Cities built by players !

Cities on planets with players contributions/influences

I tried my best to explain myself clearly. Please, understand that english is not my native language. I hope that it will not make my ideas less interesting. Thanks.

UPDATE: i've change some details so it would not imply that a city would be owned by a player or a group of players.
I would love to see many different cities to explore (cities on mountains, cities in valleys, small hidden towns in canyons etc...)
I just want to think of the best way to make this happen, and I'm afraid procedural could not give us as much varieties as people could create together.


What is space exploration without the ability to explore new worlds, unique cities and civilisations? I know Frontier might have projects for that, but I'd like to share my ideas.

This suggestion implies that we would be able to get out of our spaceship by feet.

So yeah, let's start...

We would be able to start building a city by settling a colony on a planet. It would cost credits and different materials to build a building, and players could contribute together to build a huge city (with maybe some limitations).
It would basically work like a strategy game.

The players will just have to choose from a list of different type of buildings which would be upgradeable, giving the buildings more content and higher quality merchs.

BUILDINGS:

Starter building:
-City/Colony Hall:
The first Building of the colony, where building permit are delivered.
We would chose where to place it on the planet, with limitations(check "How it would work -> Colony Placement")
It will come with enough defense systems(ground and air) to protect the colony from a small group of attackers.
Players will be able to store minerals and materials for themselves or to prepare construction of others buildings.
If not a fortress city but a small colony, people would park around the colony, they will be directly vulnerable to attacks (I don't know how this will be handled in Horizon actually). More defense systems can still be added though.
There would be a wall in the city hall with the name(s) of the founder(s) of the colony, just like it is said who discovered each interstellar object in the galaxy.
Upgradable:
to be able to unlock some type of buildings,
City/Colony Hall get higher with upgrades.


Buildings:
-Armory:
The place to buy guns and others lethal(mines,grenades,etc...) and non lethal(tranquilizer, traps??) weapons for your character.
Upgradable:for more variety and quality

-Body Armor shop:
The place to buy body armors/suits and different kind of equipments/clothes/implants
Upgradable:for more variety and quality

-Bar:

The place to hire npc crew for your big spaceships(?), or to have npc control your different weapons, to boost your spaceship stats:
-engineers: repairing, stabilising system?
-co-pilote: manoeuvrability,
-Gunmans: control turret, or add more damage(yes, a gunman knows how to fire a weapon to make higher damage) and precision
etc....
Upgradable: size only to find more npc crew, by association of 1 to X buildings as seen in Fallout Shelter for instance)

-Residence:

Have more population, more/different NPC in bars, unlock some buildings.
Upgradable: Make them higher and add more capacity

-Market

-Defense system:
Weapons to defend the city, from the air, and the land
Ability to change the weapons of the different defense "towers"

Optional buildings for Fortress City:
-Docks:
Docks are used to protect visitors's spaceship during their visit, while docked, they are not directly vulnerable to pirates/mercenaries attack.
1 dock would store many spaceship with an elevator system that already exist in starports.
People will be able to buy new spaceships and improve spaceship as it is possible now in starports.
Option to leave city (launch) or enter city (by feet)
The more you'll have the more you'll be able to proceed conccurent landings(less waiting time to get a permission or to launch while waiting for others while they're leaving)
Upgradable: 1 / 2 / 4 / 8 / 16 storage per dock (makes the building higher)

-Walls:
Upgradable: Walls and building resistance

-City Entrance and underground parking:
For people who landed outside and coming from the lands with their SRV or by feet
Upgradable: Parking capability / City entrance size to proceed more people by feet

Ideas of buildings:
? Factories
To build everything you would like to sell:
-Weapon factory
-Body Armor factory
-Spaceship Factory
-Power Generator for the city?
-Mineral Factory to be placed outside the cities next to mines of ressources.
...etc


And much more type of buildings...


