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Nerf the BORG cube before it becomes every PvP ship in DU


Demlock

Kill the Cube  

39 members have voted

  1. 1. Should NQ nerf the cube meta?

    • Yes
      33
    • No
      6
  2. 2. How should they do it?

    • Nerf the voxel if the X,Y,Z axis of the buildzone is mostly used up by voxel
      4
    • Buff weapons when attacking a ship that is calculated to be a borg cube
      1
    • Restrict players from being able to build a buildzone maxed borg cubes in build mode all together
      0
    • Nerf the voxel by removing resistances if a construct is calculated or identified as a borg cube on exiting buildmode
      0
    • Don't Nerf the Cube meta because I'm too used to minecraft mechanics and can't build a ship to save my life
      3
    • Prevent extra small core ships from using Large weapons
      5
    • Prevent extra small core ships from using Large and Medium weapons
      14
    • Have Powersystems become overstressed attempting to manage a cube ship and effectively lower the performance of every element on the ship
      8
    • Have Powersystems become overstressed attempting to manage a cube ship and effectively and stall the ship
      4


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Hello,
This post is being put up and polled to get NovaQuark's attention regarding certain mechanics of the game that may or may not be intentional.

After a fair number of PvP engagements in DU I've noticed that people are beginning to dive deeper into the cube meta of DU. As in construct XS/Small Core ships that are just a big brick of ridiculousness and large weapons. By maximizing the entire build space of a construct people will fill it with voxel and other essential elements to just power punch an enemy off the field. An effective strategy I must say. While it is not the only strategy in the game I'm trying to view this topic from a longer term or generalized view of the game (from my perspective... which could be totally wrong).

NQ and even JC has envisioned people building amazing and powerful ships to traversing the stars and battling each other for one reason or another. However, people will tend to follow the meta until NQ makes a change that forces the crowd to take a different path. With the current stance of PvP, NQ will begin to see more and more ships produced that are just shoe boxes or cubes with no thought, effort, or design prowess behind the build.

 

Without going into too much detail or some long drawn out diatribe, I've created a poll with:

  1.     Is a simple yes or no
  2.     Is an option selection based on some ideas I and others have had regarding how to kill the cube and force people to build actual ships instead of boxes.

 

I'm asking for NQ to prevent this from becoming a thing by nerfing the cube meta and forcing people to have to build legitimate ships.

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I for one support this...

The cube meta isn't just a small or xs core with tons of voxels though, I have seen one or two "Cube ships" that utilise the docking method with a Small core cube on the outside, and an xs core cube on the inside through the "Deploy overlay constructs" & The docking mechanism. This way people can effectively have two cubes inside one...

So if you destroy the outer voxels of the small core, the xs core voxels are undamaged.. and so forth, by utilizing guns, on the xs, while targeting the small core, you can keep fire concentrated.

The borg meta is BS, NQ should limit the size of the guns to the size of the core, not just to nerf the borg meta, but also to encourage better balance between ships for fighting, better designs etc...

You wouldn't expect an xs core to be able to singlehandedly destroy a large core ship, however it is perfectly possible with the current set-up

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Sleeker ships should be easier to miss with weapons. Just like in real world. The lower the lowest cross section dimension number of a ship is, the higher a chance of miss variable should be there for guns used against this ship in PvP.

 

PS: Ofc in reality this is true only if the target ship faces the shooter from its sleek, narrow side. Perhaps NQ can implement it this way. If this is too costly to implement, the above idea still works.

 

PS2: NQ can even implement the idea of "signature radius" from Eve. Cross sections X * Y * Z can be the signature radius. Large guns can miss small sig radius ships even if these ships are standing still (ofc they should give large ships their own advantages -currently close to none- before this.

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6 hours ago, Demlock said:

cubes with no thought, effort, or design prowess behind the build.

