"Power Toggle" option(s) - In effect allow ED to turn defined modules power on/off at press of a key

[NeilF]

"Power Toggle" option(s) - In effect allow ED to turn defined modules power on/off at press of a key

Anyone who's play ED for a while know in some ships it might be useful to switch modules on/off manually from time to time.

This can obviously be achieve by simply doing it manually in the right panel, or even using third party apps to throw keyboard depressions into ED to try and automate it.

Why not offer two new "Power Toggle" columns down the existing modules screen. In each you can allocate a "1" or a "2". Then in your keyboard binding you can assign any key you like to Power Toggle 1 and Power Toggle 2. The modules assigned a "1" or a "2" would then simply be toggled on/off at the press of these two keys.

This would then allow you to have to options to turn any module(s) you wish off/on.


Obviously this is a fairly simple approach, but I feel it would at least give a reasonable amount of functionality for a very small amount of development effort?

 

[Magic Man]

It already works like this automatically, hence the power priorities.

 

[NeilF]

It already works like this automatically, hence the power priorities.

Huh?

It already works like what automatically?

What have power priorities got to do with the question at hand?

 

[Magic Man]

You suggest two power groups to be able to turn each on/off.

Diving modules into 2 or more priorities will automatically switch things off as and when needed, effectively achieving the same thing, certainly achieving what you'd set up with only 2 groups.

Your micro managing, there's no real need to. It's not really the intention that you switch things on and off just to eek out enough power to fire that gun and power that SCB that, really, are too power hungry for you ship setup

Give an example of how you'd set your two groups up.

 

[NeilF]

You suggest two power groups to be able to turn each on/off.

Diving modules into 2 or more priorities will automatically switch things off as and when needed, effectively achieving the same thing, certainly achieving what you'd set up with only 2 groups.

Your micro managing, there's no real need to. It's not really the intention that you switch things on and off just to eek out enough power to fire that gun and power that SCB that, really, are too power hungry for you ship setup

Give an example of how you'd set your two groups up.

Ahh I see the confusion. (I should have included an example in the OP maybe )


A classic example maybe...

SCB | Currently Off | "1"
Beam Laser | Currently On | "1"

Power toggle "1" is assigned to F8 in controls.

When you press F8 the SCB's and Beam Lasers power are toggled. ie: The SCB is now turned on, the beam laser now off. ie: There's no enough power for both at the same time.
​

I might then set all my Shield Boosters to Power Toggle 2, maybe on F9. So if my shields completely fail I can get it back up online quicker by pressing F9 to turn all the Boosters Off. When my shields come back up, press F9 again to toggle their power from off to on.


A lot of people are doing various flavours of this, but at the moment manually by ducking into the right panel and beavering through the interface, or doing scripts to do the same quicker.

I'm simply suggesting make it simpler/easier/more friendly. It would also mean you hopefully have more interesting controls to hand to make it a bit deeper/more interesting...

ps: I suspect the folks enjoying cold running could assign loads of stuff to one of these "toggles" too?

 

[Magic Man]

I personally don't think you should need to micro manage to that level just to carry and power things that really are just too powerful for your ship, you're playing it wrong and gaming it like that

If things are switched on/off then there should be some penalty, they should take some time to come back online and also have the risk of some form of damage for being toggled in such a way.

 

[Ben Ryder]

No thanks. No keyboard short cuts. That's the skill of using the panels in combat and manually piloting your ship taken away and reduced to a key bind. Too arcade gamer for my liking.

The panel use makes elite dangerous different from other games. More Sim. Less zap zap.

 

[NeilF]

^^ Fair enough.

What we end up with then is people who simply "don't know how to" potentially being at a disadvantage.

For example, I'll happily continue press my F5 key to just run a script to zoom through my modules in couple of second to bring my SCB up online which other couldn' t be powered. Likewise my F6 key to turn my shield booster off/on. And these I've optimised down to a tenth of a second to get them as quick/efficient as possible.

Personally I think it would be better if more configs and controls are given to players mroe easily to hand to make the experience more varied/deeper etc... Makes it more sim, less zap zap.


As I remember reading once... Just because a carpenter can bang nails in with his bare hands, it doesn't make him a better carpenter

Better to give the carpenters loads of tools and see what they come up with

 

[Magic Man]

No thanks. No keyboard short cuts. That's the skill of using the panels in combat and manually piloting your ship taken away and reduced to a key bind. Too arcade gamer for my liking.