HOW IT WOULD WORK:

Colony Placement:
I'm really not sure about this, but a Colony could only be placed on a planet of an anarchy system. Maybe it would cost more money to build on a non anarchy system planet.
You could have multiple cities on the same planet within a minimum range(so cities would have enough room around but especially so our computers would not have to display too much data and overheat and lag)
A colony could be placed on water, but it would cost a lot more.

? Non atmospheric:
Gravity body armor/suit to walk around normally, helmet on
special entrance to buildings for depressurization and air conditionning, helmet goes off.

City skins:

Depending on what kind of planet the city has been built on:
- rock (metal): industrial / mining look / metallic buildings
- rock (sand): scify-far west look / sand on buildings
- ice: icing on buildings
- water...

Colony development:
My first idea was that we couldn't place buildings, we would only be able to choose from a list what building we want to implement to the city, but then i realised that all cities would then look the same.
So I figured out that there should be a placement system, on a grid with smart limitations to avoid funny and unrealistic structuration of a city.
This would give the opportunity to build great variety of cities.

Maybe there could be different type of grid (in circle or squared)

NPC crew:
To boost your spaceship stats.
They would cost credits every week. If you don't have enough credits, they will stop working until they receive payment and/or will leave the next time you land in a station.
I love this idea, because a spaceship efficiency is not only measured by the qualities of its commander, but also by its crew's quality.
So it would make sense that NPC crew would boost your spaceship stats.

? City and Building limitations:
Each kind of building will have a limitation to avoid abuses and to limit risks of breaking realism.
City expansion would be limited too?

? City Balance:
Building and upgrades would cost a lot, so colony couldn't have it all, and would have to specialize.

? City Investments:
Players who would help building a city would get interests and would earn credits
- per/day?/week?,
- based on how much they invested ? / how much the building is upgraded ?
This would be very interesting to build tensions between cities, for profit, and could end up creating conflicts.

? City damage:
A city could be damaged by pirates or mercenaries, group of players who want to weaken your city and others players interests.
This would imply rebuilding, which would cost money and materials.
To not create frustration, cities couldn't be totally destroyed, but would have different degrees of damages (in percent) which would make a building less functionnal or not functionnal at all depending on the damages.

? Ghost City
That would happen if all investors leave/close their buildings(which wouldn't be destroyed, just empty and closed) and no one want to buy the buildings, after some time, the city will cost more than it produce, and it would turn into a ghost city.

...

Please let me know what you think.
Things doesn't have to be exactly like stated, those are just ideas.
 
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I'm thinking that it should take a massive group of players to do only a small town. A single player shouldn't be able to do anything like this. It'll never happen, though.
 
This is outside the scope of ED. Player owned X is a pretty overdone suggestion.

I actually don't like the fact that a player would "own" the town, it was just a suggestion, because I didn't know how to prevent anyone to come and build anything anywhere and ruin the city.

I just want very different cities to explore, and I don't think Frontier will be able to make enough cities with a lot of varieties just by themselves.
And Cities to explore is not out of the scope of Elite dangerous, it is one of the many things Frontier want to do.

I was thinking that they should instead create tools which would allow people to create cities in a smart way, so nothing stupid could be created, which always happen when you give too much freedom to players.

I wouldn't like to only find big cities, i would like to be able to find an isolate building in a desert, small towns, abandonned cities... etc... Actually if they generate procedural cities like that, it would be cool too.


I'm thinking that it should take a massive group of players to do only a small town. A single player shouldn't be able to do anything like this. It'll never happen, though.

If it was to be made like this, a good balance could have been find. Again, I was just giving examples to explain that it would not be given to any newcomer.
 
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I actually don't like the fact that a player would "own" the town, it was just a suggestion, because I didn't know how to prevent anyone to come and build anything anywhere and ruin the city.

I just want very different cities to explore, and I don't think Frontier will be able to make enough cities with a lot of varieties just by themselves.
And Cities to explore is not out of the scope of Elite dangerous, it is one of the many things Frontier want to do.

