Ater Omen

Been thinking about posting this for a while but thought NQ would have done something already.
 
Going to post this as politely as I can but the support giveaways are a COMPLETE JOKE.  50% of people are lying, this is obvious because they say things like:

"I crashed when coming into atmosphere, logged back in and my ship was destroyed" - bullshit, you crash your ships stops what they actually means is "I have a really heavy ship, I crashed the game coming into atmosphere because i couldnt slow down, logged back in with zero momentum and my massively overweight ship fell like a rock"

"I just died on XXXXX insert planet and have magically teleported to Ailoth, can you port me back" = I was mining and tried to use the force respawn to cheese back to my ship, but didnt check my node before I used this soft exploit
 
This is causing a LOAD of problems, firstly you are completely shielding these new players from any survival elements of the game, experienced players know to fly with good scrap and extra fuel.  New players arent learning these lessons because when they make mistakes (and most ARE player mistakes) they get freebies.

The worst part about all this is that they are making a huge section of gameplay / career paths completely redundant.  In alpha there were loads of players planning to set up as repair / refuel crew or taxi services, I have reached out to several of these to see how business is and there ISNT ANY.  The game has limited career paths as it is (without really knowing the game) these are some of the more obvious ones and you are making them irrelevant.  The longer this goes on the worse it will get.

My solution - send out an email saying that the daily quanta is being continued but it is being called BETA SUPPORT INCOME, it is paid to ensure players have funds in case of emergency.  You then reach out to verified support services orgs and bring them into support via some additional channel, where you can send people who need there services.
 
This needs to be done soon, as you are making a massive rod for your own back by giving this crutch to new players (although seen several vets abusing it too).

why do call this topic saying there is going to be a wipe at the end of beta. There wont be a wipe. Stop giving out false information.

I actually completely disagree with your opinion on the state of the markets (economy wise) they are filling up with a variety of products, everyday I am competing with bots less and less and margins are getting tighter an tighter on most products.  

We sell a wide range of stuff across a wide range of markets (across several markets, on several planets), i visit several every day.  Two key things:
NQ MUST sort the bloody parking out, get tough with people, make a barren moon and ANYTHING is left at the markets for more than 48 hours is dumped there, DO SOMETHING.  It has been a problem for far too long. It screws up new player experience and stops people wanting to use the markets - I wouldnt mind if they were busy, but it is the same crappy ships and poxy advertising EVERY DAY, with the players that are actually using the market dotted around on the grass at some locations New players and orgs should be encouraged to manufacture and sell products, not use the obvious things but a wide range of stuff - we help our players to build there own industry and then enter the markets  

This is why this game needs pervasive PvP. This kind of theft should very much be a part of the game... and Vifrevaert should now be on everyone's KOS list.

There is a good reason why the voxelmancers are the superstars in this game, I dont see many people looking for a 'boxelmancer......'


See what I did there

PVP needs to be rebalanced from the ground up.
 
Hit chance needs to be entirely based on the profile of the ship from the angle it's being shot at - not the core size.
 
Vector differences must play a much larger role. 
 
L weapons should have tracking that is pitiful. An L missile should simply be unable to effectively hit a small ship that is changing it's vector.
 
HP of voxels need to be rebalanced from the ground up and not just be weight based. More complicated to make voxels should have benefits over simple to make voxels.
 
A power system needs to be added to further cripple xs ships mounting L weapons - it should be viable to mount upsized guns, but it should come with some serious downsides - IE having to have a ton of capacitors that get drained fully just from a single shot and need time to recharge etc.
 
 
I disagree that building good looking ships for pvp is pointless. It doesn't matter if your cube is shot up or your pretty pirate ship. You're likley going to be scrapping them both and redeploying from BP anyway because fixing voxels currently is too much of a hassle. Easier to scrap and redeploy.
 
The only reason people are doing cubes currently is that there is an advantage for filling the build grid but no penalties.
 
Ultimately a pvp ship that doesn't get hit due to a small profile is better than one that gets hit a bunch but lives - you don't have to fix the ship that never got hit.

The OP thinks to build an XS Death Cube is very easy but it's not. true from the outside, it might look primitive but the trick is in the right placement of the elements to cramp all these large stuff inside that relative small building area to be effective. There will always be a Meta and you as a designer will always have to make compromises that the craft does what it is supposed to do and was it was intended with it. Right now PvP builders build to be effective in this way but later on shield bubbles might be added for lets say break a bit current Meta. NQ could also restrict weapons to core size in xs core only go xs weapon and so on. The investment a player or a group does on a big ship should have benefits not like is now just a bad thing to fly large. For now PvP is avoidable and if you want to show of a build that is for expo then why fly it to the pvp zone where the only guys going to see it are they sitting on a gunner seat aiming at you?

NQ can't ignore the builders player base, I think there will always be a safe zone somewhere. Where and how big? The current safe zone is fine to me, it has every ores so builders can build everything in the game (untill everything gets mined out).
 