The panel use makes elite dangerous different from other games. More Sim. Less zap zap.

^ This.
Unfortunately, I think we are in the minority. Most seem to want to make things as easy as possible to go pew pew and make Elite not much more than a simple space shooter.

 

[NeilF]

^ This.
Unfortunately, I think we are in the minority. Most seem to want to make things as easy as possible to go pew pew and make Elite not much more than a simple space shooter.

As I said above. I'd just have loads of variety, flexibility and depth to really mix things up. I don't see hiding functionallity behind an unnecessarily difficult interface as achieving this. If functionality can be streamlined down to a single key, why not. What does pee'ing about achieving the same through X screens and key depressions truly add? That's not really depth... It's just needless faff, in search of depth

Hell, I'd even like scripts/code you could even put into your own ships computer to allow you do things to try and improve your ships behaviour.

As for using derogatory terms infering my suggestion is "mindless pew pew" rather than some "superior sim suggestion" - * Not appreciated TBH *

 

[goemon]

power things that really are just too powerful for your ship, you're playing it wrong and gaming it like that.

i think you are very wrong on that. parts of later gameplay do include powermanagement. just two examples: exploring (speeding up jumps by getting your heat down, so you can jump out of a corona), smuggling (less heat - less visibility). i end up overpowering my smuggling ship, so automatic disenabling works with one click ("deploy").

i like the suggestion, still you would need to carefully choose your set-up.

 

[NeilF]

i think you are very wrong on that. parts of later gameplay do include powermanagement. just two examples: exploring (speeding up jumps by getting your heat down, so you can jump out of a corona), smuggling (less heat - less visibility). i end up overpowering my smuggling ship, so automatic disenabling works with one click ("deploy").

i like the suggestion, still you would need to carefully choose your set-up.

Indeed, you could assign a bunch of modules on your exploration ship to "Power Toggle 1" and turn them all off when you need to try and keep cool.... and then turn them back on again afterwards.

Or are we really suggesting pressing "4", "E", "space", "S", "S", "S" "space", "S" "space", "S", "space," results in a better game than allowing players to taylor their ship to their liking, defining things properly once, and pressing just "F5" to achieve the same? Faff is not depth... It's faff

 

[Magic Man]

It's not faff, it's accepted and logical procedure, which is depth making use of the developed system screens (the method of activation of those screens in an unfortunate consequence of us trying to simulate them)

A single button to turn groups of modules on and off is gamey, shallow over simplification to cater for people who want a simplified game.

 

[Rozete]

/looking in right panel to enable sarcasm module


hell, no! core game mechanics should avoid what third party tools already allow. third party tools, that cashing in real money for their product to give users advantage over core gamers
more so, i suggest clicking on/off to be replaced with something like: "mother, please deploy heatsink! ...make it two!" writting in your comms panel ...and ban all third party tools as cheat!!!


/looking in left panel to disable sarcasm module

/looking in right panel to disable sarcasm module

 

[DocLooshkin]

I suspect the primary users of this would be (a) players spamming their way through multiple SCBs and (b) players looking to bypass the fully-intended fire group limitations (i.e. having three or four devices assigned to one trigger in a group, but only powering a few at a time). I seriously doubt that FD is going to agree with this.

 

[goemon]

I suspect the primary users of this would be (a) players spamming their way through multiple SCBs and (b) players looking to bypass the fully-intended fire group limitations (i.e. having three or four devices assigned to one trigger in a group, but only powering a few at a time). I seriously doubt that FD is going to agree with this.

uh. never thought about that. i'm no combat pilot... makes sense. yes, sounds as if it would outbalance scb and weapon loads even more.

 

[NeilF]

It's not faff, it's accepted and logical procedure, which is depth making use of the developed system screens (the method of activation of those screens in an unfortunate consequence of us trying to simulate them)

A single button to turn groups of modules on and off is gamey, shallow over simplification to cater for people who want a simplified game.

Let me understand... In a thousand years, the logical and accepted procedure to regularly turn off/on combination of module power, is you look away from your forward view (so you can't see what's ahead of you), and then delve manually through system configurations to manually turn each module on/off manually, one at a time?

And if someone were to streamline and improve this mechanism to make it more useable and versatile (as I've described), do you think pilots would be in favour of this streamlining or not?

