Elite Dangerous | System Colonisation Beta Details & Feedback
- Thread starter Paul_Crowther
- Start date
Resource balancing is not the biggest issue. System colonization in the beta is a too shallow and repetitive experience. That needs to be improved or many returning players will leave again.
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Aren't they getting quite a lot of profit over galactic avg for everything they are trucking. so if they want to do the trucking, they're being rewarded already for it. I dont think a complex percentage accounting needs to be created to give random contributors some sort of profit sharing passive income.
Got it, that’s fair. Maybe I was wrong.
Everyone talking about the tech points to build statons. T1 gets you T2, T2 gets you T3. So if you start with T3 as a primary. No T2 or T3 is given. If this is correct. I think it should give something out. I know its the "end goal" but at least let the primary T3 station give a couple of T2 points since it costs 10x the required materials of a T1 outpost station.
You get the T3 without having to build 11 other things first I think that's worth something
Yea I think I'm going to finish my Outpost and be done. I'm certainly not doing another one with the same pad to pad loop...I did get interdicted by some NPC pirates once and actually got to use my T9 chaff and mines! Oh BOY!
Hourly complaint for them to buff CMM composites by at least a factor of a thousand. Or just straight up remove it from the shopping list. Hope they're not away for the whole weekend...
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I was killed at my new refinery hub after finishing it. The game wants to respawn me at the refinery hub but is has no landing pads and i keep crashing every time i try to log into either horizons or odyssey. I guess im softlocked?
Try using the emergency option in the main menu.
Had a search but couldn't see anything on this. completed my station in system a 2 days ago. today when i jumped to the system, all the planets had disappeared, not appearing on the system map, and only the built station showed on the system map. Inara shows the system with alll the planets and suns and the built station. others can see it fine in the star map and system map , but onlly me as system architect can't see or do anythign in system or in the system map.
The low restock is still untenable for engaging gameplay on an already large requirement. In my opinion the large number of resources isn't the issue at all. The issue is waiting for material and/or jumping between many stations in hopes that they will have them in stock. Couple in now the immense load on the server as fleet carriers are jumping and you have a recipe for even longer wait times.
What it currently feels like:
I need you to go to costco and buy all the hot dogs they have and then wait for them to restock and buy them all up again. Once you have a semi full then bring them to me. If you want to go faster, feel free to drive to every costco in the immediate area to get a semi full of hot dogs. Once you are done with that semi full, do it all over again 45 times. This will be fun and you will have fun. Have fun.
Intent:
Currently it would appear that the intent for beta of resource number changing is to determine exactly how many man hours and finances are "acceptable" without giving the players too easy a path. So I can assume by the total resources that the intent is to make larger stations more of a squadron activity than solo, while still allotting enough time that a solo player could accomplish it if they dedicated themselves to it. This is why I think the total number is very reasonable to tweak.
Solution:
The fun in freighting is the freighting, not the waiting. Let there be resources available enough such that an experience freighter can pick up a haul and by the time they get back, they can pick up again. The restock should legitimately be turned all the way up to be able to handle all of the station construction freighting demands, and if needed increase the total resource requirement.
Make it fun by increasing and focusing on the requirements in the fun part of the loop, not a bandaid fix over the mundane.
Various Knobs as I see, it in relation to this issue:
Restock, increase/decrease wait times and fleet carrier total jump count from players clamoring for limited/abundant resources. Arbitrary waiting is horrendous for players.
Station material totals, increase/decrease financial and man hour requirements. More means more time with the squadron.
Commodity cost, increase/decrease financial and incidentally man hours.
Limited Locations, I often park my fleet carrier in nearby systems if I can't get in, creating a sense of prestige and increases man hour requirements. I don't advocate for this.
Fleet Carrier Capacity, increase/decrease changes man hours and total jump count for server load.
Just as a total side tangent, I feel the same about mining. Shooting/cracking open rocks and collecting is the fun part, not the finding. (Kudos to the mining maps that exist, but wack that it's almost a requirement)
What it currently feels like:
I need you to go to costco and buy all the hot dogs they have and then wait for them to restock and buy them all up again. Once you have a semi full then bring them to me. If you want to go faster, feel free to drive to every costco in the immediate area to get a semi full of hot dogs. Once you are done with that semi full, do it all over again 45 times. This will be fun and you will have fun. Have fun.
