My first post, so please let me know how I go.
Hands down, the tediousness of some of the simple tasks and the grind to reduce accessibility to engineering are my two largest sources of frustration with this beautiful game. To reduce the tediousness of tasks that, in real life, wouldn't be necessary and render engineering access more logical and reduce 'farm-grind':
1. A player-selected starport that you can save loadouts at. Even better if we could adjust the saved loadouts via browser (similar to the Coriolis.io layout), regardless of platform and without initialising the game itself.
Logic: a hired NPC (similar to a pilot that remains in the Crew Lounge) will take a percentage of all earnings to save your hardpoint loadouts and outfit your ship upon player input in a submenu within the hangar.
2. The grind requirements for engineering experimentation is highly off-putting for a significant number of players, particularly the ones that invest in the game over an extended period of time. Lower the grind requirements for re-engineering by enabling the player to unlock each engineering option (both upgrades and experimentals) and then pay credits to switch between them. If done well enough, this would remove the necessity of delivering x tonnes of y commodity to the engineer to 'unlock' them as well.
Logic: the engineer offers services for a living, so would naturally have steady access to resources like any long-standing business would. Credits would be sufficient payment for services. If additional player investment/grind is preferred by the developers, players could assist with a ONE-OFF shipments of resources/materials from a station to the engineer's base by directly transporting them or by escorting trade vessels through a couple of interdiction attempts to PERMANENTLY UNLOCK selected engineering options for purchase with credits. This would 'replenish the stock' of an engineering option (e.g. Dirty Drives upgrade or Phasing Sequence experimental) that would be purchasable with credits for the remainder of the game. [I.e. Player selects 'Transport' or 'Escort' -> player selects up to two engineering options (can select two upgrade types, two experimentals or one of each) to unlock -> player is provided with the system and station names -> player accepts the mission]. You can enable a wing-style option where up to 3 engineering options are unlocked for each player but the difficulty is increased.
3. Queue engineering requests from your home station similar to how you request that an owned ship be transported to your current station.
Logic: Place orders with the employed NPC at the player's home starport (point 1) to ship a hardpoint/module to an engineer, have the requested engineering done and have it shipped back to the station. This becomes available once points 1 and 2 have been completed.
4. Provide 'engineering tokens' to be obtainable for significant contributions to interstellar initiatives that unlock 3/2/1 engineering options. Encourage further participation in interstellar initiatives at the same time.
Logic: 'Our network of engineers are aware of your contributions to the recent interstellar initiatives. This one's on the house.'
EDIT: Underlined for clarity of each point [tl;dr beacons].
Hands down, the tediousness of some of the simple tasks and the grind to reduce accessibility to engineering are my two largest sources of frustration with this beautiful game. To reduce the tediousness of tasks that, in real life, wouldn't be necessary and render engineering access more logical and reduce 'farm-grind':
1. A player-selected starport that you can save loadouts at. Even better if we could adjust the saved loadouts via browser (similar to the Coriolis.io layout), regardless of platform and without initialising the game itself.
Logic: a hired NPC (similar to a pilot that remains in the Crew Lounge) will take a percentage of all earnings to save your hardpoint loadouts and outfit your ship upon player input in a submenu within the hangar.
2. The grind requirements for engineering experimentation is highly off-putting for a significant number of players, particularly the ones that invest in the game over an extended period of time. Lower the grind requirements for re-engineering by enabling the player to unlock each engineering option (both upgrades and experimentals) and then pay credits to switch between them. If done well enough, this would remove the necessity of delivering x tonnes of y commodity to the engineer to 'unlock' them as well.
Logic: the engineer offers services for a living, so would naturally have steady access to resources like any long-standing business would. Credits would be sufficient payment for services. If additional player investment/grind is preferred by the developers, players could assist with a ONE-OFF shipments of resources/materials from a station to the engineer's base by directly transporting them or by escorting trade vessels through a couple of interdiction attempts to PERMANENTLY UNLOCK selected engineering options for purchase with credits. This would 'replenish the stock' of an engineering option (e.g. Dirty Drives upgrade or Phasing Sequence experimental) that would be purchasable with credits for the remainder of the game. [I.e. Player selects 'Transport' or 'Escort' -> player selects up to two engineering options (can select two upgrade types, two experimentals or one of each) to unlock -> player is provided with the system and station names -> player accepts the mission]. You can enable a wing-style option where up to 3 engineering options are unlocked for each player but the difficulty is increased.
3. Queue engineering requests from your home station similar to how you request that an owned ship be transported to your current station.
Logic: Place orders with the employed NPC at the player's home starport (point 1) to ship a hardpoint/module to an engineer, have the requested engineering done and have it shipped back to the station. This becomes available once points 1 and 2 have been completed.
4. Provide 'engineering tokens' to be obtainable for significant contributions to interstellar initiatives that unlock 3/2/1 engineering options. Encourage further participation in interstellar initiatives at the same time.
Logic: 'Our network of engineers are aware of your contributions to the recent interstellar initiatives. This one's on the house.'
EDIT: Underlined for clarity of each point [tl;dr beacons].
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