The current game mechanics leads to the current pvp meta, the deathcube seams to be the most efficient fighter. You define skill involved for it as "zero", when omitting all the process players went through before starting the construction. Building the perfect XS fighter doesn't happen in a day, there are a lot of things to consider like the proportion of engines, weapons, voxel used, etc. All of this is affecting the ship capabilities and when the goal is to build the most efficient XS fighter, you have to test a lot of things before coming to the solution.
 
You place the skill at "building a nice ship", where some other players place it at "building the most efficient ship". There is no "right way" of building a ship, it's only subjective to you, it's about what you want to do with it. But you have to concider the game rules for what you want to do, a beautiful ship will win the first price at the Alioth Aerospace Expo, but outside the safe zone the rules are clear, prepare to die in your lamborghini killed by people flying in a dumpster.
 
Play in the world you want to be in, and accept what happen if you step outside of it.

NQ can't ignore the builders player base, I think there will always be a safe zone somewhere. Where and how big? The current safe zone is fine to me, it has every ores so builders can build everything in the game (untill everything gets mined out).
 
The current game mechanics leads to the current pvp meta, the deathcube seams to be the most efficient fighter. You define skill involved for it as "zero", when omitting all the process players went through before starting the construction. Building the perfect XS fighter doesn't happen in a day, there are a lot of things to consider like the proportion of engines, weapons, voxel used, etc. All of this is affecting the ship capabilities and when the goal is to build the most efficient XS fighter, you have to test a lot of things before coming to the solution.
 
You place the skill at "building a nice ship", where some other players place it at "building the most efficient ship". There is no "right way" of building a ship, it's only subjective to you, it's about what you want to do with it. But you have to concider the game rules for what you want to do, a beautiful ship will win the first price at the Alioth Aerospace Expo, but outside the safe zone the rules are clear, prepare to die in your lamborghini killed by people flying in a dumpster.
 
Play in the world you want to be in, and accept what happen if you step outside of it.

What is a bug? If it's not what the programmer wanted, it's a bug. The machine only executes what it is asked to execute, it doesn't know if it is what the programmer really wanted to do.
It's the same problem with perfectly legal tax optimizations, it is legal but when it is abused to circumvent things, is it what a civilization wanted?
The rules define how things happen, a bug/exploit will always be a valid mechanic in a sense where the program only did his job following the rules.
Based on that, the judgement of what is an exploit or not can't be deducted from the game mechanics, only NQ can make statements about this. Players can only deduct NQ's will about that.
 
The full maneuver right was given on our territorys to be able to clean up the space and to counter another mechanic allowing griefing: placing dynamic big cubes on a territory to make it unplayable for your target. Its current use to hijack ships is perfectly valid, but it isn't its purpose. I really believe that NQ is not happy about that and they couldn't publicly speak about this feature to avoid revealing it to players and making it worst. But now that this is here, they will probably make statements soon. This is the exact same problem.
 
If it's technically possible, we need the opposite of "Parent construct" right : "Child construct: Gives your construct the rights to be parented by another construct."

What is a bug? If it's not what the programmer wanted, it's a bug. The machine only executes what it is asked to execute, it doesn't know if it is what the programmer really wanted to do.
It's the same problem with perfectly legal tax optimizations, it is legal but when it is abused to circumvent things, is it what a civilization wanted?
The rules define how things happen, a bug/exploit will always be a valid mechanic in a sense where the program only did his job following the rules.
Based on that, the judgement of what is an exploit or not can't be deducted from the game mechanics, only NQ can make statements about this. Players can only deduct NQ's will about that.
 
The full maneuver right was given on our territorys to be able to clean up the space and to counter another mechanic allowing griefing: placing dynamic big cubes on a territory to make it unplayable for your target. Its current use to hijack ships is perfectly valid, but it isn't its purpose. I really believe that NQ is not happy about that and they couldn't publicly speak about this feature to avoid revealing it to players and making it worst. But now that this is here, they will probably make statements soon. This is the exact same problem.
 
If it's technically possible, we need the opposite of "Parent construct" right : "Child construct: Gives your construct the rights to be parented by another construct."

Let me spell this out for the few of you who still think this is EVE 2.0, it’s not, get over it. You want EVE, go play EVE.
 
Second, it was already stated on the DU Press Discord that just because NQ is not talking about exploits and punishments, it’s not going to happen. They where very clear that they are going to take action against players abusing game mechanics, specially duping items and such, but not limited to that only. The information is there in black and white, and they even stated that there will be a general public announcement soon enough once they close the loopholes.
 
Third, you can not interact with any construct anywhere, including the PvP zone, that don't belong to you using the maneuvering tool unless it’s inside a tile claim by you, for obvious reason, or the construct’s core is destroyed. So the ability to “dock” a ship using that to another ship with the soul purpose of “stealing it” is not a valid game mechanic or an intended one, just a side effect that will be remove soon enough and screw over the legit player that will now get harassed by people parking huge cubes on their property. But I’ll explain this down below for those of you who still think this is all legit gameplay.
 
