TheRealBeowulf
-
Posts
66 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Posts posted by TheRealBeowulf
-
-
@lethys:
Balancing will definitely be a thing, although I don't think it would be too hard to do it in a good way.
Also: most things will have to be properly balanced, weapons for example could also cause a lot of complaints, if there are balancing issues.
About ramming and torpedoes: I don't think that this would be such a huge problem (explanation on that can be found in my second post).
Let's just say that I see things a bit different, and at this point we won't be able to find out who is actually right unless the feature get's implemented (if it ever does)
To sum it up: If I got you right you would say, that if it's implemented in a stable, well balanced way you would like to have collision damage?
-
I don't think that EVE is comparable to DU in terms of server technology. EVE has static zones that are basically handled by standard servers - of if there are hundreds of people in one zone, the load on the respective server would increase until dilations are inevitable.
Dual Universe uses cloud server technology instead and doesn't have fixed zones or shards. The system is able to dedicate more and more server power to more crowded regions, so I would assume that it's a completely different thing.
The workaround solution I have in mind is not comparable to more realistic solutions for collision damage, it basically would use the exact same method to calculate collision damage as for weapon damage - so a single collision wouldn't actually add more load than a single shot fired.
The only difference is, that instead of weapon stats and player skills, construct speed and mass would be used to define the amount of damage.
Of course things like realistic after-impact movement, rotation speed and torque would not be taken into account in this method, but it would for example enable crash damage when falling to the ground, or a fighter crashing into a cruisers hull while trying to avoid AA-gunfire.
Maybe it's just me, but I really do think that having a basic collision damage model would add some nice and immersive features to the gameplay.
And keeping on discussing about it might actually lead to a solution - I am aware that this feature might not be a high priority, but it would be nice to have it at some point.
Novaquark said that they remain open to workaround suggestions, so maybe someone comes up with a good idea.
But that will most likely not happen if we just say its not possible.
-
@lethys:
I absolutely agree that the server already would have to keep track of a lot if things, although some things like keystrokes, scripts, damage and movement-physics calculation will most likely run client side (if I remember it correctly, NQ said something like that, I but can't find it right now). So I assume that the server would "only" have to take the values provided by the client.
It's just that I don't see how using collision points and the damage model(which will both already be in the game), plus two values (speed & mass), possibly from the clients, would cause so much more server load, at least compared to the features that are already planned.
I would assume that if it is done like that, the server itself would just have to calculate the collision point, while speed, mass and damage calculations could be run client side.
Maybe someone from NQ could give us some input on that topic, so we don't have to completely rely on our own theories.
-
@lethys:
I get your point
I still feel that we are talking past each other.
I'm not talking about some kind of realistic damage model, or a lot of additional calculations, just about using the checks that the engine has to run anyway - with or without collision damage.
I would assume that speed, mass, vectors and collisions are things that the game already needs to check very frequently - or how should the game know how fast you can accelerate, where you are right now, if you can land on that platform (or even on another ship) and not just fall through?
How should the engine know if your ship is already touching the platform, if it doesn't check collision points anyway?
Also, touching the platform / ground will usually slow you down to zero - so it does interact with the ships speed.
And if the engine is able to handle the weapon damage of large battles (let's say about 50 shots and also 50 hits / damage locations per battleship every second), it should easily be able to handle one or two collision-damage locations per two ships / second.
I don't think that the game would crash because of that, if it does, it could potentially crash at almost any time, even if there's not much going on.
So, ramming tactics would be an absolute valid thing, you just would have to take into account that you would most likely lose a lot of ships - so maybe retreat would be the better idea.
Maybe I should ask a mod to change the topic's title to "collision damage - workaround suggestions".
Again, this topic originally wasn't meant to be about high end, super realistic, calculation heavy damage models - just about possible ways to handle it in an easy way, so it doesn't have to be completely abandoned.
In the original post, I mentioned the AMA video and the KS post of Novaquark first, which already make it clear that realistic collision damage won't make it into the game, but maybe some kind of workaround.
And my question was: If it is implemented in a stable way that doesn't cause lags and crashes, would you like to have this feature?
-
Thanks for your your replies!
