Travel Methods

[Ian Doncaster]

I think that's one of the reasons the conversation has shifted toward giving people the option of doing either short jumps or long jumps based on how they prefer to travel rather than just making it one or the other. For people like me who can't stand being forced to do the same task over and over we can choose a more direct route that frees us up to do other things, and people who like to have a more hands on approach can choose to take shorter hops.

Sure. I think that's fundamentally looking at the wrong question, though. Giving people the choice between hands-off boring travel and hands-on boring travel is perhaps a minor improvement on what we now have - though, if you want hands-off boring travel, a Fleet Carrier does provide that pretty well: 500 LY a jump and you only have to check on it every 20 minutes to set up the next one - what we need to be looking at is how to make travel interesting so that people choose the longer journeys because of the things that happen on them.

There's a thread on here describing the events of someone just driving their SRV around one planet. It's a really interesting read in a way that a thread describing someone supercruising over to Hutton Orbital or chaining neutron boosts to Sag A* isn't. In the original Elite - much simpler as that game was - a trip from one edge of the map to the other was a significant journey filled with choices and excitement, and those maps were only about 100LY across.

The question is, how does Elite Dangerous get that sort of interesting gameplay as part of normal travel?

 

[avarusbrightfyre]

Sure. I think that's fundamentally looking at the wrong question, though. Giving people the choice between hands-off boring travel and hands-on boring travel is perhaps a minor improvement on what we now have - though, if you want hands-off boring travel, a Fleet Carrier does provide that pretty well: 500 LY a jump and you only have to check on it every 20 minutes to set up the next one - what we need to be looking at is how to make travel interesting so that people choose the longer journeys because of the things that happen on them.

There's a thread on here describing the events of someone just driving their SRV around one planet. It's a really interesting read in a way that a thread describing someone supercruising over to Hutton Orbital or chaining neutron boosts to Sag A* isn't. In the original Elite - much simpler as that game was - a trip from one edge of the map to the other was a significant journey filled with choices and excitement, and those maps were only about 100LY across.

The question is, how does Elite Dangerous get that sort of interesting gameplay as part of normal travel?

I don't necessarily disagree, however if we assume that there won't be any sweeping changes to the travel system, moving the discussion towards minor tweaks that improves the process all around is a good way to go. Many people end up failing to make any progress at all waiting for that big swing all the while missing the smaller opportunities along the way. A good first step might be to offer a long jump alternative to the short jump.

In fact, that would hold with the realistic way of new technologies coming out. Say a long jump drive is developed, and for a while people are just using it as a convenience. Then someone develops an advanced wake tracker that tells a pirate or bounty hunter where you're going and they can fairly accurately estimate where you're going. They assume you're going to spend several minutes refueling at your destination and make a b-line toward where they think you're going. With a bit of luck, they drop into the system just as you're topping off your fuel and bring on the attack, and you have to scramble to get out of there.

Then later on someone comes up with a totally cool new idea that makes it even more interesting. Baby steps are usually more productive in the long term than waiting for big, sweeping changes. I think adding a long jump option would be a small step in the right direction which allows for minor corrections in the future. I think it would be awesome to see the hypothetical scenario above come into the game.

 

[Red Anders]

I can see this one is going to come down to a familiar argument between:

a) players who want travel to be an opportunity for combat
b) players who want travel to be an opportunity to get where they're going

 

[avarusbrightfyre]

I can see this one is going to come down to a familiar argument between:

a) players who want travel to be an opportunity for combat
b) players who want travel to be an opportunity to get where they're going

Not necessarily. The advocacy is for more choice. If you don't want to fight, login on solo. The combat portion is secondary to the idea that travel should have the option to be more efficient with regard to required player interaction.

 

[Red Anders]

Not necessarily. The advocacy is for more choice. If you don't want to fight, login on solo. The combat portion is secondary to the idea that travel should have the option to be more efficient with regard to required player interaction.

What does solo have to do with it? Sorry, are you suggesting a change that's effective only for player interdiction mechanics rather than also applying to npcs and the way that they would operate? Or just that npcs would be as easy to defeat, either in terms of avoiding interdictions and/or beating them in combat as they are currently? All genuine questions by the way, just trying to elicit some detail of the vision here.

 

[avarusbrightfyre]

My suggestion really didn't have to do with player interactions. It is primarily about providing people a way to avoid the tedium of ad nauseum jumps. The player interaction mechanic arose from a response another member brought up earlier that I thought was cool. The primary idea is providing options for players who like to travel in different ways. Combat or lack of it is sort of a bonus.

