2.2's Instant Ship and Module Transport - Yay or Nay?

[Marian87]

Instant transfers don't affect anyone who chooses not to use them, and feeling the effect is still optional as the abilities to suspend disbelief and self-impose any desired restrictions are not even close to impossible. Opponents of this feature only want to limit what others can do. This has become increasingly evident throughout this debate.

Yes they do affect everyone as has been said a million times before. This is mostly about game balance rather than the in fiction explanation of the mechanic. There are a million ways to explain it away and people will be satisfied, no that's not the real issue. The issue is that everyone will only fly in Asps and Condas made for the fastest travelling and then at a station they will summon any ships they want or need even if it has the worst FSD thus bolstering all of the other systems.

I'm not an opponent of the feature, I want and like such a feature myself, but not in a way that is at the expense of game balance. That's it. It's not about limiting the way people play. The instant nature of the transfer will break the limits that are already in the game.

 

[Verax]

No fsd? Jump out and laugh yourself to death.
Because combat ships with FSDs are at such a huge disadvantage against a T6. gamebreaking.

Lol! So much WIN!

 

[Khelder]

There is nothing "immersive" about limited availability of modules. It's simply a game mechanic you're used to.
My garage is not sending me to a garage in southern France because they have no light machine for my car. They order one, it gets shipped.

Out of curiosity, how long does it take to get there?

 

[Bomba Luigi]

There is nothing "immersive" about limited availability of modules. It's simply a game mechanic you're used to.
My garage is not sending me to a garage in southern France because they have no light machine for my car. They order one, it gets shipped.

I'm all for moduls and stuff getting shipped, would be great to have that insteat of teleport

 

[Verax]

Yes they do affect everyone as has been said a million times before. This is mostly about game balance rather than the in fiction explanation of the mechanic. There are a million ways to explain it away and people will be satisfied, no that's not the real issue. The issue is that everyone will only fly in Asps and Condas made for the fastest travelling and then at a station they will summon any ships they want or need even if it has the worst FSD thus bolstering all of the other systems.

I'm not an opponent of the feature, I want and like such a feature myself, but not in a way that is at the expense of game balance. That's it. It's not about limiting the way people play. The instant nature of the transfer will break the limits that are already in the game.

You've stated that before and others have too.... but that doesn't affect anyone else! You rarely see other ships when traveling! You only see them in highly populated areas for the most part! That point is moot!

The ship bolstering part is also moot! The FSD does not impact power demands on builds to such an extreme that it makes a significant difference at all! Otherwise, in the same way we always traded out our fuel scoops for SCBs or HRPs after traveling, we'd also always downgrade FSDs! But we didn't! Because it barely makes a difference! Balancing is not hurt!

 

[Elderoy]

I even accept that people plain out cheesed Robigo before by going there in an Asp, stacked missions by selling the mission cargo, jumped back, switched to some python, rebought the mission cargo and delivered it.
If they think that's fun, more power to them. I think it's silly, but I'm not the gameplay police.
And I still got a vette and over 500 million in assets by simply playing the game and without grind. Took 600 hours .. so what?

Going to teleport your conda back from Jacques? Awesome, you missed the exploration data of nearly 1k jumps and had to pay for the transfer. Since I don't sit here watching anyone but myself do the trip back and forth, taking 3 real life weeks and 40 hours to do it, why exactly does that affect me? I'm no the gameplay gestapo either.

And there's players who play as much a day as I play a week, so what took me 3 weeks real time to accomplish, takes them 3 days and they could do the cg trip 10x or more, while I did one run.
Why exactly am I to question that or be overly unhappy about it.
They could transfer an entire fleet of FDLs to Jacques and back in the time it takes me to get there once. SO WHAT GAMEBRAKING IS REALLY DONE HERE?
.

Good point
But still, credits should not be the only currency IMHO

 

[LuciusEsox]

Insta transport will be a massive game changer. It wont be a case of not really making any difference as it will forever change the reality of the size of the world we play in, and in a negative way I feel.

Someone above said this has the potential to be the classic FD screw up of trying to please everyone, I agree !

I suspect insta transport would be far easier to implement from a programming/workload point of view but it would utterly distort the vastness of space that this game (for those lucky enough to have the time) recreates far far better than anything else I have ever played/simmed.

I have played a lot of mmo's and WOW was my favourite. Strangely a major plus point was the difficulty of getting somewhere. It added rather than detracted from the game for me as it added substance and consequences to my decision making about game play

Game worlds where it is much easier to get around (GW2, ESO, etc) feel much much smaller than WOW's even though the worlds are of comparable size.

The game environment feels far less believable but more importantly a whole level of strategic thinking is just not there.

CQC was an effort to please the "casual" gamer and I think this falls into the same category. Difference is, this will have much farther reaching consequences for game play than the largely irrelevant CQC ever did.