Maybe you got me wrong on some things, because JC already said that realistic collision damage isn't going to be in the game - so that wasn't my point.
What I'd like to know is, if it is not a performance issue (-> maybe if a simple and fair workaround is found), would you like to have it in the gameplay?
Also, my suggestion is about a workaround that uses the damage system they want to implement for the weapons in the first place, so it's quite different.
This is also not about realistic movement of debris and things like that, it's just that at least something would happen if a ship crashes, instead of just bouncing off (which would feel a bit weird in my opinion).
The idea was, that maybe they could use features that are already in / planned for the game, so they don't really add something to the load.
@wizardoftrash:
Yes, I've played Space Engineers, actually quite some hours...
But that is somewhat different, because they are aiming for realistic damage physics which won't be in DU anyway.
Also, afaik, the main problem of space engineers is the grid system, not the physics in the first place.
I don't think that checking speed an mass is an increase for server load, as they have to do that for flight physics and keeping track of the constructs anyway. Like I said, collision checks also are in the game, otherwise you couldn't land a ship or even walk on a planet's surface. The devs mentioned at some point, that they are using the collision system of unigine, I'll try to find the link and post it here.
I don't know if they keep track of that on the server side or just client side.
The damage system they want to use for for the weapons is meant to handle battles with hundreds of ships constantly hammering each other with their turrets - if it can handle that, it would most likely not increase the server load that much just because of a few collisions.
Ramming will surely be the tactic of some people, but as I said in my original post, I don't think it would be a very common thing, as it is costly.
-
Collision damage workaround idea – recycling code that already exists / is planned:
Caution! Another long post
As NQ said, collision damage might still make it into the game, if a less-costly (in terms of calculation power) workaround is found.
My idea on this topic is: why not try use features that already exist / are planned for the game?
The following suggestion is not about an accurate simulation, but hopefully it’s easy to do.
As always: please correct me if something is wrong or has been changed!
First, what do we need:
- The game engine does collision checks anyways, enabling core gameplay features like walking on / landing constructs on the ground or other constructs (touching==collision) this has already been showed in multiple gameplay videos. -> So I’d suggest that collision points are basically already there
- The damage system JC talked about is relatively accurate for weapons, (specific points of constructs can be targeted). Also different values like material, shields, angle and player/weapon stats will be used to calculate the amount of damage, which will be applied by something like a “damage sphere” (radius might also depend on the said values). – also already planned
- Next thing: ship movement (direction, speed) - probably no problem to calculate
- Last but not least: the mass of the colliding constructs. As the mass is said to be used for flying-physics, I would suggest this is also something the game already “knows”
So, we should have the point of collision, the code for damage sphere calculation, relative construct speed and construct mass.
I suggest that the damage spheres are not only affecting one construct, but everything in their range (JC mentioned that players inside the damage bubble would also take damage).
If it’s like that, I would suggest using the mass of the smaller construct for the calculation (otherwise, for example the collision with a planet would always cause mass destruction J ).
So, you could basically use the relative speed and mass of the constructs to calculate a damage sphere, which is generated at the collision point – and that’s basically all.
This idea isn’t about a realistic simulation and doesn’t include realistic movement after collision, e.g. two ships drifting apart after impact.
Also, turning speed / movement wouldn’t really matter (-> a cruiser turning on point without moving in any direction could possibly wipe a nearby smaller ship away, causing no damage because V==0).
Additional Limitations
In addition to the above, I would suggest that setting some limits could be useful:
- Lower speed limit: collision damage might not be a thing below a specific speed (e.g. 10m/s), so that small collisions and docking maneuvers don’t do harm (reducing server load)
- Maximum damage limit: limits the size of the damage sphere / damage amount to a limit that the game can handle (collision of a death star and a planet would otherwise cause a lot of server load)
- Minimum mass: this could be used to prevent small projectiles / debris from doing any damage, so they won’t be an issue (-> should be below the minimal mass of a complete small ship to avoid unfair advantages)
Greetings
TheRealBeowulf
-
Collision damage – thoughts on gameplay:
So, as I’m really curious about this specific topic, I’ll just start with my thoughts on this.
