Player owned planetary bases

hitchhiker54

hitchhiker54
The idea is planet side holdings for single players and, after q4, squadrons. The base starts small, not much more than a shed with a defined area big enough for one ship of any size to land.

  • The desired position could be marked upon landing and processed at next server downtime; a first come first serve basis in the off chance of multiple players claiming same area.
  • To mark the spot the player deploys an 'egg' unit from cargo hold. A suitably large item and expensive, this is the popup tent of base construction with basic power and gear to produce a landing strip.
  • The owner can start to land ships here and deliver goods and materials (think wing delivery/engineer unlock screen) to open up new base sections (think tech broker).
  • At this initial stage only the 'base broker' contact should be available from services to begin fleshing out the base. The player must land on the defined area to access the services as normal.
  • Famous and landmark systems should be off limits Sol, Achenar etc.
  • A single base owned by a player only, ditto for a squadron owned base. Bases can be abandoned if the player wishes to move and begin again elsewhere.

Upgrades begin on first downtime after the material/cargo deliveries to unlock are completed, finish X downtimes later depending on addon.

Theoretical base addons :
  • Control hub - the base can be seen on the map and gains a lock on from left panel.
  • 'Real' docking facilities; varying costs for s, m + l sizes with limits to numbers defined by base blueprint. Different base blueprint for player and squadron owned?
  • Repair facility
  • Restock Facility - a use for mining gear at a base?
  • Refuel facility
  • Contacts Office
  • Shipyard - No ships for sale, but to allow player ship storage
  • Outfitting - No modules sold but to allow for player module storage
  • Market - Allow for deep space bases to make money from mining. Repairs go offline if certain items deplete?
  • Decorative - Gardens, Mining gear, Solar arrays etc

While allowing players to mine distant worlds for saleable materials with a base would be fun for immersion, it might create too much of an 'I win' for credits so the value of the base is a matter of making a tiny part of the galaxy your own.
 

TheOriginalB

TheOriginalB
Amazing idea! (I literally submitted something with the same title a month or so ago, and I'm sure I wasn't the first.)

In fact, I was mentally refining my idea in the shower this morning and I came to some of the same progression conclusions you did. I think this is an excellent opportunity to introduce new engineers and deeper content.

Mechanically speaking, I'd love to see this:
1) You buy a Outpost Auto-Fabrication Ship from certain shipyards. There are different manufacturers, all of which will result in different looking bases. I'd like to see a Core Dynamics one and a Gutamaya one rank-locked to something high, while there's a Lakon one and a DeLacy one. The resulting bases will have visual cues distinct to each manufacturer.
2) It comes with a small landing pad on top of it. To get in, you must dock a small-pad vessel on it, and enter the ship. It then has the same jump range as the ship you docked in it. It's roughly the size of a Type-10 but doesn't handle nearly as well. You can fly it like a normal ship and land it, but, instead of launching an SRV or anything, it gives you the ability to deploy a planetside base. The ship then basically burrows into the ground leaving only the dock remaining above ground. You're given the opportunity to name your settlement.
3) You appear in the small ship you initially docked in. (This ensures that you can never go somewhere you can't get out of.) Landing at your outpost gives you the option to refuel, but that's about it. Everything else is disabled at this point.

At this point, this is where you build out your station.
- Do you want to be able to sell cartographic information? You need to deliver X amount of exploration data to an engineer somewhere in order to get the module to upgrade the station.
- Want to be able to restock ammunition? A different engineer will help you get the autofabrication module for that, but only if you complete some relevant task.
- Want to upgrade to a medium or large landing pad? That's as simple as delivering a non-trivial amount of relevant commodities (similar to but on a smaller scale than repairing a base.)
- Want to be able to outfit your ships? An engineer can help you enable that, then use materials and data to help you unlock various modules. (I should note here that I would hope you, as the station owner, get at least a 10% discount on all ships and outfitting at your station.)
- Want a shipyard? Different engineers for each manufacturer, and these ones offer specific linked/chain missions to be able to have different types of ships. (I'm toying with the idea of having some points system that calculates how far you are from Sol and from Colonia and then only allows you have have a number of ships that totals up to that amount, mostly in order to prevent your local Federal Corvette wholesaler from setting up shop at Saggitarius A*. For instance, the center of the galaxy would give you enough points to sell a Cobra Mk III, a Diamondback Explorer, an Asp Explorer, and maybe even a Python, but setting up just outside the bubble would allow you to unlock everything.)
- Want to add a passenger lounge to your base? Yep, you guessed it, another engineer helps you with that.
- Want some base security flying around? Visit your local manufacturer-specific engineer to help unlock varying levels of security, from a token sidewinder to a couple Pythons doing loops around.

But wait, there's more!

The Frontier store would have a whole new section for base cosmetics, including choices for a sign welcoming people to your base, voice packs for the traffic controller, and other customizations. This would be a lot of design work (different base visuals, lots of cosmetics, etc) but I imagine there would be quite a bit of income from these.

Anyway, I'm on board!
 

