Bring Back the DU We Love

[vylqun]

yeah, i'm still waiting for the incentives of building large bases that i again and again suggested and theorycrafted since before the pre-alpha. Would've created a lot of emergent gameplay and actually keep ppl together instead of everyone having their own small base.

 

On 11/10/2023 at 4:37 PM, blundertwink said:

 

So...on one hand its an arbitrary guess, on the other its powered by a small sample size of your friends...but somehow that generalization is unlikely to be wrong...?

 

that 'small' sample size is roughly 30 players. If you call that small compared to DUs currently active playerbase then we agree on that point

[blundertwink]

7 hours ago, vylqun said:

yeah, i'm still waiting for the incentives of building large bases that i again and again suggested and theorycrafted since before the pre-alpha. Would've created a lot of emergent gameplay and actually keep ppl together instead of everyone having their own small base.

 

 

that 'small' sample size is roughly 30 players. If you call that small compared to DUs currently active playerbase then we agree on that point

 

 Thirty players is not a viable sample size in the context of NQ making choices about the product...but that's kind of beside the point. 

 

The point is that even NQ doesn't want to continue developing the game...regardless of how many people "actually" are playing right now, the only entity with full transparency on its performance and cost is NQ....and they have decided not to pursue it. 

 

They've been open about the fact that their ~80 employees are spending their time on three projects other than DU and that DU isn't the main focus right now (they were at GamesCon Europe just last week and the picture of their booth doesn't even mention DU at all). 

 

So...it really doesn't matter if you think that DU has 50-100 active players or 5000 active players, NQ obviously isn't committed to continuing development at scale. 

 

Personally, I do really respect those NQ devs that are likely donating their personal time to run events or do small fixes. That's huge commitment for a community that has been rather pessimistic for a long time.

 

I don't really respect the effort to keep collecting subs when they know there's no plans for major updates...but I also see how NQ is veering into the web3/blockchain world and people in that world tend not to care too much about pesky things like integrity... 🤷‍♂️  

[ADCOne]

On 8/30/2023 at 1:15 AM, Sinjin said:

I still LOVE THIS GAME - Glad it is not just me

• Add some asteroids with mega nodes.  - Agreed, though I have not done any asteroid mining since Beta.

 

• Unbalance some of the game.  - Agreed, max speed was not the way to 'balance' ships, should have been acceleration balance  based upon mass and engine thrust (Small ships would always reach higher speeds first with this).

 

• Schematics: - Agreed, its not a fun system that's been implemented and have suggested a tech tree alternative (rewarding long standing players but allowing all to participate. which is better in my opinion). Though it has been pointed out originally it was sold as no sub parts being required and that sounds like less server taxing and might be better, certainly worth a try in my opinion if the only reason for schematics is server load.

 

• Add something for us to aspire to. - I am not sure about this the game was sold as player driven and as the game is people can aspire to what they want to do. Though I guess a story intro might be nice to teach all the aspects of the game in addition to the tutorials.

 

• Bring back the bots. - I am not sure about the bots, I agree the market is not quite as it should be but T2 ore is still more expensive than they were in Beta, where as T1 ore is much lower in prise. I think they might just need to rebalance of the ores quantities (Especially since T2 is the fuel ores and needed just to fly around). I have suggested an exchange of scan results for ore amounts on a tile of the players choosing to make ores more attainable and all tiles potentially useful.

 

• Cut the weekly fee on territories by at least half.  - I do and don't agree with this.
  I think the home tiles and the HQ tiles should be without taxes for all players.
  
  I also think the corporate taxes should be higher than the individual player taxes, the reason for this is individual players can only manage so many tiles, whereas the organisations can have infinite numbers - dependant on members. So maybe I think leaving the organisation at the current price and simply reduce the taxes for player owned tiles to maybe 100,000 each week would make the single player a more relaxing experience (it is meant to be a game after all). Where as the organisations, which I would have thought will be more likely to PvP and should be more tightly wound as a result.
  