And last, just because you can do something in a game doesn’t mean that is legal, some stuff is not intended and it’s simply either a bug or an exploit. And if you find it, stop using and reported for review or continue to abuse it and face the consequences of your actions later, it’s up to you. NQ has been very clear that the safe zone is just that, a safe zone devoted of any PvP where people can be safe to leave their items. I’m all for PvP and I can’t wait for it to be worked on and expanded but this is not PvP at all. People found a way to circumvent a game mechanic to gain an unfair advantage, which is the very definition of what an exploit is. Territory PvP or actions are not part of the game right now, but like I already mention here before, there are 4 ways to get around this that allows players to steal ships, or destroy Satic/Dynamic/Space cores and steal everything anyone has, even on Sanctuary Moon or the markets or inside safe space which again, has been stated very clear to be safe areas that people can leave their stuff.
 
I’m not here to tell anyone to do or not do something, if you think you are right, go right ahead, just don’t come crying when actions are taken and the game changes for the worst. We can’t discuss moderation actions against players on this forums either, but believe me, action has been taken already against some players that continue to circumvent game mechanics for their advantage. Just go to the regular DU discord and ask in general chat, people will tell you.
 
I’m also 100% sure that what the OP think happens wasn’t really what happened. The tile was claim to be able to use a current exploit, because of the weight of the ship itself and the cargo weight, because His ship, M Core according to him, wasn’t maneuvered into an L ship to take it away to the PvP zone at all, it was destroyed right there and dismantled on that tile, and that took the 15 minutes to claim the tile and maybe another 5 minutes to destroy and repair the core and maybe any red elements necessary to fly it away, that is it. I’m all up for PvP and piracy but this wasn’t any of that. I want the game to evolved like everyone else but not based on exploits.
 
 

It IS a stretch to assume that. Everything needs to be clearly stated and written in the eula or tos otherwise it's fair game. If NQ doesn't give any feedback on this whatsoever, ppl will just continue to do it. 
Players assuming that smth falls under exploiting or not is never a good idea because this is solely up to NQ to decide. That's exactly why I said for years that NQ needs to revisit the eula and clearly state what they deem an exploit and what isn't one. Especially now in beta 

While I always admire humans’ ingenuity at circumventing laws, taxes, surcharges, rules and regulations, that is clearly trolling for the sake of trolling.
 
placing a TCU for the sole purpose of carting a construct to the PVP zone is not cheating as such, but it’s clearly bending the rules in a way NQ did not intend or they would have put disclaimers on their safe zone definitions....
 
 As such, it is exploiting a loophole in the ingame logic that should protect against this, pretty much by definition. 
 
while I think severe punitive action again the players doing this might be considered draconian, since it’s not -technically- breaking the EULA, I think, if NQ truly did not forsee/desire this method of... capital gain... they should at least provide the “victim” with remuneration or a magic blueprint to reimburse them and create a temporary patch to at least prevent removal of incumbent constructs until they can consider a proper mechanism...

1. Everybody waits that, I don't know if it's on the track at the moment.
2. It would be too powerful, we could automate the crafting of everything with a simple setup

Well you can add console players in some sort of restricted gameplay as primitive pre-space aliens, like evoks in SW living on some distant planet, playing gathering and basic craft. We can then disover them and hunt down for sport using keybords.

 

I don't even like the sound of "but who knows" and "yet" in that DevBlog. Never have I ever seen a PC title improve for the existing player base when the developers went for console ports. It ruined UIs and UI scale, as well as input methods and customizability on all titles that I remember (like TES and FO series.. duh) and it drags the IQ requirement for games down below room temperature. Not to say that all console gamers are dumb as bricks - but a console is "easy to set up and use" for a reason. On the contrary - there surely are very bright minds on the console's gamers base too, but on the other hand those who really "can't computer" are those who only buy a console and the games need to work for them too.
 
DU is a nerd game in a niche genre and that's what grants it a shot at becoming a lasting experience in a second digital world for us, while casual/normal gamers can join in and buy stuff from the nerds. Still this talk about console ports gives me nothing but the creeps. If there ever is a console port in the future, I think mouse and keyboard should be mandatory for DU to start and players on console should be required to type at least 100 words per hour in the chat, or be disconnected automatically
 
A tale from SWG? I used to hang out at the markets, talking to players, helping them with their character's redesign, which required a constant communication flow to model their character to their desire. Now let console gamers enter the scene, which don't even have the option to chat? Great. I see similar situations in DU, where a customer buys a construct and talks to the creator about style choices and refinement. How's that supposed to work when players are laying on their couch holding nothing but a gamepad? If I have to wait for them to type on an on screen keyboard, I'd rather shoot myself in the face... or them.
 
I liked the "no guns blazing" hint in the DevBlog that made it obvious you're aware of me being out here, hehe. Howeeeverrrrr, you've lead with "for the time being", so.. well.. I'm really sorry, but...
   had it coming  

Definitely 5

Let's say the game is done (at least at a playable MMO state) and perfectly polished for PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X (assuming they can handle DU). Everything works well.
Time flies and as always, theses new consoles are outdated by new PC components, will you keep upgrading DU disregarding the consoles spec?
Will you cancel new features if it's not adapted to the consoles? Will you adapt the game according to the consoles?
 
edit: will you rename the game Dual514 ?