This shows that you obviously have very little understanding of the amount of thought and effort people actually put into many different cube designs. If it was as simple as throw a box together and toss some engines and weapons on it, I'd support your silly poll but anyone who's actually been out there PVP'ing and not just doing arranged fights or preying on haulers can tell you every single cube is different. While I do look forward to the day that NQ makes changes to PvP, I hope their focus is on the actual PvP issues and not just this silly worry about "OMG no moar cubes". Many of us put lots of thought and effort into our builds and every single fight against other cubes I've been in has been different because of that effort the builder put into it. PvP will only get better when we have less desync and server issues, so let's hope NQ focuses their efforts on that and less on this silly complaint about cube meta.

 

Note that I do want them to one day address the cube meta, but this insane focus on that over actual PvP issues is just crazy.

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9 hours ago, Demlock said:

.....are beginning to dive deeper into the cube meta of DU. As in construct XS/Small Core ships that are just a big brick of ridiculousness and large weapons. By maximizing the entire build space of a construct people will fill it with voxel and other essential elements to just power punch an enemy off the field. An effective strategy I must say. While it is not the only strategy in the game I'm trying to view this topic from a longer term or generalized view of the game (from my perspective... which could be totally wrong).

NQ and even JC has envisioned people building amazing and powerful ships to traversing the stars and battling each other for one reason or another. However, people will tend to follow the meta until NQ makes a change that forces the crowd to take a different path. With the current stance of PvP, NQ will begin to see more and more ships produced that are just shoe boxes or cubes with no thought, effort, or design prowess behind the build.

 

.........

 

I'm asking for NQ to prevent this from becoming a thing by nerfing the cube meta and forcing people to have to build legitimate ships.

So what your asking is for NQ to force players to build ships & ship designs that you approve of, that you deem worthy, and that you feel has had enough thought, prep, and innovation put in it that it's up to your high, impeccable, & un-erring build status, that everyone else in DU must measure up to. And through game mechanics, you want NQ to restrict anything that may result in a ship design that is unworthy or beneath your high standards? That sounds like a wonderful idea to. Forcing a player base or population into doing things always brings  out the best in them, encourages innovation, and lets design & imagination explode. Excellent idea!

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There's multiple issues at hand here....

1) "Voxelmancy" is such an arduous process, no one wants to take their works of art out on the field.

2) Safe Zones allow people to play their PVE play style with virtually no risk.

3) Sell bots at the start of Beta allowed massive initial Industry to jump off..... Leading now to an unhealthy saturation of warp drives/cells.... Not everyone should have them and be able to warp from safe zone to safe zone. Warping SHOULD be expensive.

 

This has lead to PVP only being performed by those that want it. Hence, you are getting ships that are Min/Maxed, true war machines....

 

Add to this that NQs current model of combat is all about statistics.... More voxels means more life. Filling the build box grants you more engagement time.

 

Let's also note that square flattened areas are much easier to repair on the fly.

 

And, people are still testing how the game works, finding the weak points, Min/Maxing .... Your not gonna take the sports car out to go learn how to drive.

 

So yeah, of course the cube is the meta, it will continue to be. As long as the game is changing, and the combat style remains status quo, there is no real reason to have anything other than an impenetrable cube. 

 

I'm not even going to answer your poll, because your "solutions" aren't going to fix anything. And they have a passive aggressive, egotistical tone that belittles the cube builders. The rhetoric showcases almost 0 realistic DU combat experience. Not everyone cares about "How pretty, and important does my ship make me look today?". I'm ok with a Borg Cube because it gets my butt in the pilots seat frequently and consistently, and allows me to experience the game's combat system readily and adaptively.

 

PVP is not in a state that I think it should be. But Nerfing everyone, because some people are analysing and building using the constraints of the game to increase ships efficiency/potency, and your choosing vanity over functionality, is just ludicrous.

