New Frames & Inventory Console Features

[Maarschalk]

Again...You don 't have to worry about fighting other players.

Tell that to Von and TER and BA. Full discloser helps insure new pilots don't feel like they were suckered into MP.

Yes, should be a full disclosure in the fine print! Who reads the fine print any way?......:P:P:P:P:P:P:P

[gietek]

That's all very sweet guys. Really kind of you, thanks. Maybe someday I will join MP.
The only thing is it doesn't address the problems I mentioned before.
EM should be playable and enjoyable without having to master the game in 100%.
Besides, the combat is only one of the issues.
But thanks again.

[MiaZ]

For me MP in EM is just like single player but with people to chat with while you play.
I am not often in the same sector of space or fighting other players.

Its just the same game mostly, with the added benefit of ppl to chat with.

[MMaggio]

We only felt it would be easier to answer your questions and offeer help in real time.
I respect your wish to play SP. but am still willing to offer help. Obviously, the game is playable and enjoyed by thousands of other people, so perhaps all you need is a little tutorial.
I would be pleased to answer your questions and offer help if you want to do it here.
Could you please repeat your difficulties so we can deal with them, one at a time?
I will do my best to clarify and answer the how and why of the things that are giving you trouble.
Sincerely, MM

[DaveK]

I find EM too hard and sometimes very tedious. I keep coming back to the game but the reputation system and combat difficulty are just too much for me.

Please, oh please can we have Easy Difficulty in EM? A little bit easier combat (no, I don't want to be supergod that destroys planets with one shot) and easier reputation system - doing the same contracts for days/weeks and not being able to leave the system = not fun.

Another thing - hangar operations. Actually this was why I stopped playing EM recently. I was trying to swap my ships and lost half of the systems/weapons because I didn't do some 'hocus pocus' to prevent them from disappearing. Come on!

Also on easy setting could hostile ships have some kind of dead zone/radius? I mean as soon as they appear 8K miles away they go after me. I'd like them to leave me alone at that distance. Let's say, I come closer - maybe 2K - and they engage, I stay well away, they just ignore me.

I'm not complaining. I really want to come back to EM, I think it could be the greatest spacesim out there, but without easier gameplay and good hangar handling I probably won't bother.

I think EM should be enjoyed by a wider range of players and not only (or mostly) hardcore reputation grinders and explorers.

[Edited on 28-7-2011 by gietek]

I agree with you that it would be nice if hostiles weren't attracted to you from a long way away - I headed out (along the y axis) several hundred sectors just exploring, stopped to refuel and have a coffee and a hostile appeared within a minute or so; an Excal pack sees them off and then another arrives - it's not fun or challenging or interesting or immersive - it's a pest!

I also agree that hangar management is frustrating since we don't do it every day - I'm have a crib sheet that tells me what order to unload equipment, change frame and reload it without dumping half of it into space! But, it's a minor part of the game and at least we can have equipment stores and own more than one frame!

Why do you want to increase your reputation? - it for the satisfaction of doing so or for safety? Once you can fly and fight, hostiles aren't such a cause of grief and spoiled enjoyment. I realise that you don't want to be stuck in one system forever, but Sapphire is very safe; you can practice various contracts and manouvres and skills, start the IMG quest gain enough money to upgrade frame and equipment. If you want to practice combat pop over to Olympus - and take on hostiles singly and when you are confident do a few contracts that involve taking on (4) hostiles. Reputation isn't such an issue here.

Early on you can even bounce innocent bystanders in Sapphire to get some combat practice Have a sesson that you don't save though - it doesn't so your rep any good

There are a couple of threads that gave very good combat technique advice. I'm still not very good but I can manage four hostiles (eventually )

Once you can hold your own in Olympus you can continue the IMQ quest until it sends you into a warzone - pause awhile until you are ready for that stage.

In the meantime you can explore, find new uncharted systems, caves in asteroids, shipwrecks, learn how to use wormholes and blackholes all in relative safety in Sapphire and Olympus. You can fly between star systems and visit Sol (a Merc's "christening") and have a Solar Systen holiday tour. You cna also win an instant fortune if you can land on Earth (though once you've worked out how to do it, you will have to demo it to witnesses in MP and take piccies of the surface)

Surviving depends on learning how to survive combat and how to make money and how to manouvre your ship as if it's an extension of your body - it all requires a bit (actually a lot) of practice. There are safe areas in Evochron (=easy mode) and safe occupations (exploring being one) and an amazing number of things to see, find and do. As in all simulations the better you get the more quickly you can improve (skills, income, equipment, rank, reputation). Make you first million or so and you can move into trade routes that allow a profit of several million per run. Get your first half billion and you can do what you want for a while without worrying about costs.



