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What value does sovereign territory have in an infinite universe?


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Vorengard and CaptainTwerkMotor have the right of it, in my opinion.

 

It really doesn't matter what the actual size of the universe is. The number of players is not infinite, and the distribution of skill and talent among players will not be even. Some people have more time than others, and some people are better at some things than others. Therefore there will be an uneven distribution of resources - above and beyond the geographical. Whether these resources are materials, constructed things, markets, violence, etc. it doesn't matter, they will be clumped into regions concentrated around those people or groups of people who far exceed the rest of us in that particular area. Specialization is innate to the human creature simply because we are not all "created equal". Some are better book-keepers, some are better traders, some better builders, some better hunters and some are better fighters. Therefore I expect the game population to slowly organize around specialized groups - and necessarily those of us who are not as skilled in one area or another will loosely orbit those groups and territories that hold the skills or things we need - or travel between sets of areas (and thus the trade route is born).

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  • 6 months later...

The position of the land is also important, how close it is to trade hubs and such

Actually I'd say position is the more important than the raw resources offered in an area.

 

Time spent playing the game is a key resource in games like DU. The locations where players have spent the most productive time will end up being the most valuable. By productive time, I mean building shops and infrastructure, mining and refining resources, etc. The only productive time in a region that doesn't improve its value is exporting finished or raw goods in a trade that doesn't return goods.

 

If there is a large concentration of shops in a given territory, it no longer matters if that territory still has any ore. A territory that has already been partially mined is often MORE valuable than one that hasn't (since the ore deposits and dig sites are visible, the time scanning and prospecting has already been spent). And this is indeed first and foremost a multiplayer experience, regions that get more player traffic will be more sought after.

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This thread, it lives! :o 

 

Definitely, the value of territory is going to be highly dependent on a lot of things, and different areas will have different values to different people. A miner would value land that is yet unmined more than land that has already been stripped bare. A mercenary group would want a strategic position that is both defensible and that they can launch attacks from. A merchant group would want to be near the trade hubs or by the large player concentrations. Alliances will want to be near their allies. 

 

In fact, land speculation might be a viable way of investing. 

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Sure, space is infinite, but space is governed by the laws of physics and largely expressed within 3-dimensions as well as time. Thus, locality and proximity will have meaning in terms of interaction among players and their subsequent orgs. You are certainly free to go off to distant systems(when the opportunity presents itself) but be aware that your prosperity or success will only be a great as your capacity to build and develop.  

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  • 1 month later...

It doesn't matter how much empty space you own unless you have planets, all that space is just that, cold hard vacuum. 

 

 

No doubt some territories (like planets) and asteroids and other resource based areas will be a lot more valuable than others. Even in empty space if you control transport corridors, space stations, and other valuable assets in that space then you'll be better off. Besides I would love to have a small amount of space where I can build without worrying about griefers. 

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Besides I would love to have a small amount of space where I can build without worrying about griefers. 

 

Go to the arkzone or just occupy a tile with a TCU and build a protection bubble

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For all the infinite space of Dual Universe, one has to reflect on mmo player activity. The reason many people play MMO's is to play with others especially in groups. Even among those not within groups the allure of a market dictates distance of operation. Some may very well head out as explorers, but given the need for content--and in variety at that--most players will find it advantageous to be reasonably close to everybody else. 

 

If it does turn out that Dual Universe is 'infinite' I'll be very excited to see how the ebb and flow of player residency in that universe shifts. Will we find 'ghost towns' from a decade ago? Will membership be wide enough that some groups become widely separated? What will this do to each player culture in terms of political, economical and military? Interesting stuff to be sure.

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

I think land will have value from strategic location. After all, it's easier to mine resources from the tile next door than from some planet several stars away. I also think that access to Ark Ships (and the new recruits that may spawn at them) will be a huge factor for more competitive Corporations. Remember that the conflicts of Europe didn't end when the Americas were discovered.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I thought the Universe in DU will be finite (and at the Start of the Game only 1 Solar-System) and expanded as time goes on.

Since the Planets are only partly randomly generated (they are algorithmic based, but Artists make them look a little less artificial by Hand) - which takes time.

