Focused Feedback - Balancing Ship Engineering & Material Gathering

[burstar]

Here's my feedback:

This topic shouldn't have taken 4 years and a Steam rating of 'GTFO of the industry' before being brought up. Now that everyone's basically already engineered their ships and you guys refuse to add more ships that might need it, this is too little too late regardless of what methods you choose to ameliorate Beyond's future degradation to Oddity style mat gathering.

Do whatever you want. Always have. Stopping now just makes the pandering too obvious. Won't matter to me or anyone I knew that played this game anyways. By the time it gets implemented your competitors will likely have a better variant to use instead.

 

[zikolach]

Rolling for Engineering Improvements​

Some time ago, Engineering was changed so that some improvement was guaranteed with each roll. However, the amount by which your progress towards the next module grade is still random. This means sometimes the same number of materials will produce a minimal increase. Should this be changed so that the same number of materials are always required to reach the next tier? This would allow Commanders to know exactly how many materials are needed.

Yes! Please make materials requirements for certain/complete grade fixed (and known beforehand). The adjustments within one grade could remain semi-random (based on already spent materials for current grade). E.g. if you are lucky - you may get major improvement (and possibly less bad effects applied) with the first try, but to complete improvement you still need to spend same amount of materials (knowing it will give less effect).

E.g. upgrading sensors to long range potentially should not increase mass on the first attempt to the maximum for the grade. This way one may prefer not completing 5th grade at all if first attempt gave large positive bonus and relatively small negative bonus due to randomness.

 

[NecasekO]

Tweaking material drop rates will not fix engineering, it will just make it slightly less horrible or move the frustration elsewhere.

Adding engineer missions for large material rewards sounds like a good idea at first, but it would just replace an activity which requires traveling to a specific location and spending time on (likely) unappealing tasks with a different activity that requires traveling to a specific location and spending time on (possibly) unappealing tasks.

Introducing any type of "universal material currency" just admits that the whole concept of different materials simply doesn't work and should be removed from the game.

And none of this would make me actually enjoy buying new ships and experimenting with different build options. I believe engineering needs much bigger changes, like:

• Drastically reduce number of different materials.
• Remove "material farming sites" and make all materials obtained as a side effect of core activities (combat, trading, exploration).
• Make engineer blueprints one time unlocks (this could actually be more time intensive), which can subsequently be applied more freely - like in any high tech station.

And of course, the blueprints themselves need a serious rebalance, but that's a different discussion.

 

[zikolach]

We also need to be able to use the thargoid mats for something. They are completely useless right now except for a few synth. We also need certain guardian mats to be easier to find closer to the pleadies or the cap increased for how many we can get.

There could be alternative way to obtain thargoid mats (instead of fighting thargoids). Opening potentially side-quests to interact with them to obtain certain technology for upgrades. Like helping one to fight "crazy" AX humans, killing thargoids for no reason at their part of space.

 

[zikolach]

My Christmas wishlist of game changes regarding ship upgrades and material gathering.

• Allow to buy/sell materials at stations (special higher rates apply) and at fleet carriers (at rates set by FC owner). Allow to find these carriers on a galmap.
• Introduce in-game ship blueprints, which will completely substitute current outfitting (so you don't outfit the ship, but change ship blueprint for free, similar to what external tools do such as cariolis, edsy etc).
• Specific module blueprints can be obtained from engineers at specific cost and then used to change ship blueprint.
• Applying blueprint to a ship would cost money (to replace modules) and materials (to engineer modules).
• Applying blueprint to ship would take time (comparable with current ship transfer), so one may consider to switch ship or doing on-foot missions meanwhile.
• Depending on current station tech level the price/quality may vary (e.g. apply outfitting at low tech system will cost less, with lower effects for engineering, while doing the same at high tech station will make effects higher and cost more).
• Later on ship may be tuned up to the blueprint at higher level stations to increase effects (for additional material cost). Different system types will tune up different aspects of engineering (e.g. resource/refinery improve mining equipment, military improve weapons/shields etc).
• Apply same blueprints upgrade mechanics to guns and suits (and potentially vehicles)
• Change ship destruction model in a way that ships will rarely blow up. E.g. this would make ships with double braced/shielded powerplant and/or strengthened thrusters almost impossible to blow. Therefore police forces would have virtually unlimited time to drop and rescue the ship at high/med security systems. At the same time ships equipped overcharged variants of modules (typically combat ships) would have increased chances to blow.
• Disabled ships as now would have ability to recover (via rebooting or repair) or calling rescue ships, at the same time it would be still possible to stealing cargo from disabled ships (considering cargo load of large ship 700+ tons and limited or no cargo space of combat ships it will take time) or make a raid to the damaged ship (to get materials/data etc).
• Ships which was successfully blown up by critically damaging powerplant//thrusters will spawn significant amount of materials and different mechanical scrap, which can be collected and processed with refinery module. The place will be shown as POI until completely gathered during extended period of time (e.g. 24 hours).
• Pilot from disabled ship should still have ability to trigger emergency eject (more mission opportunities to reactivate ship and steal it or bring back to the station for reward).
• Either blowing the ship or emergency ejecting leads to rebuy screen.
• Make usual ship rebuy/insurance cost much higher (also depending on notoriety, e.g. 50% of current (including engineering) ship cost, so e.g fully engineered Cutter rebuy would be 1B).
• Rebuy can be paid at any time within certain range (e.g. 1 month) allowing to get ship back after earning necessary money.
• And cargo missions (except rare cases with unique cargo) should not fail upon ship destruction allowing to buy/source necessary commodity type and deliver before mission timeout.

