News 2.3 Dev Update

[greenross25]

This sounds amazing and I can't wait until I can multicrew with my friends!

My biggest question about the multicrew is, how will it work within the context of a Wing? Will it be possible to invite friends onto your ship without winging up, thereby creating additional slots for wingmates? Is it possible that those of us who choose to be crewmates on another friend's ship would be covered under our Captain's wing signal? If this be the case, all of my friends and myself who regularly play Elite together could be "winged up", so to speak, and able to travel and mine and bounty hunt and explore, etc without the confusion of having to keep track of which orange bips are our friends and which aren't. It *could* be a way for FDev to allow us larger groups without breaking the game. What does everyone else think? [hehe]

 

[KnightTowel]

First, I'd like to say I love this game. (It's my first post, registered just to weigh in on this update). It's beautiful. I've spent a lot of time in it.

Now, on to the reason I've actually registered. I see a ton of people saying that it would kill the immersion or what-not if this update were to be pushed through as stated. To them, and Frontier, I want you to know that when it comes time to play games with other people my friends and I turn this one off. It is entirely too difficult as it currently is to even get together and do something. The ratio of moving to a meet people and actually playing with them is like 1:30. And when you throw work, family, responsibility on top of that: there is just no way to do it.

This update gives folks like us the PERFECT way to enjoy the game together at any time we want, without being overpowered. In fact, it's very clearly underpowered. If you're physically able to meet up, wouldn't you rather have three kitted 'Condas, or one kitted 'Conda and two extra pips? I know what my choice would be, given the opportunity.

So, for something that literally only helps out folks that don't have the time to devote, but still want to do SOMETHING with their friends... why would you try and squash it, guys? Especially since it doesn't give any real advantage.

As a small side note: I don't think removing the bounties from people that leave the crew is a good idea. That just seems silly. You did it, live with it.


TLR Frontier: Please do not kill the instant nature of the multi-crew update. You'd literally kill all reason to even multi-crew at all.

 

[Julio Montega]

Well I'm sorry but this just sounds like a supreme God mode buff to the big 3 (who were already in God mode because of Engineers). Ultra-super SSJ God mode???

- 3rd person turret camera for maximum situational awareness during combat (can we finally get a decent external camera for ALL SHIPS then?) [yesnod]
- Missiles lockable and launchable from any angle - goodbye small agile ships that can stick on the tails of bigger ships [hotas]
- 2 launchable fighters now in addition to the mothership
- Separate pips for each station whose effects can presumably be stacked. So 4 players all put 4 pips to shields = 16 pips to shields!!! same with ENG and WEP. Dear lord... [wacko]
- Ship rebuy is reduced depending on how many crew members present [wacky]
- Crews can simply say "no thanks" to bounties and fines for crimes committed while on board another ship. Well damn. That's beautiful for greifiers. You could potentially even grief your own Captain by leaving them with a ton of bounties from your crimes on their head. [haha]
- All crew members earn the same profit - basically making the game beyond easy mode for anyone crewing aboard a big 3. I hope this gets added to Wings now as well. [up]

Well, there's lots of new interesting things here but I must say; it looks like the object of the game will turn into crewing aboard one of the big 3 and curb stomping everything and everyone for as long as your lulz will hold you. Goodbye small ships, goodbye medium ships that don't have SLFs. PvP combat balance will be absolutely broken into tiny pieces by this. If you thought Open was dead before... hoo boy!

Wait and see but damn am I not feeling good about this update.

I share a lot of your reservations.
I for one will stick to my smaller ship choices.
If multi-crewable ships get buffed in this way,
add spice to jobs for smaller ships,
and especially rework signature and silhouette.

 

[Straha Yeagar]

Some further considerations since bounties and vouchers are given to all crew at full value...

What about exploration data? First discovered tags? Trading profits?

How do these credits apply towards Elite Rank? As it stands with what has been said in this update with combat bonds and bounty vouchers, if these apply towards ranking, a player could reach Elite combat with never even having left their starting base, or even flying a ship at all. If Trading and exploration profits count too, which in the interest of fairness across professions, they really should, but if those things count too, a player could become triple Elite without ever doing anything other than being an observer.

 

[Viajero]

Hey. No additional roles, other than those outlined in the post

Hi Ed, thanks for the news.

Has there been any consideration for crew members being able to do some degree of repair in the ship, even if limited? Like being able to use the field maintenance units during a battle to some limited degree?

That could also add a further role dimension that can be a lot of fun to juggle with.