[Edited on 30-7-2011 by DaveK]

[Edited on 30-7-2011 by DaveK]

[49rTbird]

It would be nice to have a box that you could enter a pilot profile number so you could then jump to that profile area for quicker selection to save them.

[DaveK]

I use the Excalibur missile pack

I managed to get one (ie afford and track it down) just after the rules were changed so that there is a delay (3 minutes) between uses - no probs, I was convinced by the arguments - rats rats rats

I would love to have the triple option of

• double missiles (so that I could have fours launches),
• quad missile (two launches) and
• all eight at once.

I feel very lonely on this one - I don't want instant reload but I would like a bit of flexibility - still happy with the three minutes reload time for each missile I launch - but I often use the missiles as a last resort and eight in one go with a three minute reload is (literally) overkill. I've managed to inflict some damage in my opponent before I need them . It would also make the pack a bit more flexible that a "doom or nothing" weapon

What is the view on missiles in combat generally and "upgrading" the Excal "launch" program?

[Edited on 9-8-2011 by DaveK]

[Marvin]

I can't remember when Excals were anything but 3 minutes in Mercenary ... up from 1 minute in Legends.

[XB7]

I agree with you that it would be nice if hostiles weren't attracted to you from a long way away - I headed out (along the y axis) several hundred sectors just exploring, stopped to refuel and have a coffee and a hostile appeared within a minute or so; an Excal pack sees them off and then another arrives - it's not fun or challenging or interesting or immersive - it's a pest!

I think what your asking for is less ships in deep space where there aren't trade lanes. All the traffic adds life to the game, but maybe a bit less could populate deep space.

I've come to realize that the scanning range of Navy and Rebel vessels has quite a bit more range than ours, so that might be why these seem to appear out of nowhere all the time. Our max scanner range is, what 10,000?

I played around awhile with the stealth generator. Turning it off too soon after hostiles are 10,000+ invites them right back into the action. If I wait around another 15 - 30 seconds before exiting the generator, they don't return. So that may put their range at 15,000+?

If ships in the sector start picking up a bogey on the radar, they are going to call it in. Eventually nearby ships also scramble in to check it out. That's the way the AI appears to be designed. I think that's pretty realistic. The added scanner range ensures deep space isn't boring.



[Edited on 8-9-2011 by XB7]

[DaveK]

What I am asking for I suppose is that hostiles (never neutral or friendly) can't find me within minutes in what should be for them looking for a needle in several million haystacks! (since I'm well away from established systems, never mind trade routes, I can understand it if I'm somewhere near inhabited territory!)

In MP yesterday I tried to keep up with a couple of pilots flitting from place to place and even though I could see their coordinates, I still found it very very difficult (actually impossible) to find them within the sector.

Interaction can make the game experience more interesting but being jumped by psychopaths in the middle of a lot of nowhere who can find me on whim isn't (interesting) especially when I'm happy pottering

I'm talking about a few hundred sectors up the Y axis, the equivalent of being half way between known systems (I got bounced regularly between Pearl and Deneb and btween Alpha Centauri and Sol

[BLEVE]

I've been giving the "penalty for dying" thing some thought and have come up with an idea. It came to me after my skirmish with DW Leader the other night.

While he was trying to detonate one of my stations, I attacked and destroyed him with Excals and Cannon. Took some damage doing it, but I succeeded. However he just re-spawned and set off to the next station and began the process over. Myself I hit F7 and re-spawned with missiles and hull all at 100%.

Neither of us should have been able to do this. So what I'm proposing is when we are destroyed we re-spawn with no secondary weapons, regardless of what we had in there to start with. The effect on station killers would be devastating and if the defender lost, it would cause mild panic as they quickly searched for new missiles.

Also this should not affect new players significantly, as they should sell their class one missiles, to buy more cargo pods and fuel. Overall this would be a significant penalty for being destroyed.

[MMaggio]

The death penalty has been debated to death. [pun intended]Altho I don't think it will get done, yours is one of the better ideas.

[49rTbird]

I agree that there should be a price paid for being killed or f7ing yourself.

[MMaggio]

Here we go again.... ;)

[Maarschalk]

Well I do not agree with the penalty for destruction. You might be carrying valuable FTs or Stealth Devices as part of a trade run or form Andromeda without a mining beam and you just saved before you attempt to jump to that dreadfull whormhole which for rookies is a chalenge and than they loose their valuable cargo because they got destroyed. It took me more then a hundred attempts before I figured out how to jump through the wormhole and I certainly would not want to make the trip a hundred times trying to do trades and constantly loosing my valuable cargo......:P:P:P:P:P:P

[DaveK]

How would it work if instead of respawning I just quit the game and then restarted with the same profile?

Anyway, it is a game after all - I don't want it to be as stressy as real life.