The changes should potentially make space for safe for non combat pilots opening new ways to interact in game (like rescue missions).

Hope someone will find any of this useful...

 

[Feye]

Material Gathering

Availability and Time Required​

To obtain them as fast as possible, materials within Grades 1 to 3 are typically traded down from Grade 4 and 5s. To make them worthwhile to gather by themselves, should their availability and the rate at which they are obtained be increased?

Similarly, Grade 5 materials can be traded down into 3 Grade 4 materials within the same category. However, Grade 4 and Grade 5 materials take similar amounts of time to gather. Should the number of materials picked up per instance be increased to account for this?

Going for lower grade materials specifically (for quantities that actually matter) will never be worth the time while Material Traders exist.
If gathering G1-G3 materials is supposed to be worth any Cmdr's time, Material Traders need to go.

We're also aware that some materials are much harder to find than others as they are tied to rarer BGS states. Let us know which materials ought to be made more readily discoverable.

Any estimates regarding how long it took to earn a given Engineered module by gathering materials will also be helpful in addressing this aspect of balancing.

Some Materials being harder to obtain than others is fine by me, however the issue of "just going to a Trader and getting it over with" is still... an issue.
Why even bother searching for things like Pharmaceutical Isolators when you can just farm Imperial Shielding (which is almost everywhere) and still come out on top in terms of time spent?

Alternate Gathering Methods
We appreciate that the repetitive nature of material gathering may not be for everyone. Some have called for ways to earn materials while engaging in the specific types of content they already enjoy.

We'd like to hear your feedback on the idea of unique missions offered by Engineers themselves. These could be repeatable and offer materials specific to the upgrades offered by the Engineer who issues them. Let us know what you think of this idea and how many materials this might offer relative to gathering the materials manually.

I like the idea of Engineers not just being upgrade bots.
While you're at it, make those Missions also Wing based if desired, and have the Wing missions give a nice bonus (like trade dividends for selling stuff in a wing), because Engineering right now is pretty much a solo adventure. It would be nice to have friends tagging along actually be worth something.

Another idea is to allow materials to be "bought" with items that are not obtainable at Commodities Markets. This could include things such as Exploration Data, Bounty Vouchers, Void Opals and Thargoid Hearts and would allow players to earn materials while playing within their chosen disciplines.

That's a "no" from me on that one.
If you go with the Engineers offering Missions to gather Materials it seems like that would at least partially be included in that option.
And if Engineer-missions will not be a thing, I think for how broken OP Engineering is, getting out of your comfort zone to get it isn't too much to ask.

Rolling for Engineering Improvements
Some time ago, Engineering was changed so that some improvement was guaranteed with each roll. However, the amount by which your progress towards the next module grade is still random. This means sometimes the same number of materials will produce a minimal increase. Should this be changed so that the same number of materials are always required to reach the next tier? This would allow Commanders to know exactly how many materials are needed.

No. Keep the randomness, or at least make the "minimum progression rolls" greater than zero.
Cmdrs already can guesstimate an average 10-12 rolls to complete the Grade 5 (and lower grades pretty much don't matter as they mostly use lower grade materials).

Other Feedback and Suggestions
Feel free to respond with other ship Engineering balancing feedback and suggestions that go beyond the ideas mentioned above. To keep the conversation on-topic and help us collect the feedback, this thread will be closely moderated. Please only reply with responses to the topics mentioned and keep feedback constructive. Unrelated or unhelpful posts may be removed during clean-up. If you find this has happened to your post, consider raising your points in another thread within the Dangerous Discussion section.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts!