Intent:
Currently it would appear that the intent for beta of resource number changing is to determine exactly how many man hours and finances are "acceptable" without giving the players too easy a path. So I can assume by the total resources that the intent is to make larger stations more of a squadron activity than solo, while still allotting enough time that a solo player could accomplish it if they dedicated themselves to it. This is why I think the total number is very reasonable to tweak.
Solution:
The fun in freighting is the freighting, not the waiting. Let there be resources available enough such that an experience freighter can pick up a haul and by the time they get back, they can pick up again. The restock should legitimately be turned all the way up to be able to handle all of the station construction freighting demands, and if needed increase the total resource requirement.
Make it fun by increasing and focusing on the requirements in the fun part of the loop, not a bandaid fix over the mundane.
Various Knobs as I see, it in relation to this issue:
Restock, increase/decrease wait times and fleet carrier total jump count from players clamoring for limited/abundant resources. Arbitrary waiting is horrendous for players.
Station material totals, increase/decrease financial and man hour requirements. More means more time with the squadron.
Commodity cost, increase/decrease financial and incidentally man hours.
Limited Locations, I often park my fleet carrier in nearby systems if I can't get in, creating a sense of prestige and increases man hour requirements. I don't advocate for this.
Fleet Carrier Capacity, increase/decrease changes man hours and total jump count for server load.
Just as a total side tangent, I feel the same about mining. Shooting/cracking open rocks and collecting is the fun part, not the finding. (Kudos to the mining maps that exist, but wack that it's almost a requirement)
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Maybe you had the exploration data for the system but hadn't sold it yet, and if you died, it causes the system to go back to unexplored. Did you try going there and using the FSS to scan the system again?
Only thing that comes to mind, though. Might as well be a bug. But try that first and let me know
Finally finished my 5% quota for the day! Now I can log out and do something enjoyable. Maybe play a game.
The thing that bothers me most about not enjoying construction is that I love space trucking. It's statistically probably my favorite aspect of gameplay. I spend hours on end doing it for days on end when left to my own devices. But I never, ever, ever take a mission that requires hauling more then 2,000 units of anything, so that I maintain control over the start and end point, and I decide when it's time to walk away. I'm going to finish building this worthless coriolis port 75,000 light seconds from where I, or any sensible person, would have wanted it, out of pure bloody-minded unwillingness to quit, and then I don't really care whether FDEV nerfs the numbers or not, because it will be a long while before I give a rip about this star system or this gameplay feature again.
The thing that bothers me most about not enjoying construction is that I love space trucking. It's statistically probably my favorite aspect of gameplay. I spend hours on end doing it for days on end when left to my own devices. But I never, ever, ever take a mission that requires hauling more then 2,000 units of anything, so that I maintain control over the start and end point, and I decide when it's time to walk away. I'm going to finish building this worthless coriolis port 75,000 light seconds from where I, or any sensible person, would have wanted it, out of pure bloody-minded unwillingness to quit, and then I don't really care whether FDEV nerfs the numbers or not, because it will be a long while before I give a rip about this star system or this gameplay feature again.
Just wanted to add my voice into the mix here.
I think that the system as it stands is pretty brilliant in it's own right. Closer to the mark than I had expected. My friends and I are going for a T3 Apollo right off the bat and we're about 80% done with it, the only commodity left is...you guessed it...CMM Composites.
I think a re-balancing of the requirement for this particular commodity is critical.
The resupply numbers obviously should be significantly buffed, but I also think that the station-side build requirement should be heavily nerfed, maybe by an order of magnitude similar to Ceramic Composites requiring around 5,000 for a T3 station seems relatively acceptable.
Personally, I'd prefer that CMM Composites be removed from the requirement pool entirely. We've just been here far too many times with this particular commodity.
Aside from the CMM shortage and the Carrier jump debacle (no time slots / 1 hour jump times galore), the feature seems VERY solid to us. At least as of now during the "build" phase.
Can't wait to see what's next.
I think that the system as it stands is pretty brilliant in it's own right. Closer to the mark than I had expected. My friends and I are going for a T3 Apollo right off the bat and we're about 80% done with it, the only commodity left is...you guessed it...CMM Composites.
I think a re-balancing of the requirement for this particular commodity is critical.
