Forums » Suggestions
In game search and more info plus a couple other things
This is a good game but searching around for things, the lack of info on some things, some user interface matters (or lack there of) can be a pain plus there's a few other things that seem worthy of a bit of adjusting.
1. A Cargo Holdings Manifest
It stands to reason a pilot would record in their computer what and where they have things stored for easy reference later on. Unfortunately this isn't avaialble in the game from what I can tell.
2. Multi Station Store Reference
If you go in or call a chain store and they don't have something they can usually check to see if another near-by store in the chain has it or you may also be able to do that yourself on-line at their web site. If that can be done today one would think that 2400+ years from now it should still be possible. Stations you can dock with should be able to stay in contact with eachother so you could go to a multi station item search tab which will show either all the stations you can enter that have each item or at least the closest ones. This would apply for items, goods and ships. The same concept but for sale of stuff could also be added so you can find out which stations would offer better prices.
3. Bot Search
If your nav computer can show you known bot types in each small area when you mouse over it one would think that it would be able to run a search for specific bots too. This way rather than spending a long time going through each grid on each map for bots you're looking for in a grouping you like you could enter some criteria like which bots you want to find, ones you don't want to be grouped with the ones you want and if there are any places where only that or those bots are found. Then you could have a small favourites list plus if you're doing a bot mission the ones you like or are looking for would be automatically selected and bumped to the top of the find list.
4. More In Game and/or Web Site Data
This would be like a list of all the items, ships, weapons, bots and such. Purchasable items would be taken care of by the Multi Station Store Reference but as there are a number of bots out there newer players at least would have an easier time picking hunting areas if they knew what each bot was like before they had to deal with them directly. Since others would have dealt with them and visited stations that info should be publically available.
5. Weapons Get Their Own Buy Window
The current method is kinda messy when trying to compare weapons as you have to click each, look at the info text area (which can't even show it all without scrolling) try to remember the info then click others to compare them all (showing max possible damage per second non-rockets/missles would be good too). One wide chart would be better with the info displayed all together nice and neat in colums and rows. Incidently all these extra tabs would likely be best managed with main and sub tabs.
6. Balance Money and XP More
The game is practically throwing money at you left and right (at least at the stage I'm at and what I've been doing) while getting XP is considerably harder. Money should be a bit harder to get or make reparing cost something so there's more of a drain on it. Earning XP should take some doing so that's not really my issue, it's just that there should be more ways to make XP like more mission options and other avenues like the race idea (piloting XP) so it at least it may not feel as much of a grind.
7. Stiffer Death Penalties
As it stands you don't really loose much what with money being easy to get at and weapons/ships being just a few jumps away. There should be more involved like unique items you may have lost, ships costing more, XP and/or standings penalties and such. There could also be variations to what you loose and how much depending on how you died.
8. Matters when Collecting Cargo
There have been times when a couple of those suckers are floating rather close together but I annoyingly manage to slip right between them collecting niether, other times I fly over and bearly miss it. So if the collection area could be widened some that'd be helpful and speed things up some. Also a cargo bay full notice would be good too.
9. Default and Preset Jump Points
(Saw this basic idea in another thread not long ago but after a couple searches I couldn't seem to find it now.) The idea was you set a default jump location so if you drop into a new location but get swarmed and don't have time to set a jump location that one is selected already so then just need to survive and make clearance distance. The problem with that was if the default was in another system it would take you to a warp area which can also be dangerous. So to build on that idea you could have the default set based on certain criteria like if in a friendly system it defaults to a random station, if in an enemy system it defaults to a random empty area of space. Then to further build on this it would be good if you could preselect some common jump locations which could be named and saved to be accessed via keyboard short-cuts like ctrl+0 - ctrl+9. Also the selected next jump location and final location could be shown in the top right for easy reference with their name (if it was a preset one or default, none or the station name otherwise), address and an icon if it's to a station or warp area.
10. Proximity Allerts
This would be a warrning once you get about 100m-200m or so from something and are heading in that direction (maybe put it on a sliding scale depending on the speed at which you're approaching it). Basically you got the whole little flashing light or arrow that shows the direction and beeping thing for an audio alert going and the rate at which it beeps and flashes determines how urgent it is. I know when in fights around many astroids I've rammed into one a few times which certainly can be a problem.
... Ship Customization (Beating a Dead Horse)
It really would be better if you at least had the option to buy different ship shells then modify them from a selection of items like different main engines, turbo engines, turning thrusters, how much and what kind of armour, area left for cargo space, weapon port count and types and so on of your choosing. The decals and such would be cool but making your ship is better. Yes this is old and in the list, I just think it really would make things more interesting, offer more uniqueness and to toss my vote for it in.
edits:
added 9 & 10 (forgot them before)
1. A Cargo Holdings Manifest
It stands to reason a pilot would record in their computer what and where they have things stored for easy reference later on. Unfortunately this isn't avaialble in the game from what I can tell.
2. Multi Station Store Reference
If you go in or call a chain store and they don't have something they can usually check to see if another near-by store in the chain has it or you may also be able to do that yourself on-line at their web site. If that can be done today one would think that 2400+ years from now it should still be possible. Stations you can dock with should be able to stay in contact with eachother so you could go to a multi station item search tab which will show either all the stations you can enter that have each item or at least the closest ones. This would apply for items, goods and ships. The same concept but for sale of stuff could also be added so you can find out which stations would offer better prices.