 

[VR StarLightPL]

1. Make a string of hyperspace jumps automated (BEAR WITH ME!)
2. Model ship interiors.
3. Give players things to do while the ship is flying itself: tuning systems, remote engineering, analysing exploration data gathered on the journey, trade management, fleet orders, maybe base management someday (I know, not on the roadmap) or just chilling in the captain's cabin reading codex. Sky is the limit.
4. Change current interdiction mechanics so you have time to get to the cockpit, e.g. interdiction targeting, something akin to enemy radar lock in a fighter jet.
5. Profit.

This will deal with the tedium and boredom of long space travel while not nerfing travel and galaxy size in the process. The engine should precalculate 2 jumps ahead, so you actually can do something while the ship it's jumping - currently it calculates only one and everything is blocked.

 

[operant]

Sure. I think that's fundamentally looking at the wrong question, though. Giving people the choice between hands-off boring travel and hands-on boring travel is perhaps a minor improvement on what we now have - though, if you want hands-off boring travel, a Fleet Carrier does provide that pretty well: 500 LY a jump and you only have to check on it every 20 minutes to set up the next one - what we need to be looking at is how to make travel interesting so that people choose the longer journeys because of the things that happen on them.

There's a thread on here describing the events of someone just driving their SRV around one planet. It's a really interesting read in a way that a thread describing someone supercruising over to Hutton Orbital or chaining neutron boosts to Sag A* isn't. In the original Elite - much simpler as that game was - a trip from one edge of the map to the other was a significant journey filled with choices and excitement, and those maps were only about 100LY across.

The question is, how does Elite Dangerous get that sort of interesting gameplay as part of normal travel?

If you are just trying to get there to engage in chosen gameplay (mining/combat rather than mission, say) then imposing extra interruption and delay just adds to the frustration. YVMV of course, and obviously does.
Fleet carriers are a partial solution, but once again involve a delay and the grind of tritium and psychological burden of upkeep. YVMV, of course.

 

[avarusbrightfyre]

1. Make a string of hyperspace jumps automated (BEAR WITH ME!)
2. Model ship interiors.
3. Give players things to do while the ship is flying itself: tuning systems, remote engineering, analysing exploration data gathered on the journey, trade management, fleet orders, maybe base management someday (I know, not on the roadmap) or just chilling in the captain's cabin reading codex. Sky is the limit.
4. Change current interdiction mechanics so you have time to get to the cockpit, e.g. interdiction targeting, something akin to enemy radar lock in a fighter jet.
5. Profit.

This will deal with the tedium and boredom of long space travel while not nerfing travel and galaxy size in the process. The engine should precalculate 2 jumps ahead, so you actually can do something while the ship it's jumping - currently it calculates only one and everything is blocked.

Well, I have a feeling that full on auto-pilot is something that the developers aren't keen about. I think I read a post about bots or something like that; I can't remember. At least with a "direct to next fuel stop" option you can get the some of the benefits of a version of autopilot without the developers implementing full on automated control. It seems like a reasonable compromise to me, especially since it's not really changing the core mechanic of interstellar travel in the game.

Another thing that popped into mind was graphics performance with the constant changes in attitude, jumping, random things zipping by, etc. With a straight shot to your destination, you're basically just in a loading screen, so the only thing that has to be rendered is your ship and its contents, and outside is just the witch space animation. It would help with lower end PC performance.

I think the only thing I would amend to the original idea would to make sure there is a way to cancel your current jump if you're doing a low speed, longer jump. Maybe it just drops you into an individual instance that allows you to change your destination or something. You don't want to get stuck in a ten minute flight if you realize you screwed up. Or maybe that's another consequence of using a more direct jump option. I know they like to put consequences in for conveniences.

I do think ship interiors with an extensive list of optional things tasks would be very nice. It would make ship interiors more than just eye candy and will allay some of the objections of pointlessness that many have brought up on the issue.

 

[Lysette]

This is a personal opinion post and I in no way expect any change to result from it. It's more of a "what if" kind of thing rather than a call to action, perhaps resulting in a rational discussion between the pros and cons of different versions of travel. Sometimes just ruminating over different ideas generates some pretty cool results.