The resupply numbers obviously should be significantly buffed, but I also think that the station-side build requirement should be heavily nerfed, maybe by an order of magnitude similar to Ceramic Composites requiring around 5,000 for a T3 station seems relatively acceptable.
Personally, I'd prefer that CMM Composites be removed from the requirement pool entirely. We've just been here far too many times with this particular commodity.
Aside from the CMM shortage and the Carrier jump debacle (no time slots / 1 hour jump times galore), the feature seems VERY solid to us. At least as of now during the "build" phase.
Can't wait to see what's next.
Great thought! This was the issue, i had died recently. Even though i was in the system i still couldn't see the planets till i honked and scanned. Thanks!
i really wonder if anyone on the product or dev side actually played this mechanic thru.
like at what hour of looping between landing pads did they go, 'yea, this is exactly the experience we are going for'?
and i get why they make some requirements use surface stations, they want players to use them because they don't.
"but why do we avoid surface stations?" asked apparently nobody at fdev.
we don't use them because they take too long to dock and leave from and none of that adds any gameplay. it's just a time penalty. there's no skill beyond landing anywhere else, it's just inconvenient. space trucking in general is barely gameplay and so players generally look to minimize it as much as possible by only using the fastest routes. if it was fun, most players would be trying to extend how long it takes... nobody does that. adding requirements to be inconvenienced via time sink to balance something is lazy and kind of antagonistic to your players.
fix that, somehow, and maybe we will enjoy going to surface stations and these requirements won't feel like a middle finger. ... or we can keep nerfing or deflating numbers and pretend the problem doesn't exist until the next time a recipe is concocted.
like at what hour of looping between landing pads did they go, 'yea, this is exactly the experience we are going for'?
and i get why they make some requirements use surface stations, they want players to use them because they don't.
"but why do we avoid surface stations?" asked apparently nobody at fdev.
we don't use them because they take too long to dock and leave from and none of that adds any gameplay. it's just a time penalty. there's no skill beyond landing anywhere else, it's just inconvenient. space trucking in general is barely gameplay and so players generally look to minimize it as much as possible by only using the fastest routes. if it was fun, most players would be trying to extend how long it takes... nobody does that. adding requirements to be inconvenienced via time sink to balance something is lazy and kind of antagonistic to your players.
fix that, somehow, and maybe we will enjoy going to surface stations and these requirements won't feel like a middle finger. ... or we can keep nerfing or deflating numbers and pretend the problem doesn't exist until the next time a recipe is concocted.
A Frontier developer thinks for a moment... hmmmm... more gameplay when using surface stations... (missing your point altogether).... aha, got it! Lets let NPCs interdict cmdrs as they fly through atmosphere! (but of course being interdicted has the same effect as dropping too fast or steep and now the cmdr is stuck mid atmosphere and must either manually boost all the way down or return to supercruise and return to orbit.) Yay, more gameplay.
Any chance of canceling the construction of an unnecessary installation?
Endless bugs and lags from FDEV.
I could not take the system with which I suffered for a day. I couldn't even cancel it.
Then I took another system, but the problems continue. As a result, I now have two identical installations for construction, because after I decided to build the first one, it did not appear for a long time. I put the second on the construction site. She didn't show up either.
I waited for a while, about an hour. Made reboots
There was nothing. I closed the game.
But in the morning they both appeared
Endless bugs and lags from FDEV.
I could not take the system with which I suffered for a day. I couldn't even cancel it.
Then I took another system, but the problems continue. As a result, I now have two identical installations for construction, because after I decided to build the first one, it did not appear for a long time. I put the second on the construction site. She didn't show up either.
I waited for a while, about an hour. Made reboots
There was nothing. I closed the game.
But in the morning they both appeared
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- Amount of resources required
- Amount of time required
Below is beyond the scope of the requested feedback, but tl;dr, consider some of the suggestions by others.
I don't think the average player can expect to engage with colonisation as well as baseline gameplay (BGS, upgrades, ranking, preferred roles) if they have to choose between those things and and hauling steel to their next building project.
I like the suggestions here about NPC haul orders. This seems like a necessary step here. If not, some form of passive development.
I fear the mere tweaking of numbers here won't cut it and many colonies will remain as lonely outposts at the edge of the bubble unless builds are made unreasonably easy to haul for.
The addition of even simple supporting features will make the difference between an entirely new role (Architect) and a novelty mechanic dabbled in by large, organised groups.