400+ Billion Stars but to what end?

[MADmanOne]

To what end does it matter how big this place really is?

For me personally it is among the most important features of that game. Because our Galaxy is really that big. I backed for that game to be able to fly in a galaxy which is as similar to our own as possible. That you can never visit even 1% of them does not matter, it is the feeling that space is so big that I like and that I can never be in all systems but I can choose from all of them where I want to go. For that I happily pay the price of never meeting anyone (I would have been so happy with the offline mode ). On the contrary, its another realistic part that I like so much. For me Elite Dangerous is a simulation, not a game.

If you would reduce the number of stars, then its no simulation anymore but only some "fun game" with another inventend galaxy which has no meaning to me and therefore bores me to hell. I don't want action everywhere, I want to feel how vast our galaxy is when I play Elite. And for that it is all important to me that there is not a single star of our galaxy missing

I understand that my points may sound strange to many of you but thats most likely because I am not from this planet and having the whole galaxy at reach reminds me of home

 

[Honeycone]

Yeah, I really think ED should have gone the SC route where each system is hand crafted as opposed to it being randomly generated. Now we're left with systems having no personality and the civilized worlds don't feel alive at all.

 

[MADmanOne]

Yeah, I really think ED should have gone the SC route where each system is hand crafted as opposed to it being randomly generated. Now we're left with systems having no personality and the civilized worlds don't feel alive at all.

I disagree, because SC will have that. Why making Elite to some early version of SC ? I would find it great to have one simulation and one "fun game" so everybody can choose what suits him best. Your suggestion would make me quit Elite, because you would remove what makes Elite so special to me compared to other "games". Maybe it would be good for some, maybe even many players but you would make me very sad, because I wont have fun anymore then

 

[cherbert]

And if no one will ever see 90% of it, what good does it do you that its there?

Please explain why it matters so much? The galaxy is procedurally generated. Whether they have 10 stars or 10 trillion stars it takes the same amount of development time.

The other misconception I keep hearing is that 400 billion stars will dilute the content. Why? Do you seriously think that Frontier intend to populate these 400 billions systems? This will NEVER happen. At most the inhabited systems will expand by a few hundred or maybe a thousand systems over the next 5 years. The rest of the galaxy is merely a backdrop for exploration if you dare venture that far and not many players will.

Are you seriously suggesting you would prefer to hit an invisible wall at the edge of explored space with something like "Turn back now". Its a technical marvel that such a thing can be simulated in a computer game.

 

[NeilF]

+1 for those requests.

They're not really requests, but must haves IMHO... I was amazed the first two were no there at release they're so important IMHO.

 

[Kars Vandor]

The Federation for example "employ" you to go to a zone and kill five ships. It doesn't matter which. You could kill five Federation ships for all they care. It's that "thin."

I agree 100%. That would be a problem, for me, too. the factions and missions must relate.

 

[Kars Vandor]

...but now is just a skeleton, still in beta, released too early because marketing/financial pressure, with plenty of buggy features that do not even work as intended, and an outstanding lack of richness, mainly driven by 'the grind gameplay'.

I agree with most of that, except, to me the lack is not outstanding, more like "sparse". And I'm an explorer, it's not a grind because it's a list of tasks, collection or data. that's what explorers do.
If there is a grind at all, it's lack of storyline style play (there is some, but it's directly related to faction change in systems, and lack of player grouping into fleets and such, with some type of benefit, and limited voice interaction.

If I was a bounty hunter, it's a list of people that are wanted. a miner works a list or ores needed or what is profitable.

I know that storyline based coding is labor intensive, I've done it.

I think this will all change when we get planets to stride upon, or visit. Or ways to build that stuff ourselves or ways to unlock something that the devs made like 1000 shipments of X gets you a wilderness landing field with a fuel dump, and a landing beacon. 5000 gets you a basic port with ammo restock, fuel, and limited repairs. 25000 gets you a decent port with a commodities market. and so on.

 

[CMDRKNac]

Is not about storylines, but lack of richness regarding mechanics for shaping the world (having more fake progression hidden behind more grind is not goign to change that, ultimately is the same thing). The problem is that the 'background simulation' now is extremely simplistic and buggy, and there are no real consequences to it, the economy is very static, as well as the political landscape (completely static). Have you seen any difference between a democratic system and a dictatorship? About Empire and Federation? A system at war and one booming? The difference are close to zero or irrelevant in practice.

There is no need for stories in this game if we got the tools to build them ourself. that was always the idea that was sold to the players. The same goes for the 400bill systems thing, we cannot even expand into other systems, for what use are all these empty systems. Everything is a chore and a grind because there is no purpose for it, in the end is just 'get more credits > get a bigger ship', at much trying to flip a system (which won't have real consequences). Exploration is a kind of unique game style which does not affect most of the player base, and even that is a poor state (and once you have seen the same type of star 100 times, there is not much to it neither).

