An API that would allow external tools to hook in to it could be both a blessing and a curse for this game. I can see why people would want it but it would depend on what level of access was allowed I think. The worst situation would be some tool that gave such a "competitive" advantage in some aspect that it would almost force everyone to adopt it. My view is that if it can't be done in game it shouldn't be done UNTIL FD determine otherwise. It was the same thing with the trade information scrapers. I chose not to use them as I don't feel the need to min/max this game at all.
Elite Dangerous' Game Design is stuck behind a rock and a hard place
- Thread starter Zaptruder
- Start date
I just found this in another thread:
https://www.elitedangeroustrader.co.uk/route-planner/
Looks very helpful for planning AHEAD
https://www.elitedangeroustrader.co.uk/route-planner/
Looks very helpful for planning AHEAD
There are two sides to SC.
In the original games, once you had your auto pilot and docking computer fitted, the rest of the game was (if you wanted), click destination, hit time boost, arrive at star system. Lock onto chosen station, planet, starport, hit time boost. Arrive docked and landed at chosen destination. Load cargo/pick mission, rince/repeat.
The original games graphics were limited and there wasn't a great deal to see.
ED is something else IMO.
I've seen some really cool sights whilst trucking through the systems. Now whilst these may not be exact or correct in every detail (a guesstimate), I have still found myself thinking, "wow, that's pretty cool, right there, that's a screenshot".
I really don't mind SC, although in some of those massive systems with multiple star, you should be able to pick which star you want to target.
OT Zaptruder, is your ship design going to be in game, or is a fan creation that we can all cry about because it isn't?
In the original games, once you had your auto pilot and docking computer fitted, the rest of the game was (if you wanted), click destination, hit time boost, arrive at star system. Lock onto chosen station, planet, starport, hit time boost. Arrive docked and landed at chosen destination. Load cargo/pick mission, rince/repeat.
The original games graphics were limited and there wasn't a great deal to see.
ED is something else IMO.
I've seen some really cool sights whilst trucking through the systems. Now whilst these may not be exact or correct in every detail (a guesstimate), I have still found myself thinking, "wow, that's pretty cool, right there, that's a screenshot".
I really don't mind SC, although in some of those massive systems with multiple star, you should be able to pick which star you want to target.
OT Zaptruder, is your ship design going to be in game, or is a fan creation that we can all cry about because it isn't?
The acceleration and deceleration is automated already though but it has limitations. You can hear the ships engines struggling if you push it too hard for instance and it is trying to do what you ask but you are flying too fast in relation to the proximity of nearby bodies. You may also have noticed that it will decelerate very quickly if you pass quite close to one of these bodies and I often use a moon or planet as a speed break while approaching a station.
Some manual adjustment of the throttle is required to fly optimally in SC and to remove this entirely would be a mistake I think.
Some manual adjustment of the throttle is required to fly optimally in SC and to remove this entirely would be a mistake I think.
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I upgrade my FDS (in the sidey) to the 15K creds one and I can see it goes faster. Acceleration and decelleration rate are heavily influenced by grav wells, I suggest you read a bit about how to REALLY use SC because most people (me included before looking it up) have no clue how it really works
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Very well said
micky1up
Banned
well there was the part of frontier where you could interdict while in a sort of supercruise mode maybe if they implemented this in this game it would be better but remember guys the games still young even if you are not
It's not a flaw, it's a design choice.
This is as real as it can be, you have to learn to pilot, and you have to accept that the galaxy is a very, very, very, very, very, very big place.
Getting from A to B will take time.
I adore its realism, I adore the delightful tedium of trundling about doing what's basically space trucking, it is like menial work in the real world, it requires no mental effort and is good for meditating.
Mental effort comes of course, when gettin' through that pesky letterbox.
This is as real as it can be, you have to learn to pilot, and you have to accept that the galaxy is a very, very, very, very, very, very big place.
Getting from A to B will take time.
