. 3) Three big developers/publishers seem to disagree: CCP, Blizzard and NCSoft (Carabine studios). Beside that, as gamers, we didn't experience the consistent huge amount of PLEX/gold selling you're mentionning in EVE (Yes, we have EVE players in the team). Do you have something to back your declaration about PLEX system being inefficient beside your own words? If it's the case, we are interested in this data. 4) The Community Manager status seems to have been misunderstood here: having a personal opinion and making the communication (both ways) between players and the Novaquark team are two different things. Whether or not I'm convinced of something is irrelevant in this case: If players have concerns about one aspect, I transmit the message to the team. If the team has an official stance on a topic, I transmit it to the players (the reason why you received twice globally the same answer). Now, while the team won't change a feature as important as the DAC system on a whim, if some solid concerns followed by facts are given in a well-argued discussion, everything is possible (except coming on what has been already promised to other players such as Kickstarter DACs). However, loud voices and threats of unpledging without solid reasons will not affect game design decisions. 5) Just because we have a different opinion doesn't mean we are non-caring. We care about every opinion. However, we are also realistic about the fact that we cannot satisfy everyone. Nobody can. If you have something else to discuss with us that are not: - Your (unfortunate) experience on EvE Online. - Assumptions of the real intents of the Novaquark Team (like implying the DAC system has been chosen by greediness, when the game is free, the expansions will be free and there will be a free trial period when starting the game... not really a good way to start a reasonable discussion with a developer). Then by all means, send me a private message on this forum and I will transmit the message to the team for discussion. Best regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi CodeGlitch0, Reminder: If you want a quicker answer about the Kickstarter campaign during the Kickaster campaign, it is best to ask the questions in the comments of the Kickstarter page. All questions are regularly answered there. To conclude the topic: Yes, Alpha and Beta phases won't require a monthly subscription (but you will need Alpha and/or Closed Beta Access Keys to participate to these phases). We thought it wouldn't be fair to charge a sub for an unfinished product. Best regards, Nyzaltar.

@johan26: To make a few things clear (before closing this topic that was ongoing for too long): 1) Arguing the fact that the limited success is just due to the monetization model is a very very biased statement to justify a point view. True, it had an impact, without a doubt. But if there was a calculated factor to reduce the amount of players interested, it was this one. We don't want to publish a "mass market" game to apply to any kind of player. And it's also just a matter of financial viability: Dual Universe might the first MMORPG to use cloud technology to host the game universe and it will have a cost per player. Yes, Dual Universe will be a niche game, but with a community probably much bigger than all those against the subscription model can imagine: Free to Play and Buy to Play have shown they weren't perfect models or the ideal solution for every game. In short, there are not the prophetized evolution as they were presented. There are just alternatives, and alternatives that make sense in specific cases. As it is now, they're are not the models that make the most sense for Dual Universe. Plain and simple. 2) If you don't see other reason for the slow progress of the kickstarter, here are a few that are quite obvious: - Dual Universe was nearly unknown 3-4 months ago. Visibility takes time. A lot of players that can be potentially interested are not even aware yet of the game existence. - There have been a few recent events (notably one very ambitious Sci-Fi game made by an indie studio that promises a lot more than what has been really delivered) that generated - understandably - a lot of distrust to the genre and we happen to have started the Kickstarter campaign in the middle of that. This is very unfortunate, but we couldn't reschedule the kickstarter campaign for later. So we have to deal with it. - There have been several kickstarter projects that have disappointed recently, generating - again understandably - some distrust to the crowdfunding model. This didn't help to promote the game either. We still think that Kickstarter is a powerful way for indie developers to finance their game, even if there are projects failing. It's not a perfect model (no one is), it's true it can be improved, but it's a model that need to exist, just because it's a relevant model in many cases. Failure shouldn't make loose faith in a model or a genre, especially when there have been also many success, but this is something only players can decide on a personal level and the mood nowadays tends - unfortunately - to see the bad without seeing the good. We hope this will have answered most of the questions on the topic. Best regards, Nyzaltar.