 

If you want to fix the cube. Change how damage is dealt and targeting is done. Higher cross sections should be more easily identified, either by range and targeting speed or both. Encourage "Stealth" ship designs, lower profiles and such. And they should change how rounds impact damage works. Right now it's all explosive splash style of damage. There may be different resistances, but it's still all splash damage. A low damage armor penetrating kinetic round needs to be added.Where damage is dealt in a straight line through the ship (to a certain point depending on size, quality....blah blah blah) and the collateral damage, or cavitation, or hole, is very minimal. They should also add a more thermal damage type, that has little effect on armor but wreaks havoc on elements. 

 

What we really need.... Is to stop the toxic "Nerf Talk Meta", who's motivation is holding everyone else back, because we can't figure the game out. And let's work towards real solutions that will encourage ingenuity, and community growth.

 

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I agreed with the nerf of the cube ship idea, until I voted and read the solutions. Restricting XS cores from Medium and Large guns is not going to fix the problem here. How exactly does restricting the weapon size effect the shapes of their ships? 

 

I honestly feel these cube ships are a temporary meta in pvp. A temporary inconvenience. The game is ever changing and I would imagine the introduction of power systems will help shift the meta. As will other mechanics as they roll out. Patience will go a long way here.

 

In the end, I don't know that placing more restrictions on the game and ship designs will help the community. Just keeping building and design a cube killer... 

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They need to introduce the power system with generators adding weight to increase capacity. Just make the capacity system more robust to include all elements. Voxel weight will slow down a ship significantly unless it’s a weak voxel that won’t matter anyways.

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XS cores are the best for their small lock on range.

I think a good fix would be the more weapons you have firing or the more engines you're turning on the larger your lock on range is.  And later on the more power you pump through your ship the larger your lock on range is.

 

I think detection range let alone lock on range should go down the less you have running on your ship.

 

I don't think volume or mass should determine the lock on range.

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Most of your suggestions as of how are pretty ba, I dont think it would work out with targeting the design by identification. The only good suggestion imo is core size locking weapon size. And also as Olmeca wrote, make thinner ships harder to hit by proxy of voxel width on the different axises from the shooters perspective. Together it would keep small ships able to exist in a battle with larger ships but also big weapons being exclusive to larger cores would make bigger crewed ships worthwhile more than just flexing.

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6 hours ago, Zamarus said:

Most of your suggestions as of how are pretty ba, I dont think it would work out with targeting the design by identification. The only good suggestion imo is core size locking weapon size. And also as Olmeca wrote, make thinner ships harder to hit by proxy of voxel width on the different axises from the shooters perspective. Together it would keep small ships able to exist in a battle with larger ships but also big weapons being exclusive to larger cores would make bigger crewed ships worthwhile more than just flexing.

 

12 hours ago, SirWillyLongShank said:

There's multiple issues at hand here....

1) "Voxelmancy" is such an arduous process, no one wants to take their works of art out on the field.

2) Safe Zones allow people to play their PVE play style with virtually no risk.

3) Sell bots at the start of Beta allowed massive initial Industry to jump off..... Leading now to an unhealthy saturation of warp drives/cells.... Not everyone should have them and be able to warp from safe zone to safe zone. Warping SHOULD be expensive.

 

This has lead to PVP only being performed by those that want it. Hence, you are getting ships that are Min/Maxed, true war machines....

 

Add to this that NQs current model of combat is all about statistics.... More voxels means more life. Filling the build box grants you more engagement time.

 

Let's also note that square flattened areas are much easier to repair on the fly.

 

And, people are still testing how the game works, finding the weak points, Min/Maxing .... Your not gonna take the sports car out to go learn how to drive.

 

So yeah, of course the cube is the meta, it will continue to be. As long as the game is changing, and the combat style remains status quo, there is no real reason to have anything other than an impenetrable cube. 

 

I'm not even going to answer your poll, because your "solutions" aren't going to fix anything. And they have a passive aggressive, egotistical tone that belittles the cube builders. The rhetoric showcases almost 0 realistic DU combat experience. Not everyone cares about "How pretty, and important does my ship make me look today?". I'm ok with a Borg Cube because it gets my butt in the pilots seat frequently and consistently, and allows me to experience the game's combat system readily and adaptively.