I personally have never been a big fan of the "jump" version of interstellar travel. My first online space game was Eve Online back when it was new, and one of the more irritating parts of it was having to jump from one system to another and then travel across a system to get to the next gate. Elite removed part of that irritation by not forcing us to travel through each system to get where we're going, and I feel like that was a good decision. However, one good thing about the Eve system was the fact that you were highly likely to be attacked by other players depending on where you were because you were forced to constantly be in a state where others could get to you fairly easily if they really wanted to. In Elite, you're not really in any danger until you reach your destination system and have to supercruise, because you basically stick close to a star and you're out of an enroute system before anyone can really get to you. Pretty boring.

I sort of wish that they had gone with a more Star Trek version of travel. Something like a big instance for interstellar travel that drops you into individual system instances once you arrive at your destination. That sort of thing would make it more possible for people to find you in the middle of your journey and increase the feeling that you're never really safe, which for me at least would generate the sort of looming sense of danger I used to feel back in my Eve days. It would also remove the repetitiveness of jumping over and over between stars, which is one of the primary reasons I tend to get bored and stop playing, because if you're on a single monitor you're stuck just sitting there manually travelling because you'll run into a star if you tab out to maybe watch a video or research something game related. With a more warp drive type of setup, you can just select a system in your fuel range, hit the warp drive, and then sit back and relax, only stopping when you need to fill up again or reach your destination...or when someone yanks you out of warp to rob you.

As I said, this is more about having an interesting discussion and maybe hearing some cool ideas than expecting any change. I understand the lore has established jumping as the norm, but maybe some other improvements might be teased out by thinking about things in a different way.

i guess you are talking of the early days of EVE - when warping directly to the gate wasn't possible. Nowadays one can directly warp to the gate (given that one is NOT using the auto-pilot option) and an instant jump is possible - so there is just danger if people use the auto-pilot option, because that drops one out 15km away from the gate and this is like a request to be ganked. But otherwise, pretty much safe to do gate jumps nowadays.

 

[avarusbrightfyre]

i guess you are talking of the early days of EVE - when warping directly to the gate wasn't possible. Nowadays one can directly warp to the gate (given that one is NOT using the auto-pilot option) and an instant jump is possible - so there is just danger if people use the auto-pilot option, because that drops one out 15km away from the gate and this is like a request to be ganked. But otherwise, pretty much safe to do gate jumps nowadays.

I was mostly talking about the difference between having to cross a system at all to get to a gate and the time it took to do that. Could you imagine in a game of this size having to cross a system every time you want to jump? It would take forever to get anywhere. The ganking part is just a parallel topic, really. It's mostly about reducing some of the repetitive action so we can either focus on something else while we travel, or maybe have some more interesting and less repetitive tasks available in transit.

 

[Arsen Cross]

The idea of a manually controlled layer of travel to replace the existing jump mechanics has been something I've wanted for a long, long time and is what I believe the OP is asking for here.

Many moons ago DJTruthsayer was able to interview Michael Brookes. In that interview one of the topics Michael spoke about was the FrameShift Drive and how it functions both in lore and how it actually functions. In that interview he made two statements that explain the functionality:

"It uses higher dimensions to compress the presence of the ship within real space. That's how it is able to travel over distances or handle accelerations that it couldn't have otherwise."

"If you make space smaller than it really is then when you translate back into it the area that you get put back into is much larger and is why you get some weird discrepancies when you are coming in and out of FrameShift Drive."

For those who may not know the difference the FrameShift Drive specifically refers to the drive that enables supercruise within a system and is not referring to the hyperspace technique used to jump between star systems. The FrameShift Drives we have now combine both technologies. The reason that I bring this up though is to illustrate that any arguments regarding the speed of ships being a limiting factor is largely irrelevant because Elite already has the mechanics necessary to account for this kind of added travel layer.

For me personally I have long fantasized about gaining access to Witchspace and imagined it similar to supercruise. My personal hope/theory is that finding Raxxla would unlock the technology needed to freely travel within Witchspace in the same way Thargoids are able to reportedly "hover" within it. The Faraway jump network built by Galcop in my opinion is evidence of this being a possibility as the lore on such indicates that not only were buoys placed within Witchspace, but structures in the form of rescue stations were also deployed within it. This is a technology reportedly lost to us and I hold a theory that Galcop's collapse was engineered to obtain and control said technology and that uncovering Raxxla which rumor indicates was also secreted away, could lead to being able to access Witchspace in that manner.