I was thinking that they should instead create tools which would allow people to create cities in a smart way, so nothing stupid could be created, which always happen when you give too much freedom to players.

I wouldn't like to only find big cities, i would like to be able to find an isolate building in a desert, small towns, abandonned cities... etc... Actually if they generate procedural cities like that, it would be cool too.
I doubt they'll be making cities at all. I'd expect the universe generator would handle this in much the same way we have light maps on the dark side of planets.
 
While I'm not sure we'll see player owned "cities" on the planets, I would honestly be surprised if we don't eventually get a mechanic for players to create new stations in uninhabited systems.

We currently have all these systems and a huge galaxy, and most of it is empty outside the extraordinarily small (relatively speaking) pocket of human settlement.

The galaxy as it stands is just so empty. We should hope that we will be able to fill the void.
 
I doubt they'll be making cities at all. I'd expect the universe generator would handle this in much the same way we have light maps on the dark side of planets.

I doubt you're right. To me, the game would have no purpose if it was not to explore planets with "life" and animation. That's why everyone is so fascinated by space to begin with.
Plus, it would not be more difficult than making a space port.
As a developper myself... ok, web developper, but still, I know that it would only take few datas per city.
City position on the planet, city type, skin, what it has into it and details about each buildings would only take a rather short series of number into a database. It is not a big deal comparing to what they already did.
What will take more time and work, is building the tools/functionnalities to render the cities from their datas, and how to render them while approaching.

Also, check this @ 1:18:

[video=youtube;EM0Gcl7iUM8]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EM0Gcl7iUM8&feature=youtu.be&t=1m18s[/video]

David Braben is very enthusiastic about this. Horizon is just the begining.


EDIT:

I don't understand, what's wrong with the light maps on the dark side of planets?

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While I'm not sure we'll see player owned "cities" on the planets, I would honestly be surprised if we don't eventually get a mechanic for players to create new stations in uninhabited systems.

We currently have all these systems and a huge galaxy, and most of it is empty outside the extraordinarily small (relatively speaking) pocket of human settlement.

The galaxy as it stands is just so empty. We should hope that we will be able to fill the void.

Actually, cities owned by players is not really what I want, I was just trying to think of a game mechanic to have very different cities to explore, and infinite possibilities("big cities, isolate building in a desert, small towns, abandonned cities").
Station and cities are not very different technically. Cities hasn't been done yet, because Horizon, and then we still need an update to be able to get out of our spaceships by feet. Then only, Cities will follow.
I'm aware that it will not come very soon, I was hoping mid-2017 or more.
 
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I think that's a great idea Jon.

Perhaps in the future, we could have community goals to build certain buildings and have something like colonies on different worlds to build.

Then further down the line, if fleets/guilds are introduced, then this could open the option for frontier to allow us build fleet/guild hqs or town.

Somewhat similar to fleet starbases that you get in Star Trek Online, but to have an actual physical place - to pick up where star trek left their idea, but better :)
 
Cities on inhabited worlds? Yes. Abandoned alien cities from long extinct civilizations you can explore? Yes, please. Player owned hangars and some buildings related to your spaceships? Sure, I'll play. Players building entire cities on surfaces of planets? Nah. This game's focus is flying spaceships, everything else is side content. And while you'll eventually be able to leave your ship to walk around on planets and stations, I suspect it will be to complement the main focus - flying spaceships - not become the focus of the game. Players building cities would dilute that and turn it into a weird, first person sim city in space with spaceships as well. Any time devoted to that would be better spent in improving the game's primary focus. Just my 5 cents, but games that try to do too much tend to lose focus and are rarely very successful.
 
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EDIT:

I don't understand, what's wrong with the light maps on the dark side of planets?
Based on this line I think you've misunderstood. I don't think they'll be hand crafting cities. I think the universe generator will craft cities in much the same way that the universe generator crafts light maps on the dark side of planets.
 