 

PVP is not in a state that I think it should be. But Nerfing everyone, because some people are analysing and building using the constraints of the game to increase ships efficiency/potency, and your choosing vanity over functionality, is just ludicrous.

 

If you want to fix the cube. Change how damage is dealt and targeting is done. Higher cross sections should be more easily identified, either by range and targeting speed or both. Encourage "Stealth" ship designs, lower profiles and such. And they should change how rounds impact damage works. Right now it's all explosive splash style of damage. There may be different resistances, but it's still all splash damage. A low damage armor penetrating kinetic round needs to be added.Where damage is dealt in a straight line through the ship (to a certain point depending on size, quality....blah blah blah) and the collateral damage, or cavitation, or hole, is very minimal. They should also add a more thermal damage type, that has little effect on armor but wreaks havoc on elements. 

 

What we really need.... Is to stop the toxic "Nerf Talk Meta", who's motivation is holding everyone else back, because we can't figure the game out. And let's work towards real solutions that will encourage ingenuity, and community growth.

 

 

16 hours ago, MaximusNerdius said:

This shows that you obviously have very little understanding of the amount of thought and effort people actually put into many different cube designs. If it was as simple as throw a box together and toss some engines and weapons on it, I'd support your silly poll but anyone who's actually been out there PVP'ing and not just doing arranged fights or preying on haulers can tell you every single cube is different. While I do look forward to the day that NQ makes changes to PvP, I hope their focus is on the actual PvP issues and not just this silly worry about "OMG no moar cubes". Many of us put lots of thought and effort into our builds and every single fight against other cubes I've been in has been different because of that effort the builder put into it. PvP will only get better when we have less desync and server issues, so let's hope NQ focuses their efforts on that and less on this silly complaint about cube meta.

 

Note that I do want them to one day address the cube meta, but this insane focus on that over actual PvP issues is just crazy.

 

12 hours ago, Memoti said:

So what your asking is for NQ to force players to build ships & ship designs that you approve of, that you deem worthy, and that you feel has had enough thought, prep, and innovation put in it that it's up to your high, impeccable, & un-erring build status, that everyone else in DU must measure up to. And through game mechanics, you want NQ to restrict anything that may result in a ship design that is unworthy or beneath your high standards? That sounds like a wonderful idea to. Forcing a player base or population into doing things always brings  out the best in them, encourages innovation, and lets design & imagination explode. Excellent idea!

 

Well,
I'm glad that everyone is at least posting thoughts and ideas about how to address it aside from the initial view that my posting this was simply to moan and complain about X,Y,Z.

My time is rather limited and writing a long diatribe about my views of PvP in DU to date in extreme detail with well thought out analysis is not something I can do at the moment.

 

In all honesty, getting people riled up over something that's not 100%  complete sometimes leads to more astute minds shining through to offer perspectives leading to a better way forward.

 

As nearly all responses here have had either a hint of, or a sound take on PvP most can agree it needs more work. I'm glad to see that the discussion is being had at the end of the day on how to make something we all enjoy better for the future.

 

Do I hate the borg cubes?

Yes, its absolutely ridiculous

Do I want a PvP system that pushes people to work towards ships that are effective, practical and have more than just 6 sides to it?

Yes

Are there ways to do so?

Yes

Is that my main point for this whole post?

No

 

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10 hours ago, Demlock said:

 

 

 

 

Well,
I'm glad that everyone is at least posting thoughts and ideas about how to address it aside from the initial view that my posting this was simply to moan and complain about X,Y,Z.

My time is rather limited and writing a long diatribe about my views of PvP in DU to date in extreme detail with well thought out analysis is not something I can do at the moment.

 

In all honesty, getting people riled up over something that's not 100%  complete sometimes leads to more astute minds shining through to offer perspectives leading to a better way forward.

