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survival mechanics?


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oxygen is hard to do in DU (because they would have to constantly check for hull breaches and that would kill the server)

they might go for a simplified system with oxygen bubble generators iirc, but that's way after release (if ever)

 

food and survival elements might come too - can't find the thread atm but they want to go there at some point

 

some reference:

https://devblog.dualthegame.com/2014/08/17/about-the-alpha-gameplay/

 

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In general over-complex food/water (and O2) systems would be adding tedium (someone said going to the loo etc). That said, Biomes with food and O2 and water etc would become much much more valuable if ships required these as abstract fuel components ie your avatar just has to go to the ship for these things after extended absence to remove the issue. The ship itself then needs refueling.

 

Also consider cities as well: A huge economic management to grow food. O2 planets "free supply" than non. Of course costlier on non life-biome habitats for these things. Then and again the control of air ala Total Recall has political ramifications too.

 

So perhaps these systems as "macro parameters" as opposed to pesky micro-ing management. At such a level they would shape player behaviour and settlement patterns in space possibly...?

 

Then even further in the future than this already future, "Terraforming Mars"! Mega corps... mega infrastructure required ! Dang, easy to get dizzy with excitement too quickly.

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An MMO is too big of a game to have you limited to tedium of refilling bars every minute. If people really want food and oxygen in the design do it more abstract and passive, like mentioned above.

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  • 2 months later...

Hope not. If i want to play a survival game, ill go somewhere else. The power of DU lies not in survival but in the grand setup and the relative easy acces for everyone, you can do whatever you want. Add a survival component and it will kill about 50% of the player base. anyone interested in creative building with no wories about food or alien plant life killing them will not enter. Any large fleet is semi doomed from the start, how to get enough food and water in a 8km ship that needs to travel for weeks on engines to the nearest planet for an entire legion. I think this will kill any strategy on general gameplay and make it all go about food and water. Might be more realistic, but then, when was the last time you saw a hoovercraft in the streets or a capital vessel in earth orbit. Sometimes it is good to skip realism for better gameplay. And in the end it would be best for us all if these planets are really full with people.

 

 

Greetz Aaron

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Yeah I come to this conclusion to: It's either ECONOMIC DESIGN scale or SURVIVAL and NQ have wisely chosen Economic.

 

DU is already probably shifted off "mainstream" towards "hardcore" though pointing in that direction as opposed to being there, Survival stuff is way too much GRANULAR DESIGN in excess of ECONOMIC DESIGN which itself is very ambitious already considering volumes that can be transported, masses of ships that interact with thrusters and of course the algorithms with which resource frequency and quality and type are created for the economy! ECONOMY is the big one that needs to scale up to make the game successful via these sub-components and the devs obviously know that as per it being on the front page as a core design Virtual Economy.

 

There have been other so-called sandbox mmos but they're in fact survival simulation mmos Xyson being one I vaguely remember: They don't scale easily or indeed look at Life Is Feudal, great designs there, and implementation is impressive: But a lot of players find the grind and survival emphasis too much effort and input for too little reward and output stimulation - as well as that ending making PvP that must more sugary... but then combat system is under pressure to be high quality system too soon.

 

I do like the economic idea of terraforming at large scale and adding some sort of value, but I guess that's future fancies for now.

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Well you will got basic survival factor here like : Food, maybe water, and may even disease, or maybe oxygen factor too.

But dont hope that will appear when the game launch, they say they will implement it but dont know when because it isn't their priority. Maybe they add food first then ? 

 

You can imagine a city in siege and people got starve to die, it is consider in strategic move lmao.

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2 hours ago, ShioriStein said:

Well you will got basic survival factor here like : Food, maybe water, and may even disease, or maybe oxygen factor too.

But dont hope that will appear when the game launch, they say they will implement it but dont know when because it isn't their priority. Maybe they add food first then ? 

 

You can imagine a city in siege and people got starve to die, it is consider in strategic move lmao.

I love sim stuff, but for DU I'd guess most if not all of that will be abstracted out: One of the biggest reason is that people's real lives mean when they are logged in for their game session, that session's quality of fun has to ramp up to make the game successful, so too much minutae or "maintenance" stuff is just not viable as you'd attempt for a survival game.

 

What currently bugs me a little bit atm, is that BIOTIC/BIOME planets don't seem very differentiated from "dead planets" apart from looking prettier and being different resource points.

 

If biome planets are much less costly for avatars to be parked, then suddenly finding "livable planets" changes their value... idk on the sim side of things that feels good to me, even if it's not practical for game play design purposes: Planets = Resources = Territory = Networks of Space Links = Virtual Economy and Spaceship goodness = DU. It's a sound and simple formula to focus on for NQ.

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6 minutes ago, MookMcMook said:

I love sim stuff, but for DU I'd guess most if not all of that will be abstracted out: One of the biggest reason is that people's real lives mean when they are logged in for their game session, that session's quality of fun has to ramp up to make the game successful, so too much minutae or "maintenance" stuff is just not viable as you'd attempt for a survival game.

WEll you can make high energy food so you dont have to often, you just spend 30s to eat an energy bar to work another 24 - 48 hour. It will while fun for you to caculate the amount of basic food for long day trip.  That is the purpose of outpost station where not only reflll your fuel tank but also your other stuff and sell your stuff of course but i think you would rather bring it to big market to sell it.

 

8 minutes ago, MookMcMook said:

What currently bugs me a little bit atm, is that BIOTIC/BIOME planets don't seem very differentiated from "dead planets" apart from looking prettier and being different resource points.

Well yeah resource on each planet will sure different. But most of all, DEAD/BIOTIC planet dont have oxygen and source of food for you.


