Hey, i am super exited about Stabound and I have some ideas for the Matter Manipulator. The MM-upgrades seem a bit too straight forward. I would suggest more things. Changeable Size: For Building it would be great to change the building area from 1,4,9,16,25 blocks. Also this could be an upgradeable feature. The MM is useful for illuminating surrondings with its blue light, where you normally can't see. Maybe this should be upgradeable. Tier 0: no illumination, only there where you can normally see through, Tier 1: Illuminates the mining area, Tier 2: mining area +2. Vaccuum feature: You could vacuum your loot with your MM, like a magnet.
the current mm upgrade system is soon to be a thing of the past (soon™. whenever 1.0 comes out, hopefully). http://playstarbound.com/7th-april-manipulate-what-matters/ this should give you some idea as to what is planned, and maybe an idea for a mod to change it when it does come out .
Thank you! I knew about the discussion and the post all along. I'm trying to think and to collect ideas, in which way the MM could go, because in my opinion the MM is one of the core gameplay elements of starbound. When I startet playing (early 2014), the MM wasn't as developed as it is today. Even today i see some remants of its (kind of distant ) past. The direction is pretty cool, but there is room for more. Especially the developers need to think that the MM is one of the objects which isn't collectable. It's the single most thing you can't uneqip. So you need a pretty good mechanic. This mechanic needs further development. One thing they changed in the current nightly: You can access your MM upgrades as eqivalent of a charactersheet (like in rpgs) on one of the side buttons - which is a good thing. Now it is the only mechanic, which is designed purely as skilltree (this isn't bad, but at least remarkable). It is highly relevant, which skills appear on the skill tree of the MM. And these are (at the time) mostly linear power increases, and only some unique skills. As example, it would be great if you could eqip/upgrade your MM with a flashlight. This would be the first thing i would do, when i was exploring space. (It is indeed disturbing, why the flashlight ins't included in the MM-mechanic as forth tool) Secondly, i am staggered, why there aren't any augments (i hope it's a secretive thing). For example you can get Augments for your EPPs and Collars for your pets, but no such things for the MM, which isn't a good gameplay decision. In my opinion it would be a no-brainer to give Augments to the MM. I would you give at least the illusion you can change your mininig equipment. (here Flashlight, chance of double ore, extra power, building in mid air ...) Another suggestion: Make options how your MM behave. As i statet in my previously post, it would be amazing to change the area of buildng. Or you can turn liquid collection "on" and "off" in your MM-menu, if you have aquired the uprgade. Sometimes, you don't want to mine water, even if you can. Tl;dr: This central game mechanic needs lots of consideration, because of its uniqueness as item.