 

[Martian Successor]

I'm already getting ready to welcome our newest members in the Mobius groups.

Well with crewing aboard one of the big 3 the game will become so easy that it will almost becomes meaningless. Newest members in Mobius will be bored before their 2nd week of playing in there.

*sigh* I'll just resign myself to wait and see but..... damn.

EDIT: Heck, maybe it might bring some Mobius members out into Open because they now have unkillable, god ships and if by some miracle they do get blown up, rebuy costs reduced to a pittance. \0/

 

[n o o d l z]

So.... nothing for solo players? Again?

Almost every update has had something for solo players, they haven't even begun to discuss other features that are coming with 2.3...have some patience.

 

[Godsailsaqueen]

Hi Ed, thanks for the news.

Has there been any consideration for crew members being able to do some degree of repair, even if limited?

There must have been, but it was too much work to handle, better port srv turrets to ships you know, a lot easier.

Sorry I'm being salty but come on.

 

[starman]

Hopefull commander creator will be less painfull http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-4176398/Human-Ken-Doll-Rodrigo-Alves-talks-worst-surgery.html

 

[Deleted member 38366]

Yay for a Dev Update! Long time no see

Just a "1st Impressions" feedback on the fundamental Concept of MultiCrew :

- Teleportation is something we're used from NPCs (often criticized), but Players doing it brings it to a whole new level
(as it could basically happen "on demand", i.e. a guy gets attacked in an Anaconda by a single CMDR flying alone - and moments later all its Powers increase manyfold as Friends react to a "Emergency Invite" and hop into the Conda)

- can't wait to get attacked by a modded Cutter basically flying with 7/0/2 Pips (what's that, 15000 MJ effective Shields, anyone?)
-> all while getting hammered nonstop by permanently hitting visually aimed Turrets being immune to Silent Running, Heat Sinks or Chaff

- got no Friends or none Online? You're screwed. Solo Player? Non-Update. Got 3 NPCs hand-trained and waited for months to Crew up with the lot and teach them new Crew Skills? Not going to happen.
-> risks being a non-update for a big chunk of the Player base

- focus on Turrets -> requires a rather uncommon Ship build, essentially requiring a dedicated "Gunner-Ready" layout (all with separate Engineer considerations)
-> Gimbal- or Fixed only? Gunner would be just a Spectator to the fight, merely donating the "Bonus Pip" to the Ship
-> Gunner loses Connection (Network)? Suddenly Ship goes from super-power aiming Weapons into "classic mode" in a split second, possibly becoming suddenly vastly ineffective

- Combat Focus only. IMHO big mistake.
-> Mining in MultiCrew? Trading in MultiCrew? Exploration in MultiCrew? Missions in MultiCrew? Those aren't V2.4 or V3.x questions... Those are V2.3.00-relevant questions.

- Exploit-proofing
-> lulz guy during a Bounty Hunting or Conflict Zone CG opens up on friendlies or Authority while in Gunner position , then plugs it. Ship with remaining crew is now at extreme risk and Wanted for x Days (at least the helm)
-> "Crew logging" could become a thing? Accept an invite to a Crew when own Ship is in trouble and join the distant Crew all safe - own CMDR Ship naturally has to vanish that moment

- NPC Crews
-> I'll fire mine the moment V2.3 releases without NPC support. No point investing hundreds of Millions of Credits onto 3 NPCs, of which 2 (by design) will earn passive income for doing absolutely nothing all the time. Usually, all 3 do that with me.
-> MultiCrew NPC concept should have been the natural next step for our "dedicated SLF jockeys", otherwise they simply aren't "Crew" by definition from the moment 2.3 comes out

PS.
I feared V2.3 would be ELITE's own redux addition of the 1998 Arcade Shooter "Incoming".
The presented concept would seem I wasn't far off.
Very shallow, none of the expected "Crew Skills" Leveling nor specific Ship Tasks. For the time being, indeed sounds like "lowest common denominator" addition. Overly simplistic, 1990's era design PewPew focus.

I just would have hoped to see the Ship Consoles around our Ships to become useful and MultiCrew being more than just another "Shoot-em-up" addition. We already got plenty of those, more than enough IMHO.

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

Yeah, in a year or 2.
Because placeholders are a good strategy. What's not finished, you can finish it later! NEVER finish anything, NEVER release anything in its final form is a good advice, that way you can always lose some time to rethink, rethink, rethink, recode, rebug, recode, rethink what's already implemented.

