Dear FD: How To Code Realistic Spawns, Sincerely: Another Game Developer.

[Dutchman141]

My job requires a high level security clearance. So nope

That was the answer I expected and hoped for, I've been part of a software development team in the past, not gaming related, and the NDAs are brutal.
We worked a lot with random sequence generators and I must admit, ED would do well with some of the stuff we came up with.
Unfortunately that stuff is locked behind a huge legal wall, well fortunate for me, it pays my bills

 

[nosleepdemon]

That was the answer I expected and hoped for, I've been part of a software development team in the past, not gaming related, and the NDAs are brutal.
We worked a lot with random sequence generators and I must admit, ED would do well with some of the stuff we came up with.
Unfortunately that stuff is locked behind a huge legal wall, well fortunate for me, it pays my bills

I imagine every developer has sad tails of amazing systems or applications they've built, where every department has been on the same page except the people in charge of finance, who invariably kill a project that might have saved humanity itself from its darkest days. All held back by signed pieces of paper :/

 

[askavir]

But ED universe doesn't pander to the player.....

One of the big issues with ED AI is that it's tailored exactly to the player and that needs to change. What should then happen is that the AI wil ldecide if it wants to interact with the player based on certain values.

So if a bounty hunter in a cobra comes up against a villain in an Ana, there's a high chance he won't attack. Now if the Cobra pilot was really skillful that might up the chances. The same would work in reverse, a top AI bounty hunter might not bother with a player with a tiny bounty.

You then spawn the AI as would be appropriate for the system it's in and player be damned, which is how the game is marketed.

So ED is tailored right around the player from AI spawning to CG's being manipulated to the players favour.

Precisely!

That same bounty hunter MIGHT (and this is where a small dose of RNG is good, as long as on top of coherent and logical rules) take an interest in your tiny bounty IF there are no other wanted ships in the system.

A pirate in a anaconda would ignore your T-6 if there is an NPC with a larger cargo vessel, he would attack the NPC instead. However if you're in a T-9 or Cutter the pirate would go for you and ignore smaller cargo vessels. Unless the pirate has something like a Cobra, then he would attack the more defenceless ship. If I am in a wing of powerful ships, pirates would think twice before engaging, on the other hand if I am a lone wolf and there is a wing of pirates, I would be shark bait. Of course, the chance of there being a wing of pirates would be very low in high security locations, but higher in low security.

Police ships might also be more inclined to investigate certain ships, BUT if a wanted ship is present then cop would follow the criminal and ignore your ship that might be full of contraband (or not). Also, if there is gunfire in the vicinity, the cops would proceed to investigate immediately WITHOUT taking a long detour to scan you for illegal cargo first.

The main thing is to create the NPC's in a natural way, not giving a fart about the player rank or ship, and ONLY THEN after the environment and NPCs are spawned, they should act in a logical way.

This would greatly increase the way we approach tasks, allowing for strategy and planning, because there would not be magic cops that just know you're carrying narcotics, not magic pirates that spawn for the sole purpose of engaging the player and ignoring the huge trading ship right next to you. If I am smuggling I might try to remain inconspicous or detour though more dangerous areas in order to avoid police attention (at the risk of being attacked by pirates), if I am trading I might be encouraged to use a smaller ship to dodge pirates after big game, or risk being the big game myself for more profit. And so on...

A coherent and natural game world wold be far richer and feel much better than a galaxy that revolves around the player.

 

[Dominic Corner]

I imagine every developer has sad tails of amazing systems or applications they've built, where every department has been on the same page except the people in charge of finance, who invariably kill a project that might have saved humanity itself from its darkest days. All held back by signed pieces of paper :/

Hi there,

The opposite has also been the case...

The first XCOM game (UFO Defense / Enemy Unknown, depending on where you lived) was actually cancelled by the publisher (Microprose), but nobody from the sub-team handling it told the developers...