3. Bot Search
If your nav computer can show you known bot types in each small area when you mouse over it one would think that it would be able to run a search for specific bots too. This way rather than spending a long time going through each grid on each map for bots you're looking for in a grouping you like you could enter some criteria like which bots you want to find, ones you don't want to be grouped with the ones you want and if there are any places where only that or those bots are found. Then you could have a small favourites list plus if you're doing a bot mission the ones you like or are looking for would be automatically selected and bumped to the top of the find list.
4. More In Game and/or Web Site Data
This would be like a list of all the items, ships, weapons, bots and such. Purchasable items would be taken care of by the Multi Station Store Reference but as there are a number of bots out there newer players at least would have an easier time picking hunting areas if they knew what each bot was like before they had to deal with them directly. Since others would have dealt with them and visited stations that info should be publically available.
5. Weapons Get Their Own Buy Window
The current method is kinda messy when trying to compare weapons as you have to click each, look at the info text area (which can't even show it all without scrolling) try to remember the info then click others to compare them all (showing max possible damage per second non-rockets/missles would be good too). One wide chart would be better with the info displayed all together nice and neat in colums and rows. Incidently all these extra tabs would likely be best managed with main and sub tabs.
6. Balance Money and XP More
The game is practically throwing money at you left and right (at least at the stage I'm at and what I've been doing) while getting XP is considerably harder. Money should be a bit harder to get or make reparing cost something so there's more of a drain on it. Earning XP should take some doing so that's not really my issue, it's just that there should be more ways to make XP like more mission options and other avenues like the race idea (piloting XP) so it at least it may not feel as much of a grind.
7. Stiffer Death Penalties
As it stands you don't really loose much what with money being easy to get at and weapons/ships being just a few jumps away. There should be more involved like unique items you may have lost, ships costing more, XP and/or standings penalties and such. There could also be variations to what you loose and how much depending on how you died.
8. Matters when Collecting Cargo
There have been times when a couple of those suckers are floating rather close together but I annoyingly manage to slip right between them collecting niether, other times I fly over and bearly miss it. So if the collection area could be widened some that'd be helpful and speed things up some. Also a cargo bay full notice would be good too.
9. Default and Preset Jump Points
(Saw this basic idea in another thread not long ago but after a couple searches I couldn't seem to find it now.) The idea was you set a default jump location so if you drop into a new location but get swarmed and don't have time to set a jump location that one is selected already so then just need to survive and make clearance distance. The problem with that was if the default was in another system it would take you to a warp area which can also be dangerous. So to build on that idea you could have the default set based on certain criteria like if in a friendly system it defaults to a random station, if in an enemy system it defaults to a random empty area of space. Then to further build on this it would be good if you could preselect some common jump locations which could be named and saved to be accessed via keyboard short-cuts like ctrl+0 - ctrl+9. Also the selected next jump location and final location could be shown in the top right for easy reference with their name (if it was a preset one or default, none or the station name otherwise), address and an icon if it's to a station or warp area.
10. Proximity Allerts
This would be a warrning once you get about 100m-200m or so from something and are heading in that direction (maybe put it on a sliding scale depending on the speed at which you're approaching it). Basically you got the whole little flashing light or arrow that shows the direction and beeping thing for an audio alert going and the rate at which it beeps and flashes determines how urgent it is. I know when in fights around many astroids I've rammed into one a few times which certainly can be a problem.
... Ship Customization (Beating a Dead Horse)
It really would be better if you at least had the option to buy different ship shells then modify them from a selection of items like different main engines, turbo engines, turning thrusters, how much and what kind of armour, area left for cargo space, weapon port count and types and so on of your choosing. The decals and such would be cool but making your ship is better. Yes this is old and in the list, I just think it really would make things more interesting, offer more uniqueness and to toss my vote for it in.
edits:
added 9 & 10 (forgot them before)
1. A Cargo Holdings Manifest
It's true there is not easy way to check this info but you can dock at a station and scroll endlessly through the station list to see what you have and where. I would be nice though to be able to check that list when not in a station!!
2. Multi Station Store Reference
I've been an advocate for this idea for a while, but the thought just came to me. How do communications transfer across extremely long distances in VO without any sort of communications network visible, unless they are simply too small for us to see, though that's highly unlikely. The only way I see for stations to communicate would be to have actual pilots ferry info of that nature from one station to the next. As such the info would probably be out of date if you were not looking at it just as it was posted. We do have the daily trade routes and local items in demand. Though you have to dock to see that info. Perhaps make a way to communicate with a station as long as your in the same system as it. Communication over that distance is not as bad and would only have a slight delay due to transmission distances. As for a universal reference, that's something your going to have to build yourself. Some guilds have a lot of that information already but it is restricted to guild members only.
3. Bot Search
Personally, I've never had a problem finding a specific bot to kill with the current system. But, more features are always nice, and I don't see how this could hurt, but it should only be able to search bots that are known by your primary factions database and any sector that you've "checked" outside of monitored space.
