Boost Overdrive - hold it like you mean it

[Victor Dragunov]

I have this thing in my head for a long time and I decided it's time to actually publish it. I'm curious what do you guys think about it:

So, we all know Boost engine in Elite; you simply press a boost button, release immediately and after a short charging, your ship launches itself with additional power for a few seconds. That is nice and I think we all appreciate of having this option in the game.
However, in some scenarios (well, kinda in lot of them) you just spam the boost button all the time, which is not that great.

I was thinking, there could be an additional function for boost button, which I'd call Overdrive.

If you held the boostbutton down instead of just pressing it, drives would come into overdrive mode, meaning it would boost like normally, BUT instead of a two (or so) second boost like we have now, it would keep boosting for as long as you hold it, but with consequences.
The longer you hold it, naturally, the more heated your ship would become, eventually leading to malfunctions and possible destruction of your ship (like what heat does already in the game). Let's say after about 5 seconds of holding the button, your ship would go over 100% heat and it would increase exponentially after that. Also, your engines would need to have full pips to be actually able to go into boost overdrive - that might work nicely against overusing/abusing the overdrive.

Now, I do not necessarily mean, that the mentioned boost - overdrive function would increase your top/boost speed (maybe a little after holding it for two seconds, or so), it would primarily let you keep at the max (boost) speed available as long as you hold the button. Additionaly, there could be engineering blueprints for this, which could add some top speed, or let the speed slightly increase overtime as you hold the button, or lower the heat at a cost of effectivity, etc.

I firmly believe this would be very interesting and exciting addition to the game, where you could boost out of trouble, or after enemies more effectively, but at the cost of overtime - increasing chance that something could go wrong (heat buildup - possible malfunctions, damaged modules). As Frontier are masters of sounds in the game, I can already imagine the heart - pumping situations, where you run from a wing of elite vipers in your tradecobra, holding the boost and praying that your cooldown on FSD will be gone soon and your ship will not malfunction from heat before you'll be able to charge FSD.

Let me say, that I really like the boost in the current game (especially the sound effects), but I think there's something missing, the "oomph" and excitement, if you get me. Repeatedly pressing the button is...just not really exciting after some time, especially when it does the same thing all the time. I'm sure, this would be the perfect addition for boost and very interesting (not that hard to do, also?) game element.

Thank you for reading and your opinions.

P.S. Please, if you like the idea, share it with your friends and other CMDRs.

 

[Cypher2139]

I like it. +1

To infinity, and beyond!

 

[Leper Messiah]

Interesting idea, but I'd rather the boost functioned like it does in Freespace....more like an afterburner. So a bit like your idea but with none of the negatives, it just fires as long as you hold the button down until the energy store is depleted then it stops (until there's energy stored and then you can boost again). I've never understood this limited boost idea within the confines of an upper speed cap to the spacecraft.

 

[Victor Dragunov]

Leper Messiah:

Yes, I know what you mean and that's not bad. But I thought; we already have a boost in game and we could possibly build up on it, not just removing it/replacing it with something else (not to mention I think it would not happen). You know, just pressing a button and let it boost has some magic too, but with the idea I proposed, we would actually have both "versions" with some additional nerve wrecking/exciting/rewarding element on top of it.

 

[Leper Messiah]

Leper Messiah:

Yes, I know what you mean and that's not bad. But I thought; we already have a boost in game and we could possibly build up on it, not just removing it/replacing it with something else (not to mention I think it would not happen). You know, just pressing a button and let it boost has some magic too, but with the idea I proposed, we would actually have both "versions" with some additional nerve wrecking/exciting/rewarding element on top of it.

I was just referring to base boost, if there was an engineers mod to increase the speed with the upper range "issues" you describe then yeah that'd work. I have no real interest in engineer mods so wouldn't want the basic function change locked behind a grind wall.

 

[Victor Dragunov]

Fine enough. I didn't mean the B-O function to work as engineer only unlock, I just mentioned it could be possibly upgraded via engineers. But I think you know what I meant.

 

[JB-JB]

I like it, but I would add something to the negatives. Let's say anything beyond the normal amount of boost time begins to erode your thruster integrity. Heat can be bad, but can be dealt with a little easier than losing thruster integrity until you can dock. That would put more emphasis on people who would use it a lot focusing on heat and integrity as well as speed. Just my thought. God I hope that made sense. I'm half asleep..lol

 

[TorTorden_VR]

So in a nutshell.
Like it does on the srv now.