The gameplay experience of such a system could be implimented in many different ways. Especially if you want to take into account the MMO aspect and downsides of p2p networking reliability. Detection of other vessels, objects or bodies within Witchspace could be it's own set of mechanics and as a result any implimentation could be designed to account for either having or not having the presence of other players.The possible implimentations could be pretty wild and I like to imagine a system where finding things in Witchspace left behind by humans, such as the Faraway network or even Thargoid related things and any other number of amazing things.

As far as traveling Witchspace in this manner, it'd be much like supercruise in the sense that as you approach star systems you could target them and drop at them similar to stations or bodies like when traveling around a system now. Traveling long distances could require you to navigate around hazards and obstacles manually (because lets face it, we don't actually know what's in Witchspace and our ships handle everything for us currently).

Combined with space legs, this kind of third layer of travel is part of my fantasy picture of an ultimate version of Elite.


oh and edit... I personally believe that the old Faraway jump network or technology derived from it is still being utilized by the Club. The possibilities of things we could find in Witchspace to uncover mysteries of humanities past and nefarious doings is insane.

 

[Lysette]

I was mostly talking about the difference between having to cross a system at all to get to a gate and the time it took to do that. Could you imagine in a game of this size having to cross a system every time you want to jump? It would take forever to get anywhere. The ganking part is just a parallel topic, really. It's mostly about reducing some of the repetitive action so we can either focus on something else while we travel, or maybe have some more interesting and less repetitive tasks available in transit.

well. I fly ships in EVE, which allow me to do 30 jumps in 11 minutes. 3.5 minutes of that is jumping - and 7.5 minutes total time to pass through 29 systems - that is 15.5 seconds per system - you just didn't have proper ships for traveling great distances, I guess.

Well, and on topic - I really love - frameshift drive charging - 4 3 2 1 - engage - that gives me goose bumps anytime - and I like as well supercruise and the big payouts I get from those missions, which are a little further out in a system (like 50,000+ Ls) - those pay really well.

 

[avarusbrightfyre]

The idea of a manually controlled layer of travel to replace the existing jump mechanics has been something I've wanted for a long, long time and is what I believe the OP is asking for here.

Many moons ago DJTruthsayer was able to interview Michael Brookes. In that interview one of the topics Michael spoke about was the FrameShift Drive and how it functions both in lore and how it actually functions. In that interview he made two statements that explain the functionality:

"It uses higher dimensions to compress the presence of the ship within real space. That's how it is able to travel over distances or handle accelerations that it couldn't have otherwise."

"If you make space smaller than it really is then when you translate back into it the area that you get put back into is much larger and is why you get some weird discrepancies when you are coming in and out of FrameShift Drive."

For those who may not know the difference the FrameShift Drive specifically refers to the drive that enables supercruise within a system and is not referring to the hyperspace technique used to jump between star systems. The FrameShift Drives we have now combine both technologies. The reason that I bring this up though is to illustrate that any arguments regarding the speed of ships being a limiting factor is largely irrelevant because Elite already has the mechanics necessary to account for this kind of added travel layer.

For me personally I have long fantasized about gaining access to Witchspace and imagined it similar to supercruise. My personal hope/theory is that finding Raxxla would unlock the technology needed to freely travel within Witchspace in the same way Thargoids are able to reportedly "hover" within it. The Faraway jump network built by Galcop in my opinion is evidence of this being a possibility as the lore on such indicates that not only were buoys placed within Witchspace, but structures in the form of rescue stations were also deployed within it. This is a technology reportedly lost to us and I hold a theory that Galcop's collapse was engineered to obtain and control said technology and that uncovering Raxxla which rumor indicates was also secreted away, could lead to being able to access Witchspace in that manner.


The gameplay experience of such a system could be implimented in many different ways. Especially if you want to take into account the MMO aspect and downsides of p2p networking reliability. Detection of other vessels, objects or bodies within Witchspace could be it's own set of mechanics and as a result any implimentation could be designed to account for either having or not having the presence of other players.The possible implimentations could be pretty wild and I like to imagine a system where finding things in Witchspace left behind by humans, such as the Faraway network or even Thargoid related things and any other number of amazing things.

As far as traveling Witchspace in this manner, it'd be much like supercruise in the sense that as you approach star systems you could target them and drop at them similar to stations or bodies like when traveling around a system now. Traveling long distances could require you to navigate around hazards and obstacles manually (because lets face it, we don't actually know what's in Witchspace and our ships handle everything for us currently).

Combined with space legs, this kind of third layer of travel is part of my fantasy picture of an ultimate version of Elite.


oh and edit... I personally believe that the old Faraway jump network or technology derived from it is still being utilized by the Club. The possibilities of things we could find in Witchspace to uncover mysteries of humanities past and nefarious doings is insane.