The might be some big confusion and hasty conclusion here: - We are talking here about deconstructing partially or totally a construct, in a clean way, like reversing the construction. - Salvaging is a totally different thing, that might be implemented later (possibly after official release) under two possible forms: harvesting scraps of a destroyed construct in battle, or "reprocessing" a whole construct meaning scrapping it entirely to take back a good part (not all) of the materials originally used to make the construct. Best regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi everyone, It won't be possible to deconstruct or remove parts from a finished construct. Primarily because we don't want people to tear stuff into pieces for retro-engineering purposes. This way we can protect smart players ideas and protect their Blueprint's value. What might be possible after the game's release though is possibly adding new parts on to a finished contruct to improve it. We're considering that, and what impact it might have both positive and negative, so it's not something that's set in stone. Best regards, The Novaquark Team.

Hi everyone, It seems the basic rules of this thread have been vastly ignored. In return, all posts who weren't following these rules have been archived. So as a reminder, I repost it there: If you want to present cases that illustrate your point of view, do it in your post. If you think a case raised by another player is not relevant, you can do it, but do it in your post by explaining why as shortly and clearly as possible. Don't reply to each other each time someone says something, this inflates the topic, making the task to keep in check what are the most important points difficult. Thanks in advance for your cooperation. Best regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi everyone! We are aware there has been a very hot debate this week about the DACs being unlootable/not possible to steal from their owner. We apologize for the late reply (the Kickstarter campaign is something getting most of our time at the moment) and we thank you for your patience. We always try to find a compromise, an acceptable solution for different categories of players, without favorizing a specific one (because a sandbox game needs as much PvP players than non-PvP players). There has been a few misunderstandings and this thread is here to dissipate them. As we know many of you are passionate about the topic, there will be a few rules, to keep the thread clean and clear, easy to read: - No Meme. - Explain only in one post your point of view (and edit it if you want to add something). Of course this doesn't count for replying on further Novaquark posts in the thread. - No flaming, no provocation toward any other participant of the topic. If some these rules are broken, your post might be edited or removed without warning. Apparently there has been some confusion/misunderstanding about what has been said on the Kickstarter page in the comments (it seems the misunderstanding comes from here). To the question: "Are DACs physical items?" the answer has been "No, the DACs are digital items". However, that was said in the sense "It's not a physical item in the real world". There have been so many occurrences about the opposite question regarding the "Arkship Passenger ID Card" being considered as a digital reward (while it was a physical reward, an item you get in the real world) that we apparently misunderstood the real sense of the question in the Kickstarter for the DACs. So, to clarify: DACs are digital items in the sense there won't be any under physical form in the real world (like a prepaid card or something similar). However, they will be "physical" in the virtual world of Dual Universe in the sense that you will be able to move them from one inventory to another. It would make no sense if they weren't movable as it won't be possible to put them on the market. This is one of the question that is still in discussion on the game design level: markets outside safezones, destructible or not? Possibly yes, but in that case, the way to handle unlootable DACs wasn't very appealing to the team (an item travelling through space to go back to its owner in case of the market destruction is a bit immersion breaking). However, there are several huge implications (and concerns) of having being markets destructible (and that's probably why it's not possible in EvE). CaptainTwerkMotor sees the fact of "DAC being unlootable" as something making the DAC a "Pay-to-Win" weapon. We're not sure to understand how he came to this conclusion so we would like to hear his reasoning behind this. We hope he will answer to this question below in the thread. You have a point in saying that some emergent gameplay would be missing. And you have also a point saying it could be acceptable to have DACs lootable if there was a 100% safe way to use them and/or transport them. So why something similar to the EVE redemption system hasn't been chosen right away? The main reason was: game development time. Developing a solid secondary inventory system outside the game, tied to the account instead of a character, interconnected with the game and a payment portal at the same time, and all the ramifications that come with it... is something far from being trivial. It will take a significant