  I also think that all single player who owns no tiles other than their home tile(s) (Haven / Sanctuary) and the HQ tiles, should receive the money payed into the taxes divided equally between them (Being part of an organisation would not affect this). Since this would also help drive the economy with single players having funds to buy items from the market and take away the tax blackhole, which provides no services in exchange for the payment of taxes.
  
  The blackhole is my personal biggest issue with the tax being in place.
   

• Mining units… the upkeep is just irritating. - Agreed. I like you can have bonus or but, I do not see why I need to keep calibrating the units every week to keep them going (these are the things keeping the market going even a little after all).
   
• Introduce clear voxels.  - Agreed, I would have liked this at the start ship building, I have found a 'work around' for using the glass panels but I am nowhere near a good enough voxel'er to make it look really nice. I think I could just about manage clear voxel though in box or oblong form.
   
• Reconfigure the Large Dynamic cores for a 2nd style. - Agreed, it would be great to be able to keep the volume of all cores but change the way that volume is shaped. My ships would look much better, even with my limited voxel skills.

Great post Sinjin 

I still LOVE THIS GAME - Glad it is not just me

• Add some asteroids with mega nodes.  - Agreed, though I have not done any asteroid mining since Beta.

 

• Unbalance some of the game.  - Agreed, max speed was not the way to 'balance' ships, should have been acceleration balance  based upon mass and engine thrust (Small ships would always reach higher speeds first with this).

 

• Schematics: - Agreed, its not a fun system that's been implemented and have suggested a tech tree alternative (rewarding long standing players but allowing all to participate. which is better in my opinion). Though it has been pointed out originally it was sold as no sub parts being required and that sounds like less server taxing and might be better, certainly worth a try in my opinion if the only reason for schematics is server load.

 

• Add something for us to aspire to. - I am not sure about this the game was sold as player driven and as the game is people can aspire to what they want to do. Though I guess a story intro might be nice to teach all the aspects of the game in addition to the tutorials.

 

• Bring back the bots. - I am not sure about the bots, I agree the market is not quite as it should be but T2 ore is still more expensive than they were in Beta, where as T1 ore is much lower in prise. I think they might just need to rebalance of the ores quantities (Especially since T2 is the fuel ores and needed just to fly around). I have suggested an exchange of scan results for ore amounts on a tile of the players choosing to make ores more attainable and all tiles potentially useful.

 

• Cut the weekly fee on territories by at least half.  - I do and don't agree with this.
  I think the home tiles and the HQ tiles should be without taxes for all players.
  
  I also think the corporate taxes should be higher than the individual player taxes, the reason for this is individual players can only manage so many tiles, whereas the organisations can have infinite numbers - dependant on members. So maybe I think leaving the organisation at the current price and simply reduce the taxes for player owned tiles to maybe 100,000 each week would make the single player a more relaxing experience (it is meant to be a game after all). Where as the organisations, which I would have thought will be more likely to PvP and should be more tightly wound as a result.
  
  I also think that all single player who owns no tiles other than their home tile(s) (Haven / Sanctuary) and the HQ tiles, should receive the money payed into the taxes divided equally between them (Being part of an organisation would not affect this). Since this would also help drive the economy with single players having funds to buy items from the market and take away the tax blackhole, which provides no services in exchange for the payment of taxes.
  
  The blackhole is my personal biggest issue with the tax being in place.
   

• Mining units… the upkeep is just irritating. - Agreed. I like you can have bonus or but, I do not see why I need to keep calibrating the units every week to keep them going (these are the things keeping the market going even a little after all).
   
• Introduce clear voxels.  - Agreed, I would have liked this at the start ship building, I have found a 'work around' for using the glass panels but I am nowhere near a good enough voxel'er to make it look really nice. I think I could just about manage clear voxel though in box or oblong form.
   
• Reconfigure the Large Dynamic cores for a 2nd style. - Agreed, it would be great to be able to keep the volume of all cores but change the way that volume is shaped. My ships would look much better, even with my limited voxel skills.

Great post Sinjin