4. More In Game and/or Web Site Data
Once the wiki site is back up (not dev site) there is a section that talks about bots, and anyone with an account can update or add to the description with info that they find out.
5. Weapons Get Their Own Buy Window
The WHOLE GUI needs to be completely redone.
6. Balance Money and XP More
Most of the xp grinds are fine, the only one I personally have issues with is combat xp, which hopefully the devs are working on with the whole Hive AI and stuff. It would be fun to see racing reintroduced along with a new ship design specific for racing, something sleek looking with 0 weapons ports, and possibly 1-6 cargo capacity. Money means nothing in VO unless your a newbie. Even then if you know the right people you really don't need to trade or mine at all. I do think that repairs should cost money and that death had more of a penalty other then the price of your favorite ship. But I don't think it will happen because then the standard of pvp would be hurt and everyone would bitch.
7. Stiffer Death Penalties
There are a lot of great posts talking about just this. My personal favorite would be if a person is destroyed they are jettisoned from the ship before destruction and either have to fly a super fast pod back to there home station or closest with desired ship, or that something would come pick up your escape pod and tug you back to the closest station where you could then buy an EC-88 or whatever and then get back in the game. Either to me seems fair.
8. Matters when Collecting Cargo
IMO this does not need to be tweaked. Just takes a level of skill to get the cargo.
9. Default and Preset Jump Points
This whole issue can be prevented if you simply set a jump point one jump after your desired location. You should be in a habit of doing this already from botting, though I'm sure some don't do that. It works and does not require the devs to add a new feature.
10. Proximity Allerts
Both audio and visual indicators so that if you are not looking at the screen you're still aware that something is about to collide with you or you are about to ram something. Could be toggleable so that when in combat it's not freaking out as all the ships are swarming around you.
It's true there is not easy way to check this info but you can dock at a station and scroll endlessly through the station list to see what you have and where. I would be nice though to be able to check that list when not in a station!!
2. Multi Station Store Reference
I've been an advocate for this idea for a while, but the thought just came to me. How do communications transfer across extremely long distances in VO without any sort of communications network visible, unless they are simply too small for us to see, though that's highly unlikely. The only way I see for stations to communicate would be to have actual pilots ferry info of that nature from one station to the next. As such the info would probably be out of date if you were not looking at it just as it was posted. We do have the daily trade routes and local items in demand. Though you have to dock to see that info. Perhaps make a way to communicate with a station as long as your in the same system as it. Communication over that distance is not as bad and would only have a slight delay due to transmission distances. As for a universal reference, that's something your going to have to build yourself. Some guilds have a lot of that information already but it is restricted to guild members only.
3. Bot Search
Personally, I've never had a problem finding a specific bot to kill with the current system. But, more features are always nice, and I don't see how this could hurt, but it should only be able to search bots that are known by your primary factions database and any sector that you've "checked" outside of monitored space.
4. More In Game and/or Web Site Data
Once the wiki site is back up (not dev site) there is a section that talks about bots, and anyone with an account can update or add to the description with info that they find out.
5. Weapons Get Their Own Buy Window
The WHOLE GUI needs to be completely redone.
6. Balance Money and XP More
Most of the xp grinds are fine, the only one I personally have issues with is combat xp, which hopefully the devs are working on with the whole Hive AI and stuff. It would be fun to see racing reintroduced along with a new ship design specific for racing, something sleek looking with 0 weapons ports, and possibly 1-6 cargo capacity. Money means nothing in VO unless your a newbie. Even then if you know the right people you really don't need to trade or mine at all. I do think that repairs should cost money and that death had more of a penalty other then the price of your favorite ship. But I don't think it will happen because then the standard of pvp would be hurt and everyone would bitch.
7. Stiffer Death Penalties
There are a lot of great posts talking about just this. My personal favorite would be if a person is destroyed they are jettisoned from the ship before destruction and either have to fly a super fast pod back to there home station or closest with desired ship, or that something would come pick up your escape pod and tug you back to the closest station where you could then buy an EC-88 or whatever and then get back in the game. Either to me seems fair.
8. Matters when Collecting Cargo
IMO this does not need to be tweaked. Just takes a level of skill to get the cargo.
9. Default and Preset Jump Points
This whole issue can be prevented if you simply set a jump point one jump after your desired location. You should be in a habit of doing this already from botting, though I'm sure some don't do that. It works and does not require the devs to add a new feature.
10. Proximity Allerts
Both audio and visual indicators so that if you are not looking at the screen you're still aware that something is about to collide with you or you are about to ram something. Could be toggleable so that when in combat it's not freaking out as all the ships are swarming around you.
I don't think we need stiffer death penalties. I mean I died at least 20 times yesterday.
Perhaps if death was stricter, you would not die as much?!
Perhaps if he didn't die as much, CP would have less fun. Vendetta Online is very much combat oriented; which means players will die a lot. But, I do think there could be some addition death penalties that would increase the fun in the game, rather than detracting from it. But IMO the spend-time-in-an-escape-pod isn't one of them. An alternative that I would prefer would be when you die, you drop a cargo crate with 10% of your credits, that could be picked up by whoever killed you (or anyone else nearby). The reason I think this would be better is because it is not only a death penalty, but is also an additional reward for killing other players, which means any loss of fun when dying would hopefully be more than compensated for by the gain of fun in killing. It would also make ELITBank much, much more useful, and ELITBank will not ever, ever want to show its ship outside of station.