 

[Uueerdo]

Please explain why it matters so much? The galaxy is procedurally generated. Whether they have 10 stars or 10 trillion stars it takes the same amount of development time.

Exactly. The only reason I could someone actually taking issue with all this empty space is that it gives others somewhere to go away from them.

 

[Gibbonici]

There is no need for stories in this game if we got the tools to build them ourself. that was always the idea that was sold to the players.

It was never pitched as a player-run game. ED has always been about the background sim and players being able to influence it rather than control it.

You're right that the background sim is light at the moment, but that just means it needs more development.

 

[CMDRKNac]

It was never pitched as a player-run game. ED has always been about the background sim and players being able to influence it rather than control it.

You're right that the background sim is light at the moment, but that just means it needs more development.

You don't need to control it to build stories, influencing is enough, if the mechanics are rich enough (which now are not). The different between "controlling" and "influencing" is rather a subjective one, is a matter of degree.

 

[Commander Azriel]

Please explain why it matters so much?
The other misconception I keep hearing is that 400 billion stars will dilute the content. Why? Do you seriously think that Frontier intend to populate these 400 billions systems? This will NEVER happen. At most the inhabited systems will expand by a few hundred or maybe a thousand systems over the next 5 years. The rest of the galaxy is merely a backdrop for exploration if you dare venture that far and not many players will.

Are you seriously suggesting you would prefer to hit an invisible wall at the edge of explored space with something like "Turn back now". Its a technical marvel that such a thing can be simulated in a computer game.

You would not hit an invisible wall if it only had one billion systems, not if it only had one million.

As you say it will never happen that there will be content for these systems, it will never happen that anyone will even ever see them. As you say it is a mere backdrop that will never be seen. So it serves no purpose.

It is an abstract idea. Yes space is big. one billion is big, too. 1 million is bigger than will ever be seen. Would it be better if it were one Trillion?

Why does it matter to you that these system are there if you could never, in a 1000 life times, see them? Do you lack the imagination to pretend they are there?

You could imagine that the game had billions of other galaxies, besides the milky way. Does the developer need to create them too, in order for you to enjoy the game? Could you not just imaging they are there, even though you could never get there?

 

[Uueerdo]

Why does it matter to you that these system are there if you could never, in a 1000 life times, see them? Do you lack the imagination to pretend they are there?

For one, it pretty much guarantees that newcomers in 5 years will still be able to go out and say they were there first.

Also, you do realize that all these extra systems are not really "there" in the sense of stored on disc somewhere, nor are they taking up significant content development resources, right? That is the beauty of procedural generation; the base galaxy is just a set of functions with some hand-crafted tweaking on top of it for known facts.

And yes, we might actually need another galaxy in the game at some point. If our existing one becomes too explored for the devs to introduce some new alien empire spanning hundreds of systems without causing many players to go "but that area was empty just last week (see youtube)", an extra galaxy (with an exponential increase in intergalactic supercruise speed...or wormhole) might be needed to fit into the "world" story why no one ever saw this massive empire before then. They might even be able to come up with better procedural generation to make the alien territory more alive, spanning 1000's of systems. Could all the players united ever "win" against such an empire if there were war? Doubtful. But I think that would actually be are rather cool way for the game to "go out" when the servers are finally shut down (hopefully after many many many years); you can't fight the tide.

...but this is coming from an ex-LARPer that could actually appreciate the manner of his character's permadeath.

Edit: Also, I notice you still didn't state what exactly bothers you about this. When the procedurally generated billions of systems take no more resources than 1000's of "handcrafted" ones would (in fact, probably much less than handcrafted ones would), the implied basis of "effort that could be directed elsewhere" behind "unnecessary" and "no purpose" (which are both disputable anyway) evaporates.

 

[N-Zed]

You would not hit an invisible wall if it only had one billion systems, not if it only had one million.

As you say it will never happen that there will be content for these systems, it will never happen that anyone will even ever see them. As you say it is a mere backdrop that will never be seen. So it serves no purpose.

It is an abstract idea. Yes space is big. one billion is big, too. 1 million is bigger than will ever be seen. Would it be better if it were one Trillion?

Why does it matter to you that these system are there if you could never, in a 1000 life times, see them? Do you lack the imagination to pretend they are there?

You could imagine that the game had billions of other galaxies, besides the milky way. Does the developer need to create them too, in order for you to enjoy the game? Could you not just imaging they are there, even though you could never get there?

Honestly, I would rather have only a handful of a few hundred star systems that were hand crafted and deliberately designed with an inference of "more out there" then 400+ Billion Stars all copy and pasted forever and ever. Now if they throw in way more custom content inside the PG asset library and show us some amazing artistry with what is and could be in space alongside all of that - then we have something. Until then, sometimes - less actually is more. I agree with Arziel but my opinion is not the only one that matters. Every one's opinion on how this whole massive galaxy scale works or doesn't is valid here.