amount of time to develop, to test and to be 100% sure the system is bug free. For the official release, the DAC system at the moment is supposed to be pretty simple: A player buy a DAC on the payment portal, he choose the character on which he want to drop the DAC and a moment later, the player can find the DAC in the character inventory. As some of us in the Novaquark team are EvE Players, we witnessed the chaos that followed the introduction of the PLEXs in EVE. With our minimalistic system (at least for now), if the DACs were lootable, we expected to experience such chaos. So we opted for the DACs unlootable (unless there was a game breaking loophole). It seemed to us a quick and easy solution, quite similar to the EVE redemption system regarding the effects: as it was possible in EVE to transport PLEX in a secure way (keeping PLEX in the redemption system and dropping them only in safe, non-PvP areas like NPC space stations), we honestly didn't think it was such a big deal to have unlootable DACs. However, seeing it is for a large part of the community, we will aim to something similar to the Redemption system, as it still seem to us an acceptable compromise for every player profiles (even if it represents extra work). We can't promise it will be implemented at official release but we will do our best: CCP had a much larger team when they implemented the redemption system, and on our side, we have already a huge roadmap ahead for a team of our size. Moreover, it will be less painful (both for the community and the dev team) to start with unlootable DACs becoming lootable in the future, than the contrary. There's something that needs to be very clear here: again, we didn't change anything immediately on a whim, just because some people had issues. We did it regarding our roadmap, and we honestly thought it wouldn't be a big issue for the community as it seemed to us there wouldn't be a big difference between unlootable DACs and an EvE-like redemption system. We still think the reaction has been disproportionate on the topic, but as a redemption system is still a good compromise for both PvP players and Non-PvP players, we are totally ok to go with that. It will just take more time to do it (and push back a bit some other features on the roadmap). Loud voices without a well-reasoned opinion/feedback will never work. Loud voices won't influence the dev team decisions (we thought it was pretty clear with the Divine Reapers case on the forum) Well-reasoned feedback (like the discussion here) can. That and game development time constraints. Regarding Scamming: As long as it won't be a scam using a bug exploit, and have some way to be avoided by being a minimum careful and responsible, this will be up to the player (who supposed to be an adult) to not trust completely a person he just met. For all other cases, the Novaquark Team reserves the right to intervene: sandbox doesn't mean "letting the game turn into chaos". On a side note: Dual Universe is not meant for children. It has never been designed for them. Regarding Griefing: Ambushing a player is part of the gameplay. Harassing some players repeatedly for any reason (be it vengeance, to make them leave the game, etc) is another thing. In this second case the Novaquark Team reserves the right to intervene: again, sandbox doesn't mean "letting the game turn into chaos". You have a point here. And that's why there's a need to have 100% safe way to handle DACs, by making them unlootable or having a system as similar as possible as the EVE redemption system. You made two good points here. And the dev team takes this factors into account. Credits will be immaterial and not lootable. Regarding character death, the current game design (it might change) is the following: When a character dies, it will loose all he has in his inventory. A part will be destroyed. The other part will be lootable. Best regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi ChipPatton and welcome to our forum. There has been indeed a few people on the Kickstarter saying DAC was a "Pay to Win" feature. We also replied to why it wasn't and why we went for this feature. We also agreed that it probably wasn't a perfect model, but it was the best we found until now. This was our official reply: The DAC/PLEX/CREDD system isn't at fault there. The problem is elsewhere because without this system, the problem remains: it's just hidden. And it's not because something is hidden that it doesn't exist. The people we got in contact with (probably your officers) turn a complete blind eye on our point of view. They didn't try to understand our position or even suggest an alternative. It's always easy to blame or criticize something without trying to come with a better option. In this situation, how could the discussion go anywhere? Threatening to cancel the pledges (and doing so) won't change the situation either if there no dialog and just threats. We want to listen to feedbacks from all people interested in our game and take them into account, but without constructive feedback helping to find a good compromise for both sides, it's not possible. Also, while we want to satisfy as much players as possible, We are also aware that we can't satisfy everybody. In any case, we remain open to discussion if you have more to say on this topic. Best regards, Nyzaltar.

