The Planetary landing and planetside missions discussion Thread
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I really don't think this is mutually exclusive with what I was suggesting. I'm happy for there to be lovely safe worlds to fly around and marvel at and explore. I just think that having some difficult places to land would really add something both to the gameplay and the experience.
Something more than what we have would be nice because trade, explore, fight (meh)
Really I do not see why it should be so much more difficult to land at a planetary base. A bit more difficult as you have to watch the altitude, but mostly weather should not effect a space craft that much. I mean they do have rather powerful shields and the thrusters can be used to adjust against wind effects. Fog would make it very difficult perhaps...
What planetary landings add is variety such as hopefully:
Planet docking stations.
Shops and bars and night clubs with dancing girls.
Wildlife.
Weather, clouds, lightning, rain, wind, fog.
Vegetation and diverse terrain and climate effects.
Places with relics and crashed ships would be a very cool bonus.
Underground complexes another very cool bonus.
Cities, I do not think they will come initially and may never be done, we shall see...
What planetary landings add is variety such as hopefully:
Planet docking stations.
Shops and bars and night clubs with dancing girls.
Wildlife.
Weather, clouds, lightning, rain, wind, fog.
Vegetation and diverse terrain and climate effects.
Places with relics and crashed ships would be a very cool bonus.
Underground complexes another very cool bonus.
Cities, I do not think they will come initially and may never be done, we shall see...
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What I hope happens is
- We get to land on all bodies
- Atmospheres probe somewhat challenging but not overly fatal.
- scooping of brown dwarfs and gas giants. I.E damaged th
- I hope we could have battles in the atmosphere and then as we shoot each other down the damaged craft falls to the ground. Damaged thrusters could be fatal in the atmosphere!
I more just can't wait for the ability to have the freedom to explore planets and have them there as more than just placeholders. It's going to add a lot to the game!
- We get to land on all bodies
- Atmospheres probe somewhat challenging but not overly fatal.
- scooping of brown dwarfs and gas giants. I.E damaged th
- I hope we could have battles in the atmosphere and then as we shoot each other down the damaged craft falls to the ground. Damaged thrusters could be fatal in the atmosphere!
I more just can't wait for the ability to have the freedom to explore planets and have them there as more than just placeholders. It's going to add a lot to the game!
The big issues with planetary landings should be the purchase of an atmospheric shield and landing at a tangent rather than straight down to a station. The lock to the station would always provide the approach no matter what the weather. Still sun, clouds, lightning, rain, snow, wind, fog and more "pretty pretties" would be great!
^^ this! the ability to land, get out of your ship and look at a spectacular sunset on a beach...
If planetary landings are generated in much the same way as the space environment then I'd say samey could be one way to describe it
Yeah; And that would be great!
Perhaps the ability to purchase some land and build a base. Not trying to re-create Minecraft here. But would be nice to own something other than a ship.
Perhaps you could create a business and leave it there to generate extra income. Refueling station, trading post etc.
Perhaps you could create a business and leave it there to generate extra income. Refueling station, trading post etc.
I want it to be a bit like Starflight on the old Sega megadrive, when gravity makes a difference on how to fly, low gravity you use more fuel to stay up, high gravity the ship just floats. I want to land on planets and get a little buggy out with a mineral scanner and dig for the best resources. Have Wildlife that's peaceful or a threat and attack your buggy or yourself if you get out the buggy and be able to capture the creatures dead or alive. Have lightening storms to damage the ship and high winds to throw you of coarse, earthquakes that damage the buggy so must rush back to your ship. To find all this info out before you land with a planetary scanner so you know the risks before hand. And best of all, scanning the planets to give co-ordinates to find ancient civilisation with ruins data and relics you can sell. I loved that game back in the day. Its a big hope but lets see.
I don't know if anyone else has notice and played Starflight back in the day, but firing the mineral laser in ED sounds a lot like the old buggy noise in Starflight on the sega.
