Search & Rescue Gameplay Loop

[Musclethorpe]

A gameplay loop that is player driven, and open ended. To facilitate this endeavor, a distress signal transmitter/receiver would need to be introduced into the game. The range would need to be significant to be effective, something to the tune of 100 SU or more. To encourage use, and limit predatory ganks/traps, have said transmitter/receiver element(s) usable only on ships without weapons, like the Remote Controller. A nice touch could be to have a pre-determined message list such as, "Out of fuel" or "In need of repair".

 

This has been submitted to the suggestions page pending approval. Discuss here, please.

[Warlander]

Im not really sure what the purpose of this would be tbh but ill bite.

 

For search and rescue to work you need something to happen. If that is PvP then you pretty much lose your ship and the transponder beacon is moot once they claim the core.

 

If there is a crash somewhere or a ship is deralect on a planet somewhere then you can always run to a market or mine to buy what you need there. Pinging a signal with a beacon is pretty much asking for trouble and potentially getting hijacked if you already crash landed in an occupied tile or even if you crash in an unclaimed territory you are asking for people to come and claim the tile then maneuver tool it onto their ship then fly it up to space and take your ship once you are in the PvP zone. 8-9/10 times you will attract the opposite of help. Its not to say you might get lucky but you are waaay more likely to get ganked than helped. Running a rescue beacon just makes their job easier.

 

But, if NQ were to say add NPCs through missions and seeded crash sites with a crew of however many were on board not knowing if there are survivors (they might all be dead by the time help comes) you can go and try to save them before the timer runs out. In which case it becomes a salvage opperation and you can bring back the remains of the crew or salvage or repair the ship. If the crew is alive then you have a few options depending on the RNG of the situation. Perhaps its just a simple hey come fix the ship and we pay you. Perhaps its you need to fix the containers to get the scrap or whatever is in the cargo hold at which point you could steal whats in there. Perhaps the ship is completely destroyed and they need and evac and you just walk up and hit F and escort them onto your ship that uses a /follow command like in counterstike with hostages.

 

If NQ goes further with NPC and Scripts that use the available Auto Pilot Script they could send a ship crew to anywhere and if the auto pilot isnt tuned that is ok too if they crash it works with this kind of suggestion if they crash or whatever. With an Auto Miner Script and Auto Pilot Script you could have NPCs traveling, mining, crashing, etc. If NQ also did an Auto Crafting Script (Nano Crafting), Auto Mining, and Auto Piloting Script together you could have NPC ship crews that can be PvPed and if they make no distinction between pc/npc tags nobody would really be the wiser. If NQ made a Anti-PK script that had combat based Pilots that could be sent to attack Pirates or players or NPCs it would also make things more interesting. Especially if we ever got guns and the NPCs are hostile and baiting you to the crash site to rob you or they are trying to protect their cargo. NPC gunners could also help as hired henchmen or wingmen.

 

If NPCs ever got access to the Talent System as their base of skills and were no better or worse than a player that you could hire to do any number of jobs or just AI that requires no avatar or as just a ship, element, or a kind of micro core driven construct (XXS, Nano, etc).

 

Otherwise this system is dead on arrival as a game loop unless you use NPCs.

[Musclethorpe]

32 minutes ago, Warlander said:

Im not really sure what the purpose of this would be tbh but ill bite.

 

For search and rescue to work you need something to happen. If that is PvP then you pretty much lose your ship and the transponder beacon is moot once they claim the core.

 

If there is a crash somewhere or a ship is deralect on a planet somewhere then you can always run to a market or mine to buy what you need there. Pinging a signal with a beacon is pretty much asking for trouble and potentially getting hijacked if you already crash landed in an occupied tile or even if you crash in an unclaimed territory you are asking for people to come and claim the tile then maneuver tool it onto their ship then fly it up to space and take your ship once you are in the PvP zone. 8-9/10 times you will attract the opposite of help. Its not to say you might get lucky but you are waaay more likely to get ganked than helped. Running a rescue beacon just makes their job easier.

