Rare "Prize" resource planets.

Rare "Prize" Resource Planets and Ideas on How to Find Them

Original Idea With Flaws:

I'm not sure if it's been suggested, but I propose the addition of a rare 'prize' resource planet.
What I mean by this are randomly generated planets that, rare as they may be, yield rare, hard to come by, or otherwise unique resources. This can be offset in terms of using it to accelerate advancement or 'cheating' so to speak, by capping the length and depth of these planets by quite a lot. Just very small, extremely resource rich planets.

This could be implemented many ways, but one way I can see it working is the use of treasure maps, or in this case, treasure data.
Data, little barely functional storage chips (like a more advanced micro-US left behind and mapped by an unknown traveler. These could have a random, but rare, chance to spawn in dungeons, off a random monster (0.1% chance).
These micro storage units would contain these rare 'prize' planet coordinates and upon finding say. . .two or three of these, you'd be able to recover enough of the coordinates to accurately find this resource rich, or unique resource, planet.

Improved Idea and Pre-implementation Exploit fixes:

WoxandWarf mentioned these planets coordinates could be exploited and used to rapidly farm high-grade materials. They are absolutely right. So, the community ( being amazing as Hell ) stepped in and have reworked the idea into a more plausible, and seemingly exploit free idea.


Strife's take on the idea has the data pieces being dropped in various ranks extremely rarely, depending on monster tier, with applicable exploit fixes.

To quote Strife:

"Basically, a conglomerate of what has already been mentioned by you guys (with my own phrasing and a bit of modification):

Several items exist game-wide that have a chance to drop from various locations. To prevent real easy farming, item drops are restricted to what tier of monster they are associated with.

Old Navigational Fragment (drop from any tier monster)
Dated Navigational Fragment (drop from mid to high tier monsters)
Ancient Navigational Fragment (drop from high tier monsters)

The above are physical item drops. You can sell or trade them if you wish, but this does not give you progress towards the secret planet.

Once obtaining one of these items, you may go to your ship's navigational computer and have it decipher the information and add it into your logs. This will consume the item, destroying it. Upon entering the first fragment into your computer, you are given a quest to find the remaining pieces.

After you have located and deciphered all three shards, your computer gives you the option to head to the now fully deciphered coordinates (which are not actually revealed to you). Upon arrival, you are met with a very menacing and mysterious wormhole. You'll want to enter, but your scanners inform you that the forces in that spacial anomaly are too dangerous.

Quest updates, suggesting that you search for how to modify your shields to withstand the wormhole's unique energy signature. You must find an item that appears very rarely in any dungeon: Mysterious Shield Modulator. Installing this in your ship will give your shields the ability to pass through the wormhole. Upon leaving the unique star system, the Modulator is destroyed, it's physical integrity compromised after two trips (in then out) through the wormhole.

On the other side of the wormhole is a planet that you can explore which contains many various types of resources and items. Leaving the star system after you've visited the planet will make the wormhole disappear.

It is now possible to enter new Fragments into you computer to do the process over again, also requiring that you discover yet another Modulator.

Some of these unique planets can contain loot and resources that can only be found at these locations, yet uncommon even to these rare planets. Later, I'll make a new thread that goes more in-depth about that."





Strife's take on it is by far pretty amazing. The only draw back seen is the limited travel before the modulator breaks, even after finding these rare 'coordinate' containing data fragment.


So, LightHoof has created a way that works with this idea, but to not limit travel to and from the planet for the person who has found the proper data fragments.

To quote LightHoof:

"Seems like you are offering to restrict these planets to one-visit-only scheme. This , IMO , is too restrictive for a sandbox game. That's why I proposed to use gates.

Generally speaking we can combine planetary effects with cosmic effects to create a large variety of events player needs to overcome to get to different prize planets. It could stat from a drop item or just by stumbling upon a restricted prize planet.

For example, you found a planet with your on-board scanner (or any other way devs want us to explore the galaxy). You try to jump there, but your scanners detect heavy asteroid activity and mass instability, which automatically restricts ship from jumping there until you get adequate defense system installed. This could start a quest to find this defensive system. Some anomalies would be accessible with normal medium-complex shield, some more rich would force you to quest all around the galaxy to find proper system.
In the case of planetary effects, like weather instability or lightning storm , you may need a weather control device or something similar and so on, possibilities are limitless."



Blazerer stated that these planets could also have changing coordinates. Integrating this with a specific data tag to the planet after the coordinates can keep from the eventual small chance of over-writing the coordinates of another planet.

