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Hello there, Noveans! Today I'd like to present you with two online tools (possibly more coming soon) I've been recently working on, that aim to make the Dual Universe life easier! Item Database Explorer Link: https://dual.wolfe.science/tools/item-database-explorer An online database containing useful information related to DU items and their recipes. It has a search bar where you can search for any item or resource, and by selecting one from the list you can see the following set of information: Basic data such as ID, category, tier, volume, mass and density; All available crafting recipes for that item, including when it is a by-product of something else; All recipes that use that item as an ingredient; All honeycomb types that can be produced using it; All resources, parts and items where that resource is required as part of the chain (except when it's part of a Catalyst); As a starting example, you can check out Pure Iron and see how many parts and items use it There's also a new section in the works that will list all planets, moons and moonlets where a certain resource can be found, but it's still a WIP, due to some divergence I found when comparing in-game ore lists with the Atlas file. Celestial Body Calculator Link: https://dual.wolfe.science/tools/calculators This one is more like a general-purpose visualization of the Atlas, but also supports few calculations on things based on altitude. At the moment it offers: Gravity information, including the altitude where gravity is 0.01g; Atmosphere information, including the altitude where atmosphere density is 10%; Surface minimum, average and maximum altitudes; Construct build limit altitude; Total surface area and number of territories; Calculation of gravity, atmospheric density and total circumference length at desired altitude; I hope that information is somehow helpful for the community and I'm completely open to suggestions on what could be improved or added!

In this post I'm going to list (in some detail) what I think should be top priority for an update that focuses on a few pillars: intuitiveness and documentation. In these two pillars, this game can make a lot more sense to newer players (thus keeping more on board), while also helping the pre-existing community from becoming discouraged. Other things you must assume, as is for most games. This game should not require 3rd party tools to play, as MOST players do not use any outside tools to play games. Even if this changes in the future, it is still a good idea to take things from the ground up, assuming they do not understand how to play this game. Starting with actual Quality of Life features: Complete overhaul of Maneuver tool to indicate with proper HUD a. Create durability for the Maneuver tool. This durability amount directly correlates with the amount of meters a player can move ANY (dynamic) construct. This is not tied to the construct, but the item itself. b. Increase range capacity from 50, to 150 meters. This is because of making it a unified meter for all ships, while also adding a bit of QoL by allowing players to move their constructs a bit further. c. This durability would recharge at 2m/s* while the durability is not gone, while if it is gone, it recharges at 5m/s*. While the bar is recharging from empty, the tool is not usable until durability is FULL. *Since we're measuring the durability in meters allowed to move distance, using m/s indicates the rate of which durability is recharging per second d. Add a status bar tied to the durability, of which would function similarly to most durability bars (see Minecraft). This would be a visual indicator on the tool itself, like the image given below, which allows the player to understand how these mechanics work in an intuitive way. Allow cores to be swapped out for larger ones Similar to how Mindustry does cores (see gif), allow players to replace the current core on a ship with a larger one (not vice versa). If there is ANY other element in the way of the core, then it would collide, and not be allowed. In addition, the core must entirely envelop the previous core in order to replace it (like Mindustry). Lastly, the previous core is destroyed upon replacement, and all data tied to the previous core is transferred into the new one. Better Item/element descriptions a. This one is purely documentation, but a static table with groups you can choose from a dropdown menu next to it would be much more intuitive and better working than a scroll bar. Examples of groups of these would be "resistances", "basic info" (HP, tier, mass, unit volume), "unit specific info" (fuel consumption, thrust output, just related info for that specific part). I'm sure a dev team could make better groups than I can, but that is the idea. b. Review EACH and EVERY item description, and make sure that it is neither generic, nor is completely forgotten about. For example, there are a LOT of items that just don't have descriptions, or have copy pasted descriptions that don't really tell the player much. This is not a chair? At least it doesn't have a lot of generic text... So a bunch of generic text, with a generic description afterward. What does this element do again? For a lot of functional elements, the game nails the proper description. However, I don't see a reason to have a copy pasted description on EACH tier of EACH engine, because if a player is buying a higher tier engine (than basic), it's quite clear they understand how engines work, because they've played the game enough. In addition, reminding a player each time they look at a decorative element "they do nothing but make your construct look cool, but they do add mass", instead say "this is a decorative element", or something similar, of which shortens descriptions, and makes them more rich in content. In addition, less need for that annoying scroll bar... Increase documentation in, and OUTSIDE the game a. The codex's information, while sorta useful early game, is extremely outdated. There hasn't been a single time in my entire DU playthrough where I've looked in the codex, and genuinely found something that is new, and USEFUL. The sort of things needed to be documented inside the codex are things such as tutorials, how an element works, such as how to use Anti-grav, or warp drives! Uhh... so how does one use this? How do I control the AG unit? ...hello? b. Increase external documentation on the DU wiki. Even if it's community run and made, encouraging, and/or working on the wiki is a MUST. Perhaps encourage users in some way to update the forum. Anything to get proper documentation. In addition, tying in the wiki with the codex (as in, it's edited on the wiki, then the codex syncs to it) would be very beneficial by having both be updated *dynamically*, cutting the work in half. To be the face of knowledge for this game, it seems quite old. As the background suggests, this seems sunsetted. Developers dedicated to fixing smaller issues This isn't really a list, but as a lot of games have, having DEDICATED developers that play the game and from there fix these minor issues and gameplay elements is a good idea. This would be beneficial because you'd only need 1-3 devs total to work on something like this, and they'd be able to do things such as these QoL changes in game, and fixing these minor bugs or inconveniences. In addition, having devs that do this will also increase involvement with the community. This is because these minor changes makes a big difference when playing the game for a long time. In addition, being able to fix minor issues on-the-go means that they won't build up, and instead will be maintained much more efficiency, due to being at a ground level. I hope you guys enjoyed my post, I plan to update it with more ideas in the future as time goes by.

I'm gonna be honest, the wiki is looking quite sad right now. Basically everything there was written before alpha access, and you can really tell since everything is all just speculation, even for features already in the game. I wouldn't even be that surprised if less than 25% of the playerbase even KNOWS that there is a wiki. I myself have been updating it, but there still is a lot there that needs doing. It's a real shame, since if it was accurate it would be way easier to find out questions about the game without asking for the millionth time on the official discord. For example: did you know that shooting too close to another ship can deal self damage? I bet you didn't! But there isn't really a good place to store all of that info anyway, because the wiki is so outdated and nobody is using it anyway. so, if you see this and have some spare time, please ,update the wiki! taking 10 minutes out of your time to update a page can be a massive help to the community!

So to start off, @RightBigToeand myself are, by the numbers, the two biggest Dual Universe wiki contributors, and I am currently the administrator of the wiki. RightBigToe recently began adding organizations into the wiki as articles, a decision I disagreed with. Rather than repeat myself, I'll just post our conversation thus far. I will summarize after. To summarize, RightBigToe argues that large organizations are a big part of the game as it is in it's unreleased state, and as such belong on the wiki. I disagree, I think that they have no place on the wiki because they are player-made content; I do not believe community content of any kind belongs on the wiki, only information gathered by the community based upon steadfast mechanics and data released by Novaquark. One of our opinions will have to be set aside, and I feel that it should be the majority opinion based on what the community thinks. Also, there is no animosity of any kind between us, it is simply a difference of opinions! I want this to be fair. So what do you as the community think? Should community content, at least for now, be added to the wiki? What are your thoughts?