Thanks a lot for your understanding Best regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi Kytheum and welcome on the official forum. I'm sorry to be the bringer of bad news, but what has been mentioned to the Galactic Empire may also apply - to a lesser extent - to your organization. Please read our answer regarding the use of Star Wars material here. Best regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi MrStarWars and welcome on our forum. It was planned to contact you soon, but as you opened a thread on the forum, this will be much easier as it will clarify some points for all other members as well. There are many fans of Starwars in the Dual Universe Community. However, while we want to give as much freedom as possible to the players, Starwars material is copyrighted. To copy openly the Starwars Universe as much as you do, we can't allow that for several reasons: - The most important one is copyright infringement. As the community portal has a goal of promoting player-generated content, you can't use copyrighted material (not made by you) to promote your organization. In fact, to do the things well, you should ask permission to the author for each material not made by you (even if it's not copyrighted), to use it for your organization. - Using Star Wars material can be extremely misleading for newcomers: We are NOT a Star Wars game. Dual Universe has its own story, and while we can understand you really love the Star Wars Universe, our game is not the right place to recreate it. So in short, you can't use material with iconic characters or spaceships and the same applies for words like Palpatine, Darth Vader, and such. You can reproduce in Dual Universe a social/political structure similar to the Empire in Starwars, but you can't say "Hey this is Starwars!" Getting inspiration from the Starwars style for your spaceships can be tolerated, but you must keep in mind that at any moment, if we receive some complaints from Starwars copyright owners, we will have to remove it. This is the risk of copying something that already exists. We didn't delete anything until now, because we wanted to get in touch with you first. We hope you'll understand our position as we ask you to remove obvious starwars content posted by you on the Community Portal. In the case you wouldn't do it by yourself within a week, we will remove it without further notice. Best regards, Nyzaltar, Community Manager at Novaquark

The Devblog dedicated topics are going to be all moved in the "Rules & Announcements" section. I'm precisely doing that right away. Best regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi everyone, I'm going to make this reply both in English and in French to avoid any misunderstanding. ----------------------- Bonjour Citoyen et bienvenue sur le forum official de Dual Universe. Ce n'est probablement pas clair pour les nouveaux venus, mais dans la mesure où le forum est - pour le moment - intégralement en anglais, il y a une règle implicite d'essayer de poster des sujets en anglais, par politesse pour les autres. il y a sur ce forum des joueurs dont la langue native est l'espagnol, l'allemand, le polonais, le russe ou le français, et ils font tous l'effort de poster en anglais même si ils ne sont pas à l'aise avec cette langue. Nous pouvons totalement comprendre que certains joueurs ne sont pas en mesure de parler couramment anglais, mais dans ce cas, il reste toujours la possibilité de passer son texte en anglais via Google Translate (même si le résultat ne sera pas parfait). Depuis le début nous avons encouragé que tous les membres de la communauté communiquent entre eux, quelque soit leur pays d'origine. Du coup, lorsque quelqu'un vient sur le forum pour dire "je fais un sujet juste pour parler à ceux qui parlent la même langue que moi", il est compréhensible que cela soit vu par un certain nombre de membres du forum comme peu amical et impoli. Dans la mesure où d'autres ont fait l'effort avant vous, nous ne pouvons pas faire de favoritisme. Il y aura probably à l'avenir des sections de forum pour chaque langue mentionnée au-dessus. Mais dans la mesure où le jeu sera exclusivement en anglais jusqu'à sa sortie officielle (la localisation dans les autres langues devrait venir après la sortie officielle), nous préférons, dans un premier temps, conserver le forum à l'image du jeu concernant les langues parlées. Nous espérons que vous comprendrez notre position. Cordialement, Nyzaltar. ----------------------- Hello Citoyen and welcome on the official Dual Universe forum. It's probably unclear for new comers, but as the forum - for the time being - exclusively in English, there is an implicit rule about trying to post topics in English, to be polite towards others. On the forum, there are people for which the mother tongue is Spanish, German, Polish, Russian or French and they all make some efforts to post in English, even if they are not comfortable by doing so. We can totally understand that some are not fluent in English but in that case, there is still the possibility to translate the text in English by Google Translate (even if the result won't be perfect). From the beginning we have encouraged that all the community members speak with each others, regardless of their country. That's why when someone come on the forum to say "I'm posting a topic just to talk to those who speak the same language as me", it's understandable that it could be seen by other members as unfriendly and impolite. As others have made efforts before you, we can't favorize anyone. There will probably be dedicated forum sections for each language mentioned above in the future. But as the game will be exclusively in English for the Official Release (game localization in other languages should come after the official release), we prefer, at least for the time being, keep the forum according to the game regarding the spoken languages. We hope you will understand our position. Best regards, Nyzaltar.