Flatkat

Flatkat
That's a pretty cool idea. It'd be a good way to expand the uninhabited universe. Although there are currently more important issues to be fixed first.
BTW Stabby Dave, love your username, made me laugh [big grin]
 
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Gun Star

Gun Star
The only way I can see it work is it's just a place to hang you hat/ship/ship parts.

To keep it fair you cant gain any credits from it and if it has services you still have to pay for them.
 
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shemmie

shemmie
Absolutely awesome idea, that helps to address the... kinda emptiness, and the lack of "being able to make your mark" on the galaxy.

The universe isn't "read-only", we strive to make our mark on it.
 
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LuxAeterna

LuxAeterna
Cool idea! I would also set limitations where they can't be placed in relation to an existing planetary NPC base(s) or a CMDR's base (i.e. Players can't build within 100km of another player's or NPC's base; ??or any POI??.)

This would prevent any opposing forces from setting up a base a few meters from yours; or letting a player setup next door to an Engineer/NPC base; or setting up near a resource POI (Thargoid stuffs, crashed ships, etc.).

I can already imagine a large city of player bases surrounding their favorite Engineer or Thargoid POI...
 
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Mags885

M
I think this is a great idea, it'd also be pretty knarly if we as a community could begin to "war" against each other and have these bases as HQs that could be attacked, sieged and whatever else you can imagine.

"Warring Squadrons" would be amazing if you could have a MOB (HQ), with several smaller "FOB"s (forward operating bases) located in systems close by meaning that players can fight over territory and resources.
 

Mags885

M
Gun Star said:
...To keep it fair you cant gain any credits from it and if it has services you still have to pay for them.
Click to expand...

Personally, although I agree and understand - I think you should be able to earn from them if other players land at them, either that or services operate at a highly discounted rate.
 

Justinian Octavius

Justinian Octavius
There should be an in game method for Player Groups to create their own planetary & space assets in the future other than via Community Goals as they do now; fleet carriers I assume would will be the model for this. The first steps though should be, imho, merging Squadrons & PMF's and increasing PMF functionality so that if they own a port or control a system they can have some tangible impact upon said asset or system.

CMDR Justinian Octavius
 

trollson

trollson
I would really love this type of thing in the game - but have my doubts whether it fits into the current manifesto or implementation.

Fixed locations structures seem to be hard-coded into the game, only appearing or changing with server updates. For player build structures this would have to change -- structures would have to be able to evolve in real time, visible to all.

Were we to have player built or owned structures, they would have to exist to all players -- in open, solo, and group modes. Otherwise the universe would look different. So then we get into the tricky realm of other players interacting with your stuff, especially from, say, a private group. Unless they are purely look-but-don't touch - which is possible, but gets boring as you can't invite friends over to see your collection of etchings.

Data and bandwidth is a limitation. The number of sites per context (loading) would have to be limited. Unless bases are represented through a procedural creation system, then the limit becomes a total complexity -- you can't add a parlour because your neighbour has built too many swimming pools.

I suspect that if we ever see anything like this it will be part of the space legs. So don't hold your breath (in space you'll explode).
 

MarkSimpson UK

M
"Minecraft" can do all this easily. Other games, like "Planetbase" and "Surviving Mars" do it in a similar way, but with higher maintainance aspects. Once the assets are isolated and made positionable by the player, it should all fit into place, ....quite literally
The main point is, as humans, we are pre-dispositioned for exploration, settlement and exploitation of natural resources. Settling on a stellar body, building a base and mining a shelter under the surface is as natural to us as procreation! FAR MORE natural than orbital structures! Far more safe and defendable! Just look at the plans being imagined for our exploration of Mars, if you need inspiration!
 

TheOriginalB

TheOriginalB
In my head, there are pretty strict criteria for creating a player-owned planetary base:
1) It can't be on a planet with an existing non-player-owned base
2) It can't be within X range of an existing player-owned base (alternatively, perhaps no more than 2 player-owned bases per planet or something)
3) Creating a base includes some terraforming, such that there needs to be a sufficiently open space around the zone that can be leveled out, which would likely make adding base assets much easier.

Of course, the byproduct of this is that some industrious players will create bases near Saggitarius A* or near Beagle Point. If this isn't desired behavior, they can, of course, introduce restrictions on the deployment of the base, such as "only within 400 lys of Sol" or something like that.

But having the base deployment terraform an area will make adding the physical assets easier. As for updates in real-time, it could be that there's a delay for physical building that only happens during the server tick, or only happens when the instance is re-created. Maybe a shielded area pops up, slowly displacing any ships or players there, and then the improvements are built underneath it (out of sight), with the shield dropping when the build-out is completed.

I mean, there are a bunch of mechanical ways to make this work. I don't need to be able to place the upgrades to my base, I just want them there, so if all the bases of a type look the same (except for optional cosmetic upgrades) I'm okay with that.
 

Knot2clever

Knot2clever
Over the years this has been proposed many times. The response has always been the same. Great to see it being brought up yet again, 4 weeks seems so long ago.
 
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