One thing you are missing though is engine distributor draw.
If we now for the sake of it say you get a two second boost this drains nearly half you eng cap.
With an a rated distributor and four pips to engines, your recharge is quite often just enough to keep boosting repetitively.

If you apply a hold feature the best you would get is a 4-5 second boost and then. Nothing.
Really not a lot of gain.

 

[Victor Dragunov]

TorTorden:

Not really missing, I thought about that.
Of course, there could be some changes to that too and there are many options. For example, when entering the overdrive boost, it would not deplete distributor charge (like standard engine boost does now), but instead, would generate significant heat.
Also, upon entering overdrive, instead of keeping the max speed, it could be speeding up a little bit over time.

As I said, there are many options how to implement this.

 

[SVL KrizZ]

I don see this happen ever, with Elite on XB1 and next on PS4 where if you hold the boost button it opens contextual menu.

 

[Victor Dragunov]

SVL KrizZ:

Well, it's not like that can't be changed.
Also, if Frontier found that a good idea, but scraped it because of that, that would be a really weird reason.

 

[Victor Dragunov]

Frontier: could you please say your opinion on this?

 

[Boff'in]

I like the op's idea.


I think in all honesty,

They landed on the current boost mechanic because they tested ideas.
If this is a boost mechanic from another game, then they have a lot of feedback already, it's not that hard to implement a prototype.
So they probably did test it.
And current version was the fairest most balanced they could get.


but don't listen to me, I still try to boost in supercruise so.......

 

[Victor Dragunov]

What I came up with here, is not from another game - at least not that I know of.

Still would love to know Frontier's opinion on this, I know they have full hands right now, but maybe just let us know, if they wanna try it at some point in the future, for example in some of their experimental beta patches (like the one's running currently).

 

[SVL KrizZ]

Well, this is is a good sim but there are things aou of realism. If you boost, you should keep moving at the same speed forever untill something stops you, even if you turn off the engines.

 

[NkD]

I like it. +1

 

[Ripbudd]

Well, this is is a good sim but there are things aou of realism. If you boost, you should keep moving at the same speed forever untill something stops you, even if you turn off the engines.

Actually if you turn off engines you do move forever, problem is engines counter your speed all the time and in space if you shut them down they ignore you fire retro thrust to slow you down and then they turn off.

Can we get ROOT access to our ship?
Rooted ship = no insurance no limits + borderlands cash respawn penalty to make you even more salty

 

[NW3]

Good idea. Rep++

I think the heat buildup is a reasonable limit. The excess heat will damage your systems (unless you use heatsinks), but additional Thruster damage might be appropriate. I would think keeping the Boost button pressed would keep your Engine pips at 0, and use up significant hydrogen fuel.

Well, this is is a good sim but there are things aou of realism. If you boost, you should keep moving at the same speed forever untill something stops you, even if you turn off the engines.

ED does that now, just turn off Flight Assist (which uses your thrusters to slow you back down to normal speeds, adjust your yaw, etc.).

Here's more info: http://elite-dangerous.wikia.com/wiki/Flight_Assist

 

[Tryst]

I think an afterburner would be better. The negative side should be that it drinks like a thirsty camel and you would see your fuel bar going down fast. Not a great deal of good if you get away and slip into Cruise, only to run out of fuel before you can get to safety. You boost as normal and then use the afterburner to maintain the speed at the cost of considerable amounts of fuel.

The afterburner without the boost just uses fuel to maintain your current speed, but that could be a tactical move: You could ramp the speed bar down while maintaining your speed with the afterburner and then release the afterburner to slow down far more rapidly than normal, hoping the other player isn't fast enough to react and overshoots, straight into your gun sights (or straight into your rear end which could be disaster for a small ship behind if you have a big ship). For a less agile ship like a Type 7, this would give it a small advantage over an agile ship like a Cobra or Eagle that can outmanoeuvre it normally.

 

[Thran Maru]

I was having feelings similar to OP's when pressing boost repeatedly. It just doesn't feel right, but you have to do it to leverage your ship. I'd support this.

I'd just like to add:

I'm sure, this would be the perfect addition for boost and very interesting (not that hard to do, also?) game element.

It might be harder, than you think. Speaking from view of aspiring game dev. It's relatively easy to implement into ship's mechanics. Input handling/UX might go well too. But there's awful amount of balancing needed, as you have many different ships that should be strong in different aspects and you have many parameters to balance. Depending on implementation: distributor draw, heat, fuel consumption versus ship's mass, thrusters' size and grade. So yeah ...