Making conflicts and blockades more interesting and logical

[cool_lad]

One thing that becomes quite clear over time is that there is no real way to blockade any station or planet in the game. This makes all conflict locations seem arbitrary as there is no real reason to be fighting anywhere.

I would like to propose the addition of small 'picket' satellites that are capable of interdicting any ship within a radius of 1-5 ls of their location. These satellites would be deployed near planets and stations and act as checkpoints which would interdict and scan (or allow their accompanying ships to scan) any ships trying to enter the station/area that they cover. This would make checkpoints more significant than a simple arbitrary point in space as they would also contain these picket satellites.

The presence of such satellites would also make for more logical points of conflict as aggressors would actually be capable of blockading stations using these satellites while defenders would try to remove/destroy these satellites; making the places where they are deployed into natural and more logical combat zones with an actual objective for the various sides to fight over. As the conflict progresses, the winning side would move their pickets/blockades closer and closer to the losing side's bases/installations, allowing them to blockade these places into submission through a protracted blockade while also creating opportunities for pilots brave enough to run these blockades (by overcoming their interdictions and/or surviving the picketing ships) in order to deliver much needed supplies to these stations for either lucrative payouts as part of blockade running missions or in order to sell these goods at extremely high markups (caused by shortages brought on by the blockade).

 

[Marc_Hicks]

One thing that becomes quite clear over time is that there is no real way to blockade any station or planet in the game. This makes all conflict locations seem arbitrary as there is no real reason to be fighting anywhere.

I would like to propose the addition of small 'picket' satellites that are capable of interdicting any ship within a radius of 1-5 ls of their location. These satellites would be deployed near planets and stations and act as checkpoints which would interdict and scan (or allow their accompanying ships to scan) any ships trying to enter the station/area that they cover. This would make checkpoints more significant than a simple arbitrary point in space as they would also contain these picket satellites.

The presence of such satellites would also make for more logical points of conflict as aggressors would actually be capable of blockading stations using these satellites while defenders would try to remove/destroy these satellites; making the places where they are deployed into natural and more logical combat zones with an actual objective for the various sides to fight over. As the conflict progresses, the winning side would move their pickets/blockades closer and closer to the losing side's bases/installations, allowing them to blockade these places into submission through a protracted blockade while also creating opportunities for pilots brave enough to run these blockades (by overcoming their interdictions and/or surviving the picketing ships) in order to deliver much needed supplies to these stations for either lucrative payouts as part of blockade running missions or in order to sell these goods at extremely high markups (caused by shortages brought on by the blockade).

Heck, they could do a lot just by making those Checkpoints useful. You see them scattered throughout Systems in War or Lockdown states......but they really seem to serve no function. Have Checkpoints be an actual asset, one that gives out a strong "Interdiction Pulse"-for want of a better word-a "pulse" that can significantly slow down ships in Super-cruise or, at close enough range, pull them out of Super-cruise altogether. Also make Checkpoints a focal point for Security/Military ships, who will be patrolling the area looking to interdict any vessel not pledged to their faction. This then makes Checkpoints a serious impediment to free travel within these kinds of systems, forcing players with less than honourable intentions to try & travel as far from these checkpoints as possible. A difficult prospect if they are placed squarely between your system entry point & your destination.

Also, why stop there? Why not have USS's containing mine-fields? They might be hard to detect at longer ranges &, if you get to close to it, then you can get wrenched out of Super-Cruise & left within a massive field of mines.......mines that make recharging your FSD difficult too.

Lastly, I have said elsewhere that Conflict Zones need to be made more interesting, by having actual assets within them over which each side is fighting. Plus the Flagship of each side should be able to offer specific missions to Commanders or Wings engaged in the conflict.

Just some extra thoughts.

 

[cool_lad]

Heck, they could do a lot just by making those Checkpoints useful. You see them scattered throughout Systems in War or Lockdown states......but they really seem to serve no function. Have Checkpoints be an actual asset, one that gives out a strong "Interdiction Pulse"-for want of a better word-a "pulse" that can significantly slow down ships in Super-cruise or, at close enough range, pull them out of Super-cruise altogether. Also make Checkpoints a focal point for Security/Military ships, who will be patrolling the area looking to interdict any vessel not pledged to their faction. This then makes Checkpoints a serious impediment to free travel within these kinds of systems, forcing players with less than honourable intentions to try & travel as far from these checkpoints as possible. A difficult prospect if they are placed squarely between your system entry point & your destination.