O7

Engineering "balance"? That hardly exists to be utterly blunt.
It's one of two things depending on what side of the "knowledge barrier" you are:
a) "noob trap". If you're new to Elite and/or don't know anything about any third party tool/website, you'll be stuck at G1 or G2 basically forever as you can spend your lifetime SRV'ing around moons for scraps of Iron or Nickel while never really getting much of anything.
b) totally OP after you fully G5 everything on your ship in about a week's time (or two, depending on your average playtime per day obviously) because you looked up where to go and what to do etc.

The options available aren't really "options" if one of them is better than the other two (or more) in 99% of all cases.
Like when did you ever get anything other than Charge Enhanced + Super Conduits for your PD (min/maxed Explorers go Engine Focus + Stripdown / Cluster Caps to retain boost capabilities with undersized PD)?
Or Heavy Duty Deep Plate for Bulkheads or Hull Reinforcement Packages (except maybe one HRP going for resists if the experimental effects don't get you where you want to be with them)?

Why is every single human made engineered Module better than its Guardian counterpart?
The only guardian items worth using are certain weapons against Thargoids or the Module Reinforcement Package for the modules that have mundane counterparts.

A fully Grade 5 engineered ship is way too strong for the effort it takes to get to that point, or - if you prefer looking at it from another angle - it takes way too little effort to get to G5 for how strong it is (assuming you know what you're doing of course).
I'd rather see diminishing returns than exponential powercreep.

Overall though I think Engineering cannot (and probably will not) ever be properly balanced without wiping the slate clean and starting over - and that would rub many a Cmdr the wrong way no doubt.
So in the end I really don't envy you guys, being stuck between putting the foot down and doing it properly and constantly adjusting the few screws you can fiddle with without triggering an outrage ¯\(ツ)/¯

 

[Cori]

One thing that baffles me is that you can find Intact Cargo Racks that can be cut open with the Arc Cutter on foot, but you can't then pick up the materials that come out from them unless you get into a SRV. Why make it that complicated?

(I'm sure some's mentioned this, but we're already 32 pages in by the time I even heard this thread existed, so...)

 

[Vedmo]

Step 1, drastically reduce the power of all engineering. Like G5 is 10, maybe 15% increase.

Step 2, allow materials and engineered modules to be traded between players/Fleet Carriers.

Step 3, outlaw legacy modules in game, like being scanned with them or being caught using them gives you notoriety and a bounty, and they cannot be replaced via insurance. Eventually that will sort itself out.

 

[brotherlizardo]

I feel material gathering needs adjusting such that you don't need to use logout/login loops to complete. I don't mind making a jump or two in order to get to different type.

The randomness of actual endgineering does not serve a function other than wasting time.

And as for time... all levels of material requirements (engineering, on foot suit/weapons. trade vendors) need to be reduced. Some (on foot) more than others.

People don't play this game to gather materials. They play this game to do things AFTER they have gathered the materials. Focus on the stories, quest, missions, community goals, new things out there to discover, BGS, PowerPlay, Faction wars, bug hunting. Not how long can we keep them collecting materials.

If most of the streamers and tutorial video makers are showing how to loop logouts, mats farming, etc...you are doing it wrong.

 

[ScorpioChrisCBH]

I really wish instead of getting all crazy with "rebalancing" engineering before Odyssey is released all the way, could we please just increase the amount of mats collected per item by 3? Also, making High Grade Emissions available where they should be so we can actually gather them. Like, if there were at least 10 HGEs for the type we want in a system. Right now we are forced to trade across and get only 18 of a G5 mat for spending more than an hour looking for and filling up another G5 to trade down, which zeros it. It takes 7 trips, about 6 hours on a good day to fill a G5 mat...
Ive spent over 100 hours on gathering mats alone and only have 6 G5 ships.
At this new rate, at least id have 18 of my 71 ships done.
To be honest, itd be nice if we got about 6x the amounts. Then I could spend another 150 hours or so and have all them done. Another 150 hours, at 6x the mat increase...
So if it was 3x, about 300 hours. Does that seem fair? At least a 3x increase?
I really thought about this, and I think thats fair. Its still a GRIND, but not soul crushing. It would still take a Vet of Elite more than 80 hours to start a new account, and G5 a ship knowing exactly what they are doing.
Thanks for the listening ear everyone.

 

[Cori]

Also (and this has been mentioned before) update the Odyssey inventory to be a maximum per item, rather than 1,000 overall. You may remember you originally had the Horizons material storage working the same way, but changed it to the current method once you found out it was driving everyone nuts.

I'm still not sure why you thought it was a good idea to implement the Odyssey inventory in the way that was already tried and rejected from Horizons. A bizarre decision.