I can tell you right now if you did that I would stop pvp'ing all together. The risk is too great then IMO. An escape pod that can reach 3000m in under 15sec does not seem to me to be a lot of time wasted. But it does add down time, to cool down from your fight or to simply go to the bathroom. Sure you can do that now buy just sitting in the station but we're trying to add something here. I'm also trying to get away from the kill kill kill kill mentality you all seem to love so much. More PvE, less reward for pk's!! That's the ticket!!! =P
what reward for pk's? Its bankrupted me several times.
I wouldn't mind seeing a bit of cash drop when someone died. 5-10k though, not a percentage.
I wouldn't mind seeing a bit of cash drop when someone died. 5-10k though, not a percentage.
PvE is in the process of being worked on & improved right now, and will no doubt become a great source of fun in the game. But IMO there is no way no how PvE could ever be as fun as PvP.
An escape pod that would reach 3000m in under 1 second would still be a few seconds that I am not having fun (and BTW, every ship in the game, including the freebus, can almost always reach 3000m in less than 15 seconds. 15 seconds is a long time). And how exactly does an escape pod contribute to PvE, anyway? And johnhawl... please tell me you're not saying you want to be able to take bathroom breaks in the middle of combat.
@Shapenaji: What's the problem with a percentage? If you're worried about losing too much money, use ELITBank or your guild bank. Currently, the only real reason IMO to use them is to transfer money to players a long way across the universe, but I for one never leave any balance in the bank. This would give me a reason to. It could also be way cool if capturable stations are implemented, and we could force ships to undock. Capture Odia M-14 (I hope I remembered it right), force ELITBank to launch, and then kill ELITBank - and get a Bank Robber medal.
An escape pod that would reach 3000m in under 1 second would still be a few seconds that I am not having fun (and BTW, every ship in the game, including the freebus, can almost always reach 3000m in less than 15 seconds. 15 seconds is a long time). And how exactly does an escape pod contribute to PvE, anyway? And johnhawl... please tell me you're not saying you want to be able to take bathroom breaks in the middle of combat.
@Shapenaji: What's the problem with a percentage? If you're worried about losing too much money, use ELITBank or your guild bank. Currently, the only real reason IMO to use them is to transfer money to players a long way across the universe, but I for one never leave any balance in the bank. This would give me a reason to. It could also be way cool if capturable stations are implemented, and we could force ships to undock. Capture Odia M-14 (I hope I remembered it right), force ELITBank to launch, and then kill ELITBank - and get a Bank Robber medal.
How about having these escape pods go 250m/s and make them player steerable. So you could manuever to the fastest possible way out of the area. Home stations will become useless then and you can pretty much use whatever stations you want. A little added twist is that if someone manages to kill your tiny fast escape pod you lose lets say 45k of your money in a peice of cargo for them..
I really don't like the idea of escape pods at all. 250m/s is too slow; that's only 10m/s more than some of the current ships, which means you won't be making it to a station all that much faster than a regular ship would. As for whether it should be player controlled or automated, either way is time spent doing nothing, which means time being bored. I really think the way the game deals with death right now is the best possibility. Yeah, it's hard to come up with a believable explanation for what happens, but it lets you get back to having fun almost immediately. Any type of escape pod forces you to have downtime where you are not having fun.
Anyway, this has all been beaten to death before (pun intended). The devs will do what the devs think best, and we'll all like it.
Anyway, this has all been beaten to death before (pun intended). The devs will do what the devs think best, and we'll all like it.
, and we'll all like it.
Speak for yourself!
@TNA
If you reward players for killing the escape pod, you might as well make a tk badge.
Also, loosing any money in a fight that is not actually in the cargo hold of the ship in some form of a widget is rediculous. If your going to give a penalty make it an xp penalty and increase the reward xp.
Speak for yourself!
@TNA
If you reward players for killing the escape pod, you might as well make a tk badge.
Also, loosing any money in a fight that is not actually in the cargo hold of the ship in some form of a widget is rediculous. If your going to give a penalty make it an xp penalty and increase the reward xp.
"I really don't like the idea of escape pods at all. 250m/s is too slow; that's only 10m/s more than some of the current ships, which means you won't be making it to a station all that much faster than a regular ship would. As for whether it should be player controlled or automated, either way is time spent doing nothing, which means time being bored. I really think the way the game deals with death right now is the best possibility. Yeah, it's hard to come up with a believable explanation for what happens, but it lets you get back to having fun almost immediately. Any type of escape pod forces you to have downtime where you are not having fun."
I chose 250m/s for a reason, most people cant shoot a rev c turboing at full speed, although it might take a lil bit to get somewhere it would make it shootable for some rewards. Advantages are rewards and going to any station you want after death..
Say someone has 5mil credits aprox...say credits are coins or eles elit bank would be useless..under the assumtion that credits are actual CREDIT that the stations remember. Are they going to put the money all in their pockets? ouch.. So dropping it would make sence because it prolly would be in the cargo hold just not heavy enough to take any cu because its bills..