Thanks,
Dom

 

[Dutchman141]

I imagine every developer has sad tails of amazing systems or applications they've built, where every department has been on the same page except the people in charge of finance, who invariably kill a project that might have saved humanity itself from its darkest days. All held back by signed pieces of paper :/

I agree but as Dominic Corner stated the opposite is also true.
I'm very happy with the knowledge that at least one of the developments I was part of did in fact not save humanity but at least a number of people's lives.
Some fantastic developments do find their way to the right place.
I do agree though that much is covered with a thick shroud of financial or political benefit and only sees the light of day when most profit can be made.

 

[Rafe Zetter]

You need to be a few thousand Ly from a populated system as I recall. Can't recall what the actual distance is...more than 2,000 but less than 8,000 i think.

Edit: actually, for NPCs it may well be less. You'll still get POIs and things like downed nav beacons for a while but even they fade away. I've been out of Colonia heading up-and-east-ish and I stopped seeing POIs a while ago. Can't remember when I last saw an NPC.

Thanks GreyAreaUK - this highlights my point that someone else tried to dismiss - even 1,000 LY out from the bubble is ludicrous for a pirate - the amount of traffic in that zone is effectively ZERO, and even if they did manage to find a ship to pirate, do they think a ship that far out will be a trader loaded with high value cargo? Nope, just another explorer with fk all cargo.

ANY pirate with half a brain will stay WELL INSIDE the high traffic populated areas of the inner "core" of the bubble, of which there are plenty, at best they might venture closer to the rim of the bubble if they get attention from the security.

Same goes for those single pirates that hide in asteroid belts - zero traffic there too.

As for the "let no one get away" style of bounty hunter - 1,000 ly for FOUR HUNDRED credits? cmon don't be fff...stupid - the repair bill would be more than that.

It's laughable that people are trying to defend this sort of NPC spawning mechanic as reasonable.

 

[Madrax573]

Hi there,

The opposite has also been the case...

The first XCOM game (UFO Defense / Enemy Unknown, depending on where you lived) was actually cancelled by the publisher (Microprose), but nobody from the sub-team handling it told the developers...

Thanks,
Dom

Just goes to show that pen pushers and accountants have no idea in what makes an awesomely successful game!

 

[Rafe Zetter]

Just goes to show that pen pushers and accountants have no idea in what makes an awesomely successful game!

There's a few game designers that don't know that either.....

 

[cmdr underhill]

wstephenson I wish I could give you more rep. You have some great ideas and points in this thread.

Thanks GreyAreaUK - this highlights my point that someone else tried to dismiss - even 1,000 LY out from the bubble is ludicrous for a pirate - the amount of traffic in that zone is effectively ZERO, and even if they did manage to find a ship to pirate, do they think a ship that far out will be a trader loaded with high value cargo? Nope, just another explorer with fk all cargo.

ANY pirate with half a brain will stay WELL INSIDE the high traffic populated areas of the inner "core" of the bubble, of which there are plenty, at best they might venture closer to the rim of the bubble if they get attention from the security.

Same goes for those single pirates that hide in asteroid belts - zero traffic there too.

As for the "let no one get away" style of bounty hunter - 1,000 ly for FOUR HUNDRED credits? cmon don't be fff...stupid - the repair bill would be more than that.

It's laughable that people are trying to defend this sort of NPC spawning mechanic as reasonable.

I was really dumbfounded when I first found out how far out the pirates were.

Just out of curiosity though, who is defending the NPC spawning mechanics?

 

[[Diplomacy] Carnegie]

There's a few game designers that don't know that either.....

And an infinitely larger number of gamers...

 

[wstephenson]

I don't think I have, but I will if you kindly point me in the right direction.

The way I suggest, and Isinona agrees, would be that any 'wildcat' mining outside a RES would simply generate a dynamic SC PoI ("mining activity emissions") like a drop wake, inviting all sorts of attention. This would be balanced by greatly improved yields vs in a RES. Risk vs reward, as Sandro is fond of saying. Could be good for get rich quick solo miners, or for a wing of BHs to set up a honeypot.