 

But, if NQ were to say add NPCs through missions and seeded crash sites with a crew of however many were on board not knowing if there are survivors (they might all be dead by the time help comes) you can go and try to save them before the timer runs out. In which case it becomes a salvage opperation and you can bring back the remains of the crew or salvage or repair the ship. If the crew is alive then you have a few options depending on the RNG of the situation. Perhaps its just a simple hey come fix the ship and we pay you. Perhaps its you need to fix the containers to get the scrap or whatever is in the cargo hold at which point you could steal whats in there. Perhaps the ship is completely destroyed and they need and evac and you just walk up and hit F and escort them onto your ship that uses a /follow command like in counterstike with hostages.

 

If NQ goes further with NPC and Scripts that use the available Auto Pilot Script they could send a ship crew to anywhere and if the auto pilot isnt tuned that is ok too if they crash it works with this kind of suggestion if they crash or whatever. With an Auto Miner Script and Auto Pilot Script you could have NPCs traveling, mining, crashing, etc. If NQ also did an Auto Crafting Script (Nano Crafting), Auto Mining, and Auto Piloting Script together you could have NPC ship crews that can be PvPed and if they make no distinction between pc/npc tags nobody would really be the wiser. If NQ made a Anti-PK script that had combat based Pilots that could be sent to attack Pirates or players or NPCs it would also make things more interesting. Especially if we ever got guns and the NPCs are hostile and baiting you to the crash site to rob you or they are trying to protect their cargo. NPC gunners could also help as hired henchmen or wingmen.

 

If NPCs ever got access to the Talent System as their base of skills and were no better or worse than a player that you could hire to do any number of jobs or just AI that requires no avatar or as just a ship, element, or a kind of micro core driven construct (XXS, Nano, etc).

 

Otherwise this system is dead on arrival as a game loop unless you use NPCs.

I can't say that I agree with anything you said here. Markets aren't always within a reasonable distance, nor do you always have the resources to mine/fabricate the fuel or scrap needed to get the job done. As far as the maneuver tool on a claimed territory, as I understand that exploit of stealing ships was done away with a couple months ago with the parenting change.

 

In regards to ganks, there is a reason I suggested it only be useable on ships without weapons...though I suppose the dedicated could always store them then reattach upon arrival. Honestly even that is unlikely, as they would have to cruise around specifically without weapons on the off chance they find a distress signal. There are far better and easier ways to gank.

 

There is always the chance some one could come to your aid and either exploit your misfortune, or out and out salvage your ship from under you if you don't have a core and are in the PvP zone (as of now you can't lose ownership planetside/safezone no matter what unless you actually abandon). This is simply the risk you run, but again the likelyhood of someone flying a weaponless ship cruising specifically for distress signals they may not even find just to be malicious is unlikely. As I said, there are easier ways to grief, and griefers typically follow the path of least resistance. 

[Warlander]

If the hijacking has been dealt with then my apologies.

 

I did make a suggestion for a sensor array in which a fleet flagship had a large area radar or sensor beacon in which orgs could set up for additional viewing of what is in the area along with a ship sensor/diagnostic tool which could allow an org to see where all ships were along with their radar added to the flag ship along with the health/status of the ship.

 

In that sort of light I can see a rescure beacon being useful if you can count on someone within an org to come to your rescue and placing a blip on org radar with a yellow waypoint. Or a red waypoint if a ship is taking fire, target locked, or targeted as well. You are far more likely to be saved by an orgmate than a random stranger. I am also sure that orgless players are also more prone to needing rescue.

 

To me if I need to im not above running 1su to a market for 4 hours. Before the maneuver tool got nerfed I walked an M class ship .9su over mountains and other features for like 10hrs straight. I could have mined and fixed it but it was way over weight coming back from a mining haul. If the will is there you can figure it out without support. If you can mine and craft Nitron with carbon, silicon, oxigen, and hydrogen which can be found everywhere. With enough mining you could get both the scrap and the gas to get to a market.

