On cruise distances (aka "let's talk about inner-system jumps again")

[Cmdr Nemo]

I decided to partake in the current CG to bring some specific rare goods for Olelbis. Now, I don't have a great memory for rares (despite making quite some money back in the day from them), so I really didn't know that 2 locations selling the required rare goods (out of 3 available) were just over 500k LS from the main star. I only found that out AFTER making the trip to each system (that one's on me, I could have checked this beforehand).

Whilst travelling, I asked myself... "what does this travel distance add to the game?" and, more importantly, "is this fun?"...

And sadly, the answer to the second question is "no, it's not really fun", and I had to struggle to come up answers to the first.

So, why the distances? I think these are the reasons:
- sense of scale
- encounters along the way
- USS?

Did I miss anything? I don't think so. Unfortunately, I would argue that all of these 3 points don't really work any more. And it's not like in Euro Truck, where one actually needs to DRIVE to get somewhere... in ED it's "align and go for a break for 15 minutes". Actually, it's worse, because of the changing speed you don't REALLY know how long a break it can be so you can't rely on the in-game "time-to" timer... Anyway I'll try to break down the 3 points above and why they aren't really good arguments...

1. Sense of scale:
Yes, that's a large distance... unfortunately, past a certain point (something like a few thousand LS) one loses track. This is compounded by the speed changing as you travel between the stars. The sense of scale is restored once you SEE the target stellar bodies and observe how they move about on your screen and grow. But when one's travelling 500LS... well, it's just dots all the way and things get interesting only once you're actually THERE. Anyway, having the ability to jump between stars shouldn't REMOVE the ability to fly the distance manually, so...

2. Encounters:
Hands up who has been interdicted DURING a lengthy travel time. Not when nearing the target stellar body (i.e. during deceleration when the timer's at 0:06) but when flying between the stars at 1000+LS/s... Anyone? Didn't think so... Unless the AI cheats and spawns right behind you to interdict you instantly (which is a bad experience in an of itself), nothing will happen during that time. Perhaps some PVP then? But, barring some CG which sends everyone flying on a single, long-distance haul like that, I bet people avoid such distances in the first place, making this a bad place to find PVP action... and PVP interdictions will still be far easier near the start or end points of such a journey anyway...

3. USS:
Oh come on - USS are already bloody annoying RNG-generators... And approaching them during inner-star travel is as engaging as everywhere else, if not less.

Now, I really think such distances should be a novelty. Like Hutton - I wouldn't want to see it gone or "moved closer". So having a few places where you NEED to travel that long around the universe for the "LULz" would be perfectly fine. But in all other cases we should have a "jump to star" on our ships, as these large distances are by no means a rare occurrence. So far I think the only actual effect these systems have is cluttering up the mission tab and forcing everyone to double-check the LS distance before accepting a mission... Having inner-system "star-only" jumping capabilities won't remove the sense of scale or danger (orbits around a star can still be quite big, and that's perfectly fine). Unless I'm missing something here, and these extreme distances and travel times add something else to the game I'm not seeing?

I agree, regardless of how big a jump one can do based on their FSD and or the engineering of it. The actuall real time involved in the various distances available to the various and numerious configurations of FSD is always the same. In real time it takes just as long to hyper 15 ly's as it does 25. If one ever observed the only difference in the amount of fuel one utilizes when making a 25 one jump vs a 15 two jumps. The real time duration is the same, only the amount of fuel utilzied is different.

If any and all ships use the same amount of real time when using hyper drive. Then why can it take the same amount of time in super to get to a destination as it is when using hyper to reach a star. Most jumps with experience including scooping as one's vector is generally behind the star in most cases. Only takes about 45 seconds. Why does it take sometime over an real time hour to go from a star to the station or other intended object?

 

[Iron Body]

No micro jumps

But just increase top speed, acceleration/deceleration rates and the distance at which the stars gravity well starts to influence speed.

Agreed, if we could get from 100c to 1000c more quickly, there would have been no need for the FSS. We could just go and explore (map) each object in the system in a reasonable time.

 

[Shaamaan]

Here a idea for the Op. Instead of asking for something like miro jumps. Wait until 3.3 is released and redo your idea.

Since I have no access to the beta... care to explain what changes are planned with regards to this?