Lets all just agree that there will be only one "life" per session at the "hard stuff" like trying to hurt other clans - you get killed, then you go do something else for the evening (teach newbies how to fight or go exploring or go off and kill Vonari in a warzone or sit in space grinding your teeth/fangs or ringing your hands/tentacles).

That should give the attacker a bit of "buzz" do it right or you don't get a second chance - the defenders? Well, HB has an agreement with DM that we will leave each other's stations alone if there is no defending pilot present- it seems to work well - no rules, no game penalties, just an agreement that it is far more fun that way. Defenders might agree to time out for xx minutes before they came back to the fight or not to use secondary weapons in a rematch, or to give the winner a "bounty" - so many credits to join in again

It's been said before and will be again - if you think it's too easy then make it hard on yourself - don't impose your angst on those of us who think that having another go is fine - in fact it's fun - in fact I'll risk attacking Leader over and over again until I can survive more than 15 seconds , and learn as well! If I have to poddle off and spend 20 minutes requipping I'll only get a couple of rounds in and won't learn very quickly at all!

[slamscape]

I think that death she be more "server" side based and not save file based. I think that rather than having to reload your profile where you last saved, you respawn.

Basically you would "save" by docking at a station or planet, when you die you respawn at whatever your last dock was. Clans would be able to create a "hostile clan list" that would disallow hostile clans from docking at your clan's stations. When a ship respawned, their cargo would drop where they died (would only be accessible to that person and last say for 30 min), ship would have damage say 75% of full health and would keep whatever missiles they had left when they died. Maybe add a no PvP flag for one minute or so after dieing, or have a one minute or so respawn timer. Also it might be nice if missions persisted even after a death.

Thats my 2 cents

[airassassin]

I said it be4 and I will say it again. It would be nice if we could fly the bigger ships and have a bunch of our own ships in the bigger ship so we can move them around in 1 wack. That and it would be cool to have the NPC put their big ships in use and move our stuff for them.

Besides that I agree with gietek about the bad guys shouldn't start attack you by a long distance. When I go and explore in deep space I try to build stations to fuel up and to say I been there. Well I put sensors out when I do this because your on board systems only pick up things about 10k away and the sensor picks up most of the sector. And I notice they know I'm there even beyond what my sensor picks up. That means they might know I'm there when they are a few sectors away.


That and I would like the auto pilot to be fixed. It's nice to use near by distance but it kinda sucks when you want your ship to jump a few gates away. Like it would be nice if it used the gates if possible.

[MMaggio]

If you want to jump to stations or gates w/o auto dock or auto pass thru, all you have to do is set pitch off a few degrees. Simple.

[airassassin]

If you want to jump to stations or gates w/o auto dock or auto pass thru, all you have to do is set pitch off a few degrees. Simple.

Well it's not the fact that I have to keep messing with the pitch or anything of the ship when I jump in gates. But that is a very very useful tip.



The problem is when I am jumping say 5 gates I have find the gate, jump to it, find the next gate, jump to it, etc.
It's more of a request to let me be more lazy lol and to make the game more real. Like I would think if we were in space and had all this tech and what not then we would have the auto to jump from system to system by using the gates if possible.

[Marvin]

Download Atollski's mod. It was built to do just that: determine shortest route and get you from point to point.

[airassassin]

Download Atollski's mod. It was built to do just that: determine shortest route and get you from point to point.

Does that mod let you push the auto button and it will jump from system to system using the gates by itself? If so can you post a link so I can download it

Thanks

[Marvin]

Try either here:

http://www.starwraith.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=6799

Or SeeJay's website ... he has a downloads page (a couple of them, actually).

[Sinbad]

Download Atollski's mod. It was built to do just that: determine shortest route and get you from point to point.

Does that mod let you push the auto button and it will jump from system to system using the gates by itself? If so can you post a link so I can download it

Thanks

It's not quite so totally autopilot, but it does make it easier. Basically it calculates the shortest route and sets all the intervening gates as waypoints in your maplog. So all you have to do is click on each waypoint instead of searching everytime on your nav map. But after each gate you still have to click on the next waypoint and hit your jump drive so it's not quite "sit back and relax until you arrive".

[DaveK]

Download Atollski's mod. It was built to do just that: determine shortest route and get you from point to point.

Does that mod let you push the auto button and it will jump from system to system using the gates by itself? If so can you post a link so I can download it

Thanks

I don't think so, but what it does do is put all the waypoints into your Nav screen map log section do you just have to click on each waypoint in turn to and hit autopilot again to get the next gate - OK not fully auto but pretty close;

perhaps we could have a 5th crew member class - pilot; whilst we're at it, a 6th as well - ace combat person! - I'd certainly hire the latter :P:P:P