 

[Uueerdo]

Honestly, I would rather have only a handful of a few hundred star systems that were hand crafted and deliberately designed with an inference of "more out there" then 400+ Billion Stars all copy and pasted forever and ever.

The two are not mutually exclusive, and many of us who appreciate the billions would be right there with you if the topic leaned toward "need more hand crafting" and not "want less space".

Now if they throw in way more custom content inside the PG asset library and show us some amazing artistry with what is and could be in space alongside all of that - then we have something. Until then, sometimes - less actually is more.

As much as I like the PG systems, I (and I think many other PG fans) would go so far as to say they'll probably never fully replace authored content.

 

[Commander Azriel]

Edit: Also, I notice you still didn't state what exactly bothers you about this. When the procedurally generated billions of systems take no more resources than 1000's of "handcrafted" ones would (in fact, probably much less than handcrafted ones would), the implied basis of "effort that could be directed elsewhere" behind "unnecessary" and "no purpose" (which are both disputable anyway) evaporates.

It doesn't bother me, per se, I just think it is little more than a marketing thing, ohh look 400 billion system. Wow. But it's just pointless in practically. As you say the don't real exist. They are just theoretically generated. I imaging if no one goes there they aren't generated, yet. You could just as well say there are an infinite amount of them.

But focusing on areas that for all intent and purposes don't exist, or at least don't matter one way or another is pointless. All for what? To state the obvious, that space is big? IS that some sort of news flash?

As for a game though it does matter. If it is an MMO, spreading players over such a space kill the point of having other player. Already the PvP crowd which considered this an MMO, are bored because they might as well be playing solo mode.They want contact, they want guilds, and way to group up and play together. I'm not one of those but I understand why they are disappointed.

For a player like me that bought into the idea of a reactive, dynamic universe where are action help shape the game, and influence the factions a game that massive make every thing seem pointless. Nothing we do has a real impact. Minor factions get a little boost here and there. I don't think a single system has flipped yet. And if one did who cares? The empire lost one of there 500,000 systems? Is that supposed to make us care?

So, if this game has little MMO support, and the "dynamic universe" is all but meaningless. Why do we have to log on 24/7 while playing, put up with disconnects, server reboots, etc?

If we are playing in a almost unlimited universe, not focused on Pvp, not really affecting factions or the economy in any measurable way, and spread across oceans of space why do we need to be playing in the same persistent universe? Especially solo players?

So, it only servers the explorer LARP'ers. The one that can pretend there are really in spaceship, but need a developer to tell them there are 400 billion system that they will never, ever see. But don't worry, they are there...wink...

 

[Portent]

because it's cool.

...and because they could!

 

[Sysmon]

Honestly, I would rather have only a handful of a few hundred star systems that were hand crafted and deliberately designed with an inference of "more out there" then 400+ Billion Stars all copy and pasted forever and ever. Now if they throw in way more custom content inside the PG asset library and show us some amazing artistry with what is and could be in space alongside all of that - then we have something. Until then, sometimes - less actually is more. I agree with Arziel but my opinion is not the only one that matters. Every one's opinion on how this whole massive galaxy scale works or doesn't is valid here.

You can choose to not go there and stay in the more designer-modified core systems. But are you saying that because you personally don't want to see the procedurally generated stuff it shouldn't be there for others to explore?

S

 

[Commander Azriel]

Honestly, I would rather have only a handful of a few hundred star systems that were hand crafted and deliberately designed with an inference of "more out there" then 400+ Billion Stars all copy and pasted forever and ever. .

I agree. But I am more of a fan of strategy/grand strategy games then pure simulations. A limited amount of space and resources would be a focal point for drama, story element, combat and trade. An infinite amount of space and resources is a bore to me.

Factions don't matter, everything is plentiful, no reason for conflict. No real reason for exploring really. There isn't even conflict over earth like planets. It seems more like a space tourism game, come see the pretty stars!!!

 

[Uueerdo]

I agree. But I am more of a fan of strategy/grand strategy games then pure simulations. A limited amount of space and resources would be a focal point for drama, story element, combat and trade. An infinite amount of space and resources is a bore to me.

Factions don't matter, everything is plentiful, no reason for conflict. No real reason for exploring really. There isn't even conflict over earth like planets. It seems more like a space tourism game, come see the pretty stars!!!

I think everyone agrees the game is far from "done". But the game is barely past it first month of release, were you expecting the factions to break into all out war right out of the gate? As far as infinite resources and space, the presence of both is where the potential for conflict lies. Proximity/Time is the resource. Sure, there is a another system with rich resources and a life-supporting planet 10 more jumps away, but why put up with the ongoing increased fuel costs when there is a system almost as good right "next door"... so what if it is occupied.