Better ship fueling mechanics

Discussion in 'Mechanics' started by Seven Dollers, Dec 7, 2013.

  1. Seven Dollers

    Seven Dollers Poptop Tamer

    You don't see a problem in people being able to skip the exploration process that leads to the reward, in a game where the exploration process is one of the core focuses...
    There is a reason games are designed to provide challenge, and then reward you know. It is our psychology, we need it. Allowing players to skip the challenge by giving them access to higher leveled gear without the process of looking for it themselves will end in a dull game.
     
  2. Dimitriye98

    Dimitriye98 Subatomic Cosmonaut

    A dull game for players who choose to do it. If that's the way you want to play, all props to you. My primary focus is leveling out the two play styles of high-speed exploration and lower-speed base building.
     
  3. Seven Dollers

    Seven Dollers Poptop Tamer

    Once again, blaming players for how they choose to play is sloppy design by people who don't know better. It is the job of a game designer to make choices about the experience a player will have, if their choices result in a system that encourages and rewards activities that are monotonous and surpass reward mechanisms, that is the fault of the developer, not the player.
    You have yet to justify how a fuel based system actually contributes to either high-speed exploration (It is an arbitrary weight on the rate you can explore) or lower-speed base building (It provides the disincentive of wasting fuel by going home) there as is counter productive to both your supposed goals.

    No, refining coal does not make mining it any more fun.
     
  4. shark2199

    shark2199 Orbital Explorer

    I had an idea to make spaceships run on some unstable element (yup, Rez) that could be found only in planetary core.
    Also, quest for a mining superlaser.
    That would be fun, just imagine cutting through the planet to get the juice.
    Or for fun, how do you like...
     
  5. octopussoup

    octopussoup Scruffy Nerf-Herder

    Wonder how they'd implement that. Right now the planets core (the lava area) just seems to generate higher amount of gold and lesser ore. It might take a bit of coding I think to make it generate something new only on that level.
     
  6. Gorvi

    Gorvi Subatomic Cosmonaut

  7. Ludovic

    Ludovic Giant Laser Beams

    With all respect though, considering the sometimes sillier themes of the game... Doc's very popular time-travelling Dorolean travelled through time by running basically on wastebin trash ;)

    This said, perhaps a higher amount of "superfuels" later in game could be interesting however. Once there's more of a multiplayer community, I could see inter players and clans conflict over the "ownerships" of superfuels-rich planets... especially if we ever get the ability to build our own colonies populated with recruited NPCs and special facilities(such as clan beacons or such, to tag a planet as "owned" and so on... I'd probably write this in a suggestion somewhere else).
     
  8. -R7-

    -R7- Aquatic Astronaut

    If you limit someone's ship range, they have to make a bunch of small jumps to get anywhere. Imagine doing that to get from alpha to gamma or across the star map to your friend's base.
    Which honestly sounds more tedious than smashing trees is currently.

    Additionally, on playstyles, of course someone rushing a threat 30 world and looting boxes is going to have better gear than someone sitting on a threat 1 world building a big castle and farm. The explorer will have weapons, but he won't have an immaculately decorated house and a spacious bean farm. But why does that matter? It isn't a competitive game.
    You're doing entirely different things with entirely different goals, how would you balance player activity choices when it is really about how you are deciding to spend your time changing what you get out of the game?
     
  9. Gorvi

    Gorvi Subatomic Cosmonaut


    Early game, this will be fine. Late game, or even after you beat the first boss engines should be upgraded to compensate to the rest of the quadrant, and then another upgrade to transverse the rest of the galaxy.
     
  10. Fromage

    Fromage Big Damn Hero

    Here's a thought, pretty close to OP but a bit different. have a space beacon (effectively a warp gate, it could easily be called that but it would seem weird to be able to craft something like that as early as you would need to) that can be placed in orbit around a planet, not too difficult to build and place. Fuel costs would scale with distance (for sense making, mostly, heh) but travel between beaconed planets would either be free (my preference) or severely discounted.

    Actually, have it be a stargate, but have it be the only recipe you have remaining auto-loaded in the 3D printer, that way it would only cost pixels to build and deploy.

    That way it still costs to explore, but it doesn't cost to return to places you deem important enough to invest once for a free return trip to.

    To sum up, provide stargate blueprint in the 3D printer from the start of the game (or maybe loot from the tier 1 boss?), make fuel costs based on distance so that traveling in-system is relatively cheap.
     
  11. Gorvi

    Gorvi Subatomic Cosmonaut

    I would love to find stargates and naturally occurring worm holes besides building our own. Permanent ones which would allow us to supplement fuel costs, or one use worm holes which transport us to another quadrant. Like a random encounter en route or a little extra random to the random button.
     
