CalenLoki

There is already an solution (confirmed by NQ) for "how to get someone to mann the guns of your cargo ship without forcing them to sit for hour doing nothing when not needed".  It's called multiple characters per account. You simply leave your friends mining with their mining characters, while their fighting chars sleep on the ship while you pilot. When someone attacks, they simply switch chars and start manning the guns.
No AI needed.
 
That being said, IMO it should be possible to manually give commands to more than one gun per person. The game has planned only lock&fire combat mechanics, thus sitting at your single AA gun and from time to time selecting single opponent seems nothing like interesting combat. It's like being commander with only one subordinate (AI gunner) with only one possible order to give (fire at him). Being able to control multiple guns at least let you choose which one to use, which one shoots where, how to distribute power between modules, even driving your ship at the same time, ect.
Only limit should be players ability to manage all of this, and engineering skill to make it easier.

Back to the economic reasons to build cities. Someone mentioned large factories/power plants as being more effective. That won't change much - people will just build as big as they need/can afford.
 
It would work much better if factories for anything higher tier than "very basic" were only available in XXXXL size, producing only one type of component, and requiring each other in close proximity. Their production output should easily fulfil needs of hundreds of players. But their upkeep cost (whenever they are being used or not) makes them economical if you use them constantly.
 
There is also all the simple artificial stuff - kind of "aura" that work only in certain proximity, and has constant high upkeep cost, no matter how many people use it. They work great in games that try to encourage city building (i.e. Anno series).
Stuff like "laboratory" that you need x amount nearby to unlock certain tech level. 
 
Another incentive for independent players to gather and build stuff in one place could be de-centralised trading system: Instead of single "trading hub" that handles whole stock market, I'd rather see a lot of smaller, private shops co-existing next to each other.
How to? Make the trading system super simple: Owner of the shop is owner of all the goods in there. He's also the only one who can create passive offers ("want to buy", "want to sell"), and everyone else can only accept those offers (which is always less profitable). That create need to build a lot of shops of various sizes, with individual landing pads, storage buildings, item dispensers, ect.
Of course Trade Information Unit gathers the info from all shops all and display them as "stock market", so finding the best offer is not a chore. But you need to physically go to specific shop and buy the stuff in person.
It also clears the problems with "What happen when my resources are in shop that get looted? Do I get refund from shop owner?" or "Someone flooded my storage with tons of dirt".

Sundies can't spawn vehicles, only infantry. And for that we have spawn room.
 
I'd rather have all short-distance travel conventional. Wan't reinforcements? Bring carriers full of fighters (so your downed pilots can fly something again). Retreat and repair larger units. Protect those carriers by either placing them in safe distance (at cost of slower reinforcement) or escorting them.
In general pay adequate price to tactical advantage.

DU will have some kind of infantry PvP. NQ also wants to encourage teamwork in various activities.
And I think most agree with me, that forcing players to specialise roles increase the importance of teamplay in infantry combat.
IMO it's also important to switch off hand-nanoformers during combat, as they have potential to be extremely OP and immersion breaking.
 
We have inventory system. But because you'll be able to hold cubic meters of matter (or i.e. dozens of different weapons), it can't be used for specialisation.
We have leveling system. But It allows seasoned players use everything, while new players can't use anything. Not much specialisation I'd say. It's more of a tool to split playerbase.
Commonly used in RPGs and shooters "classes" usually heavily and arbitrary limit creativity and customisation. Or require tons of sub-classes, which are pain to balance.
 
Thus I suggest implementing "loadout" system. It's kind of similar to typical "class" in most RPGs, but more open for customisation, and also not permanent.
Loadout can't be changed in combat. You're stuck with what you had equipped once someone turns nanoformer-jamming-devicenearby (possibly just alternative mode for nanoformer itself. And TCU for larger scale). Thus changes on the fly are not possible.
 
Loadout consist of main tool, 4 secondary tools and 3 ability modules.
 
-Main tool will be usually some kind of weapon. Anything from carbine or shotgun to heavy machine-gun or anti-material rifle falls into that category. Also old-school mining drills that can bypass RDMS.
 
-Secondary tools are meant to either enhance main tool, or suplement it's weakness. So sidearms, melee weapons, spare mags, nades, stim-packs, explosives, ect.
 