 

So there will not be infinite Space and Resources available and if we start running out of stuff and the next Expansion (Stargates where mentioned at some point) is still far off - I would say stuff will get pretty expensive pretty fast. And conflict will raise.

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On 7/13/2017 at 5:23 AM, Inasyah said:

I thought the Universe in DU will be finite (and at the Start of the Game only 1 Solar-System) and expanded as time goes on.

Since the Planets are only partly randomly generated (they are algorithmic based, but Artists make them look a little less artificial by Hand) - which takes time.

 

So there will not be infinite Space and Resources available and if we start running out of stuff and the next Expansion (Stargates where mentioned at some point) is still far off - I would say stuff will get pretty expensive pretty fast. And conflict will raise.

The universe is technically infinite but we will only be able to access some of it because it takes time to discover and connect new systems. The planet's and systems are completely procedurally generated. The artists do not touch them since that would take way to much time. The systems don't get added in expansions because they already exist from day one

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44 minutes ago, Lord_Void said:

The universe is technically infinite but we will only be able to access some of it because it takes time to discover and connect new systems. The planet's and systems are completely procedurally generated. The artists do not touch them since that would take way to much time. The systems don't get added in expansions because they already exist from day one

It would make sense for them to not include the Systems you can't reach yet into the Game already. Since unused Data is just a waste of Money to store on a Server - also it is always good to not give People even the smallest chance of breaking out of Game Mechanics (People always manage to do things Developers thought would be impossible).

I looked up a Video from JC about the Procedural Generation and I believe you are right with the correction that everything is procedural (I probably got it confused with Star Citizen - there they use Artists to make the Procedural Stuff look more natural).

As to a finite or infinite Universe: I know you said technically infinite, but I want to press the matter again: Infinite is not possible.

But to go more into depth, I remember JC saying that they store the base of the Universe in the Procedural Algorith, (Mathematical Form - Compact and basically no Data Cost). But everything the Players do to derive from that Mathematical Description is Stored on the Servers. And that will accumulate to a lot over the Time. If then the Universe is really big and Players begin to make Crazy stuff it will start getting really costly on the Storage side of Things. So my guess would be that they limit the Size of the Universe so that you would generally speak of a finite Universe and not an infinite (even if you speak in non technical terms where you would call finite sizes infinite (like say No Mans Sky where the Player can not customize every Planet to his liking and generate tons of Data and on top of that DU is a MMO where not 1 Person does this to his own HardDrive but Hundreds of Thousands of Players do it to the Server)).

 

TDLR

You are right about the Procedural Generation: It seems DU will generate everything Procedurally.

I disagree on there being the whole Universe in Place at the Beginning of the Game since that would not make sense in multiple Cases.

I don't think you can speak of a technically infinite Universe since over time the Players will let the the Universe derive that much from the original Mathematical Description (which is cheap to store) to a Point where it will be really costly to Store that amount of derivation Data and there will be a Size Cap. In comparison to Games that can be technically infinite because they don't have to store Derivation from the Mathematical Description (like NoMansSky).

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2 hours ago, Inasyah said:

It would make sense for them to not include the Systems you can't reach yet into the Game already

 

The thing is that all systems are "reachable" in the sense that you could fly to them. It may take months or years but you *could* do it. 

 

2 hours ago, Inasyah said:

Since unused Data is just a waste of Money to store on a Server - also it is always good to not give People even the smallest chance of breaking out of Game Mechanics (People always manage to do things Developers thought would be impossible).

 

Systems that haven't been visited yet don't take any data to store since they haven't yet been generated on disk but hey do *exist* in the sense they are already defined by the math. Also, the devs have stated that they want people to be able to reach systems even without stargates (though it would be very very difficult) so having that as a possibility doesn't violate their plans. 

 

2 hours ago, Inasyah said:

But everything the Players do to derive from that Mathematical Description is Stored on the Servers. And that will accumulate to a lot over the Time. If then the Universe is really big and Players begin to make Crazy stuff it will start getting really costly on the Storage side of Things. So my guess would be that they limit the Size of the Universe so that you would generally speak of a finite Universe and not an infinite (even if you speak in non technical terms where you would call finite sizes infinite (like say No Mans Sky where the Player can not customize every Planet to his liking and generate tons of Data and on top of that DU is a MMO where not 1 Person does this to his own HardDrive but Hundreds of Thousands of Players do it to the Server)).

