FDev Suggestion: Engineered Cargo Racks

drakkster2025

drakkster2025
I know its going to be sometime before we see a new ship with a greater carrying capacity than a Type 9 Heavy,
but I have a suggestion. Engineered Cargo racks. 10-50% increase depending on the level. You have enough
engineers that the addition can only be a few lines of code, so the work to put this in the game wouldn't take
much effort. But think what it would do for the players? Right now with a 784 tonnes cargo cap. it still takes me
forever to supply my construction, 25%-50% would mean less travel and more carrying cap so the grind isn't
so bad. You can also run it as a community goal, I think everyone and their mother would do this CG, I don't think
you would have enough space on the server for the demand. It would make my type 9 or Cutter more effective
and I would be much happier. I'm sure the community would feel the same way.

This is my humble suggestion from one coder to another. I hope you can continue to make the game better.

sincerely,

Drakkster
 

Archvillain

Archvillain
drakkster2025 said:
the addition can only be a few lines of code, so the work to put this in the game wouldn't take much effort.
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Not commenting on your suggestion, just wanted to point out that this assumption is wrong and a persistent myth (which sometimes results in devs facing misplaced anger). Nothing like that in large-scale gamedev is just a few lines of code because there are so many interconnected systems in a large game and so many crazy edge-cases to examine and handle. But even if it was just a few lines of code, it's still a lot of work to put in because it has to be extensively tested, especially in a case like this where allowing ship to carry more tonnage than its design assumptions allowed for is likely to result in unexpected issues or bugs. (And that's not even getting into the gameplay design aspects studying what degree of change works best and disrupts other intentions least)

In a small amateur project you can do something like that with just a few lines of codes, but large-scale gamedev has little resemblance to that :cry:

(It might also be worth noting that you can be absolutely 100% certain that FDev has examined the idea of engineered cargo racks. What their conclusions were, who knows, but they've definitely considered it. Maybe they decided it was a low priority for another time, maybe now is that time, maybe they decided it conflicted with their design intentions and was not wanted, maybe they found that there were complications that made it not worth the time, maybe something else)
 
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varonica

varonica
Archvillain said:
especially in a case like this where allowing ship to carry more tonnage than its design assumptions allowed for is likely to result in unexpected issues or bugs.
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Not just unexpected, but entirely expected, there's a reason why a ship has a max tonnage allowance, you engineer your cargo racks to increase capacity suddenly your total mass increases and stuff starts, well, simply not working. For instance shield generators have a maximum mass rating, suddenly you exceed that and your shield generators stop working, thrusters have a maximum mass rating, you engineer your cargo racks and fill up suddenly you can no longer take off, it would break 90% or more of current ship setups maybe to the point you can't even carry a full load in your newly engineered cargo racks. Oh well, you've ruined your ship, is what would happen
 

GoldenSilver484

GoldenSilver484
varonica said:
Not just unexpected, but entirely expected, there's a reason why a ship has a max tonnage allowance, you engineer your cargo racks to increase capacity suddenly your total mass increases and stuff starts, well, simply not working. For instance shield generators have a maximum mass rating, suddenly you exceed that and your shield generators stop working, thrusters have a maximum mass rating, you engineer your cargo racks and fill up suddenly you can no longer take off, it would break 90% or more of current ship setups maybe to the point you can't even carry a full load in your newly engineered cargo racks. Oh well, you've ruined your ship, is what would happen
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Shield generators don't use total mass like thrusters, they use the base hull mass stat.

It's why something like a Python, which has 350 base hull mass, can use a class three shield when loaded with 286 tons of cargo, despite the shield having a maximum mass of just 413 tons.
 

drakkster2025

drakkster2025
varonica said:
Not just unexpected, but entirely expected, there's a reason why a ship has a max tonnage allowance, you engineer your cargo racks to increase capacity suddenly your total mass increases and stuff starts, well, simply not working. For instance shield generators have a maximum mass rating, suddenly you exceed that and your shield generators stop working, thrusters have a maximum mass rating, you engineer your cargo racks and fill up suddenly you can no longer take off, it would break 90% or more of current ship setups maybe to the point you can't even carry a full load in your newly engineered cargo racks. Oh well, you've ruined your ship, is what would happen
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You know this is just a game right? how do you carry all those items you pick up in a game? You magically levitate them above your head? goods, data, etc. Engineered is just that, you magically have the same mass not adding more to the ship, just increase the load.