EDIT:
BTW, people seem to think that "micro-jumps" would allow one to jump ANYWHERE inside a system. They certainly should NOT. These should only allow jumping between main stars. Stellar bodies can STILL have large orbits, requiring some regular travel time (thus ensuring the sense of scale and that regular dangers remain). Finally, just having the ability to jump between system stars doesn't mean one couldn't travel the "normal" way, if one so desires (for USS hunting or something)... I also don't think such jumps between stars (and only stars) should be expensive or require crafting - our ships can already jump between system, for crying out loud, many LYs apart... yet somehow we can't jump 800,000Ls?

Of course there are some additional things that could be made regarding in-system jumps:

Idea 1:
When jumping to a system with a nav-beacon, you always arrive at that nav beacon star (i.e. as it is currently). But when jumping to systems without one you arrive at a random star inside the system.

Idea 2:
In-system jumps between stars shouldn't be "instant". Ideally I'd like to see a spin-up time and instantly accelerate to a few hundred thousand LS, travelling at a fixed path towards the selected star.

Idea 3:
Possibly allow one to jump TO any star, rather than between. (I.e. extension on how our FSDs work when jumping between systems - it seems the TARGET is important, not the source!) Why? Because sometimes it's faster to jump OUT of a system and back in to get somewhere, which is rather insane if you think about it! Admittedly, this only useful if you're near a stellar body and are the mass severely limits your SC speeds... still, having to jump out and back in is rather silly, so having the ability to jump to a star should always be there.

Idea 4:
Roadblocks? PvPers / pirates could purchase / build navigation disruptors, creating "forced mini nav-beacon" style locations, where players and NPCs alike would be pulled to when travelling nearby. Destroying the disruptor removes the blockade. (This needs expanding to prevent disruptor spam, both from players and NPCs!)

 

[DWorth]

I suppose: what if you made micro-jumps only possible by enforcing a minimum jump disance - say 100,000Ls
It could be explained away by something like 'the FSDs are too inaccurate to use over short distances' or something, but would still force a fair bit of cruising in SC whilst shortening journey times for those 'go away and read War and Peace' in-system hops.

 

[Ian Skippy]

It is very simple: having to do nothing but wait for 15 minutes while traveling in a straight line towards a small dot on a black background is simply terrible game design, and 'my immersion' is no excuse. I suggested it a few times earlier, but systems with a sufficient population should have nav beacons at other stars that have stations/bases around it that allow microjumps. You still get to keep the sense of scale when exploring or in backwater systems, so it also helps set apart big vs small systems. Those who dont like it can opt to just cruise there instead, and you can have special USS that only spawn a minimum distance away from the closest star.

Please no micro jumps. I tried Star Citizen lately and they were one of the things I personally hated about it. It's just fast travel. Awful!

There may be not much to do in SC now, but in 3.3 there will be a) Persistent USS (which is a million time better system than we have now), b) A LOT of new places to visit, c) scenarios. Travelling across a system will be more interesting.

Please no micro jumps

SC doesn't really have fast travel in that sense, traveling between two planets (which in ED would be roughly 400LS or some such) takes 20 minutes there. It is even worse there than in ED, as it lacks the control of SC while taking more time.

 

[Ian Skippy]

So you want to ruin pirates and bounty hunter game play?

There is no interdiction possible during 99% of these long SC cruises due to the constant acceleration and all ships being as fast as any other in SC. You'll just be waiting for 15 minutes for the other ship to slow down before you do, the distance adds nothing. Adding interstellar microjumps has no impact on piracy as proper pirates operate between stars and planets, not between different stars within a system.

 

[rootsrat]

SC doesn't really have fast travel in that sense, traveling between two planets (which in ED would be roughly 400LS or some such) takes 20 minutes there. It is even worse there than in ED, as it lacks the control of SC while taking more time.

"Slow travel" then. Even worse

 

[Ian Skippy]

"Slow travel" then. Even worse

Heh, pretty much. As a general design philosophy, players should always be doing something. If I could use the FSS during supercruise, or walk around my ship fixing bits, or monitoring this or that system, it would be not much of an issue. But right now supercruise is pretty much just a giant loading screen with nothing happening, which is a basic no-no when it comes to game design.

 

[CMDR Carbo]

I like the idea of having multiple nav-beacons in multi-star systems and the ability to jump to them. This would basically be something like micro-jumps "light".

- Frontier could basically hand-place jump destinations via nav beacons, having some sort of control which stars can be jumped too

- Micro jumps would be restricted to the bubble and inhabited space.

- No confusing lists of jump destinations when you jump into a system with a lot of stars (like Maia)

- Nostalgic journeys like the trip to Hutton Orbital could be preserved (e.g. by adding a defunct nav beacon at Proxima Centauri).