Note: some things might be subject to change, and maybe I have got some things wrong, so please feel free to correct me
(quote / link to the correct info would be nice
)Caution: this is going to be a somewhat longer post…
I definitely agree with NQ, that people ramming other ships could negatively influence the gameplay experience, but I think that this may not be such a huge problem in DU, because:
- Specialized ramming ships would require very heavy armored parts to keep damage minimal for themselves – this would make them very costly (resources) and also very heavy
- Players won’t be able to just “spawn” creations in DU, gathering the necessary resources will take quite some effort (you could also build more lighter ships, instead of one heavy).
- Heavy ships will most likely not be very nimble, unless you use lots of and / or very powerful engines -> the ship would become even more costly.
- Energy / fuel is said to be a mayor limiting factor, so people will most likely have to choose between engines and weapons
- the lack of weapons and / or the limited maneuverability would make them easy prey for lighter ships with better weaponry, or ships specialized in boarding
- For the most other ships, I think that people would want to avoid damaging their ships, so they’ll try to avoid ramming (repair costs).
So I would expect that this kind of ship might rather be an exception than the first choice for battles.
Torpedoes - I can’t actually say that I wouldn’t like to see those, but I think that they wouldn’t be so common because I’d expect them to be somewhat difficult to handle:
- In the video about server technology, JC Baillie says, that far away objects are less frequently updated – which makes targeting moving constructs with unguided torpedoes difficult if not impossible over distances
- Torpedoes need for example propulsion and a firing mechanism to launch them from a ship (maybe also a guidance system) – this is often quite tricky and doesn’t handle very well, unless you put a lot of effort in building and scripting those – which would make them rather rare and their production almost exclusive to more experienced builders / scripters.
Last but not least, the main reason for me to still hope for collision damage as a feature is the immersion and the engineering aspect of ship building:
- No collision damage would also mean no fall damage for constructs. This could also lead to a very carefree piloting style, which is also not very immersive.
- dropships (or drop pods and other single-use landing devices) could in theory just be simple “boxes” without engines, and would still fulfill their purpose. This would, in my opinion lead to some disadvantages for people who are more into proper built constructs with proper systems.
(Note: suggestions like: “…just try to think of the ships as they are so advanced, that they completely avoid collisions.” Just don’t seem to work for me when it comes to boxes without power sources or engines – no offense
)Greetings
TheRealBeowulf
- LurkNautili and BliitzTheFox
-
2
-
Hello everyone!
Collision damage has already been discussed at some points in other posts, but I didn’t find a post especially on this topic, so I’m starting a new one.
In the latest AMA Video, https://youtu.be/efu_129hI9o JC Baillie talks about how the weapon and damage system (note: construct vs construct battles are still a stretch goal) may work, and that precise collision damage will most likely not make it in the game for several reasons.
The main reasons he mentioned are:
- Very high server load for precise collision damage calculations, that could kill the game performance especially in large ship battles
- Unwanted playstyle of some players, who could mostly rely on ramming ships in battle and / or build kinetic torpedoes as weapons, increasing the server load even further
After the AMA video, Novaquark was asked about this topic again in the kickstarter comments, and their answer was the following:
“…Collision damage is one of the most costly feature (calculation-wise) that can be imagined in a voxel-made environment. It is (at least for the moment), not compatible with a massively multiplayer, seamless environment. There are a few games where realistic collision damage system has been implemented. By making this choice, they sacrificed the possibility to have a massively multiplayer feature running smoothly. It was a tough choice, and on our side we opted for the other solution. We know it's not the best for game immersion, and we remain open to all suggestions that could be used as a workaround.”
This brought up a few questions to me, especially these:
- What does the community think about collision damage? Is it a feature that a lot of players would like to have (if it's stable and balanced of course), or do you think, that this would not benefit the gameplay?
- What possible workarounds could be there?
I’m looking forward to your opinions and suggestions!
Greetings
TheRealBeowulf
Edit: Please note that this topic is not about realistic collision damage models, because they are already confirmed not to be in the game - It's about possible workaround ideas!