I adore its realism, I adore the delightful tedium of trundling about doing what's basically space trucking, it is like menial work in the real world, it requires no mental effort and is good for meditating.
Mental effort comes of course, when gettin' through that pesky letterbox.
I think you actually spelled out the key issue and then ignored it: There are trade offs for every design decision and they won't please everyone or get each and every one of our personal approvals.
I find the challenge, immersion, and realism appealing. I think if I could insta-jump to every station point of interest the game would lose many things I value, like a sense of scale, immersion, risk, etc. It also negates interdictions and other elements of risk that the game absolutely needs MORE of, not less.
I'm sure the design team would have picked the "please everybody" option if it was available.
Supercruise it's nice as is it.
and it's perfect for the future expansion: walking around your ship.
what we need is a automatic navigator or a ''setable'' robot with few parameters : set course to where,
warn me when arrived, warn me when interdicted (or try to excape it automatically with high percentage of failure of course).
but this feature should be available only for bigger ships (multycrew ?)
in fact one thing that i consider wrong so far is the high power capability of the smaller ships like sidewinder and eagle that makes exactly the same things that you can do with bigger ships.
This lack of gameplay balancing is the result of a unusual development where in only 1 year (!!!) we just have the official release.
Game like this should be fully balanced and tested when the gameplay is ready and not during the development, but it would take
at least one more year.
and it's perfect for the future expansion: walking around your ship.
what we need is a automatic navigator or a ''setable'' robot with few parameters : set course to where,
warn me when arrived, warn me when interdicted (or try to excape it automatically with high percentage of failure of course).
but this feature should be available only for bigger ships (multycrew ?)
in fact one thing that i consider wrong so far is the high power capability of the smaller ships like sidewinder and eagle that makes exactly the same things that you can do with bigger ships.
This lack of gameplay balancing is the result of a unusual development where in only 1 year (!!!) we just have the official release.
Game like this should be fully balanced and tested when the gameplay is ready and not during the development, but it would take
at least one more year.
"The biggest shame about this community is that... it recognizes the problem, but feels the need to defend the flaws anyway"
Holy Moly I hadn't seen this part..... what a waste of time...
Mods, don't you think that at least you should have explained to Op that there is a difference between a flaw and a design decision?
No wonder the others are sniping him down!
Holy Moly I hadn't seen this part..... what a waste of time...
Mods, don't you think that at least you should have explained to Op that there is a difference between a flaw and a design decision?
No wonder the others are sniping him down!
I agree with some things.
Supercruise is pretty boring most of the time.
It could be quicker to accelerate and to slow down.
I just completed two missions for rank, each requiring 15 minutes travel time.
That was pretty dull and more dull lately because there are very few interdiction's. Just enough to have to sit there and watch though.
Supercruise is pretty boring most of the time.
It could be quicker to accelerate and to slow down.
I just completed two missions for rank, each requiring 15 minutes travel time.
That was pretty dull and more dull lately because there are very few interdiction's. Just enough to have to sit there and watch though.
Supercruise isn't too bad for me. Make me feel like a trucker. What does a trucker do as he drives his truck? Play with the radio, sings a song, watches the traffic.
I reduce speed so I have time to get a coffee. I scan nearby ships. Check my deliveries, check the system map. I have to do that because I have a lousy memory. Before jumping I know what station to go to, when I arrive it is gone. Have to check again.
I still don't know how not to overshoot and when to break enough without going so slow it takes even more time. It is not clear to me.
What I do dislike a lot is the final part. Getting out of supercruise. I am lead to believe all the travel I do is somehow logical and based on calculations. I don't really understand the parameters. I don't know exactly what 'c' means, other than you can find in in E=MC²? So...pfft. I should really look it up, but what am I, a doctor or a moonshuttle conductor?