 

[zikolach]

Well I have three ways of gathering mats.

Manufactured: I take my Vette and stuff it with limpets. Then I go to a CNB and scavenge ships after I blow them up.

Raw: I used to go to the Crystalline Shards. Now I just don't use raw mats anymore, I guess?

Data: I look up where to go (can't remember now), and then I go scan something, relog, and scan again, and relog, and scan ad infinitum. AFAIR it's some ship wreck.

Then I trade.

It would be nice to make relog obsolete, like getting more rare materials after certain condition. Also in Odyssey making filters/heatmaps more meaningful - something similar to overlapping hotspots in rings. Or possibly discovering "Horizons-like" geological/biological sites using skill-based DSS game mechanic.

Step 2, allow materials and engineered modules to be traded between players/Fleet Carriers.

Could be great step forward to introduce cross-play trading for materials/engineered modules/ships, while true cross-play is not possible.

 

[Kaocraft]

We'd like to hear your feedback on the idea of unique missions offered by Engineers themselves. These could be repeatable and offer materials specific to the upgrades offered by the Engineer who issues them.

Yes this is dearly needed. Every upgrade and unlock could have a mission connected to it and this would make it so so so much more interesting working your way through the Engineers.

 

[Bonesaw]

Oh , can we also get the ability to synthesize torpedoes ?

 

[Rubbelspritz]

Hi Bruce and Team,
have you considered to make modules or even ships tradeable between CMDRs? This way you'd have a way to lower the grindwall for new/casual players when they build their ships and at the same time get another stage for player interaction.
You could add a small malus to the properties of any sold modules or ships (on account of them being 'used' items) and by that keep an incentive to engineer modules from scratch.

 

[Xae]

Similarly, Grade 5 materials can be traded down into 3 Grade 4 materials within the same category. However, Grade 4 and Grade 5 materials take similar amounts of time to gather. Should the number of materials picked up per instance be increased to account for this?

Materials are best thought of as a currency. Which means Engineering is a system with over 200 currencies.

That is way too many. For example another game famous for its... generous dedicated to prolonged progression systems, Warframe, has a total of ~60 materials (currencies) that are used for crafting or upgrading on foot, vehicle and ship gameplay. Most games have far fewer types.


Instead of working out ways to transfer materials between types, simply reduce the number of types there are. This would also make materials available through more means and give players more choice in how they acquire them.

Reducing the number of currencies would also make it far easier to track incomes for players and mean you can more easily manage it as well.

You can't manage what you can't measure. If the system is so complex and there are so many materials that you can't programmatically track the rate of collection then you can't monitor and adjust it.


And open up feedback from elsewhere. Engineering was the number one cause of my friends quitting the game. They aren't here. They won't read this. They won't contribute to the discussion. Getting feedback from the players who tolerated the system self-selects to a very small group of people. Take this discussion to other places where former players are and ask them. Their input matters too. As FFXIV's turn around shows, people will gladly return to games they dropped, if the reasons for their leaving are addressed.

 

[Gregorio Cortez]

I'd like to throw in my 3 cents here.
Generally i'd love the idea of more variety of ways to achieve the same goal. Let's have multiple mechanisms that would allow to gather the materials and data, trade them, and acquire them through missions.
Someone mentioned that it would be good to make use of these permit systems that we can get permits to - that's a great idea to combine with missions, data traders, material markets and so on. Mix these things and you'd have more complex and interesting gameplay that makes up a whole more complex universe.
Engineer given missions? I like the idea, and go further - make some of these missions lead to some interesting places, make them available only from certain engineers, and make them another way to unlock some engineers.
Trading mats for exploration data? I'd like the idea but probably for some engineers, not all.
Place some more derelict ships, crash sites, abandoned instalations and settlements around so that it would be easier to get some materials and data.
Another idea - give some more alternatives to use one materials for enginering (substitution, meaning that you could use one type of material or dara or another instead)
Enabling to recycle an engineered module for materials and data would be awesome.

Some might say that these changes would make game easier, but for a lot of people that would make games mor fun. Less grind, and more variety od paths to choose from.

 

[Parduz]

Reducing the number of currencies would also make it far easier to track incomes for players and mean you can more easily manage it as well.

This game emulates a complex reality: in a "perfect balanced game" we could have planets and moons with no money value like the WW or EL but precious as source of raw materials. The more materials you have (talking about RAW) the more different planets may have some meaning.
I may agree that (also) this one is a missed opportunity.

 

[Ashus]

I'd also like to voice my opinion here. A lot of what was said is already great!

What I wanted to add is that I like the idea of getting materials by just participating and engaging with your fun activity like mining, exploration and combat.