- Schoff and LurkNautili
-
2
-
@Leonis:
At least the so called "inception syndrome" (that's what NQ called it, maybe the name will change?) will be available. It is ingame, but you can build and test and even create blueprints without necessarily having sufficient resources and without anybody being able to bother you. It'll be like some kind of creative mode. There are no plans for external editors or import of designs from third party software besides that, at least as far as I know.
-
@Phroshy:
In one of the dev blogs
https://devblog.dualthegame.com/2015/09/18/lua-script-and-distributed-processing-units/
they actually talk about plans for something you would call more "hardcore" physics ("...Engines are real (they physically push your ship where they are, with the power they have)"). So if they manage to implement it as planned, thruster positions will matter.
Most likely this would also mean, that the cornering capabilities of ships won't depend on gyros like in SE.
-
If you just want inspiration without actual building, then Everspace could be a good choice. It's a really good looking space game in my opinion.
-
@Dygz_Briarthorn:
You may be right if it's only about small craft, but for the larger ships you will be able to use voxels for almost everything. You will most likely also be able to use voxels to cover or hide elements. In his ship-building-video, JC Baille said that wings are only decorative elements for players that aren't so much into building and that you could also use voxels if you like. The voxel tools that are shown the newest update video also look quite promising in terms of creative freedom
A thing that I've been missing so far, but which will hopefully be added, is some kind of glass / transparent material. The control room of the large station that's been shown in the trailer didn't seem to have glass windows.
-
And if you want a colony-ship of a few hundred meters in length (maybe even kilometers) that is capable of landing on a planet, things might become even more complicated...
There are some pieces of concept art that show anti-gravity engines - maybe they'll do the trick for some larger constructs, if they actually make their way into the final game.
-
-
Welcome to Exo Dynamics – Your No. 1 Choice for integrated System Development and Production!
Exo Dynamics Ltd. is your partner for development, integration and scripting of advanced technologies.
Our company was founded in 2024 on earth as a manufacturer of high end components for heavy industry and aerospace corporations. Exo Dynamics was among the first companies that aimed for the establishment of orbital factories. This has enabled us to push the limits of production capabilities on earth, and get closer to our goal of reaching the stars.
Ever since the 26th April of 2027, when the dawning destruction of earth of earth was discovered, we have been pushing the limits of technology to avoid the almost inevitable extinction of mankind.
After the landing of the arkship, our goal is to supply you with everything you need to be able to rebuild our civilization – from Allioth to deep space.
Planned Services of Exo Dynamics are:
- production and sale of high quality elements for ships and constructs
- upgrading hard- and software for ships and constructs
- planning, constructing and scripting of ship- and construct systems for your needs
- manufacturing of small to mid-size crafts in limited-lot production for customers without own automated production capabilities
- tech development
Exo Dynamics is located inside the Terran Union.
All personnel must be legal citizens of the Terran Union.
We are currently not employing.
Employment will start when more information about the actual gameplay mechanics of Dual Universe is revealed.
We will be active in Alpha Engineering (Organisation) once the Alpha of Dual Universe starts.
If you have questions about our company, our services or future jobs, please feel free to contact us!
We are looking forward to hear from you!
-
As I would at least expect the mesh elements to go through a lot of changes during alpha, this would most likely mean that older blueprints would break because of parts being changed or even missing. Also some materials might be changed, or like it also happened in Minecraft, the code for elements could be changed. This would also most likely cause blueprints to break.
So I'm not sure if keeping blueprints will be a matter of intention in the first place.
-
Hello everyone!
As far as I can tell, the distance between planets in a solar system will be much longer than in the recent trailers (JC Baille also said that in the god mode trailer).
Novaquark said that you will first have to unlock warp technology, because the distance will be too long to travel effectively with standard engines. It will probably take a long time (weeks or even months in real time) after the release to gather the necessary tech to reach other planets. The Stargates, that will be necessary to reach other solar systems - which will be even farther away, may actually not be implemented from day one.
One main reason for that is that they want to encourage players to settle and work together instead of quickly go their own ways and leave you with a mostly empty universe. Also, this is meant to make discovering new planets and systems feel like a real big achievement.
So I think we can expect really great distances.