P.S. I am a coder.
 

varonica

varonica
drakkster2025 said:
You know this is just a game right? how do you carry all those items you pick up in a game? You magically levitate them above your head? goods, data, etc. Engineered is just that, you magically have the same mass not adding more to the ship, just increase the load.

P.S. I am a coder.
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You know FDEV could just ignore everything and just make stuff work like magic right, wave a wand and appear at Beagle Point, sure, throw some fairy dust and melt Thargoids, right on, I mean it's just a game, right?

P.S. I am a coder.
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And how many successful space games do you have to your name? It takes more than being able to code to release a successful game of any sort.
 

drakkster2025

drakkster2025
varonica said:
You know FDEV could just ignore everything and just stuff work like magic right, wave a wand and appear at Beagle Point, sure, throw some fairy dust and melt Thargoids, right on, I mean it's just a game, right?
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They have, how do you load up in a settlement without getting burdened. So it's ok for on foot but not for the ship?
 

varonica

varonica
drakkster2025 said:
They have, how do you load up in a settlement without getting burdened. So it's ok for on foot but not for the ship?
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Because some things are in the game to help with game play and some things are in the game to help with immersion.

So, how many successful space games do you have to your name? Making a successful game isn't just about coding, it's about knowing what people want from a game, and, more importantly, knowing when what people want is not good for the game. It appears FDEV are doing ok there because they are indeed selling and making a profit from a space game. The desires of individual players can't all be catered for and some ideas simply don't fit with the game and the vision for the game. Magic resizable cargo racks are apparently something FDEV has decided not to put in the game, I am sure they have their reasons.
 

IstvaanDCIV

IstvaanDCIV
GoldenSilver484 said:
Shield generators don't use total mass like thrusters, they use the base hull mass stat.

It's why something like a Python, which has 350 base hull mass, can use a class three shield when loaded with 286 tons of cargo, despite the shield having a maximum mass of just 413 tons.
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Don't FSDs take total tonnage into account? Adding extra cargo could severely impact jump range and/or fuel consumption.
 

Jmanis

Jmanis
Engineering to arbitrarily increase cargo rack sizes is something I don't like as a concept.

Racking optimizations make far more sense... in that they optimize to haul more of a particular type of cargo, but cannot store any other commodity type. So you might have a "Weapons optimization" for weapons cargo types, a "Minerals optimization" for minerals, "Agricultural" for food.

This could be tricky too, for different reasons though.

Edit: the canonical logic is, according to lore, cargo canisters don't hold 1t of goods, just the combined weight of canister and goods is 1t. This accounts for the discrepancies in relative value of goods in terms of credits. Therefore, the rack optimisation results in partial disassembly and "merged storage" of the canisters in order to optimise storage for that sort of item.
drakkster2025 said:
P.S. I am a coder.
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So am I, and many of my peers. It's an almost everyday occurrence when one dev says "This should be easy" to another, only to discover it's not, because the implementation is very different to what they assumed.
 
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vanFace

V
Kzak said:
Space-compression technology is not (yet) a thing in the Elite universe. It could cause a number of issues, as mentioned above, with max ship mass and so forth.
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The material storage you take with you wherever you go is basically space-compression technology. Its size or content is not influencing your ships abilities like cargo does, for example. Besides data - where having everything on an USB stick in your pocket even today would be possible - the raw and manufactured mat storage is not "realistic" at all. And this is fine for a game. It is just a bit strange to put forth the simulator argument for one aspect of it, but totally ignore it on another.
 

Rubbernuke

Rubbernuke
Racks would automatically be for a set size so I could not see them being optimised further unless they perhaps made the ship weaker (since they are so bendy now).

Rando ideas: you could make hybrid cargo racks that sacrifice total space for more structural reinforcement too. You might also have scan resistant (to a set distance) racks for smuggling.
 
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