This brings up a whole new idea, the more credits you have no the ship it takes CU and makes you slower? That would make guild banks or elit bank more used..
I chose 250m/s for a reason, most people cant shoot a rev c turboing at full speed, although it might take a lil bit to get somewhere it would make it shootable for some rewards. Advantages are rewards and going to any station you want after death..
Say someone has 5mil credits aprox...say credits are coins or eles elit bank would be useless..under the assumtion that credits are actual CREDIT that the stations remember. Are they going to put the money all in their pockets? ouch.. So dropping it would make sence because it prolly would be in the cargo hold just not heavy enough to take any cu because its bills..
This brings up a whole new idea, the more credits you have no the ship it takes CU and makes you slower? That would make guild banks or elit bank more used..
@johnhawl218: Wow, we have different opinions on a lot of things. I'd hate an XP penalty associated with death even more than I'd hate escape pods.
@TNAtits: Depending on the circumstances (mainly, is it coming towards me, or going away), it can be very, very easy to shoot a Rev. C turboing at full speed. Remember, turboing ships can't dodge. And my complaint about 250m/s is not that it would be too easy for the escape pod to be hit, but that it would take too long to get back to a station & get a real ship. And "going to any station you want after death" is not enough of an advantage to sell me on escape pods; I can already go to any station I want after dying, I just have to decide which station I want beforehand.
As far as dropping credits goes, yeah, it would be hard to come up with a completely believable explanation, but it's already hard enough to explain how we survive our ships blowing up so many times. IMO this is an excellent example of how realism/believability doesn't necessarily always go hand-in-hand with fun. It's fairly standard for computer games to have gold coins/credits/etc. take up no space and weigh nothing. Realistic no, but I for one think it would detract from the fun of a lot of games if they went with a more realistic representation.
@TNAtits: Depending on the circumstances (mainly, is it coming towards me, or going away), it can be very, very easy to shoot a Rev. C turboing at full speed. Remember, turboing ships can't dodge. And my complaint about 250m/s is not that it would be too easy for the escape pod to be hit, but that it would take too long to get back to a station & get a real ship. And "going to any station you want after death" is not enough of an advantage to sell me on escape pods; I can already go to any station I want after dying, I just have to decide which station I want beforehand.
As far as dropping credits goes, yeah, it would be hard to come up with a completely believable explanation, but it's already hard enough to explain how we survive our ships blowing up so many times. IMO this is an excellent example of how realism/believability doesn't necessarily always go hand-in-hand with fun. It's fairly standard for computer games to have gold coins/credits/etc. take up no space and weigh nothing. Realistic no, but I for one think it would detract from the fun of a lot of games if they went with a more realistic representation.
Har, i see what you mean about the escape pods, this is not another pod idea..
*TRANSPORTER BEAMS!!*
My explanation for dieing then living. It transports you out the second your ships hull is breached :)...
*TRANSPORTER BEAMS!!*
My explanation for dieing then living. It transports you out the second your ships hull is breached :)...
for one thing with the GUI, for heavens sake, no sub-tabs. and I don't ever want to see a window-based game GUI again, especially in a game that's as action oriented as Vendetta.
as for death penalties? well, make them harsh and people will just run, run, run. every fight will start at 3K and ends at 5%. CtC will become, well, interesting. economic gains from winning fights is hard to balance, since it's yet another thing that'll hurt newbies a huge deal more than better players. anyone who has played a few months should be more than able to make money as they please, moth-less newbies need a bit more time.
but, I would like to see people who concentrate on PvP to be able to get away with having very little trade or mining XP. I think the best solution to this would be to offer higher priced combat missions, right now, doing combat missions means mindless botting with very little economic reward. how about a nice queen-killing mission? or maybe a mission from a competing faction to kill traders with a cargo worth a certain number of credits going to a certain destination? the cargo doesn't have to be delivered anywhere, you're just looking to starve the station.
as for death penalties? well, make them harsh and people will just run, run, run. every fight will start at 3K and ends at 5%. CtC will become, well, interesting. economic gains from winning fights is hard to balance, since it's yet another thing that'll hurt newbies a huge deal more than better players. anyone who has played a few months should be more than able to make money as they please, moth-less newbies need a bit more time.
but, I would like to see people who concentrate on PvP to be able to get away with having very little trade or mining XP. I think the best solution to this would be to offer higher priced combat missions, right now, doing combat missions means mindless botting with very little economic reward. how about a nice queen-killing mission? or maybe a mission from a competing faction to kill traders with a cargo worth a certain number of credits going to a certain destination? the cargo doesn't have to be delivered anywhere, you're just looking to starve the station.
terjekv:
The sub tabs would only be for areas crowded with other tabs. The current station menu has plenty of tabs already, if more were added a sub tab system would be required with the current layout. Another option though would be you have a little grouped list on one side and you select from there (like how the site layout here is). It's just for the stations this would be needed though.