-Abilities allow player to perform specific actions, which truly shape the way you play. Players can either focus on enhancing single ability by using multiple modules of the same kind, or mix them for specific playstyle. Available modules:
Battery increase avatar energy storage and generation by 100% (each battery). So while it doesn't give any new ability, it allows using other modules longer or more often. Sprinting uses energy too, so even battery-only build is viable. Storage increase inventory space by 100%/module. Useful for long exploration trips if you can't bring hover-cargo-drone. Jump-pack allows you to jump quite high (or if every player can jump, make it enhance jumping). Equiping more of them allow you to jump much faster, but not further - for that take jetpack+battery Shield-pack allow projecting force-field in front of you. It has limited coverage angle and drain energy both per time and per prevented damage. Taking more shield modules increase their coverage and increase efficiency of prevented damage (good against multiple opponents or to shield teammates). However it increase energy drain per second, so for long-lasting protection better take more batteries. Stealth-pack allows you to remain invisible. But just as shield, i's directional. It also drain faster when you move fast. Take more of them, to increase coverage angle and reduce movement penalty. Take more batteries for longer quicker recharge. Exo-arm allows usage of heavier weapons or reduce penalty of using those (like slower locking time). Ammo-pack can be mounted in two ways. Either it connects directly to main weapon, making it drain energy rather than use ammo in mags, or can be used for filling mags in the field.
Lore: ammo pack is shielded from jamming (all the nano-forming happens inside), thus can always work. Healing-pack allows healing team-mates (when mounted as active) or fill stim-packs of your team-mates (when passive).
Lore: personal body armour has ability to convert any received hit into heat. But need coolant or time to get rid of it. Healing pack allow shielded nanoforming of that coolant.  Grappling hook allows getting to various spots. Less dynamic than jump-pack, but allows hooking to fast-moving vehicles or pulling other players (help teammates climb or pull enemy from the cliff). Repair-pack allows small scale nano-forming of constructs. It's incredibly slow, due to working against jamming. But for small repairs it's all you need. Mining-pack allows (or increase speed of) mining. Or allows bypassing RDMS limits on mining after FFU are down (during battle). Equip more to be more efficient against harder materials (or even able to mine them), equip batteries for faster mining of soft materials. Control-pack allows piloting constructs. Take more to pilot bigger things. Can't think of a way to make it with battery... maybe each construct drains energy, so need high regen to control multiple small ones? Spy drone pack - allows third person camera. The further the drone, the more energy it uses. Equip more for better range-efficiency, equip batteries for longer fly-time at short range and quicker drone repair after it's shoot down. Nano-jammer - allows jamming hand-nanoformer (thus initiating combat mode). It keep working even after wearers death, until switched off manually.  
Because player would be limited to only 3 (maybe more, maybe less) modules, that would force them too specialise.
For mid-range fire support it's probably smart to take shield+ammo+battery. For frontal charge into close range: shield+shield+shield.
Combat medic would pick medic(active)+grappling hook(to pull downed allies into cover)+battery(to use ability more often).Or maybe shield instead of hook, to heal without worrying about cover.
Surface-miner would probably take mining+battery+battery, while cave explorer: mining+storage+storage and deep miner: mining+mining+mining.
Sniper: stealth+battery+battery. Maybe jump or hook to get to elevated positions. Close-range assassin may want more stealth than batteries, to close gap quicker. Maybe drone to know where to strike.
 
All those would of course be available in various qualities, based on resources needed to make them.
And character leveling could allow using those higher quality items. Or simply boost efficiency in specific field.
I'd rather avoid forcing player to choose more than mentioned 8 elements - that would quickly grow tedious if you had to take 50 of them.
 
 
What do you think? Any alternative ideas to encourage/force specialisation in infantry combat? Any more ability-modules you can think of?
 
 
PS. I searched forum for: inventory, loadout, equipment, class. Nothing similar found.
PPS. I refuse to call character leveling "skill". That's term I reserve for actual player skill, not how long they have an account.

@CoreVamore IMO that's too artificial. Salvaging is basically the same as removing parts from your own constructs, and should follow the same rules. What if I attacked a base/ship to take it over and keep it, not just to loot/destroy? Do I have to scrap whole construct and build my own?
 