It's like someone's looked at the stats and said "omg look at all of that play area not being utilised, how can we change this" and then thought this up. This will bring the more casual gamer into the game no doubt but doesn't this go against one of Elites (and David Brabens) core philosophies in a very very big way, i.e. insta transport is absurdly unrealistic but more than that it will lead to totally ridiculous situations where people can move "real" assets around in the blink of an eye. Think what effect that would have on the dynamics of a war. No point defending anywhere as an attacker can bring massive overwhelming force to bear anywhere almost instantly. Found a good trade route? better get in quick because because once found by others with the ability to move massive assets in almost instantly Well, you get the idea.

I don't think the concept of insta transport and how utterly game changing it will be have been thought through properly, or if it has and they still do it... ???

I am all for being able to remotely transport ships around but done in way that doesn't break the game as much as I believe insta transport will. Tell a ship to move somewhere and it takes the same time as it would take you (although if sending into deep space it doesn't have to sleep and log off like you or I do ) also factor in risk so if that large undefended transport has no escorts there is actually more of a chance of it not even reaching it's destination at all.

Trouble is once you start to think about it is a massive undertaking to do entirely realistically. It would be wonderful if so desired to actually be able to meet and escort said vessels but I this would add a whole other layer of what are effectively NPC's to the game and although I am no programmer I suspect this would not be feasible.

I say an effective fudge would be to introduce a realistic delay and a realistic chance of damage/destruction depending on makeup of the convey and the areas it has to pass through.

Why would the CEO himself who only last week stated he slavishly supports realism wherever possible allow this idea to even gain some traction ?

I think all insta transport will do will speed the grind and give people less to think about.

Now where's me phone - I gotta to get to the next level in Candy Crush.

 

[Goose4291]

The "my time is precious" is a non valid argument, most people got busy lives, its called time management. I can only play in the weekends, so I PLAN my gaming time.
No, it's the same crowd who cry when the AI gets to hard, and FD goes along with it. Trust me, there will be more "demands" down the road, and they will use the same tactics.

It's time for Frontier to make a new mode where some of these features are blocked out, or just make a private group who ignore all this arcady stuff?
Because I don't think they will change on this on, the "give it all to me now" crowd are outnumbering the SIM crowd.

The only problem with such a new mode (which I'd welcome) is that the BGS and PP data would be tied to the other servers

 

[Tuub t Tute]

Maybe it would help if people offered specific examples as to how they think this will impact their gameplay?

For me, this means I would never contemplate taking a large cargo ship in Open to a trade CG (if I would have beforehand...) My rationale is that I know full well by the time I get there, Open will be more heavily populated with RPK combat ships, because more people will go across there in a fast Asp and summon their optimised combat ship. They no longer have to worry about swapping out the fuel scoop for something more effective on arrival, as an example.

This might be "fun, challenging, emergent gameplay" for some players and more power to them if they enjoy that sort of thing. Play your own way and all that.

 

[Ziljan]

There is nothing "immersive" about limited availability of modules. It's simply a game mechanic you're used to.
My garage is not sending me to a garage in southern France because they have no light machine for my car. They order one, it gets shipped.

And it takes days or weeks. Shipping is fine. Teleportation is not.

 

[kofeyh]

Why did you cheat and take a cutter to Jacques?

.. please don't. I did actually laugh, because I certainly found it funny, but please just don't.

This is a fairly important discussion, and if the solution is to reduce the debate to (even in jest) point scoring, why should Frontier bother listening to a bunch of people sniping?

I am happy to consider other viewpoints, indeed I've read quite a few. Right now I am concerned as to how instant ship transport affects most everything we do. It's hard to believe it will not fundamentally change it. During beta, might turn out the concerns are unfounded? Cool. Win-win. But beta is too late to fix it; any major changes have to go into Alpha. They can at best fudge numbers in Beta.

 

[Boomer Kay]

Maybe it would help if people offered specific examples as to how they think this will impact their gameplay?

For me, this means I would never contemplate taking a large cargo ship in Open to a trade CG (if I would have beforehand...) My rationale is that I know full well by the time I get there, Open will be more heavily populated with RPK combat ships, because more people will go across there in a fast Asp and summon their optimised combat ship. They no longer have to worry about swapping out the fuel scoop for something more effective on arrival, as an example.

This might be "fun, challenging, emergent gameplay" for some players and more power to them if they enjoy that sort of thing. Play your own way and all that.

Those "griefers" play 25 hours a day. They were at Jaque's in a FDL before I got there in my T6.
They probably have 200 combat ready ships stored around the bubble anyway.
What exactly is going to change? That they'll be there 3 minutes earlier because they didn't have to jump to the nearest system to the CG and do the last 4 hops in the FDL?

.. please don't.

This is a fairly important discussion, and if the solution is to reduce the debate to point scoring, why should Frontier bother listening to a bunch of people sniping? I am happy to consider other viewpoints, indeed I've read quite a few.