  12. Fromage

    Fromage Big Damn Hero

    Agreed...possibly you could find them in temples on some planets, being worshiped by the natives.
     
  13. Braethias

    Braethias Big Damn Hero

    what about this? Allow the fuel gauge to stay, and allow for a broader range of fuels - keep wood and coal as emergency to make the beginning make sense, and have the fuel gauge slowly (takes maybe 10 minutes - long enough that exploring will leave you with a full gas tank and you can use resources to speed it up if you don't like the planet) refill itself after getting the proper upgrade, which conveniently is available for next to nothing after beating T1, making staying on your first planet important, but not impossible to leave

    alternately, allow anything to be used as fuel and remove the fuel cap altogether. Too many weapons? Stick'm in the mr. fusion and bam. gives exploring to completion a more profitable outlook, since you can raid a settlement and get 30-40 weapons that currently wind up being trashed. if you take your time to mine, you're gonna have lots of dirt and rock anyways. if you're a pirate, you'll end up with unwanted good.
     
  14. Russy

    Russy Pangalactic Porcupine

    Do you have a problem with my steam-powered FTL engine? :yeahhhh:

    I'd rather see other types of fuel, or what Braethias said, purchasing an upgrade that would slowly refuel the ship, and being able to use certain items to speed it up
     
  15. Nighzmarquls

    Nighzmarquls Void-Bound Voyager

    I think this or having more things in general give a variety of fueling options would be best.

    It reduces the grinding because we will always end up with SOMETHING on hand, just not necessarily wood.

    But perhaps the exact value should vary.

    Dirt? Maybe ten dirt or more to 1 fuel.

    But I found some Tar sand on one planet that should probably be worth about as much as wood or coal.

    Food items should probably be worth comparable fuel to their food value (hydrocarbons/releasable energy mate).

    Maybe you can then get fuel refinery upgrades that make CERTAIN materials MORE fuel efficient for you.

    MY ENGINE runs on ICE and does it AWESOME.

    Etc etc.

    There is a lot of personalizing potential here.

    Also ditto on a homeworld stargate...

    Alternatively I LOVE the idea of having a planet tow-rope available for you if you want to move your home world with its base somewhere else.
     
  16. Dimitriye98

    Dimitriye98 Subatomic Cosmonaut

    I agree, refining coal doesn't make it more fun. But the infrastructure put there allows for the creation of complex items by people who prefer to base-build, while it limits high-speed exploration, making it possible to roughly equalize the two.
     
  17. Seven Dollers

    Seven Dollers Poptop Tamer

    By 'complex items' you mean refined fuel. People who want to build a nice home are concerned with
    1. Filling out the crafting menu/scanner so that they can actually access all those neat items. That has already been suggestion about a million times.
    2. Being able to actually access their base. Something your refining suggestion fails to address.
    Having to go to the trouble of refining fuel does not help people who prefer base building, it hinders them by limiting their access to quality fuel to get home.

    Nor does it intrinsically limit high speed exploration without a massive nerf to regular fuel. Assuming you did, however, nerf fuel then you are just limiting exploration by making it more grindy to actually get enough of the stuff, not in a way that is actually enjoyable.
     
  18. Dimitriye98

    Dimitriye98 Subatomic Cosmonaut

    By complex items I mean more powerful weapons, making laser pistols and things like that. You can easily access your base by remaining close to it (same or very close solar systems).

    If the game makes sure that you start in a solar system with lots of resources, and you gain a method of producing things like tech upgrades (preferably through large and expensive systems which make it so you need a base, thus not removing the challenge), the play styles get equalized.
     
  19. Seven Dollers

    Seven Dollers Poptop Tamer

    More powerful weapons still do not help home builders.
    The game is built around a progression system. It forces you to climb the tiers to gain access to more interesting items. I'm sorry but telling people 'If you want to have a home base just never leave the first sector!' is an unacceptable solution.

    This is a progression based game, mechanics should be built around that idea.
     
  20. Dimitriye98

    Dimitriye98 Subatomic Cosmonaut

    Note: I never argued against a way to build/find "stargates" I just argued against player range limitation. And I never said never leave the first sector. With their refinery, homesteaders can create powerful fuels allowing them easy access to other sectors and easy return. Also, even with the current system, I regularly leave and return to my "base planet/system" (have yet to build anything though :p). I chop a few trees, done. The removal of such easy fuel in favor of having powerful fuels that I can make in my home base would lead to a net-neutral outcome in terms of fuel use, however I'd have a reason to actually build a base on my planet.
     

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