.
johnhawl218:
2. Multi Station Store Reference
In the back story they refered to more advanced comm systems so those may be able to reach other systems in good time. If you don't like that another thought is very little and heavily armoured (maybe cloaked so they don't have to be actually added to the game) relay bots zipping in and out of warps relaying info to neighbouring allied sectors. The stations send info to the bots, one or more zips in and passes it to the stations in the next sector.
4. More In Game and/or Web Site Data
A Wiki entry is little more than a fan site. Showing at least more of what is avaialble in the game at the main site would help entice new players, which the game could really use. When you look at the main site you really aren't too sure what is in the game right now as while the back story is well developed the game details are rather weak. If the four devs are also managing the site they may want to get some outside help for the site (I could even do that as I've done it before). This need not be an ongoing pay out as with the right design adding and changing things would be a simple matter of changing what's in a database and adding or changing images in certain directories which they could manage easily.
7. Stiffer Death Penalties
Here I was thinking more in the lines of standings penalties plus maybe in some cases XP penalties, as noted though what and how much would depend on how you died. Then if items were added to the game which can modify your ship that could work as your penalty right there. The pod idea sounds too EVE Online to be used and if used it would undoubtedly result in EVE's clone maintenace concept being added as well since players could pod kill you in VO as well. General similarities since both are space MMORPGs are one thing but stuff like that could result in law suits.
Back on topic, unique items would certainly add more sting to death if or when added. Then again how you died would result in standings and any XP losses. Like if you died from a bot the type and your levels would play into what you lost. If you're a lower level and it was a strong bot you may not loose any standings or XP but if it was a weak bot you could loose some standing and maybe a bit of XP, how much would depend on your levels. In PvP you would only risk your standing with your faction. So if you're a noob and got offed by a vet you'd loose nothing, if the reverse were true though you'd loose some. This would make death mean more and makes sense since for instance if some bot offed you and you're not a noob your faction would think less of you.
8. Matters when Collecting Cargo
Usually I can manage that just fine but sometimes I'm in some little thin ship and I think surely I'll hit it but miss by a hair. I'm not saying make the area huge, just expand it a little or add a collection net you could deploy then reel back in.
9. Default and Preset Jump Points
I and anyone that has played a while do quickly hit n and set one once they jump in a new area but there are times you just find yourself in the thick of things upon entry and as more players are added this will only become a more frequent and dangerous matter in some areas. Right now there are maybe 20-100 or so playing at a time which considering the size of the game universe means you really have to look for people more but other MMORPGs often have in the thousands playing at one time. Go to the EVE-I site ( http://www.eve-i.com/ ) for instance, it shows the players playing EVE Online at one time in different time frames and it generally is around 4000-10000. If or when VO gets more in that area of popularity even as the game universe increases in size different areas will get to be more crowded, have campers and so forth so a preset default and abilty to set a jump location without taking your eye off the playing area could be a real life saver. Then the user defined presets would also be rather handy and quicker than going to the map all the time too.
10. Proximity Allerts
Yes I did say both audio and visual then I was thinking more in the way of things, not other players. You really need to play VO with flight assist off but a noob would likely have it on (as that's the default) and be ramming the training bot freaking out with all the beeping and flashing going on. Then one could have the option of setting what sets the alarm off so they could tweak it to their tastes, a toggle wouldn't be bad either.
The sub tabs would only be for areas crowded with other tabs. The current station menu has plenty of tabs already, if more were added a sub tab system would be required with the current layout. Another option though would be you have a little grouped list on one side and you select from there (like how the site layout here is). It's just for the stations this would be needed though.
.
johnhawl218:
2. Multi Station Store Reference
In the back story they refered to more advanced comm systems so those may be able to reach other systems in good time. If you don't like that another thought is very little and heavily armoured (maybe cloaked so they don't have to be actually added to the game) relay bots zipping in and out of warps relaying info to neighbouring allied sectors. The stations send info to the bots, one or more zips in and passes it to the stations in the next sector.
4. More In Game and/or Web Site Data
A Wiki entry is little more than a fan site. Showing at least more of what is avaialble in the game at the main site would help entice new players, which the game could really use. When you look at the main site you really aren't too sure what is in the game right now as while the back story is well developed the game details are rather weak. If the four devs are also managing the site they may want to get some outside help for the site (I could even do that as I've done it before). This need not be an ongoing pay out as with the right design adding and changing things would be a simple matter of changing what's in a database and adding or changing images in certain directories which they could manage easily.
7. Stiffer Death Penalties
Here I was thinking more in the lines of standings penalties plus maybe in some cases XP penalties, as noted though what and how much would depend on how you died. Then if items were added to the game which can modify your ship that could work as your penalty right there. The pod idea sounds too EVE Online to be used and if used it would undoubtedly result in EVE's clone maintenace concept being added as well since players could pod kill you in VO as well. General similarities since both are space MMORPGs are one thing but stuff like that could result in law suits.
Back on topic, unique items would certainly add more sting to death if or when added. Then again how you died would result in standings and any XP losses. Like if you died from a bot the type and your levels would play into what you lost. If you're a lower level and it was a strong bot you may not loose any standings or XP but if it was a weak bot you could loose some standing and maybe a bit of XP, how much would depend on your levels. In PvP you would only risk your standing with your faction. So if you're a noob and got offed by a vet you'd loose nothing, if the reverse were true though you'd loose some. This would make death mean more and makes sense since for instance if some bot offed you and you're not a noob your faction would think less of you.