Also, why stop there? Why not have USS's containing mine-fields? They might be hard to detect at longer ranges &, if you get to close to it, then you can get wrenched out of Super-Cruise & left within a massive field of mines.......mines that make recharging your FSD difficult too.

Lastly, I have said elsewhere that Conflict Zones need to be made more interesting, by having actual assets within them over which each side is fighting. Plus the Flagship of each side should be able to offer specific missions to Commanders or Wings engaged in the conflict.

Just some extra thoughts.

That's sort of the idea. Conflicts and conflict zones should make some sort of strategic sense. There's also the idea that blockade running should be a profitable if risky profession.

 

[Paul_Crowther]

Interesting idea, thanks for the suggestion!

 

[Howard o Pato]

(mind blowing meme!)

I really like this, it makes a lot more sense to interdict technology.
Systems like the Sun could have some of those that would tip you off to stop in front of the federal fleets for a routine scan. This would represent a real line of defense for anything significant

 

[ATrifleMiffed]

I seem to recall making a suggestion like this a few years ago, but why not take it a step further? Okay, how's this for a slice of fried gold, if the faction setting up the checkpoint is Federal or Imperial aligned, you could in some cases replace the satellite and its guard fleet with a capital ship + escorts. Capital ships don't make a lot of strategic sense in Elite right now, BUT, handwave that only a capital ship or a dedicated station is large enough to power an "interdiction volume generator". This generator would interdict any ship entering its interdicted volume (a few ls, like suggested), with interdiction difficulty increasing as you get closer to its centre (something something inverse square law). The interdicted ship is then pulled to the satellite/capital for a scan and a friendly railgun volley to the reactor if they happen to be doing missions for the enemy. If they escape, there's a cooldown (ahem, "frame shift field instability") that prevents them from being caught again for, say, 20 seconds.

What does this do? Well, primarily, it makes the Imperial capital ship's name make sense, hooray! It also allows a way for conflict zones to develop organically. An interdiction checkpoint would have a "fleet strength" statistic, that can be depleted either by player actions (what do you mean, that sounds like a mini community goal?) or by the opposing faction attacking it, after a while. This would turn the checkpoint into a conflict zone, first a low intensity one (a few small raids on the ship) and then a high intensity one (bigger scraps, with optional capital ship intervention if available). Oh, and disable the interdiction bubble when the conflict zones start. If either of these deplete the interdicting fleet's strength, the checkpoint vanishes and that region of space is cleared. If they don't manage to deplete it before the attacks end (something something casualties), it goes back to being a checkpoint, with a lowered fleet strength. And obviously, missions would spawn to attack it. You could adapt this to Thargoids, too, systems under attack having Thargoid interdiction zones (an NHSS with an interdiction field around it, essentially) to make them a threat to people who aren't actively hunting Thargoids (and incentivise Thargoid hunting through high paying missions to get rid of them). And missions to deliver to stations being interdicted would have to obviously pay big premiums to justify the risk. The fleet strengths would probably have to scale with the number of players participating, a bit like GW2's dynamic events, so they don't get immediately killed by large player groups.

CZs around other installations would be pretty cool as well. Hell, CZs around stations (with a similar strength mechanic to the checkpoints in both cases), where if the station's faction loses it enters a watered-down version of the repairing state when the winner takes over. And obviously, this would have to include capital ship-on-station battles, because Nevermore vs. station was way too awesome to only happen once.

 

[Andovar]

Love this idea.
I've wanted CZ's to have meaning for a long time.
This is a really ingenious way of creating "front lines", and creating more believable and easily identifiable win/loss scenarios. Instead of the current "how many npc's can i blow up from the endless CZ spawns".

The only small tweak I'd make is to have the pickets broadcast a FSD disruptor within a specific area around them, basically causing a hard-drop to ships that pass in the area.
As I'm not sure the interdiction mechanic could work with a stationary object. It just seems strange to me the idea of multiple ships fighting an interdiction against a satellite.

