Crappy unrepairable pick durability =/= fun

I am inclined to agree with the initial poster. Why? Because I'm using logic that revolves around the game's startup rather than when you're actually established. Unlike all of the people who seem to be against it who keep saying to upgrade the matter manipulator. At the start of the game before you're even ABLE to upgrade the matter manipulator, it's still a gigantic piece of crap at that point in the game. And up until you can upgrade it, it remains a gigantic piece of crap. This makes the startup phase of the game slow, tedious and boring. In fact, if you look at some of the reviews regarding starbound vs terraria, the 'you can mine one square at a time only in terraria' vs' 'nine at a time in starbound' is one thing that had shed a positive light on starbound. Now, with the crappy durability and so on, the early game phase isn't fun, it's a chore because mining with the crappy matter manipulator prior to upgrading it is obnoxiously boring. Later on when you CAN upgrade the matter manipulator? Sure. picks become obsolete. But until then, low durability picks are only a slap in the face to new characters and make the game extremely boring at the start. But the fact they become obsolete shouldn't necessarily mean they should be considered useless and as a result of that, they make them where they break in two swings either which they've practically done. -.-

 

the Mm slows the game? you play the wrong game.
at begin it has 2x2 block and it it fast.
the first upgrade is there for 10 bar chopper and it upgrade the speed.
the next upgrade is speed and liquid collecting.
after that there 2 speed upgrades to make it faster than the upgrade to 3x3 blocks coming.

i playe the nightly since 4 weeks and with it several new starts and the materie manipulator is not slowing the game.
it is at the beginn with no upgrade not slower as the stone pickaxe

 

Picks/drills shouldn't ever become obsolete to begin with. They should serve their purpose efficiently in comparison to the MM. Otherwise, you could just remove their redundant existence from the game though I wouldn't much care for that either.

They could have limited the MM upgrades to liquid collection, kept the other tools as useful as they were aside from maybe being a little harder to initially build and maintain might have been alright, and that would have been just fine.

Neutering picks and drills for the sake of finding a use for the MM isn't exactly a fair trade IMHO.

 

I think it would probably be a good idea to take the gadgets off of the scroll-wheel selection though. Since you can't toggle back to the item you were using before the MM now.

Kinda makes getting to the 6+ items a bit of a hassle.

 

I disagree. Pickaxes are a good way to get going in the early game. two pickaxes can go a long way in getting you down to the core, with a low cost. I have not tried out the diamond pickaxe, but it makes sense that the MM eventually becomes a better tool in the end, with more upgrades and utility added on as you progress. Users were pretty adamant about giving the MM a use, as using pickaxes and drills to the exclusion of the MM isn't keeping with the hi tech theme.

 

yeah because an old pickaxe is better than a futuristic mining device... Yeah pickaxes mine fast but they do have that low durability, that is the pro and con. The thing is though, you aren't supposed to use them to dig around. I use them to dig up ores that are in certain stones to hurry harvesting and by doing that they last long enough to be worth it. Also maybe I'm just lucky but I find picks in chests all the time so its not a hassle to get them. I personally like this change as an item you get in the beginning is useful throughout the game instead of being cast aside to be replaced by an old style pick/drill. Why would they even need the MM if the pickaxe was so superior? See that just doesn't make sense.

 

Having an item that's useful throughout the game still doesn't justify making two entire trees of items fundamentally useless though. Regardless of 'I think you shouldn't use a pickaxe because you have a matter manipulator' style logic, did it ever occur to you that maybe some people actually prefer the pickaxe's style of mining? The matter manipulator has a longer range, but in some cases that can be a liability. Namely, if you mine something from a distance it can fall. With a pick you're pretty much guaranteed to get what you're mining. Regardless of personal feelings, the fact still is people sometimes prefer 'oldschool' methods of doing things, and I don't feel anyone should have the right to tell them they're wrong, especially if the oldschool methods work. Making the tools more or less useless in the way they have has sort of went to 'you have a variety of things' to 'you ONLY have the matter manipulator' now. And that in my opinion, goes against the whole freedom that starbound was supposed to have to it.

 

So in other words, you like that they neutered picks and drills for the sake of finding a use for the matter manipulator.