Of course you shouldn't be able to make blueprints of captured construct or access Lua code (IP protection). But no other actions with constructs should be limited just because you're not the original owner.
 
Also IMO encouraging people to salvage by making it faster than mining is a good way to make the space and planets cleaner. If it's too slow to be viable, we'll end up with tons of space garbage flying everywhere. We just need to make sure that there is not much left after battle, but it should be well worth picking up.

I think you misunderstood my post. You still have access to your character - the only thing suspended is % of character skill level.
 
Example: when you die you get -50% levels. Every 1 hour that penalty is reduced by 1%. After 50h (2d2h) you're back at 100%.
 
Now if you still think that would lead to any support calls, please explain why.
 
 
Pissed off players? Any more than after loosing expensive ship, equipment and resources that they need to work to regain (rather than just waiting)? Doubt it.

Because it require very good connection speed and responsiveness, as lags affect it quite a lot. No game that I know of can support fluent twitch-aiming combat with hundreds of players close to each other, destructible environment and vehicles. Also don't forget that all players will be on the single shard, so those who physically live close to servers would have huge advantage over those living far away.
 
Another reason is that a lot of players just don't like it, and prefer combat to be based more on well thought decisions, rather than being forced to think and act fast and precise. And NQ seems to target those players as their playerbase.
 
I wouldn't mind FPS, but won't cry when it's not implemented.
And I'm glad it won't be implemented poorly - that would kill the game.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barrage_balloon
 
Nothing new

Player can belong to multiple organisations. But he can choose to repersent only one of them.
You couldn't see all of them, because it should be possible to hide belonging to some of them.
So you'd be only able to see what he wants to show you (i.e. only his name).
 
Quite useless feature if you ask me.

First thing first, IMO balancing anything by hidding it behind waiting is the lazy, and in the long term inefficient way. It also promotes multi-account, which is P2W.
 
Besides that, I could see this idea working, but on much limited level: you can loot someone's "tag box" which allows you to use elements this person could use (buttons, diors, storage, control units). But no access to things like org management, elements rdms management or modifying constructs. Just physical objects. And just until he reset the tags (either few hours from death, from first use or set number of uses)
 
You also couldn't see what's inside the box - you can just guess what doors are now open for you.
 
And in the org logs it should show "hacked access", not tha poor man's name.

IMO it would be the best with weapon grouping. So if you can handle controling multiple guns, then good for you. But if you have weapons that differ greatly (tracking speed, firing angles, ect.) You better have more people to help.
 
There are tons of other tasks that could encourage multi-crewed ships, i.e.: combat repairs, boarding, piloting small crafts as direct support.
 
Just please, no mindles sitting and clicking, that could be done by dumbest AI.
 

IMO it would be the best with weapon grouping. So if you can handle controling multiple guns, then good for you. But if you have weapons that differ greatly (tracking speed, firing angles, ect.) You better have more people to help.
 
There are tons of other tasks that could encourage multi-crewed ships, i.e.: combat repairs, boarding, piloting small crafts as direct support.
 
Just please, no mindles sitting and clicking, that could be done by dumbest AI.
 

@Orius
It's a bit difficult to recommend a box-only voxel editor, as voxels, in general, in games such as LandMark, carry slant information, as such creating angular models like this should be possible:
 
 
With that in mind, I recommend you simply use Blender, or any other free 3D modelling program.
In Blender, using the 'Remesh' modifier on an object will give you voxel-like behaviour, with the Blocks mode showing you which 'voxels' would be mostly full in box mode: 
Keep in mind, they've shown in the videos for the player construct voxel-density to be 0.25m, so if your goal is to create game-feasible models, make sure scale your model to fit roughly 4 of these boxes in a single grid line (which you can consider as 1 meter in blender).
 
Then flipping the modifier into Smooth or Sharp mode will show you how your Blender model might look recreated in a voxel engine:

 
As you can see, my model had very thin detail in the rear, that was smaller than the voxel engine could handle, which means I would have to reduce the detail in that part of the model, or increase the overall model size, increasing how many voxels I have for detail:

Hi everyone,
 
It seems the DevBlog was not clear enough on some points.
We have said it many times before, and we'll continue to say it again:
While many players wants to see Dual Universe with a dominant gameplay aspect, it's important to understand that it's NOT the case. 
 