 

[ATrifleMiffed]

Well, I wasn't thinking of exactly copying it one-to-one, but sort of making it apply a hard brake to ships (to keep them in the bubble until they manage to escape) and bend their trajectory towards the interdictor in addition to the normal interdiction escape tunnel - imagine a sort of lasso for FSDs, basically. The thinking behind this being that the picket wouldn't be mandatory, but a failure state for people trying to run the blockade. If you can't escape the interdictor you get kicked out, pulled to the interdictor, scanned and quite possibly shot. If you do escape it, you're immune to it for a short while (you'd also have this immunity if you managed to escape back into supercruise) and can get to your destination safely. Perhaps the bubble could have two layers, an outer interdiction tunnel layer and an inner instant-drop layer to snag people who are really careless with their flying.

I'd probably not make every checkpoint like this, hell, maybe only give one station per system a "blockaded" state that includes an interdictor. Kind of like damaged and repairing stations, but with a much shorter duration.

Oh, and another thing - conflict-specific USS would be awfully nice. Call them Skirmishes, make them essentially small, transient CZs with a fixed number of participants and the same faction-picking system as big CZs, and a variety of scenarios - maybe a battle around a satellite, or a damaged capital ship, or a raid on a convoy, etc. A way for players in smaller, more fragile ships to get combat bonds and take part in war massacres without diving into a CZ. Because while CZs are quite fun, they're also... pretty hardcore nowadays.

 

[RamirezKurita]

An alternative could be that players have to get docking codes (which would be single use) for a station under any kind of super-security (lockdown, war or simply very high security system) from the interdictor beacon, so rather than the beacon itself actively stopping people it simply adds an extra hoop for players to jump through and increases the difficulty for smuggling into high security stations as they would be swarming with system security. This could also add extra gameplay regarding players who wish to smuggle, as there could be extra gameplay facets regarding getting contacts in the station to let you in without docking codes or to buy unused codes from anonymous blackmarket sources.

 

[K M Butler]

If I wanted to be affected by somebodies blockade, I'd play in open. I do not like somedude deciding for me what my gameplay is.

 

[Marc_Hicks]

If I wanted to be affected by somebodies blockade, I'd play in open. I do not like somedude deciding for me what my gameplay is.

Yawn. You're actually not helping. Clearly you want a game in permanent Easy mode. Have you considered Animal Crossing? Sounds like its more up your alley.

 

[Marc_Hicks]

One thought I had a while back, also, was to make Conflict Zones a bit like competitive Community Goals. As one side racks up kills (or completes Conflict Zone Specific side-missions), they fill up their "victory bar". Once one side wins the battle, then that Conflict Zone shuts down & a new one crops up, closer to an asset (Station/Settlement/Outpost) belonging to the loser......until such time as the Conflict Zone engulfs that actual asset. Really give the feeling of a shifting line of battle, rather than just random Signal Sources dotted around the place.

Love this idea.
I've wanted CZ's to have meaning for a long time.
This is a really ingenious way of creating "front lines", and creating more believable and easily identifiable win/loss scenarios. Instead of the current "how many npc's can i blow up from the endless CZ spawns".

The only small tweak I'd make is to have the pickets broadcast a FSD disruptor within a specific area around them, basically causing a hard-drop to ships that pass in the area.
As I'm not sure the interdiction mechanic could work with a stationary object. It just seems strange to me the idea of multiple ships fighting an interdiction against a satellite.

Yep, pretty much what I was referring to in relation to Checkpoints. Give them an actual function.

 

[Marc_Hicks]

An alternative could be that players have to get docking codes (which would be single use) for a station under any kind of super-security (lockdown, war or simply very high security system) from the interdictor beacon, so rather than the beacon itself actively stopping people it simply adds an extra hoop for players to jump through and increases the difficulty for smuggling into high security stations as they would be swarming with system security. This could also add extra gameplay regarding players who wish to smuggle, as there could be extra gameplay facets regarding getting contacts in the station to let you in without docking codes or to buy unused codes from anonymous blackmarket sources.

Interestingly, I have said for a while now that Anonymous Protocols should be a method of docking that needs to be earned, not given gratis. Basically the criminal player needs to hack themselves into the Docking System to get back door access.

Of course, I also believe that most systems need to contain at least one facility that is controlled by a local criminal faction-one that can only be learned about by either having Rep with that Faction, or by having a high enough Notoriety.