I don't know if anyone else has notice and played Starflight back in the day, but firing the mineral laser in ED sounds a lot like the old buggy noise in Starflight on the sega.
Yes you are right. I didn't fully read your post. The point i want to make is that i do land or explore planets just for relaxing, enjoying the beauty etc. - don't need some sense in terms of gameplay. Of course there can be really bad conditions at times that are a challenge to fly in. Would also be great if for example it would be possible to fly into gas giants atmospheres. The game should then not only track heat but also pressure and when it goes over the limit your ship should implode, not without prior cracks in the canopy.
For example I rarely fly to agricultural worlds since they don't make too much sense in trading. But when i do bulk-food-fetch missions that i collected on my normal trade route i go to outdoor worlds of course to fetch that stuff and then it would really be great to be able to land outside at some nice beach too and relax a bit while having a break.
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I remember than nostromo landing on the lv planet in the first alien film. Some planets like that and worse would be awesome although it would be hard to do me thinks.
I think it would be a lot easier to achieve than what a lot of people here are hoping for or expecting.
Flight Assist and Planetary Landings
Knowing this subject's come up a time or two, I wondered whether it would be better to start a new thread or add to an existing one, and it's probable I made the wrong decision.
My reasoning was this: I do want to make a point that others have made, but I also wanted to make a lesser suggestion and ask a question; so I decided to err in this direction.
Getting on with it, my only gripe about this otherwise very impressive game is the flight dynamic. I want to add my voice to those who've asked for a de-linking of the Flight Assist functions. I'd like to see FA given separate modes for rotation thrust damping only, linear thrust damping only, both on or all off. I'm working on learning to fly without FA, just because I want to, and I rarely switch it on unless I've really screwed things up. But I can't shake the sense that it's far more difficult than it ought to be or could be. It does impact on the immersion for me, because rotation damping is a basic gyro mechanism. There's just no good reason why ships in 3300 wouldn't be able to do it, and it's a pretty frustrating lack.
But okay, say we don't want to decouple these functions, and Flight Assist will stay mostly as it is. What about this: add in a Kill Rotation function (a la Martin Schweiger's 'Orbiter') - a keypress that, when activated, will stop all rotation but will then release, putting the ship back to full FA:Off? I know that switching FA back on will do this, but it also kills linear motion and puts the ship back into aeroplane mode until it's turned back off. If you do it quickly it can work fairly well, but again, it just seems more difficult than it needs to be.
All right, so assuming we don't even want a Kill Rotation key. What about this: allow the inversion of the 'Hold' function on Flight Assist Off? So that Flight Assist only activates when the button is held down, rather than switching off while the button is held down? (If this feature is present already, I missed it, so I'd appreciate a pointer).
Finally, a vaguely related question:
Given the current flight dynamic, and the suggestion that a future patch will introduce seamless planetary landings, I'm curious how we think they're going to be seamless.
At the moment, the flight model denies access to a large band of speeds. Bearing in mind I've only flown cheap ships so far, my normal-thrust speed tops out at around 300 m/s - but my minimum speed in supercruise is 30 km/s. The former seems far too slow to make approaching and landing on planets anything but a trudge, while the latter is far too fast to manage an approach. So given the condition that landings will be seamless - i.e., the game won't just flick from 'in space' to 'in atmosphere' like 'Evochron: Mercenary' does - how will ED implement this?
Knowing this subject's come up a time or two, I wondered whether it would be better to start a new thread or add to an existing one, and it's probable I made the wrong decision.
My reasoning was this: I do want to make a point that others have made, but I also wanted to make a lesser suggestion and ask a question; so I decided to err in this direction.