So the last part seems to let go of all the 'realism'. Somehow you can just press 'j' within some sort of range. Suddenly you go from Magic Speed to Nonsense Speed. You see yourself fly past a station but as long as you press J the station magically appears in front of you. So the final approach is Magic Approach. It is not real. Why the hell not? is there a need to leave supercruise? Why doesn't it kind of automatically disengage without the special effects? My speed is like a few hundred clicks a second. How is that still supercruise? I could do that on a bicycle.
So that annoys me. A bit. It makes me want to fly more manually to avoid the strange effect of magically appearing 8 km away from a station I aimed at for billions of km's.
I reduce speed so I have time to get a coffee. I scan nearby ships. Check my deliveries, check the system map. I have to do that because I have a lousy memory. Before jumping I know what station to go to, when I arrive it is gone. Have to check again.
I still don't know how not to overshoot and when to break enough without going so slow it takes even more time. It is not clear to me.
What I do dislike a lot is the final part. Getting out of supercruise. I am lead to believe all the travel I do is somehow logical and based on calculations. I don't really understand the parameters. I don't know exactly what 'c' means, other than you can find in in E=MC²? So...pfft. I should really look it up, but what am I, a doctor or a moonshuttle conductor?
So the last part seems to let go of all the 'realism'. Somehow you can just press 'j' within some sort of range. Suddenly you go from Magic Speed to Nonsense Speed. You see yourself fly past a station but as long as you press J the station magically appears in front of you. So the final approach is Magic Approach. It is not real. Why the hell not? is there a need to leave supercruise? Why doesn't it kind of automatically disengage without the special effects? My speed is like a few hundred clicks a second. How is that still supercruise? I could do that on a bicycle.
So that annoys me. A bit. It makes me want to fly more manually to avoid the strange effect of magically appearing 8 km away from a station I aimed at for billions of km's.
That would soon result in Elite Dayz/Life. ;-)
You can't have external customization without breaking the game. I'd rather not have zombie ships, bad 3D models, ugly textures, incompatible mod versions and hackl0l-kiddies blowing up all spaceships in a 1000LY radius. You also cannot run a custom Elite universe apart from the original one unless you have enough server power.
What you suggest works with i.e. ARMA since in that game you have a limited map with limited player slots. You can host your own maps+mods from your desktop. But there is quite some criticism with ARMA3 because there are hardly any vanilla ARMA3 servers, and tons of mod games that flood the server list.
For the future I'd like to see planetary landings, to be able to exit the ship and walk around, explore things more or less scientifically like geology and meteorology. I'd like to leave probes on celestial bodies like mining robots. I'd like to be able to rent real estate like cabins on space ports where I can invite other players. I'd like to be able to leave messages on message boards in stations. I'd like to be able to wire money to others. I'd like to have a ship log and to be able to save long distance routes so I can easily load there in the route planner. I'd like to be able to share those, so -with others doing this also- this will lead to interstellar 'highways' to interesting systems, with 'a lot' of real player traffic.
Anyway, good ideas on the forums are picked up by Frontier Developments and i leave it to them to evaluate and build them if it sounds good.
That happened to me a lot when i started, then I watched a few tutorials and videos and started making sense. Now the approach (final) part of SC is my favourite one, you can do quite nice things to slow down organically and never overshoot (playing with the grav wells), read this
http://www.reddit.com/r/EliteDangerous/comments/2q3h6z/how_to_supercruise_faster_and_save_time/
I use the spiral approach and usually can travel at almost top speed till I ma 30s from target.
Once you figure it out, it's really fun
Good point, Not overshooting, its easy 6 is the magic number - never let your time drop below 0:06 - keep it at 0:07 for ease! simple as... if it drops below 0:06 you will overshoot... the lower the number the faster you're going, this will go up and down depending on gravity etc...
I agree with everything you both said. Interesting point about using planets etc. They can still add even better drives though as another tweak. Imagine how cool it would be if some of the top end drives used skillfully could make you arrive in 10% of the time of other pilots. Maybe make blue glow other people see in supercruise a slightly different colour so people can see there's someone special in the area.