Building gameplay is as important as Combat gameplay. Not more, not less. Balancing both won't be easy and we are aware of it. No, Building is not the major feature of Dual Universe. If the Building aspect has been made first, it's only because, it was making total sense to start the development with this part: we are pretty much in R&D field regarding the Voxel technology. It was an essential piece of tech to build the base of the game: Voxels were necessary to create editable planets in the first place. Then the logical next step was to develop tools to give players to manipulate voxels. That wouldn't make sense to develop Combat gameplay before the two previous steps because, there wouldn't even something to destroy, or even an environment where the combat could happen.
 
The order in which the features are developed are NOT by order of importance.
It's just a matter of logical game development roadmap.

We have no plan to make Dual Universe a total free for all PvP game, just as we won't make it a whole game universe safe, just because some players want to explore it completely without taking any risk. While we don't plan to make our game some kind of "EVE Online 2.0", we don't want either to make a "No Man's Sky 2.0". We understand this may not appeal to everyone taste, and we totally understand that. However, if there is something that is very unlikely to change, it's the fact that there's no intention to catter to only one specific category of players. 
 
A final word about the griefing and the mindset of the community. Our point of view is that griefing mainly proliferates when it's an easy way to get rewards with little effort, not necessarily because many people really wants to play that way. Of course, there are people who like to grief just for the enjoyment of annoying other players but we are convinced they're not a majority. If game mechanics are designed in such a way that griefing doesn't give easy rewards, then griefing will be naturally limited. 
 
Why not simply remove the possibility of griefing, then?

Yes, it would be clearly easier and quicker to remove the ability to grief other players, but while we have no intention to encourage griefing, removing it totally would go against the very definition of the sandbox concept: players are free to interact in the way they want. If we remove any kind of interaction, then we are not in a Sandbox MMORPG anymore: we would be in a Theme Park one. And that is not Novaquark's vision. We want a game universe where bad behavior is discouraged by game mechanics and heavy in consequences if a player still choose to do so, than arbitrarily forbid the said behavior. We want players to be free but also to live with the consequences of their choices. That's what Sandbox mean to us at Novaquark.
 
Best Regards,
Nyzaltar.

I'd prefer if nametags were not visible by deault, unless you point your crosshair at him, or tag him for tracking (i.e. your whole team during combat).
So hiding in the crowd would be still possible, unless someone is checking every single passing person (or just spot you by accident).
And sneaking, ambushing, hiding and things like that would be player-tactical-skill based.

Make ammunition expensive. 
 
- In EVE Online ammunition needs to be cheap and plentiful, because of the PvE elements in the game. As far as I've heard, PvE (shooting AI controlled constructs for loot) is not really going to be a thing in DU, therefore it can be expensive enough that shooting some random newbie for a few units common materials is not worth the trouble.
 
The economy of PvP needs to be tuned to the point where blowing something up is only worth it for political reasons or punishing reckless greed. For example, the ammunition required to destroy the most basics of constructs should always cost more than said construct. If someone is hoarding wealth, they should need to invest a portion of it to protect it, or use some other means to make it not worth the effort, such as setting up in some obscure location. 
 
This obviously wouldn't stop an individual from throwing away their time to blow stuff up without a tangible reward. But, when scaled up,  it does prevent a significant portion of people from spending more time blowing up trivial things, than it does to acquire the tools/consumables to do so.  On the flip side, there is a need for potentially lucrative targets, as well as accessibility for players to engage in PvP for fun.
 
There does need to be some degree of persistence for all players, so blowing someone's stuff up should be a calculated or consensual decision. It's mostly an economic problem that will require a lot of tuning to find the right balance. 
 
I've played in many games where anti-griefing mechanics get abused, so I would first target the problem economically. Also, having an accessible and engaging combat system, where shooting targets that shoot back, is simply more fun than shooting people who are trying to gather resources or flying their first ship, would go a long way.

Engineering for combat. So building things, then blowing other things with it. Or getting blown, then building better things.
 
Quite possibly in semi-protected environment, like player-made sport arenas. Just to be able to spend more time building/fighting than searching for opponents.