I don't mean to be agressive eagleboy, neither towards you nor towards Fdev, but this is a letdown to me at least. And this strategy of minimalism is becoming a bit too visible.

Show me any game who have succeeded to implement this without jumping trough hops, at first try?

 

[Alklazaris]

First I'd like to thank the Frontier team, I have friends in the game industry and this is hard grueling often thankless work. So thank you for making this game even more awesome than it already is.
That said I am curious on why the following abilities were not created with this patch, since they seem to fit in well with them. Or perhaps was it considered, but ultimately dismissed for some reason?

I was hoping that we could share all missions or at least share missions that we both have access too, such as faction/superfact rank. Also cargo profits, if the Commander approves. I assume the cargo vouchers you can recieve in a wing will still be available?

And what about SRVs? Quite painlessly Commanders can have two SRVs in their ship. I was really really looking forward to having a crew that could take them out and explore while another crew member pilots the ship or better yet, lets the NPC crew member fly and hop into an SRV or fighter themselves. Along with that why not enable players in a wing be able to load and unload cargo from any of the winged ships, with Commander approval of course or at the very least the ship that they would all share the SRVs with.

Sorry for the this, I don't mean to come off rude. I just don't understand it wasn't added in since it blends so well with this update.

 

[MarcusKross]

Setting up Multicrew
Fundamentally, Multicrew is about having fun with friends, so we want to make sure there are as few barriers to enjoying this feature as possible, starting with the crew formation process. We want to make it as easy as possible to start having fun on a multicrew ship.

As long as their ship has enough seats (different ships have different multicrew capabilities) a Commander can directly invite players, or can set their vessel to allow multicrew access. Commanders looking to play as crew can either accept direct invites, or activate a new “looking for ship” feature, which will automatically place them as crew on a suitable vessel with multicrew access allowed, making the process quick and painless.

When joining a crew, a Commander will log out of their current vessel and transfer to the multicrew vessel, regardless of distance. They can also leave at any time (or be evicted by the ship’s owner) at which point they can return to where their ship was last, making the whole affair a very friendly, drop in – drop out procedure.

Here we go again with the magic teleport floo network..

 

[Cyrus Tek]

Lot's of things to consider but off to an interesting start.....
Will the omnidirectional scanner be applied to supercruise? That would be an added bonus (and would be nice for explorers as well if it included more powerful surface scanners as well as ship/USS scanners).

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

First I'd like to thank the Frontier team, I have friends in the game industry and this is hard grueling often thankless work. So thank you for making this game even more awesome than it already is.
That said I am curious on why the following abilities were not created with this patch, since they seem to fit in well with them. Or perhaps was it considered, but ultimately dismissed for some reason?

I was hoping that we could share all missions or at least share missions that we both have access too, such as faction/superfact rank. Also cargo profits, if the Commander approves. I assume the cargo vouchers you can recieve in a wing will still be available?

And what about SRVs? Quite painlessly Commanders can have two SRVs in their ship. I was really really looking forward to having a crew that could take them out and explore while another crew member pilots the ship or better yet, lets the NPC crew member fly and hop into an SRV or fighter themselves. Along with that why not enable players in a wing be able to load and unload cargo from any of the winged ships, with Commander approval of course or at the very least the ship that they would all share the SRVs with.

Sorry for the this, I don't mean to come off rude. I just don't understand it wasn't added in since it blends so well with this update.

Because it most likely will be improved/upgrade upon later?

 

[Quester91]

Because it most likely will be improved/upgrade upon later?

"Later" and "soon" will be the epitaph of this game.

 

[Toumal]

Yeah it is mostly combat so far. But adding mining and other mechanics to multicrew could be done with comparatively little effort once the basic mechanic is in.

 

[Jenner]

Fantastic! Looking forward to this!

I said it before, and I stand by it: The only way this works is if it's drop in/out and has a very low bar to entry. It is indeed about having fun with friends. I'm all for it as it's outlined here.

 

[Mephane]

I see little to be gained from multiboxing. You can't transfer credits easily. Each role likely requires significant attention... so much that one person controlling different pilots will likely find it to difficult. And if you think its for the credits... there are way more time efficient means to make credits doing missions.

Even afk multiboxing would buff you - 2 extra pips. Imagine flying an FDL with 0/4/4 distritution: maximum speed and agility, infinite boost and full weapon power at all times. Just for 2 accounts being passively there.

 

[Toumal]

"Later" and "soon" will be the epitaph of this game.

They made good on that with landing on planets, slf and more, so?