Oh ok, so you meant, "I doubt there will be -making cities- at all". I thought you meant "I doubt they(Frontier) will be making cities at all". Sorry
 
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Oh ok, so you meant, "I doubt there will be -making cities- at all". I thought you meant "I doubt they(Frontier) will be making cities at all". Sorry
I doubt they (FD) will be making cities at all. I expect the universe generator handle this. I expect the universe generator will handle this in the same way that it handles creating light maps for the dark sides of planets.
 
Oh okkkk... now I get it. Sorry :)
Yeah well no one knows how they will handle this, they could be making some unique cities, and generate the others. I just hope they won't generate them all, or cities will feel very repetitive, just like space stations do, which I can understand.
 
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I like the idea on paper, but I can't see it happening in practise. As others have indicated, it's not what ED is about.

Moderation's definitely an issue: the minute FD allows any ability for players to decide a layout of anything, someone, somewhere will use it to create an image of reproductive organs or write obscenities in a foreign language - and any mechanic used to avoid this will almost certainly produce results indistinguishable from something procedurally-generated anyway.

On the plus-side, having to report an entire city for being obscene would certainly be a new experience for me.
 
Very briefly (meeting in 5min)...

SimCity within Elite game system - fine, but remember that Elite plays out in real time, and cities take years to develop from scratch...

Cities should be owned/controlled by minor factions, in the same way that stations and (presumably) worlds are - allowing contest for control.

However I do think that players should be able to become members of a minor faction, and participate in raising proposals and decision making, which would address multi-level play such as a "SimCity" or "Civilisation" roles.
 
I like this, because it adds purpose for people to keep playing. People like building and crafting too.

According to the ED FAQ:

You will be able to own small inflatable asteroid stations as depicted here.

Yes, real purpose is what is missing to ED in its current state.
Contributing to something/anything concrete(rendered in the world, not just datas/stats), would add more purpose, and would be more rewarding.
Asteroid stations sounds weird but great at the same time. David Braben has a lot of imagination. Thanks for sharing this video! :)
 
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I like the idea on paper, but I can't see it happening in practise. As others have indicated, it's not what ED is about.

Moderation's definitely an issue: the minute FD allows any ability for players to decide a layout of anything, someone, somewhere will use it to create an image of reproductive organs or write obscenities in a foreign language - and any mechanic used to avoid this will almost certainly produce results indistinguishable from something procedurally-generated anyway.

On the plus-side, having to report an entire city for being obscene would certainly be a new experience for me.

Yes you're right. But I'm sure something procedurally-generated can do the same.
First time i've looked closely at a planet, I've already found heart shaped roads(?), the opposite of obscene, but i guess then that you could find different kind of shapes.

So why not use the same rules the "procedurally-generated engine" will have, but leaving it to the players to decide what kind of buildings, what kind of specialisation the city will have and where it should be placed on the planet.

Maybe I'm completely wrong, but I don't know why I think users generated contents would be more interesting and coherent than random and generic contents.
To me it definitly has to involve the players in some way, maybe less directly than what I stated in the original post, but it has too, it is the only way to create unique and believable experiences.

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Very briefly (meeting in 5min)...

SimCity within Elite game system - fine, but remember that Elite plays out in real time, and cities take years to develop from scratch...

Cities should be owned/controlled by minor factions, in the same way that stations and (presumably) worlds are - allowing contest for control.

However I do think that players should be able to become members of a minor faction, and participate in raising proposals and decision making, which would address multi-level play such as a "SimCity" or "Civilisation" roles.

That's exactly what I was thinking, we wouldn't be able to make a huge city in few clicks. But also remember that ED takes place in 3301, and we have the technology to travel up to 2000 times light speed.
So I guess we could also have "pre-programmated" micro bots that replicates themselves enough to merge together as a big structure in a day or even a minute.
In 2015 we're already working on bots duplicating themselves so why not

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The time it would take to build a building is not a concern to me, since there would always be a way to explain it with such an advanced technology.
 
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