Such as (No idea how the coordinate system works, just winging an example here):

For normal planets, you'd access them via: -34, -8, 9345, 29

For Prize Planets, among the prior restrictions, you'd access them via: -34, -9, -9345, 29: 5942


Here's Blazerer's full post regarding it:

Below, I've compiled a list of the ideas/fixes/suggestions of what people have mentioned thus far into a more condensed and threaded method:

Over-all, a run-down of the compiled idea is:

- Rare Resource "Prize" Planets that can be found through finding the proper data fragments.

- Data fragments, and the round-about value of the Prize planet is quasi-predetermined based on a ranking system between what level of fragments you receive.

- Data Fragments can be found in dungeons, or dropped by monsters as a rare drop, as well as the fragments being related to an enemies tier/rank. Example:
Old Navigational Fragment (drop from any tier monster)
Dated Navigational Fragment (drop from mid to high tier monsters)
Ancient Navigational Fragment (drop from high tier monsters)

- Once a particular data fragment is found, to ensure the player at least has a chance to find this planet (and not end up finding different fragments while hunting the archetype you found), a 'quest' system. Once Fragment A is found, if a monster drops a fragment, it should be another Fragment A, until you've found enough.

- The fragments will be decoded and a method of travel only you can access will get you to this resource planet.

- To prevent singleplayer exploitation of rapidly farming these rare planets, implement a feature that either:
* Denies you access to the planet if you do not have the right coordinate fragments due to: Heavy Cosmic Distortion preventing an accurate scan: which can be returned to the player via a message.
* A certain NPC will grant you access via talking to them, so long as you have decoded all three of these fragments.
* Other means of telling the player who doesn't have the proper coordinate fragments decoded that universal catastrophes in the area are preventing the ship from landing, etc, etc.

- The planets will be extremely capped in size/generation, to prevent from giving the player FAR too many high-grade resources

- Planets should still be randomly generated in terms of atmosphere, biomes, plant life, gravity, and resources.
* Resources for these planets should contain an extremely higher chance to yield high grade ore and other resources and loot/dungeons. Perhaps even structures specific to "Prize" planets.

- Coordinates for these planets could be tradeable, so long as you can -ONLY- trade them if you have not decoded all three. You can only sell them as a complete set and so long as they haven't been decoded.

-Fragments should be destroyed upon a successful decoding, and the information tied to the player.

- Even though there are only three suggested Data Fragment tiers, the coordinates for these prize planets should still differ vastly, as well as what they can contain.

- To prevent these coordinates from over-laying an already existing planet on someone else game (in case of game merging/playing on a server), the coordinates should also have an extra set of coordinate data.
This way, someone's home world on 1, -9, -4, 3 will not clash with a fragment of say. . . 1, -9, -4, 3: 34
Maybe the data after the colon refers to a sort of sector, or other specification.

-




Any other ideas, modifications, or suggestions are welcome.=D

 

Ah, you know what, you have a very good point.
Maybe, though, that could work, though. It would actually keep people from spreading these coordinates if say, the loot was decent enough. More of a reason to only give the coordinates to someone you absolutely trust, lest you come back and it's raided.

I understand your concern though. Perhaps make it far smaller than I originally mentioned.
Though. . .it would certainly cause the faction interactions to be unpredictable.
You'd come back to your prize planet, and a buddy in your faction turned against you, joined another, and gave out the coordinates, which would indirectly result in a war. . .

Or if it was possible, one of the developers could make it so that these prize planet coordinates could not be shared. Maybe make it so that unless the game detects you have found these bits of treasure data that are specific for that planet, when given to someone else, the coordinates would just generate a random planet.

 

I have no idea why I forgot about the singleplayer for a moment.xD I apologize for that.

So, going by your idea about the NPC's. . .let's say that, you find these treasure data bits. There is a specific NPC who will decode them for you, and send you, or run a sort of create planet event that will not have any obvious coordinates, but to generate randomly will still need that seed. So, say then it is only accessible/visible if the game detects that your in-game username, or singleplayer game, has met the proper requirements and you currently have the decoded data the NPC gave you.
That way, if you somehow managed to wrangle coordinates or a seed out of another player, if you didn't have the data specific to that prize planet, you'd be met with nothing.
Maybe even make that data untradeable, or more or less something that quasi-sticks to your character itself.