Getting on with it, my only gripe about this otherwise very impressive game is the flight dynamic. I want to add my voice to those who've asked for a de-linking of the Flight Assist functions. I'd like to see FA given separate modes for rotation thrust damping only, linear thrust damping only, both on or all off. I'm working on learning to fly without FA, just because I want to, and I rarely switch it on unless I've really screwed things up. But I can't shake the sense that it's far more difficult than it ought to be or could be. It does impact on the immersion for me, because rotation damping is a basic gyro mechanism. There's just no good reason why ships in 3300 wouldn't be able to do it, and it's a pretty frustrating lack.
But okay, say we don't want to decouple these functions, and Flight Assist will stay mostly as it is. What about this: add in a Kill Rotation function (a la Martin Schweiger's 'Orbiter') - a keypress that, when activated, will stop all rotation but will then release, putting the ship back to full FA:Off? I know that switching FA back on will do this, but it also kills linear motion and puts the ship back into aeroplane mode until it's turned back off. If you do it quickly it can work fairly well, but again, it just seems more difficult than it needs to be.
All right, so assuming we don't even want a Kill Rotation key. What about this: allow the inversion of the 'Hold' function on Flight Assist Off? So that Flight Assist only activates when the button is held down, rather than switching off while the button is held down? (If this feature is present already, I missed it, so I'd appreciate a pointer).
Finally, a vaguely related question:
Given the current flight dynamic, and the suggestion that a future patch will introduce seamless planetary landings, I'm curious how we think they're going to be seamless.
At the moment, the flight model denies access to a large band of speeds. Bearing in mind I've only flown cheap ships so far, my normal-thrust speed tops out at around 300 m/s - but my minimum speed in supercruise is 30 km/s. The former seems far too slow to make approaching and landing on planets anything but a trudge, while the latter is far too fast to manage an approach. So given the condition that landings will be seamless - i.e., the game won't just flick from 'in space' to 'in atmosphere' like 'Evochron: Mercenary' does - how will ED implement this?
How will planetary landing work?
I love playing Elite so far. But getting close to so many planets while exploring makes me wonder how will planetary landing work.
Also, what will make said landing fun? Will we explore and scan lifeforms, minerals, be planetary explorers? Or hunt bandits in a shooter style gameplay? Maybe find lost treasures?
I want to know if I should get excited about it or not
I love playing Elite so far. But getting close to so many planets while exploring makes me wonder how will planetary landing work.
Also, what will make said landing fun? Will we explore and scan lifeforms, minerals, be planetary explorers? Or hunt bandits in a shooter style gameplay? Maybe find lost treasures?
I want to know if I should get excited about it or not
Watch this, it's about as specific as they get. All I know for sure is that DB wants to do big game hunting. I want archaeological research. http://elite-dangerous.wikia.com/wiki/Elite_Dangerous_Wiki?file=The_Future_of_Elite_Dangerous
I guess there will be another mechanism (similar to SC/HJ) to initiate the landing because the game needs to create the 'planet instance'.
Tbh i don't expect a natural and seamless transition e.g. approaching the planet from space in normal cruise mode with your thrusters then dive into the atmosphere with clouds and move through the cloud layers towards the surface.
Maybe its done similar to approaching a station in SC: you target the planet in normal cruise mode and once you are within a certain speed/distance frame you have to press the 'landing' key which puts you (after some delay...) directly into the clouds and from that you move down to the surface to find ... what?
Another instance transtion to land on the surface on a RNG landing platform?
Please no...
Tbh i don't expect a natural and seamless transition e.g. approaching the planet from space in normal cruise mode with your thrusters then dive into the atmosphere with clouds and move through the cloud layers towards the surface.
Maybe its done similar to approaching a station in SC: you target the planet in normal cruise mode and once you are within a certain speed/distance frame you have to press the 'landing' key which puts you (after some delay...) directly into the clouds and from that you move down to the surface to find ... what?
Another instance transtion to land on the surface on a RNG landing platform?
Please no...
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Those ideas sound very good . I would also like archeological research
. I would also like archeological research 
What would be nice would be flying around looking at the planet. What we'll probably get is like a USS but on the surface, and we get to run around a 1km square area.