Just to voice my opinion:
 
1. Any automatic reputation system is going to fail at identifying who's really the bad guy. And I don't want such easy to go around system to decide on quite core game mechanics (like ark safe zone).
If I see someone building dirt around my base (or right outside my TCU), I gonna shoot him dead, as it's only way to stop (or at least slow down) his vandalism. And IMO I shouldn't be punished for that.
And don't forget that safe zones are not spread all around the universe. They are around ark, and on moons around Alioth. Pretty far (by that I mean - time consuming to travel) from all other planets. Thus they can be used by pirates quite rarely anyway.
 
2. Protective bubbles are not meant to protect from PvP. They are meant to force PvP, rather than PvOfflineBase.
 
3. Main game mechanics to discourage attacking everyone on sight should be economy.
For example: If ammunition is more expensive than you can ever earn by destroying ship (unless it holds or protects cargo) then griefers will be able to destroy others much less frequently (because they need to earn monies to buy griefing tools).
Or for extreme example: ammunition required to destroy ship is more expensive than said ship. Thus you need really good reason to attack the guy. Otherwise you waste more of your own time than his.

Just to voice my opinion:
 
1. Any automatic reputation system is going to fail at identifying who's really the bad guy. And I don't want such easy to go around system to decide on quite core game mechanics (like ark safe zone).
If I see someone building dirt around my base (or right outside my TCU), I gonna shoot him dead, as it's only way to stop (or at least slow down) his vandalism. And IMO I shouldn't be punished for that.
And don't forget that safe zones are not spread all around the universe. They are around ark, and on moons around Alioth. Pretty far (by that I mean - time consuming to travel) from all other planets. Thus they can be used by pirates quite rarely anyway.
 
2. Protective bubbles are not meant to protect from PvP. They are meant to force PvP, rather than PvOfflineBase.
 
3. Main game mechanics to discourage attacking everyone on sight should be economy.
For example: If ammunition is more expensive than you can ever earn by destroying ship (unless it holds or protects cargo) then griefers will be able to destroy others much less frequently (because they need to earn monies to buy griefing tools).
Or for extreme example: ammunition required to destroy ship is more expensive than said ship. Thus you need really good reason to attack the guy. Otherwise you waste more of your own time than his.

I'm not trying to "change the game", all I'm trying to do is to make sure that prospective DU players understand what they're getting into.
 
DU is a FFA-PVP game with loss of all items on death. If you're not comfortable with that, don't play.
 
NQ seem to have some idyllic notion that DU can support all playstyles, but that is a pipe-dream at this point. And it will remain a dream unless they have some highly original game design ideas that have yet to be revealed...
 
If you give players guns and buckets as tools, those that pick up the guns first will also eventually own all the buckets.

You know the saying - there are sheep (just wanna do their thing in peace, and not have to do a thing to protect themselves) there are wolves (just wanna shoot everything in sight - only rule is what a man can do and what a man can't do savvy) there are sheep dogs (dangerous people that have fun protecting the weak and innocent and hunting wolves)

Looks like we have plenty of sheep and wolves already, if we get enough sheep dogs things can be well balanced without needing too many silly artificial rules.
 

Space Warfare
 
 
 

I think 4 types of detection wouldn't enforce tactic, it would only enforce gambling.

Then we'll have BOO1, BOO2, BOO3, ..., BOO69, ect.
A lot of hassle for everyone (players, devs), and doesn't really help much.

@Lethys It all depends on effort required to run those sensors.
Hypothetical question: Does the fact that they have full detection running means my fleet (of the same cost, player numbers, tech level, character level, player skill, ect) without that much detection will have significant advantage if we meet?
Is it something like 1% of their total investment, thus cheap no-brainer that everyone need to check out to be stealth-proof?
Or closer to 20%, which gives them advantage over stealth fleet (which spent even more on being stealthy, maybe 50%), but put at severe disadvantage against one dedicated to raw firepower?
Is that ratio constant, thus viable for both small and large fleets? Or maybe stealth is totally OP in small and totally useless in large encounters?
 
The problem I see is that stealth, which gives quite constant advantage, scale with size (proportionally or even exponentially harder to make large stuff hidden). While countermeasures have quite constant cost, thus are large investment at low level, and pretty much no cost at high. Thus at low level you have quite random chance to sneak past enemy (because you're stealthy against half of detection systems, and enemy can't afford to have them all. Dice roll if they see you), but at high level you have absolutely no chance (they always have all the detection equipment, because it's dirty cheap).