Well then explain yourself, please.
I deliberately took the "uphill both ways" approach, because that's the way I like to play the game. You didn't. If you would have equipped a proper shield on the Cutter, it would have been as indistructible as my Vette or even more so. All this talk about "balance" and "working for it" is so numpty, it hurts (metaphorically speaking).
It's simply game rules. It's not even new rules, since you have the instant respawn and "unlimited free sidewinder option" already in the game.
You can use them or ignore them. Like everyone else and FD is taking care about the cheat programs.

I am happy to consider other viewpoints, indeed I've read quite a few. Right now I am concerned as to how instant ship transport affects most everything we do. It's hard to believe it will not fundamentally change it. During beta, might turn out the concerns are unfounded? Cool. Win-win. But beta is too late to fix it; any major changes have to go into Alpha. They can at best fudge numbers in Beta.

The addition of the Cutter affected everything.
The addition of Engineers affected everything.
Every addition affected everything.
Are we going to sit here and shoot at every addition with a vengeance, because it's changing things?
Make up overly hysteric, totally constructed points just to prove we're right?

 

[LuciusEsox]

.. please don't.

This is a fairly important discussion, and if the solution is to reduce the debate to point scoring, why should Frontier bother listening to a bunch of people sniping? I am happy to consider other viewpoints, indeed I've read quite a few.

Clap clap mate my faith in forums is nearly restored

 

[Eymerich]

Yes they do affect everyone as has been said a million times before. This is mostly about game balance rather than the in fiction explanation of the mechanic. There are a million ways to explain it away and people will be satisfied, no that's not the real issue. The issue is that everyone will only fly in Asps and Condas made for the fastest travelling and then at a station they will summon any ships they want or need even if it has the worst FSD thus bolstering all of the other systems.

I'm not an opponent of the feature, I want and like such a feature myself, but not in a way that is at the expense of game balance. That's it. It's not about limiting the way people play. The instant nature of the transfer will break the limits that are already in the game.

No a single reason explained

For what i get reasons are this because of this.

Still lack to understand the game balance broken

 

[Shar]

Maybe it would help if people offered specific examples as to how they think this will impact their gameplay?

For me, this means I would never contemplate taking a large cargo ship in Open to a trade CG (if I would have beforehand...) My rationale is that I know full well by the time I get there, Open will be more heavily populated with RPK combat ships, because more people will go across there in a fast Asp and summon their optimised combat ship. They no longer have to worry about swapping out the fuel scoop for something more effective on arrival, as an example.

This might be "fun, challenging, emergent gameplay" for some players and more power to them if they enjoy that sort of thing. Play your own way and all that.

Well if it goes live I,m just setting up a 60LY Asp then stripping all my combat ships down to D class FSD and reaping the weight power and heat benefits across my fleet, oh and thinking much less of the game in general.

 

[ThatFuzzyTiger]

Really? We only "know" where ships are when we look at the galaxy map or shipyard - given that there is already a location check when we open these screens, just add a "has the ship arrived" date/time comparison to those screens and they would only be checked when players actually go looking for them - as said before, the ship could be instantly placed in its new location on completion of the transfer transaction and the game would show "in transit" until the "docked" date/time for that ship was no longer in the future.

The difference is you wouldn't be able to trust any of the data coming from the client, so you need a scheduler. That's computationally expensive for a process involving a large number of pilots * however many ships.

 

[OriginalBadBoy]

The "my time is precious" is a non valid argument

Er no .... It really isn't and you are being disingenuous to anyone who has limited play time. Sometimes people will just want to pick up and play a game, not 'Plan' what they are going to do for the next hour or so, its not a job    .

FD needs to make a game that appeals to as many people as possible, they are also making the game that THEY want to. Sounds to me like you are trying to hang onto ideals that existed 20 years ago when Frontier/FFE came out, well I am sorry but those days are long gone. If you created a game like that now people just wouldn't buy it, not in any huge amount anyway. And this is coming from someone with thinks Elite/Frontier/FFE are some of best games ever made and thoroughly enjoyed playing them at the time. But things move forward and times change.

Thats not to say that Elite should go down the route of NMS and make everything utterly simplified because they won't do that, but some QOL additions to the game that make it a bit more palatable to some is fine by me. You really need to take into account other people needs as well as your own.

 

[Robert Maynard]

The difference is you wouldn't be able to trust any of the data coming from the client, so you need a scheduler. That's computationally expensive for a process involving a large number of pilots * however many ships.

How is this different from receiving a commodity as part of a mission reward?

 

[OriginalBadBoy]

Well if it goes live I,m just setting up a 60LY Asp then stripping all my other ships down to D class FSD and reaping the weight power and heat benefits across my fleet, oh and thinking much less of the game in general.

But you dont have to do that .. Thats your choice in the end, so basically you are biting your nose off to spite your face with that attitude.

 

[Verax]

No a single reason explained

For what i get reasons are this because of this.

Still lack to understand the game balance broken

Yep..