You could have used matter manipulator mainly for fluids and that would have been good enough.

Another good use for the matter manipulator could have been its overhead reach to get to ores above you at the cost of decreased mining speed.

What used to be a third good use for the matter manipulator was to be able to carefully destroy single blocks while you're building.

Making picks and drills better at digging and mining far from renders the MM useless.

 

on the contrary, that was exactly what made the MM useless in the eyes of many players. The only thing the picks and drills did in prior builds was do that, and i don't think liquid collection is going to be that vital of a gameplay element to redeem its use.(it might even hinder it, as water collection takes priority over mining with the mm)

Simplay put, people were tired of switching to pickaxes and drills as a gameplay element and saw the MM's abilities as a fresh new take on getting around. I certainly would love to have the equivalent of dynamite at my fingertips.

 

I can't help but think the changes to the MM and such using keys instead of a hotbar is to prepare the game for the PS4 version. So we went from something that was simple and worked to convoluted in the hopes it sells well on the PS4, a version that won't have any mods, a huge draw for most Starbound players.

 

That's not even remotely accurate, up until now I've really wanted liquid collection for building.

Before this update I always had my MM on my hotbar for specific reasons and would have never taken it off my hotbar.

Nobody was "tired of switching to picks/drills,"... lol..

 

I know i was. So "nobody" is untrue. I know that many simply used too trow the matter manipulator away early game (it took up space and was allmost useless as soon as you hade a pickaxe and a axe).

 

So I guess now you're tired of switching to the MM instead.

While were at it, naturally you must be you're tired of switching to melee and ranged weapons to fight with as well.

I'm totally with you man, I'm tired of game devs trying to put depth in their games.

 

Its not the same now as it was then. Instead of taking up two of your slots you have one hardcoded slot. You dont have to switch around stuff in your inventory while building if you want to remove something (becuse all 10 slots in your hotbar is filled with materials).

Off course il have to admit that if they added hardcoded slots for the pickaxe and axe that would allmost be the same. So yea, the argument isent that valid.

If i would say why i prefear the new system over the old it would be becuse using something as primitive as a pickaxe and a axe when you have something like a matter manipulator allways was a bit weird for a science fiction game, in my humble opinion. Now the matter manipulator is boosted to be realy usefull, while you can still bring pickaxe's and such for a temporary mining boost (still a bit weird that they are stronger, but i guess it beats chucklefish just trowing the work on them away).

 

Nothing says primitive like a diamond tipped drill.

I also love realism arguments in starbound because starbound is sooo realistic to begin with.

You'd have to fill your 10 slot with building materials because there isn't much other use for all of the slots, gonna carry around a hoe just in case? Mentioning that they hardwired the MM to an uncustomizable keybind slot rather than being able to customize it to 1-10 is more of an indictment than a compliment IMHO.

 

Yea becuse a diamond tipped drill (something you can get nowadays if you have enough cash) isent primitive compared to matter manipulator that uses some sort of space magic (was it lasers that manipulate space itself? That might even be possible considering that NASA is currently experimenting with bending space using lasers. But honestly i dont understand that stuff in any detail at all).

Off course realism isent the issue, its immersion.

Edit: To be honest it comes down to personal opinion in the end. You may not find it immersion breaking, but others including myself do. It has been a recurring complaint since early beta.

 

Show me a jackhammer sized diamond headed drill available for purchase please.

I find the MM being used for everything immersion breaking. The MM isn't possible, nasa isn't working on something like a MM, its hokus pokus magic just like most of the supposed tech in the game.

On the other hand, picks and drills being used to mine with added immersion and good viable depth to the game that has now been made trivial enough to consider gone.

Sorry but immersion is hardly an issue either.

Seems to me that using the MM for everything when there used to be tools for different things just dumbs the game down.

 

Can God make a pickaxe so durable that even he cannot break it?

 

Seriously guys lets put this into perspective.

Lets add a low durability to all the weapons in the game and when they break they're gone.

Then we will add a lightsaber mode for melee and phaser mode for ranged to the matter manipulator because we all know you'd like nothing more than to exclusively use the MM for everything.

What they've done with picks and drills is really no different.

P.S. Lets make all armor vanity only and add all stats through upgrading the MM while were at it.