 

As nearly all responses here have had either a hint of, or a sound take on PvP most can agree it needs more work. I'm glad to see that the discussion is being had at the end of the day on how to make something we all enjoy better for the future.

 

Do I hate the borg cubes?

Yes, its absolutely ridiculous

Do I want a PvP system that pushes people to work towards ships that are effective, practical and have more than just 6 sides to it?

Yes

Are there ways to do so?

Yes

Is that my main point for this whole post?

No

 

I am glad you posted the topic tho, Cubes really do need to be dealt with somehow. From what i've seen there are challengers in terms of design out there, but its extra effort vs the easy and cheap performance with cubes. 

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I ran into a XS Cubed ship the other day, it took me like 2-3 minutes to whittle it down to destroy it with XS guns. It was literally just a cube with a core inside of it. My guns wouldn't target the core until all voxels were smashed. Which is odd because the core was wide open to be attacked within a minute of shooting it. Why it forces it to hit only voxels first I have no clue. But that was my only experience with it so far. None of the poll selections offered a solution if you ask me. I assume bigger guns are the better counter to a defence of a squared cube ship. Because more damage, cone, range, etc.

 

But my guess would be to somehow change how the guns target a said cube ship. To target a core if it was wide open, instead of targeting more voxel. /shrug

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I personally don't have a problem with cube shaped ships, but being able to mount large railguns and radar on a tiny cube and then shoot freight ships 160km away that cant even see them is a bit ridiculous. I totally get the minimalist approach to building, i totally get that people want to be able to take out larger ships with smaller fighters, but the range and mechanics of the current cube meta are ridiculously lopsided. if you are in an actual hauler, and you happen to run across one of these cubes, which is currently fairly rare, there's not much you can do. You cant outrun them, you can't even see them to shoot back with the ranges involved... I mean if they at LEAST made it so that firing larger weapons or hitting someone with weapons made you visible on radar for a few seconds, it would give the guy that's just trying to play the game and get materials back to their base a chance to do SOMETHING... I totally get that people want to pvp in such a way that they minimize self risk and maximize kill potential... but being able to set up a complete checkmate to basically grief someone without them having a chance in hell to do anything about it is pretty dumb. A lot of players in this game like it because it is a building exploration game. Yes there are risks, and they can accept that, but it really throws mud in their eye when the game mechanics are such that "well if you run into one of these meta cube guys you're just gonna lose the last 8 hours of work gathering materials, and your ship and there's nothing you can do about it" I'm not a fan of no-win scenarios. I mean if I'm an idiot and dont even put weapons on my ship and I get killed by someone that did, fair, that was my fault. If its impossible for me to defend myself when I take precautions? Time to find a new game.

 

My basic point is, pvp? YES i want it. Do I want some guy with a very cheap (well thought out) ship to completely checkmate me when I'm in anything other than a meta cube? NO. Some people want to only "pvp" all day and do very little else, and some people want to try out all aspects of the game. Stacking all the cards in the pvp'ers hand and spitting on the people that actually want to do the other half of the game (build/explore) is going to kill this game if it is not dealt with at some point somehow. Completely one sided engagements are only fun for the people that are automatically going to win, and even then its barely fun for them after 3-4 times because they didn't have much risk. Next thing you know all the players left in the game are sitting in their little cubes looking for haulers, but there aren't any cuz they all quit playing.

 

This is the choosing point that most game developers nowadays have to decide on. If I were the developer, I would make choices that encourage more people to play and build a thriving community, make a lot of money. Choose to allow a few players to ruin the game for the majority, and this great game with great potential will sink into obscurity.