8. Matters when Collecting Cargo
Usually I can manage that just fine but sometimes I'm in some little thin ship and I think surely I'll hit it but miss by a hair. I'm not saying make the area huge, just expand it a little or add a collection net you could deploy then reel back in.
9. Default and Preset Jump Points
I and anyone that has played a while do quickly hit n and set one once they jump in a new area but there are times you just find yourself in the thick of things upon entry and as more players are added this will only become a more frequent and dangerous matter in some areas. Right now there are maybe 20-100 or so playing at a time which considering the size of the game universe means you really have to look for people more but other MMORPGs often have in the thousands playing at one time. Go to the EVE-I site ( http://www.eve-i.com/ ) for instance, it shows the players playing EVE Online at one time in different time frames and it generally is around 4000-10000. If or when VO gets more in that area of popularity even as the game universe increases in size different areas will get to be more crowded, have campers and so forth so a preset default and abilty to set a jump location without taking your eye off the playing area could be a real life saver. Then the user defined presets would also be rather handy and quicker than going to the map all the time too.
10. Proximity Allerts
Yes I did say both audio and visual then I was thinking more in the way of things, not other players. You really need to play VO with flight assist off but a noob would likely have it on (as that's the default) and be ramming the training bot freaking out with all the beeping and flashing going on. Then one could have the option of setting what sets the alarm off so they could tweak it to their tastes, a toggle wouldn't be bad either.
It's quite clear you guys don't die enough. Money penalties, xp penalties. How much fun is this going to be for people with 1000+ deaths? It's easy to say "Well maybe they won't die as much" but it's far more likely that they may just not play the game as much.
Yeah, Martin, you really can't afford to lose a few credits when you die, now can you? Especially not if you'd be getting credits for the times you kill people.
Let's play place-that-(utterly-mangled)-quote: "18th Century England suffered from an interesting cash-flow problem: too much cash, not enough flow."
Let's play place-that-(utterly-mangled)-quote: "18th Century England suffered from an interesting cash-flow problem: too much cash, not enough flow."
Martin, here's my point about death and death penalties. A lot of you consider this game a pvp fpss, I don't, and I think that's where a lot of our differences in opinions comes from. That's the reason I run during combat and why I think death is NEVER an option. If you want a kill me you have to work for it, and if that means you have to track me down and kill me in a station zone then be it. PvP is NOT why I play the game, and so I don't just endlessly die all day and call it FUN. I have never enjoyed playing Quake, Doom, Halo, all those shooters, and had I known that this was going to be the dominate force of VO, probably would not have started playing to begin with. Unfortunate when I first started playing I was under the impression that it was going to be an MMORPG when it was actually NOT, but I've stayed around and things are being added and things are moving forward, but it's still a pvp fpss, which is fine but if your trying to go the mmorpg route then death is something that should happen as little as possible IMO. Death penalties are a way to stop the senseless deaths & also delay advancing too quickly. Right now it doesn't take more then a week to get to a point in VO where there is nothing left to do but pvp and that is where I'm at now and it's getting really boring. I know there is more content coming and I'm waiting to see how it turns out.
Martin.mac.au:
If you bothered to read what I wrote about PvP death penalties you'd see that it was just faction standings you'd loose should you die and that depended on the difference in level between you and the other guy. Also I suppose they could set it so you never drop below a certain standings level from PvP deaths.
.
Anyhow, now that I look at it all more and have played more the whole game design as it is is rather warped. It says it's a MMORPG and you have skills to develop like in RPGs but there are so few, only five compare to the 15 skill groups with sub sets in most resulting in many skills to learn in EVE and then in WoW there's about 10 classes able to use varying numbers of about 10-15 professions each able to do I don't know haw many different things once you add the spells and such up. Yes there are standings aside from skills in VO but that doesn't do much at this stage from what I can tell. Then of the five skills in VO three are combat based ones, add that to the "twitch" based controls and the lack of any real RPG content now months after release and you've got what results in a PvP game. Nothing in the game really makes you feel like you're doing anything to effect change, botting gets pretty annoying as they never end, if you run cargo to get better trade levels you get what, that one bigger ship with more cargo space? Then if you mine you get, what, does anyone know? With hordes of bots doing it for you one could just get the ore plus some scrap by blasting bots rather than sitting there mining for a long time. Then I've never seen a station say they can't make one thing or another due to a lack of materials so mining and even bringing in cargo of one type or another does nothing from what I can see. Now lets talk about the ships, there's what, about ten main types usable by each faction with only one for each that is unique, while each comes in somewhat different set ups that's still pretty sad compare to the 14 classes of ships in EVE, many with multiple types for each race resulting in many available ships for each race, that number could then pretty near be multiplied by four resulting in a whole lot of ships, all of which are customizable with I don't know how many different items resulting in a near infinite number of ship configurations. Then you can't customize your ship much at all, set up shops in a stations, start your own station, find or buy add-on items (despite it being hinted at on the web site) and so forth that can allow you to develop your presence in the game and effect real change in it. Now with the "twitch" based combat you know right away VO is going to be rather combat oriented, I can accept and enjoy that but there needs to be more things to do with your combat skills than endlessly botting in asteroid fields and PvP. Other games start out with full character creation and many development options plus a good bit of game content then build on that. VO started with everything still very much a work in progress and little to no game content, it's like we're being asked to pay for access to a beta version rather than a full release version.