 

Very true, the data storage will definitely accumulate over time but the cost to store it all will hopefully go down over time too. You're right that *technically* it can never be infinite, but it is infinitely expandable. 

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17 hours ago, Lord_Void said:

 

The thing is that all systems are "reachable" in the sense that you could fly to them. It may take months or years but you *could* do it. 

 

 

Systems that haven't been visited yet don't take any data to store since they haven't yet been generated on disk but hey do *exist* in the sense they are already defined by the math. Also, the devs have stated that they want people to be able to reach systems even without stargates (though it would be very very difficult) so having that as a possibility doesn't violate their plans. 

 

If it's by design to reach those Systems already on launch then I agree with you.

 

But then I have to also revice my assumtion about the value of territory. If the Universe is that big from the beginning than that would counteract my prediction.

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50 minutes ago, Inasyah said:

 

If it's by design to reach those Systems already on launch then I agree with you.

 

But then I have to also revice my assumtion about the value of territory. If the Universe is that big from the beginning than that would counteract my prediction.

The universe is THAT big. however you have to have the skills, resources, and ships to build something that can take you "there". which with what we know NQ is saying its going to take weeks/months before we are in space. I COULD go to a desert planet but it may be void of any useful resources.

 

You could probably have a flotilla style org. but I imagine that no matter how far out we go. Having a "home" is always important. if for no other reason than for a rez node

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7 minutes ago, The_War_Doctor said:

You could probably have a flotilla style org. but I imagine that no matter how far out we go. Having a "home" is always important. if for no other reason than for a rez node

 

I imagine for many Organizations big Ships will become their "home". If it will be possible to have a rez node on a construct (which it is I believe to remember).

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On 18/07/2017 at 6:42 PM, Inasyah said:

 

I imagine for many Organizations big Ships will become their "home". If it will be possible to have a rez node on a construct (which it is I believe to remember).

 

That is entirely dependent on the mechanics of the game, if they would allow it to be practical to have a ship as a home.

 

Will the ship be vulnerable during offline hours? Will you be able to perform all actions required, i.e crafting, refining and such, that otherwise would take buildings/stations on the ground? Will you be able to respawn at the ship at all?

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In short, my intuitive take on this is:

 

Though functionally infinite, the amount of planets and land on the planets (& other celestial bodies) actually accessible at a given time will be limited, and the discovery of new territory (and developing logistics to that location to actually make it useful) will be rate limited.

 

Therefore, there will be scarcity, but it will be transient/fluctuating in nature, and the extent of it will depend on how NQ balances the mechanisms that enable the discovery of new resources.

 

As sort of eluded to by other posters, the value of an area will have stages/modes/layers associated with it. I'm not sure what sequence things will happen in, but the utilization of an area can be broken down into at least:

  • usage for the raw resources/minerals,
  • usage for land and living spaces,
  • as well as usage as a population/trading/social hub (and possibly other stages/layers).

These all have economic value associated with them, and will deplete at different rates. It's a difficult problem to consider more concretely without seeing the exact implementation.

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  • 4 weeks later...

 As far as I understand it there will be one system, to begin with, with subsequent systems being added by NQ for exploration via stargates. 

 

There is potentially the possibility for an infinite amount of systems. The trick will be storing all those voxel edits. 

 

As for the value of sovereign territory. You can expect that to rise and fall as trade hubs resources are moved around. Then there is war and conflict to think about. 

 

You also really have to think about how you value sovereign territory be it strategic value or economical value. 

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  • 3 weeks later...

Sovereign territory is important, because it allows a certain group to define "laws" for that territory (via RDMS). That allows the group to define things like land use permissions, taxes, etc. Those laws will also affect the exploitation of resources in that territory.

 

Sovereignty allows you to shape your territory as you see fit.

 

NQ have also floated the idea of allowing sovereign space claims, and ultimately the possibility of claiming entire planets and even solar systems.

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