About rotating planets and real orbits: somewhere in the Q&A (I think it was near Q&A 30 or so) Nyzaltar said, that they have 3 options for solar systems in mind, static planets with the sun only rotating in the skybox, only rotating planets and real orbits.
For now, it's only the skybox.
If they find a way to make a "sticky" planet atmosphere, so that ships in the atmosphere could move along and so remain static relative to the planet, rotating planets will be the solution they are aiming for.
Real orbits will most likely not make it into the game for several reasons.
Such a mechanic would require everything (asteroids, planets, player build ships and structures) to follow an orbit, otherwise static space stations could for example be run over by a planet.
Also it would make navigation much more difficult, as you would have to calculate where your destination-planet would be when you will arrive.
Just like it is a thing with real-life mars missions, distances between planets would change over time, making it more expensive (time and fuel) to get there in some times.
Like many other aspects of the game, this may all be subject to change.
Greetings
TheRealBeowulf
-
Hi!
Nyzaltar talked about this in The Q&A (Q&A 5):
https://board.dualthegame.com/index.php?/topic/841-ask-us-anything-event/
There is also some concept art available about so called anchor units, which may be early concepts of rotors and pistons and docking / merge elements:
http://dualuniverse.gamepedia.com/Anchor_Units
I also asked the devs about that topic (especially about docking and merging units and about "inter-construct" scripting) in the kickstarter comments and had a little discussion with another user. The reply we got from Novaquark was the following:
"...Guys, keep in mind these are advanced possible game features. And we are nowhere near this stage. We have Autopilot/Docking gameplay as a stretch goal, but it's not among the first ones..."
As you can see, those things are planned, but nowhere near a point where we can talk about details.
Greetings
TheRealBeowulf
-
Hi everyone,
Just to clarify on this topic:
We totally understand that First Person Shooter gameplay would be more immersive.
However, we have to take everything in account. And when we do, then we have to make some compromise.
We want combat, but combat is not the main feature of the game. Only one of the main features, equally important with building, real massively multiplayer system in a single-shard universe, exploration, trading, etc. Once this was sorted out, it was logic that we wouldn't sacrifice things like the massively multiplayer aspect just to have the best First Person Shooter possible. In that case, even if it's not the best combat mechanics (we totally agree on that), target locking combat gameplay is the answer for the best compromise. So it's not a decision led by personal taste, but really the most relevant decision on the technical aspect in our case.
We totally understand that it won't appeal to every player.
We are aware that our game won't satisfy everybody, and it's the same for any game.
Best regards,
Nyzaltar.
Thank you Nyzaltar for making this clear!
I must say, that this is not what I was hoping for, but the decision is perfectly understandable.
Having tab-targeting confirmed makes me even more curious about some other combat related mechanics, which may not have been decided on yet.
The first thing I'm wondering about is how damage is going to be handled.
With tab targeting, I don't see a possibility to have a realistic voxel-damage model, since we won't be able to target specific points on the hull of enemy ships.
So, will ships only be one entity with a specific "health-bar" and some random cosmetic damage marks (like scratches, holes, fire) depending on the remaining health? Or will there be Subsystems and maybe even hull compartments, that can be locked on?
For example, if I fire all available weapons on the port side of an enemy ship, will the damage also mostly be on this side, or randomly generated all over the ship?
This also leads to another question: If the enemy ship is, let's say on my starboard side, will I only be able to use my starboard weapons, or do all weapons simply add up?
Another question is: are there plans for dogfighting mechanics? There are some suggestions on this forum on how this could be achieved, even with tab targeting - so, is that an option?
Since ship design and efficiency was mentioned in the dev-blog to be a core element for ship designers, is that only going to be about, let's say things like acceleration, fuel efficiency and aesthetics, or is design also going to influence combat durability?
If it is, then how could armor placement influence a ships health and durability, or is armor just going to add up (means you could, in theory, just craft a huge "block of armor", put engines and turrets on it, and have an incredibly durable ship)?
Boarding an enemy ship has been mentioned as a possibility in the dev-blog, so (if there already are plans for that) is this going to be a scripted event, or may there be some options to decide where to cause a breach and then board the ship with your crew members?
Another thing would be repair mechanics - how could that work?