 

But I do see value in having something like a "Black box" type container that is much more durable than a standard container that would be required to even fire a rescure beacon if the ship is completely donezo. If your whole ship gets blown it either has to be some kind of standard tool or having emergency type beacons that can be stored inside the black box container that still function like active elements from within the box. And it should be much more durable to make it through a crash and perhaps just has a whole ton more hp than the gravity slam of the crash can do tot he box but requires a lot of scap for the luxury of being able to use emergency elements within it.

 

In the case of new players though either their ships are not worth much and easy to replace if need be. They likely wont be going off world and would be in range of a market or mining area to fix their ship if it is on the ground and not stuck up in the air. It should take them no time at all to fix XS/S parts.

 

Even if the rescue is tied to a mission system it still begs the question how much is it worth it to fly to repair and fix a ship when the person could likely do it themselves with a little effort in  about an hour or less unless they are flying L+ parts that take a good while to fix. At that point if you arent in an org you are just asking for trouble anyhow.

 

 

[Haunty]

It's already happening, don't really need special game mechanics for it, just call a known rescue org for help, give position and what you need etc.

[Daphne Jones]

I know of two orgs doing rescue work already. Both are connected with my nation-org, so are visible to me. There are probably many others. 

 

I know one was lured to into a trap and ganked in the first week or so of beta. I don't know if they're still in business. The other one shows up for rescues armed and ready to defend themselves. I'm pretty sure the proposed beacon would be useless for either of these businesses.

 

Obviously, if gankers are setting a trap with a beacon that can only be used from an unarmed ship, the beacon will be on an unarmed ship with an armed ship right next to it. The fact that it can only be received by an unarmed ship just means their target may show up unarmed.

 

So, imo, the proposed beacon is merely a ganker's tool and that's probably the OP's intent.

[Musclethorpe]

2 hours ago, Daphne Jones said:

So, imo, the proposed beacon is merely a ganker's tool and that's probably the OP's intent.

That's a bold assumption. As I stated in one of my replies, there are far easier ways to gank. Activating a beacon with the intent to grief, on the off chance some one comes along that is within range and wants to assist, is a bit of a long shot. The idea to have it not work on ships with weapons is at least a hurdle in the way. You will never stop a determined ganker.

 

Do you honestly think I would take the time to make this suggestion, and reply in this thread, just to create a sub-par way to maybe kill a good samaritan? 

 

Now all this being said, the purpose of the beacon would be to have an immersive in-game tool that didn't require you to go to a chat channel, or a 3rd party site to get help.

[Musclethorpe]

3 hours ago, Haunty said:

It's already happening, don't really need special game mechanics for it, just call a known rescue org for help, give position and what you need etc.

It would be in-game, immersive, and passersby could respond if they happen to be in range. This kind of thing has been happening in the sci-fi genre since the beginning.

[Daphne Jones]

6 hours ago, Musclethorpe said:

 

 

Do you honestly think I would take the time to make this suggestion, and reply in this thread, just to create a sub-par way to maybe kill a good samaritan? 

The only think sub-par about it is that in game chat already does this just fine. Type /join 911 and call for help. Eyes and Ears rescue monitors that and maybe other rescue services. Of course gankers are monitoring it too. Other rescue services have more secure channels that only they and their subscribers can access. Probably fewer gankers on those.

6 hours ago, Musclethorpe said:

It would be in-game, immersive, and passersby could respond if they happen to be in range. This kind of thing has been happening in the sci-fi genre since the beginning.

See above - in game chat. Immersive; Can be secure(-ish); No extra dev cost.

[Musclethorpe]

2 hours ago, Daphne Jones said:

See above - in game chat. Immersive; Can be secure(-ish); No extra dev cost.

In-game chat is anything but immersive. That's fine though, the fun-factor of this feature is clearly lost upon you. No sweat.