The idea is great, it's already implemented, but just needs to be improved upon.

In odyssey with exploration, you can fly over the area to scout for bio/geo sites as they're scattered, it's good exploration fun, but the way engineers is implemented, it will take ages to collect all the materials. The requirements is tedious, but the exploring part is fun, gives a sense of achievement in locating something.

Few changes to implement is the drop rates, increase the drop rate (and count) of lower grade materials. Let them be more common. While rarer grades have minor increase to their drop count depending on where they're found (different sites yield different results, which gives explorers a fun and engaging way to explore planet surfaces while flying by).

This is also done similar to combat, different ships drop different grades, with higher ranked giving rarer mats, while bigger ships giving more drop counts to the mats.

Mining can be done the same.

The idea is to have the materials gathered being apart of what we're engaged in, and not be a separate mini-game grind.

You can then add engineer specific missions which also reward materials for their own engineering type to fill the gap of what you're missing. Say if you're an explorer and do not want to engage in combat to fill the other material grind, take a mission that is similar to passenger runs to scan something in another system.

 

[Pyro247]

Greetings Commanders

Now that Update 8 for Odyssey is live, we'd like to reignite the series of balancing changes that started before Odyssey's release. Now, it's time to turn our attention to ship Engineering. We recognise there has been significant feedback for on-foot Engineering too, but we'd like to approach these one at a time due to the number of aspects involved. Specifically, we'd like to look at the balancing of the Engineering grind, which largely relates to...

Material Gathering

Availability and Time Required​

To obtain them as fast as possible, materials within Grades 1 to 3 are typically traded down from Grade 4 and 5s. To make them worthwhile to gather by themselves, should their availability and the rate at which they are obtained be increased?

Similarly, Grade 5 materials can be traded down into 3 Grade 4 materials within the same category. However, Grade 4 and Grade 5 materials take similar amounts of time to gather. Should the number of materials picked up per instance be increased to account for this?

We're also aware that some materials are much harder to find than others as they are tied to rarer BGS states. Let us know which materials ought to be made more readily discoverable.

Any estimates regarding how long it took to earn a given Engineered module by gathering materials will also be helpful in addressing this aspect of balancing.

Alternate Gathering Methods​

We appreciate that the repetitive nature of material gathering may not be for everyone. Some have called for ways to earn materials while engaging in the specific types of content they already enjoy.

We'd like to hear your feedback on the idea of unique missions offered by Engineers themselves. These could be repeatable and offer materials specific to the upgrades offered by the Engineer who issues them. Let us know what you think of this idea and how many materials this might offer relative to gathering the materials manually.

Another idea is to allow materials to be "bought" with items that are not obtainable at Commodities Markets. This could include things such as Exploration Data, Bounty Vouchers, Void Opals and Thargoid Hearts and would allow players to earn materials while playing within their chosen disciplines.

Rolling for Engineering Improvements​

Some time ago, Engineering was changed so that some improvement was guaranteed with each roll. However, the amount by which your progress towards the next module grade is still random. This means sometimes the same number of materials will produce a minimal increase. Should this be changed so that the same number of materials are always required to reach the next tier? This would allow Commanders to know exactly how many materials are needed.

Other Feedback and Suggestions​

Feel free to respond with other ship Engineering balancing feedback and suggestions that go beyond the ideas mentioned above. To keep the conversation on-topic and help us collect the feedback, this thread will be closely moderated. Please only reply with responses to the topics mentioned and keep feedback constructive. Unrelated or unhelpful posts may be removed during clean-up. If you find this has happened to your post, consider raising your points in another thread within the Dangerous Discussion section.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts!

O7

I would upgrade modules by using them:

CALIBRATION
Your ship's computer collects calibration data of all installed modules during their use.

Aktive modules:
They gain data by action:

• Guns need to be fired and hit a target. Killing a ship will gain a boost.
• Shields need to be hit
• Thrusters need to boost
• Shield cell banks need to fire
• Fuel scoops need to scoop
• Limpet controllers need limpets to work
• Scanner need to scan
• Frame shift drive needs to jump. Loger jumps gain more data

Passive modules:
They gain data by action of active modules Passive modules would be something like power plan or power distributors.

DATA PROCESS
The collected data can be analysed at the specific engineer which upgrades the specific module in the way you want. This way you can just do what you want to do with your setup and level the moodules during real gameplay.

The idea with handing in combat bonds, exporation data and more might have a problem with balancing. There will be one way that is the fastest. This will be shared on YouTube and everyone will just do that to level all modules. Most probably it will be "Road to Riches".