 

IMO this feature could be implemented by quests. Let's say, you find first piece of navigational data in some old forgotten temple or base. You get a quest to find some more parts of this data to reconstruct full coordinates. Then you must find an activate some sort of spacegate, that can only be used with this, reconstructed navigational device in your inventory. This gate brings you to a randomly created rich planet without any coordinates accessible only to a person with this specific navigational device.
Perhaps there could be several gates in the galaxy. So , basically, navigational device is a unique key, that can't be copied. Probably you could sell it to another person.

 

Actually a modification of this idea that still uses coordinates would work just fine.

Here's how it would work:
You find the little USB key thingy that would give the location to the resource planet. Whether you want to go through a quest to get that info or just have the corrdinates imprinted on the key is irrelevant, as long as the coordinates are revealed somehow. Then, the player heads to their ship, enters the coordinates, and arrives at said resource planet. Tadaa!

Now, let's say the player starts up a new game. He now knows the coordinates, because he wrote them down or something. He heads to those coordinates, but he is unable to land on the planet because "a dense storm prevents landing safely" or some other plot reason. That storm will last conveniently until he gets that key on this character.

In other words, the planet is only accessible if the player has found the key, even if they know the coordinates ahead of time.

 

That's also a great idea. I'm all for it.

This is pretty much how I've been figuring it would work. Some sort of restriction, that unless that exact data carried/coordinates have been found, something like that would make the planet inaccessible. So, I'm all for it. Especially the planetary event that would prevent players from landing. Hell, it could even be made to where if a player tried to access it, the coordinate grid/interface would static out and return with a message telling the player that it was impossible to access the location, or a "Couldn't locate a viable mass at this specific location. Heavy cosmic distortion is preventing an accurate scan."

 

That's certainly an interesting, but heavy-handed way of dealing with things...

 

Basically, a conglomerate of what has already been mentioned by you guys (with my own phrasing and a bit of modification):

Several items exist game-wide that have a chance to drop from various locations. To prevent real easy farming, item drops are restricted to what tier of monster they are associated with.

• Old Navigational Fragment (drop from any tier monster)
• Dated Navigational Fragment (drop from mid to high tier monsters)
• Ancient Navigational Fragment (drop from high tier monsters)

The above are physical item drops. You can sell or trade them if you wish, but this does not give you progress towards the secret planet.

Once obtaining one of these items, you may go to your ship's navigational computer and have it decipher the information and add it into your logs. This will consume the item, destroying it. Upon entering the first fragment into your computer, you are given a quest to find the remaining pieces.

After you have located and deciphered all three shards, your computer gives you the option to head to the now fully deciphered coordinates (which are not actually revealed to you). Upon arrival, you are met with a very menacing and mysterious wormhole. You'll want to enter, but your scanners inform you that the forces in that spacial anomaly are too dangerous.

Quest updates, suggesting that you search for how to modify your shields to withstand the wormhole's unique energy signature. You must find an item that appears very rarely in any dungeon: Mysterious Shield Modulator. Installing this in your ship will give your shields the ability to pass through the wormhole. Upon leaving the unique star system, the Modulator is destroyed, it's physical integrity compromised after two trips (in then out) through the wormhole.

On the other side of the wormhole is a planet that you can explore which contains many various types of resources and items. Leaving the star system after you've visited the planet will make the wormhole disappear.

It is now possible to enter new Fragments into you computer to do the process over again, also requiring that you discover yet another Modulator.

Some of these unique planets can contain loot and resources that can only be found at these locations, yet uncommon even to these rare planets. Later, I'll make a new thread that goes more in-depth about that.

 

Yeah, basically that...

 

Seems like you are offering to restrict these planets to one-visit-only scheme. This , IMO , is too restrictive for a sandbox game. That's why I proposed to use gates.

Generally speaking we can combine planetary effects with cosmic effects to create a large variety of events player needs to overcome to get to different prize planets. It could stat from a drop item or just by stumbling upon a restricted prize planet.

For example, you found a planet with your on-board scanner (or any other way devs want us to explore the galaxy). You try to jump there, but your scanners detect heavy asteroid activity and mass instability, which automatically restricts ship from jumping there until you get adequate defense system installed. This could start a quest to find this defensive system. Some anomalies would be accessible with normal medium-complex shield, some more rich would force you to quest all around the galaxy to find proper system.
In the case of planetary effects, like weather instability or lightning storm , you may need a weather control device or something similar and so on, possibilities are limitless.

Suggest you propose some more events.