 

[rootsrat]

Heck, they could do a lot just by making those Checkpoints useful. You see them scattered throughout Systems in War or Lockdown states......but they really seem to serve no function. Have Checkpoints be an actual asset, one that gives out a strong "Interdiction Pulse"-for want of a better word-a "pulse" that can significantly slow down ships in Super-cruise or, at close enough range, pull them out of Super-cruise altogether. Also make Checkpoints a focal point for Security/Military ships, who will be patrolling the area looking to interdict any vessel not pledged to their faction. This then makes Checkpoints a serious impediment to free travel within these kinds of systems, forcing players with less than honourable intentions to try & travel as far from these checkpoints as possible. A difficult prospect if they are placed squarely between your system entry point & your destination.

Also, why stop there? Why not have USS's containing mine-fields? They might be hard to detect at longer ranges &, if you get to close to it, then you can get wrenched out of Super-Cruise & left within a massive field of mines.......mines that make recharging your FSD difficult too.

Lastly, I have said elsewhere that Conflict Zones need to be made more interesting, by having actual assets within them over which each side is fighting. Plus the Flagship of each side should be able to offer specific missions to Commanders or Wings engaged in the conflict.

Just some extra thoughts.

Oooh, adding "Pointless Checkpoints" to my immersion breakers list. It's something that bugged me for a while now, but I forgot about it

 

[Marc_Hicks]

Oooh, adding "Pointless Checkpoints" to my immersion breakers list. It's something that bugged me for a while now, but I forgot about it

Happy to be of service, rootsrat. It has annoyed me for the longest time. They're a hold-over from when the in-system travel method was going to be "micro-jumps", but they failed to change or remove the checkpoints once Super-Cruise was settled on. Would it really be so tough to give them an Interdiction Field ability, within a certain range?

 

[Andovar]

If I wanted to be affected by somebodies blockade, I'd play in open. I do not like somedude deciding for me what my gameplay is.

Is it ok if the "some dude" is the dev team? Because this mechanic could easily be employed by NPC's, making it viable to be implemented in solo/PG.
The idea here is to make conflict zones and war states more interesting and compelling.

If combat isn't your cup of tea, that's fine. These areas could easily be avoided just like they can be now.
It's a huge galaxy, and there's plenty of room for a wide variety of content. Elements you don't care for in a few areas does not mean it's being forced upon you.

 

[Parmo]

Yawn. You're actually not helping. Clearly you want a game in permanent Easy mode. Have you considered Animal Crossing? Sounds like its more up your alley.

And just what is wrong with someone wanting a permanent easy mode?
The same as someone wanting to have a permanent hard mode?

You're very ready to dismiss others wishes when it comes to your own wishes for this game.

Not very helpful.

 

[Marra Morgan]

Some great ideas here

Is it ok if the "some dude" is the dev team? Because this mechanic could easily be employed by NPC's, making it viable to be implemented in solo/PG.
The idea here is to make conflict zones and war states more interesting and compelling.

If combat isn't your cup of tea, that's fine. These areas could easily be avoided just like they can be now.
It's a huge galaxy, and there's plenty of room for a wide variety of content. Elements you don't care for in a few areas does not mean it's being forced upon you.

I was thinking the same thing too! As part of the BGS, it would make War, Unrest and Lockdown much more dynamic and interesting, as well as being available to everyone in all modes.

 

[K M Butler]

Dude Alpha wishes to build sandcastles without maybedude Bravo kicking them. Is this "easy mode"? Who's the jerk?
Nondude Charlie is playing chess with dudette Delta, in a Moscow park, in November. Without wanting weredude Echo sitting on the board. Is this easy mode? Who's the jerk?

 

[Marra Morgan]

Dude Alpha wishes to build sandcastles without maybedude Bravo kicking them. Is this "easy mode"? Who's the jerk?
Nondude Charlie is playing chess with dudette Delta, in a Moscow park, in November. Without wanting weredude Echo sitting on the board. Is this easy mode? Who's the jerk?

These ideas are to give us more interesting stuff to do when BGS states are in effect (which affect all modes). Rather than talk in vague notions of sandcastles and chess games, maybe you could articulate your concerns about how these ideas would adversely affect your game?