I know that the game is still in a very early stage of development - at least when it comes to gameplay mechanics - but I'll try to take my chance to point out some questions and ideas, as long as things aren't set in stone
Greetings
TheRealBeowulf
-
I found the topic where NC-Nyzaltar posted some thoughts about orbit to ground combat and collision damage:
https://board.dualthegame.com/index.php?/topic/388-few-questions-on-ship-and-ground-mecheanics
(I hope the link will work - sometimes it doesn't when I'm writing on my phone)
He said that orbit to ground combat might be a possible feature. The DEVs are also thinking about collision damage, but it might be difficult to handle - so it might not make it's way into the game.
-
There's another topic where weapon mechanics from the interview are discussed:
https://board.dualthegame.com/index.php?/topic/775-target-damage-combat-and-fixed-weapons/#entry6338
They didn't say that there won't be collision damage, but that adding this feature could have a large downside when it comes to server resources (I think it was Nyzaltar who said something like that , but I didn't find the post)
I would also really like to see things like collision damage (and also oxygen mechanics - I know I already said that
) but we'll have to see if the DEVs can find a way to implement this in such a huge scale project without killing performance.In this early state of development we all have the chance to tell them what we would like to see and what features are most important to us. So keep up the discussion and never say never
-
Thanks for your welcome posts!
-
In an interview with JC Baille on the XPGamers YouTube Channel, he said that weapon damage an hits will be calculated based on weapons and skills of the user. Hit probabilities will be used, and there won't be actual projectiles. I also read something like that in other posts - this method is said to be a lot less expensive when it comes to server resources.
Having projectiles as separate entities would kill performance in large battles - at least with server technology that's available today.
Plese correct me if I got that wrong, but I think that's how weapons are planned to work at the current state.
-
@Fitorion:
I like the Idea of the Babylon 5 hyperspace-mechanic, but I don't know if that is suitable for stargates.
For ship based jump drives this could definitely be an option.
It would actually be very similar to how the Nether in Minecraft works - I'll give a short summary, in case there are people here that haven't played Minecraft:
The Nether is a kind of sub-dimension in minecraft, that you can enter/exit via portals (they can be placed anywhere).
This dimension is connected to the "overworld" in a way, that when you enter the nether at one point, travel 1000m, and then build a portal and go back to the overworld, you exit at a point 8000m away from your starting point - in the same direction.
This mechanic is often used as a fast way of travel in Minecraft and should be doable in a similar way in DU.
Another way of fast travel (also FTL but not only), that came to my mind is the Mass Effect Drive - if course from the game Mass Effect.
This kind of drive uses electrical energy to reduce the mass of the ship on a, let's say quantum particle base (I don't know how the exact fictional explanation was, but I'll explain the mechanic).
That means if you continuously power the mass effect core with a certain amount of energy, it reduces the mass of your ship to a certain amount - allowing a significant better power-to-weight ratio. If the ratio is high enough, you can also go faster than light.
An important thing is, that you can't use the drive continuosly. It doesn't really wear of, but the complicated particle / quantum (or whatever
) mechanics cause it to get "dirty" and less efficient. In mass effect you can clean it by physically touching a big object like a planet (even gas giants) to slowly get rid of the particles and regenerate the core.I actually only played a demo of the game, where I read about the backstory, and the principle of the mass effect drive.
Maybe someone who is more into this could explain it in detail
I think this mechanic could also be used in DU.
There could be some very odd appearances - for example a capital ship with the handling of a fighter, if someone manages to reduce the mass that much and has strong engines
Collision damage - workaround suggestions
in Idea Box
Posted
@wesbruce:
I didn't think of ramming weapons until now
I would say that the gameplay effects would depend on the balancing. This is one reason why I would prefer collision damage to be a general mechanic instead of a special weapon type, so the ramming ship would also get damaged.
In my second post I described why I think that ramming ships would most likely not be some kind of super weapon. If it's properly balanced, would expect dedicated ramming ships to be an exception, rather than a common thing. The main reason for this assumption is the point, that resources for ship building and fuel will be rare, so a most likely heavy ramming ship would have some serious disadvantages.