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9 hours ago, TheKatzMan said:

I personally don't have a problem with cube shaped ships, but being able to mount large railguns and radar on a tiny cube and then shoot freight ships 160km away that cant even see them is a bit ridiculous. I totally get the minimalist approach to building, i totally get that people want to be able to take out larger ships with smaller fighters, but the range and mechanics of the current cube meta are ridiculously lopsided. if you are in an actual hauler, and you happen to run across one of these cubes, which is currently fairly rare, there's not much you can do. You cant outrun them, you can't even see them to shoot back with the ranges involved... I mean if they at LEAST made it so that firing larger weapons or hitting someone with weapons made you visible on radar for a few seconds, it would give the guy that's just trying to play the game and get materials back to their base a chance to do SOMETHING... I totally get that people want to pvp in such a way that they minimize self risk and maximize kill potential... but being able to set up a complete checkmate to basically grief someone without them having a chance in hell to do anything about it is pretty dumb. A lot of players in this game like it because it is a building exploration game. Yes there are risks, and they can accept that, but it really throws mud in their eye when the game mechanics are such that "well if you run into one of these meta cube guys you're just gonna lose the last 8 hours of work gathering materials, and your ship and there's nothing you can do about it" I'm not a fan of no-win scenarios. I mean if I'm an idiot and dont even put weapons on my ship and I get killed by someone that did, fair, that was my fault. If its impossible for me to defend myself when I take precautions? Time to find a new game.

 

My basic point is, pvp? YES i want it. Do I want some guy with a very cheap (well thought out) ship to completely checkmate me when I'm in anything other than a meta cube? NO. Some people want to only "pvp" all day and do very little else, and some people want to try out all aspects of the game. Stacking all the cards in the pvp'ers hand and spitting on the people that actually want to do the other half of the game (build/explore) is going to kill this game if it is not dealt with at some point somehow. Completely one sided engagements are only fun for the people that are automatically going to win, and even then its barely fun for them after 3-4 times because they didn't have much risk. Next thing you know all the players left in the game are sitting in their little cubes looking for haulers, but there aren't any cuz they all quit playing.

 

This is the choosing point that most game developers nowadays have to decide on. If I were the developer, I would make choices that encourage more people to play and build a thriving community, make a lot of money. Choose to allow a few players to ruin the game for the majority, and this great game with great potential will sink into obscurity.

Same goes for solo  PvP'ers I can't use those bigger guns or radars as a solo player. So those guys with the bigger guns and radars will have the advantage over me. Doesn't matter if they have a XS ship or a Large core cubed ship. I'll never have an advantage using XS guns against these guys. Group play is the strongest. If you are just a solo hauler player its the same kind of situation. 

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On 10/25/2020 at 4:00 AM, Olmeca_Gold said:

Sleeker ships should be easier to miss with weapons. Just like in real world. The lower the lowest cross section dimension number of a ship is, the higher a chance of miss variable should be there for guns used against this ship in PvP.

 

PS: Ofc in reality this is true only if the target ship faces the shooter from its sleek, narrow side. Perhaps NQ can implement it this way. If this is too costly to implement, the above idea still works.

 

PS2: NQ can even implement the idea of "signature radius" from Eve. Cross sections X * Y * Z can be the signature radius. Large guns can miss small sig radius ships even if these ships are standing still (ofc they should give large ships their own advantages -currently close to none- before this.


I am glad the above idea I offered here and elsewhere is confirmed by @NQ-Entropy on Youtube as the direction they want to go.

 

@NQ-Entropy, if I may be so bold to follow up on that; if the server can know which side I am receiving damage from, and take the cross section facing that side as the variable going into the hit/miss formula; that'd be the optimal addition for PvP'ers as it gives them the option to turn their sleek side toward the enemy and receive less damage. However, I feel like this can be costly to develop compared to the case where you take X * Y * Z as the variable that goes into the hit/miss formula. This too, would encourage thinner or tube-shaped ships.

 

Either way, you could also introduce X * Y * Z as sort of a "signature radius" value, and use that not only for hit/miss but also for radar identification speeds (and any other place which you want to distinguish small/sleek ships vs large/cube ships).

 

o7

 

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