Ship to Ship Communication and / or Player to Player Communication?

[BzyBuilder]

How do you guys Handle Communication? Is it by a Global Chat room, or by Ship to Ship 'radio signals'?

[Anaximander]

The ancient trick the ninjas taught us. Teamspeak.

[Shynras]

How do you guys Handle Communication? Is it by a Global Chat room, or by Ship to Ship 'radio signals'?

There are likely going to be channels in game. Social interactions are vital for a game like DU. But maybe you'll need to have an element in your ship or a device in your inventory, who knows. 

[yamamushi]

There's really not enough options on this poll.

 

Considering ships won't even be in the game for the first few weeks or months, "ship to ship" radio signals doesn't really make sense.

 

Global chat is listed twice in the options too, so the whole poll somewhat excludes people who don't want Global Chat. 

[Dominar]

Once everyone have their own ships and bases, there is no doubt going to be some sort of long distant communication. Most likely, you'll need to research the technology required and work towards constructing it.

My guess is, there will be voice chat in-game, with no other programs required. However everyone will probably use Teamspeak anyway. If not voice chat, a global and local chat makes sense too. However It doesn't make sense for you to be able to talk with someone half a universe away when this game is based on emergent gameplay.

[Megaddd]

Realistically I'm guessing we're going to have text only channels by distance and region, as well as custom global channels. You know, just like in EVE! (seems to be the running theme on these forums, really)

[Dhara]

I hope we can have ship to ship communications in game and I want to be able to encrypt them as well. 

[Xorkil]

I hope we can have ship to ship communications in game and I want to be able to encrypt them as well. 

 

 

I really can't see them not having comm channels we can create dedicated to fleet communication (and other ways). I'm so confident it'll happen I don't have hope for it; no need. =)

 

As for encryption I'll have you covered there. I'm sure there will be way and I can make it happen.

[Archer]

In theory I always thought it would be cool for a game to represent player to player communications as following in-universe rules.  For DU this would mean limited range, vulnerability to interference or active jamming, requiring a power supply and antenna assembly for long distance and/or overpowering interference, etc.  In practice, of course, players would probably bypass this with out of game voice chat half the time and render the entire system pointless except for limiting communication with automated/remote control units.

[Anaximander]

I hope we can have ship to ship communications in game and I want to be able to encrypt them as well. 

Ma'am, there's something better. It's called Skype. Totally encrypted against code-peasants across your screen in the game. Also, Teamspeak, Mumble and, Cthulu forbid, Ventrillo. There's no need to hog the server in my opinion with a feature like a voice comm.

[Dhara]

Ma'am, there's something better. It's called Skype. Totally encrypted against code-peasants across your screen in the game. Also, Teamspeak, Mumble and, Cthulu forbid, Ventrillo. There's no need to hog the server in my opinion with a feature like a voice comm.

 

Actually, I can think of several scenarios where secret messages being sent ship to ship could be useful. 

[Megaddd]

Actually, I can think of several scenarios where secret messages being sent ship to ship could be useful. 

And to further this, adding in-game communication solutions is never going to be a negative, and one shouldn't be going in with the assumption that everyone's just going to be using 3rd party solutions anyways

[Anaximander]

Actually, I can think of several scenarios where secret messages being sent ship to ship could be useful. 

IT's called a /whisper or /tel command. Problem solved.

[Megaddd]

IT's called a /whisper or /tel command. Problem solved.

I don't think a WoW or PoE style chat system would really work here.

[Anaximander]

I don't think a WoW or PoE style chat system would really work here.

Because as we all know, Dual Universe is a military simulator and not an actual game.

 

 

And of course, if you want to trash-talk about someone, you should be using the whisper chat. You'll be talking to the captain either ways. And if you are tthinking of "coercing" someone from the crew of a ship, then good luck, chances are people will not allow strangers other than real life friends on board as their crew.

[Vyz Ejstu]

IT's called a /whisper or /tel command. Problem solved.

"Try out a walkie-talkie. It's been proven and tested for years on end.