Obviously this would be very risky in populated/dangerous systems, but profitable if you head a way out of the bubble to mine.

wstephenson I wish I could give you more rep. You have some great ideas and points in this thread.

Thank you, you're very kind! I've been at this long enough not to expect any of it stick, but playing armchair game designer is still fun. Maybe I should just patch it into Oolite.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

There's a few game designers that don't know that either.....

Is that the armchair ones the reside on these forums.

 

[nosleepdemon]

Is that the armchair ones the reside on these forums.

Yeah, well my office paid for my armchair

 

[S3B4ST13N]

Wow, just wow.... *shakes head* the lengths fanbois will got to misdirect or deliberatly misinterpret a comment in order to make the quoted poster (me in this case) look foolish when my statement of...

I think he was just referring to the large number of gamers (across all games) who seem to think their opinions will make the game great.
Of course, I could be wrong - but that's what I got from his comment anyway.

 

[Rafe Zetter]

I think he was just referring to the large number of gamers (across all games) who seem to think their opinions will make the game great.
Of course, I could be wrong - but that's what I got from his comment anyway.

Yes he was - but it was the way he said it - that basically there are more gamers who don't know how to make a good game compared to developers, which is bloody obvious because there are more gamers than developers by a factor of millions.

It's like someone stating there are a lot of politicians who don't know what they are doing and DrewCarnegie replying by stating that there are still more people who don't know about politics than there are politicians - well duh? OFC!

It's an empty argument.

 

[Rafe Zetter]

I am so incredibly curious as to which game the OP has helped being developed.........

Some insight in this would realy help his credibility imho.

Why? because credibility only comes with a mega successful multi million copy selling game?

LMAO!!!!!

By that measure FDEV themselves had no credibility for 20 years between FE2 (FFE didn't do so well) and before the ED kickstarter.

The guy coding Evochron Legacy might have some choice words for you on that matter, as would the guy who ported Baldurs Gate, in it's ENTIRETY into a Neverwinter Night 2 mod, so you can play Baldurs Gate in 3D - and just to remind you - the entire PC games industry is built on the backs of solo programmers, in their collective basements, hacking away at code.

Just because many never made the big time - doesn't mean they weren't any good, you would do well to remember that.

 

[SushiCW]

Well drat, I was hoping this thread was going to be about making spawns less obvious. e.g. when you enter an instance, it looks like things have been happening without you there, rather than everyone suddenly popping into existence and initializing themselves right when you arrive.

Which is what I'm more interested in. When I drop into a signal source or distress beacon, there should already be lasers and missiles flying everywhere!

 

[Jenner]

Settle down, peeps. I just snipped some badgering posts. Keep it civil and non-personal please. Thank you.

 

[[Diplomacy] Carnegie]

Yes he was - but it was the way he said it - that basically there are more gamers who don't know how to make a good game compared to developers, which is bloody obvious because there are more gamers than developers by a factor of millions.

It's like someone stating there are a lot of politicians who don't know what they are doing and DrewCarnegie replying by stating that there are still more people who don't know about politics than there are politicians - well duh? OFC!

It's an empty argument.

I humbly apologize for using the word 'number' when I should more correctly have used 'proportion'.

On the subject of "empty arguments", OFC there are games designers who don't know what makes a good game. The history of game development is littered with stupid and failed ideas, so your statement had no more merit than mine.

Empty pronouncements beget empty responses.

 

[Rafe Zetter]

Settle down, peeps. I just snipped some badgering posts. Keep it civil and non-personal please. Thank you.

I just noticed that Jenner - MUCH appreciated, REALLY REALLY THANK YOU - I got hot headed and did that "shouty" post because it was clear I was being singled out as a target for sniping instead of addressing the points I made.

It happens a lot - usually by the same few people.