How can something that is making the game more versatile, for more people, and is clearly something pilots in a real situation would even wish for, "gamey"?

It's not removing a single element of choice as it's not doing anything automatically for you that you don't tell it (define it) to.

In truth, I'd suggest you stop brandishing your term "gamey" around, especially where it doesn't really fit. It seems to be a bit of a default stance TBH on anything you don't agree with.

- - - Updated - - -

I suspect the primary users of this would be (a) players spamming their way through multiple SCBs and (b) players looking to bypass the fully-intended fire group limitations (i.e. having three or four devices assigned to one trigger in a group, but only powering a few at a time). I seriously doubt that FD is going to agree with this.

Indeed! That's a more than valid point. It highlights those problems do exist, but surely they aren't anything to do with this suggestion as those "loop holes" are already there, and being exploited

I'm doing it myself to some degree, and I'd rather see it controlled within ED for this reason hence putting such processes/options into ED. ED could then better balance the whole matter.

BTW I think we should be able to power down module by fire group... See my sig. It's this posts suggestion in platinum!

 

[Magic Man]

Let me understand... In a thousand years, the logical and accepted procedure to regularly turn off/on combination of module power, is you look away from your forward view (so you can't see what's ahead of you), and then delve manually through system configurations to manually turn each module on/off manually, one at a time?

No. The logical and accepted procedure is that you equip modules that your ship can power without issue and you fit a weapon load out as appropriate for the task at hand.
The accepted procedure is certainly not to run the risk of blowing your power capabilities by cramming modules in that you can only safely power by switching off other systems.

The accepted procedure is that you have a fully functioning system computer that enables you to switch modules on and off when really required (to reboot etc.) and manage automatic power profiles.

The accepted procedure is not that you manically switch entire systems on and off just to eek out the few extra volts required to fire another module or weapon that you are carrying.

And if someone were to streamline and improve this mechanism to make it more useable and versatile (as I've described), do you think pilots would be in favour of this streamlining or not?

No, because your "streamlining mechanism" is certainly not more useable nor versatile to these real life pilots we are referring to. It would be seen as downright dangerous and stupid and nothing more than a series of system hacks that is liable to blow modules and leave the pilot stranded if not dead.

How can something that is making the game more versatile, for more people, and is clearly something pilots in a real situation would even wish for, "gamey"?

Because, if we are applying this to real situations as you say, your suggestions are anything but versatile. They result in a ship that is unable to power all modules safely. A ship where the pilot needs to remember which button turns which set of combinations on and off. The real pilots in your example wouldn't wish for that in a million years and it would never get implemented because it's daft.
It would be like current combat aircraft patrolling the skies with power plants that are knowingly unable to safely power all systems and require that the pilot turns things off via a memorised configuration button in order perform one function or the other.
"Damn, I forgot the ejection system was in config 2. Powered it down because I needed a bit more power to run that over-spec'd radar I wedged up front... Oh well, at least I had the versatility to die stupidly"

It's not removing a single element of choice as it's not doing anything automatically for you that you don't tell it (define it) to.

It's cheapening the game.

In truth, I'd suggest you stop brandishing your term "gamey" around, especially where it doesn't really fit. It seems to be a bit of a default stance TBH on anything you don't agree with.

I shall continue to criticise suggestions that I feel cheapen and "game-ify" Elite for as long as people keep suggesting them thanks. I've certainly agreed with many other suggestions, some of yours I seem to remember. Those made sense.

BTW I think we should be able to power down module by fire group...

<facepalm>

 

[Dhan]

I like that you are thinking about simple functionality additions but I don't like that this would make it even easier to have extremely power demanding builds. If you want scbs and beam lasers and shield boosters and all that jazz and you don't have the power for it, you either have to micromanage the module panel like crazy, reducing combat effectiveness in the process, or just go without the power intensive stuff. I kind of like it that way to be honest. It's basically a soft cap on power management.

 

[Roken]

While I sympathise with the desire to keep things non-gamey I also don't like third party addon's becoming 'must have'. Having played Warhammer Online where addon's made or broke groups competitiveness sometimes leading to misplaced calls of Hax & Cheats, I'd rather these tools were available in the official UI to keep the playing field 'transparent'.

(edit - so a yes please from me in case it wasn't obvious!)