While on biome planet (or also the BIOTIC PLANET ) you can grow food, and they have confirm animal will be there to grow too. Animal product can use for food, bio product, plastic maybe ?, some kind of Oil , ... And plant product for oxygen maybe ? For bio product, oil, medicine, ... 
 

so i dont think it is bad, it make some player to be a FARMER  :) !!!

you can read here to know more about FARMER idea.

 

14 minutes ago, MookMcMook said:

If biome planets are much less costly for avatars to be parked, then suddenly finding "livable planets" changes their value... idk on the sim side of things that feels good to me, even if it's not practical for game play design purposes: Planets = Resources = Territory = Networks of Space Links = Virtual Economy and Spaceship goodness = DU. It's a sound and simple formula to focus on for NQ.

Well maybe unique planet will be some factor here. But we cant deny the possible that there will be abandon planet ... but have too see how reward & risk will work out in DU.

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I hope there are no survival mechanics beside maybe oxygen.

DU is not a survival game. I don't want to waste my time on on getting food and water, I have better things to do.

Needing oxygen for places without it or no breathable atmosphere would be OK for me.

Also those mechanics will not work anyway in DU: What if you don't have any money and run out of food / water?

 

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21 hours ago, ShioriStein said:

But we still Pre-Alpha isn't it ?

What outside its scope ?

I think the devs (rightly) have taken the approach that:-

 

1. They build a solar system of voxels

2. Any of the actual planetary bodies are effectively interchangeable land for players to build their territories over (for game play reasons)

3. The only major difference in these bodies of voxels is the resource types, their sizes and distances from each: It's all very physical for all the subsequent physics: Volume, Mass, Spaceship Thrust, Transportation Time and Capacity which then feeds into:

4. Economy itself very complex as well: Prices, trades, manufacturing and so on...

5. That feeds into the politics and combat eventually.

 

Biological factors; idk...Commodies and/or consumables? Only thing I can think of is that Biome planets look more habitable and probably feel better even if it makes no difference in actual gameplay. Alioth for example clearly is more attractive than other planets to sight-see around for eg.

 

edit: yeah as per the alpha-game-play-ideas link above: Food may be a consumable to h(eat) your body to power your nanoformer (builder/terraformer/punch to the face) tool. So presumably in the future: Alioth might turn into a huge exporter of food consumable types?

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I think food/water/oxygen would have a good benefit to the game if implemented correctly.  As long as it doesn’t feel like you have to struggle to maintain it.  If it takes a small amount of resources to maintain your levels for a week or so, and you don’t loose levels while offline it just becomes a minor thing you deal with occasionally, but would add the ability for people to have functionality like farming if that’s what they want to do.  It would also add an aspect to longer sieges.  Blockades, and blockade runners would have more value with these mechanisms also.  

 

I think it is something worth debating the pros and cons.

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I remember a post like this a long time ago as well.  My opinion remains the same, food/drink etc should have temporary boosts when consumed (if implemented at all).  They should not be necessary to survive.

 

Will I throw a hissy fit and throw the game out if they are necessary for survival?  Nah.  Just would be a little disappointed.

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It basically comes down to preference, not (solely) pros and cons if I think about it. On one end of the spectrum you have the "hardcore survival crowd" and on the other, the ones with a more casual or hassle-free mindset in that regard. 

 

I doubt you can change many stances solely through debate (here). I think it kinda boils down to "how many are in favor, against or indifferent about it and what would NQ's state be about it. 

 

I for one can only suggest a survival system where you have to eat maybe 1 to 2 times per real day. Or 3 maybe. By that I mean played time. A good balance can surely be found.

 

But why am I in favor of it? 

 

1) Challenges. This adds another layer to the game. As trivial as eating may sound, it adds logistics and planning and in some situations maybe reliance on others. 

 

2) Jobs. Farming, industry and maybe a further options to use some stuff for chemicals and further refining. Or beer brewing. If food items are planned without survival, adding survival (to be precise, need to eat)  would make all those objects more useful beyond "fluff or buff". 

 

3) Other stuff I can't think of right now and stay is not covered by 1 or 2

 

The need to eat could open a whole new market and I think this is not too much to ask for if you have to use various items only a few times per day (real hours). 

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1 hour ago, Warden said:

The need to eat could open a whole new market and I think this is not too much to ask for if you have to use various items only a few times per day (real hours). 

Despite this being a controversial opinion i'm totally in favor of such implementation.

As long as it's not tedious and adds to the overall gameplay,it would make a welcome addition!

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As above I see Food, O2 etc merely as commodities to insert into the DU Economic system, thus providing new "industries" for players such as Agriculture and Air production or some such (!). Also such a system might increase the value of BIOME planets where those are simply kept simple and abstracted as a component in powering/energy provision of ships, spacestations, planet bases adding an extra power/energy component/cost... though that obviously has ripple implications that may become too substantial.

 

I think the granular stuff might become feature bloat too quickly for too little wider gameplay space increase. Not discounting just think it needs adapting to scale as another resource type on the markets that some planets produce and others do not produce.

 

Eg Forests could be encouraged to grow for O2 harvesting?

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23 minutes ago, CoreVamore said:

I dont want to eat drink sleep to survive in DU. I have enough issues with those in rl and dont want it in du

Buy today for yourself with a new ENERGY FOOD POPPICO!!!

 

One bar and you dont have to worry about food for one day!!!

 

You can go to deep space, fight pirate and loot them all without pause time for eating, food worrying.

 

Just 99.99 Quanta a bar for your entire day of fighting, looting, exploring.

 

 

P.s: This food not replace any kind of medicine and we wiill refuse to take any responsibility if anything happen with you.

 

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