Pax Vobiscum.

 

​"

[croxis]

MMOs are also social experiences -- (futile) attempts to make communication more realistic can really hamper the success of the game.

 

There are in game reasons to have "ship to ship" communication. For example, ships and probes sharing sensor data. Will this be "magically" done regardless of distance? Will communication range be a factor? Will there be no magic checkbox and sensor sharing has to be a protocol written by the in game programmers (this would lead to some interesting emergent gameplay).

 

 

Ninja edit: Let me put it this way -- one of the advantages of limiting range of in game comms is that it would help keep people closer together and the population density higher, giving a better illusion of a bustling metropolis. However I feel the same effect could still be had if being in antenna range to civilization had in-game purpose -- such as sensor sharing, telemetry, access to the in game market, and so on, so venturing out into the wilderness has some effect.

[Dominar]

Here's what I can see happening.

Faction members will probably use their own, private, voice chat applications outside of the game. When playing together, it would make sense to use a separate program to speak to one another. I can imagine why it could make in-built voice chat mechanics useless, however they can still be useful.

 

Let's say one of your faction members was attempting to dock at an possibly hostile faction's base to discuss a treaty. They'd need permission. That's where the in-built voice chat would come in. The pilot(s) would need to hail the faction base and request to dock. Otherwise they may get shot down.

 

[Cornflakes]

Let's say one of your faction members was attempting to dock at an possibly hostile faction's base to discuss a treaty. They'd need permission. That's where the in-built voice chat would come in. The pilot(s) would need to hail the faction base and request to dock. Otherwise they may get shot down.

 

 

Because that totally needs voice chat and cant possibly work with text chat.

/sarkasm

[Anaximander]

Because that totally needs voice chat and cant possibly work with text chat.

/sarkasm

Or the mystical plane of communcations, as the ancient chinese sorcerers called it, Skype.

[Cybrex]

I do think an in-game voice chat would be used, but the sheer amount of third party programs which are easier to use, will still make in game voice chats severely under used. Especially with MMORPGs. I don't believe there is a need for it personally, and would be happy if we simply had a robust, customizable text chat system.

[Anaximander]

I do think an in-game voice chat would be used, but the sheer amount of third party programs which are easier to use, will still make in game voice chats severely under used. Especially with MMORPGs. I don't believe there is a need for it personally, and would be happy if we simply had a robust, customizable text chat system.

Even though I'm not in favor of in-game voice comms, I can see merit to that. But NQ should be focused on making the server as stable as possible before they move to in-game voice-comms :/ Voice is not light on the server side, it's a lot of data to transfer to everyone around you. :/

[ttcraft0]

I think both. For the chat, it could be like in Ingress : with a distance filter. Or (or both) with a organization filter (our org, our org + allies, all), maybe

[friendlytyrant03]

I wonder if there is going to be a global chat board like in roblox just at a larger scale.

[lethak]

We do have Teamspeak to communicate as a community.

 

Ingame text instant/delayed message would be used for communicating with other player/group outside of our community.

 

But, the only way I would use voice com ingame, would be if this is well integrated, and not some sort of magic.

for example: a Radio Unit Element + Radio Antenna being placed on any construct, allowing interactions

• Request an encrypted (private) voice channel with <target>
• Request a public voice channel with <target>
• Broadcast to all in range (like marine emergency VHF canal 16)

 

Players manning a terminal at the radio screen could "subscribe to comm request"  to be poked when someone is requesting to open a channel.

Maybe they could manage open channels by closing them, or playing them to the ship speaker system so that every one inside can listen.

 

I know teamspeak have a professional SDK that would enable a game developer to do that without starting from scratch. I bet they are not the only one.

 

 

"TFR Radio" in Arma is another good example of ingame implementation: you have portable radios and the ability to change frequency like a real one.

also the broadcast / listening range is limited by the radio model you are equipped with. Sadly, TFR is a teamspeak client plugin that interact with a game server script and is not supported as an official feature.

 

 

I would not make it a priority: first things first, remember this is an indie studio.