 

I applaud you. You've pretty much taken the original idea, all the suggestions and seem to have improved on them. If you don't mind, I'm going to toss your modification up to the top of the post.

I feel you, and absolutely agree. it would give it a bit more variation and 'limit' it in only certain lights. I'm going to toss your idea as well up into the main post. I love how it takes absolutely no time for a decent community to get together, disect the flaws out of an idea, and improve on it so that only awesomeness is left. Now if only I had you guys at my disposal to critique my art.xD

 

The awesomeness of the original post have just dramatically increased

 

Unfortunately, a prize planet with a static location would be too easy to abuse, especially if the items required to get past certain "checkpoints" were trade-able. One possible way to combat that is making at least one item per checkpoint be a quest update instead of an item. The only real advantage I can see is that you'll be able to re-visit the planets, but now they will be barren ... so only for nostalgia purposes.

However, it is possible to have various "tiers" of these planets or locations. I was going to make an entirely new thread for this, but what the hell ... might as well go into a little detail now.

Low Tier - You can encounter a key during your travels (be it a monster drop or chest loot). Upon inspecting the key, you are given a quest. You recognize a symbol on the key that appears to be that of the main Galactic Mail HQ. Essentially, a mail station. The quest recommends you go there to investigate. Turns out the key opens up a secure box, it's contents now yours to loot. This is a repeatable quest. Infinite amount (there are simple variations to this scheme).

Mid Tier - Essentially, your suggested gate idea. However, it only leads to lower class planets, asteroids, and other smaller areas. These places have static coordinates and can be visited again (but no new loot). There are a finite number of these.

High Tier - Based off of my post. Long-winded, random-drop based repeatable quest. Leads to medium or large planets and space stations. Very difficult to complete due to rewards. Infinite amount.

 

+1 and my full support. What you people created here is amazing and adds a whole new level to gameplay. While it may still be farm-able (everything that is not limited is) these ideas ensure it's not easy to do so yet still possible for a normal run.

What should be the most limiting factor is either the ship or an item's drop chance. Both can be easily influenced and changed and are most easily to restrict by damaging/removing items.

I would personally by against prize planets with a static location. Perhaps the higher type tiers could be rogue planets. This would cause them to have moving coordinates and no light, which would also add to the difficulty curve. Another thread discussed the idea of having lost civilisation ruins on planets, perhaps that could go well with the find places for the crystals as it would indirectly indicate where these crystals come from.

As for the higher end monsters I was thinking of a spawn rate of about 7-10% and an item drop chance of 5-6%. This would make it hard to farm, yet not impossible with some determination. I'm unsure whether static defences will actually be added, but perhaps they could be scripted in such a way that damaged by static defences immediately reduce the drop chance to 0% to prevent farming it without effort.

I came across this thread: http://community.playstarbound.com/index.php?threads/fifth-core-the-armory-planet.12988/ Which could very well be one of the puzzle pieces. In short it's about a teleporting space station with advanced weaponry that use Aether. This could very well become the source of the shield required to traverse the black hole, should both idea owners agree.

 

I like this proposition. I think the drop rate should be lowered, but as for changing coordinates, that could prove very useful. I mentioned above that the coordinates for prize planets should have a second set of data, that normal planets do not have to keep from causing an accidental chance of overwriting pre-existing coordinates in another existing game or server. So to add to that, the coordinates could change every few hours or so. Like; -3, 400, -198: 3498 (The 3498 being the prize-planet specific location data). Which would then change to. . . -4, 568, -95: 3496. Or the latter data could contain basic seed generation for these planets, in which case, you could keep 3498 the same for the same planet.

And you're right. I don't think trap systems should work on farming these data fragments. Implement a bit of code saying that if the player kills --------, and have the rare chance to drop a fragment follow behind it.

I'll add what you suggested to the main post.=D

 

The effective chance of encountering a monster and have it drop a quest item would in this case be 0,35%. You'd need to defeat 143 monsters with a 7% spawn rate to have a 50% drop chance. I guess you could lower that somewhat so 143 would only be 30% but it I guess some testing will simply be required. Just plain numbers don't take difficulty and time into account.

 

All the numbers you ppl provide are purely theoretical, these things should be thought about and tested by devs. It's their call how to make these planets unique.

 

of course they are, but it can give a better view on things, thus aiding in working out the idea.

 

Flawed, yet sounds pretty fun.

 

Feel free to point out the flaws. We'd love to be able to get this as solid as possible.