Make it happen, Frontier!

 

[XW_Ziggy]

When watching youtube footage of elite, I usually set the playback speed to 2x and even then, I end up skipping segments.

Current 3.2 supercruise needs everything changed by at least a factor of two - so gravity well influence halved, speeds and acceleration/deceleration rates doubled. It would still be boring and slow but it wouldn't upset those "YOU'RE RUINING MUH IMMERSION" types too much and we'd all spend fewer cumulative hours 'playing' Elite whilst actually alt-tabbed doing something else.

 

[Tarman]

Another idea would be to have moddable Supercruise handling and acceleration, and for different grades of FSD to have different rates. E-rated being the slowest acceleration but least affected by gravity wells, and A-rated being by far the fastest but most affected by gravity wells. Engineering could include dramatically increasing resistance to gravity wells by sacrificing maximum cruise speed; better handling for more power draw etc... At least that way random encounters might stand a chance of happening in those interstellar regions.

While maybe not this exact iteration, variable SC speed and handling is my personal favourite dream addition to SC gameplay. I'm not a fan of the one size fits all approach. As long as we're dreaming, we can add some EWAR gameplay on top of this to make SC much more unpredictable.

 

[Ian Skippy]

While maybe not this exact iteration, variable SC speed and handling is my personal favourite dream addition to SC gameplay. I'm not a fan of the one size fits all approach. As long as we're dreaming, we can add some EWAR gameplay on top of this to make SC much more unpredictable.

One thing I'd love is 'SC boost': being able to set the throttle above 100%, increasing speed above normal operation but also causing damage to the FSD with the possibility of critical failure.

 

[Tarman]

One thing I'd love is 'SC boost': being able to set the throttle above 100%, increasing speed above normal operation but also causing damage to the FSD with the possibility of critical failure.

Frenotx had a great active-input booster concept that burned fuel and generated heat; it got lost in the Great OOPP Riots earlier this year but there were some great discussions going around about alternate SC movement methods that didn't just equate to a fast-travel portal.

 

[Shaamaan]

I suppose: what if you made micro-jumps only possible by enforcing a minimum jump disance - say 100,000Ls
It could be explained away by something like 'the FSDs are too inaccurate to use over short distances' or something, but would still force a fair bit of cruising in SC whilst shortening journey times for those 'go away and read War and Peace' in-system hops.

I'd shave one more 0 off that number (a 100k LS is still, what... 5 minutes of doing nothing?). But really, if you limit the jump capabilities to stars only (i.e. the most massive stellar objects), that pretty much solves all problems. If you want to retain the occasional "Hutton-like" station or planet... I dunno, have broken nav beacons there or something, preventing the jumps to the nearby star in those instances. Scale is preserved (orbits can still be HUGE) and so is danger. In general I think you should always be able to jump to any star. Star, not planet, mind you!

 

[Connolly91]

+1 for microjumps. Now that we have the FSS and USS's are identified that way rather than flying around aimlessly, it makes sense to have some form of a microjump. It doesn't even have to be an actual 'microjump' so to speak, even if it was implemented in the similar way as Star Citizen where you select a waypoint and then you just accelerate to it at greater speeds than is possible in current supercruise. Maybe tie it to your engine boost. Maybe use the blue halo interdiction effect as this looks good.

 

[Connolly91]

Space is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space.

Yes, but this is a game with faster-than-light travel mechanics. Gameplay has to come first. Sitting watching a black screen with numbers trickling down is not engaging gameplay. It is nothing more than a time sink.

 

[Lily from anim.o.v.e]

I doubt FD ever changes this, a true course plotting and jumping would be really cool, but we never gonna get this for technical reasosn I guess.

What about another modification altering max in system speed, acceleration and decceleration? like in +100% at G5? that coudl bring peopel through the systems much faster.

 

[Chaparral]

Space is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space.

This is a GAME. It is not space. Sitting for 20 minutes is not game "play". It is stupid and lazy game design.

 

[IcemanAJL]

So you want to ruin pirates and bounty hunter game play?

Just make it so the jumps have to be outside an exclusion zone nearby each Star/main body.

Pirates and Bounty Hunters don’t wait in the middle anyway, but at the end as it’s less likely for someone to want to Highwake.

(and both jobs are already ruined currently, they need other fixes to even matter again)

 

[IcemanAJL]

OP’s idea seems very reasonable, spending 45 mins+ staring at a dull screen does not make for exciting or engaging.