When looking at http://mage.net.tc/vapg/ the player count seems to be in a steady decline as I've heard of numbers up to 120 at one time in the past, but now 60-90 is about the best it can do, compare that to the many thousands on the more popular MMORPGs and I'm not sure how much longer VO will be around. Then should they finally make a release level game they should list it as a kind of sequel so the game sites take another look at it and they have some chance of getting players back. Unless they come up with real content soon or try something else this game seems doomed like all the other spaced based MMORPGs aside from EVE before it. I came to VO hoping it would be like EVE with better combat, less waiting during flights and playable on a Mac (go to http://www.petitiononline.com/eve2106/petition.html to sign a bring EVE to Macs and Linux petition, supposedly the developers of EVE are considering doing that and looking at the petition) but it looks like VO has fallen short so I guess I'll need to hold onto a Windows PC for a while longer and go with EVE, I'll take a look at VO now and then but I'm not sure if I should be expecting much. One thing to the VO devs is that if things don't work out with VO you could talk to the EVE guys, think I heard it originally started as a project by five guys (they dropped the publisher a while back so it's all CCP now with the client only offered as a download) so you four with experience in multi-OS game release could be of interest to them and help bring EVE to both Macs and Linux by making up the Mac and Linux team, you might have to move to Iceland though.
If you bothered to read what I wrote about PvP death penalties you'd see that it was just faction standings you'd loose should you die and that depended on the difference in level between you and the other guy. Also I suppose they could set it so you never drop below a certain standings level from PvP deaths.
.
Anyhow, now that I look at it all more and have played more the whole game design as it is is rather warped. It says it's a MMORPG and you have skills to develop like in RPGs but there are so few, only five compare to the 15 skill groups with sub sets in most resulting in many skills to learn in EVE and then in WoW there's about 10 classes able to use varying numbers of about 10-15 professions each able to do I don't know haw many different things once you add the spells and such up. Yes there are standings aside from skills in VO but that doesn't do much at this stage from what I can tell. Then of the five skills in VO three are combat based ones, add that to the "twitch" based controls and the lack of any real RPG content now months after release and you've got what results in a PvP game. Nothing in the game really makes you feel like you're doing anything to effect change, botting gets pretty annoying as they never end, if you run cargo to get better trade levels you get what, that one bigger ship with more cargo space? Then if you mine you get, what, does anyone know? With hordes of bots doing it for you one could just get the ore plus some scrap by blasting bots rather than sitting there mining for a long time. Then I've never seen a station say they can't make one thing or another due to a lack of materials so mining and even bringing in cargo of one type or another does nothing from what I can see. Now lets talk about the ships, there's what, about ten main types usable by each faction with only one for each that is unique, while each comes in somewhat different set ups that's still pretty sad compare to the 14 classes of ships in EVE, many with multiple types for each race resulting in many available ships for each race, that number could then pretty near be multiplied by four resulting in a whole lot of ships, all of which are customizable with I don't know how many different items resulting in a near infinite number of ship configurations. Then you can't customize your ship much at all, set up shops in a stations, start your own station, find or buy add-on items (despite it being hinted at on the web site) and so forth that can allow you to develop your presence in the game and effect real change in it. Now with the "twitch" based combat you know right away VO is going to be rather combat oriented, I can accept and enjoy that but there needs to be more things to do with your combat skills than endlessly botting in asteroid fields and PvP. Other games start out with full character creation and many development options plus a good bit of game content then build on that. VO started with everything still very much a work in progress and little to no game content, it's like we're being asked to pay for access to a beta version rather than a full release version.
When looking at http://mage.net.tc/vapg/ the player count seems to be in a steady decline as I've heard of numbers up to 120 at one time in the past, but now 60-90 is about the best it can do, compare that to the many thousands on the more popular MMORPGs and I'm not sure how much longer VO will be around. Then should they finally make a release level game they should list it as a kind of sequel so the game sites take another look at it and they have some chance of getting players back. Unless they come up with real content soon or try something else this game seems doomed like all the other spaced based MMORPGs aside from EVE before it. I came to VO hoping it would be like EVE with better combat, less waiting during flights and playable on a Mac (go to http://www.petitiononline.com/eve2106/petition.html to sign a bring EVE to Macs and Linux petition, supposedly the developers of EVE are considering doing that and looking at the petition) but it looks like VO has fallen short so I guess I'll need to hold onto a Windows PC for a while longer and go with EVE, I'll take a look at VO now and then but I'm not sure if I should be expecting much. One thing to the VO devs is that if things don't work out with VO you could talk to the EVE guys, think I heard it originally started as a project by five guys (they dropped the publisher a while back so it's all CCP now with the client only offered as a download) so you four with experience in multi-OS game release could be of interest to them and help bring EVE to both Macs and Linux by making up the Mac and Linux team, you might have to move to Iceland though.