Well, honestly this is pretty much exactly what I had in mind with my first post, and it's what I meant about a more Star Trek way of moving around. Rather than jumping point to point, it would be moving more freely through actual space. People got fixated on it being EXACTLY like Star Trek, though, so the conversation shifted away from that and I didn't really stick to my original thought because it seemed like such a huge shift away from the established system. However, I hadn't thought of these details quite that way, and now that you've laid it out the way you did, I sort of want to go back to the original idea. An interstellar version of super cruise would definitely be the most ideal way of doing it. That way you can have maximum freedom and minimum grinding.

 

[avarusbrightfyre]

well. I fly ships in EVE, which allow me to do 30 jumps in 11 minutes. 3.5 minutes of that is jumping - and 7.5 minutes total time to pass through 29 systems - that is 15.5 seconds per system - you just didn't have proper ships for traveling great distances, I guess.

Well, and on topic - I really love - frameshift drive charging - 4 3 2 1 - engage - that gives me goose bumps anytime - and I like as well supercruise and the big payouts I get from those missions, which are a little further out in a system (like 50,000+ Ls) - those pay really well.

I'm sure I didn't. I was into Eve for quite a long time, but I never really focused on it much.

The countdown is cool at first, but after a few hundred times it loses its appeal. The same holds true with having to swing around stars over and over. I just want to get into travel mode and only drop out when I arrive at my destination or need to refuel. All this repetitive jumping is incredibly annoying. I seriously haven't played the game in weeks solely because I just can't find the motivation to put up with that specific repetition. I enjoy certain aspects of the game, even some of the more repetitive ones, but those are completely overshadowed by the travel system...for me at least. I want travel to be downtime between activities, not an active part of my gameplay.

 

[Lysette]

And there is the problem - ED and EVE as well are about space ships and flying them through space. This is an active part of the game, not a downtime. Space is huge and I see no advantage with the star trek method over jumping between star systems. Both happens outside of spacetime - let's be clear about this, both use hyperspace where the rules of physics like we know it for spacetime aren't valid.

That is why we can fly with up to 2001 times light speed in supercruise and even more during a jump between star systems. You are not flying through spacetime - but have kind of a warp bubble around you - from outside this bubble it looks like you are actually flying, but you just don't - because the acceleration of going to warp would outright kill you, if it would happen in spacetime and not in a warp bubble, where you actually don't move at all - the bubble is moving with you inside, but you are not moving at all inside this frame of reference - that is what the frameshift drive does - it moves you to a difference frame of reference inside this warp bubble and what is moving is this bubble around you, but not really you.

 

[Lysette]

Star Trek is even inside sci-fi quite a fantasy - like turning the ship around while being in warp speed - imagine this nonsense - there is a really huge forward vector - any input you would do to get this ship moving to the side would be rather small and get this forward vector just slightly off course. The energy required to turn at this speed would be insane. Star Trek is just not realistic not even inside the sci-fi setting.

Pointing the ship into a different direction is not making it turn - it would still be moving in the same direction, just slightly off course, given that there would be some thrust, which would add to the forward vector. The method used in ED is far better - a simple forward vector into the direction of the target sun - everything happens inside this straight line - the abrupt stop at the end is falling back to spacetime - the bubble is just not moving anymore and you will be released back into spacetime right in front of the target sun.

 

[avarusbrightfyre]

Star Trek is even inside sci-fi quite a fantasy - like turning the ship around while being in warp speed - imagine this nonsense - there is a really huge forward vector - any input you would do to get this ship moving to the side would be rather small and get this forward vector just slightly off course. The energy required to turn at this speed would be insane. Star Trek is just not realistic not even inside the sci-fi setting.

Pointing the ship into a different direction is not making it turn - it would still be moving in the same direction, just slightly off course, given that there would be some thrust, which would add to the forward vector. The method used in ED is far better - a simple forward vector into the direction of the target sun - everything happens inside this straight line - the abrupt stop at the end is falling back to spacetime - the bubble is just not moving anymore and you will be released back into spacetime right in front of the target sun.

I appreciate your thoughtful and informative posts regarding the physics behind warp drive, though I am probably about as versed as a layman can be regarding the mechanics behind the various FTL models. The Alcubierre drive is by far my favorite version, and that is certainly because I grew up as a fan of Star Trek.

Unfortunately, your response misses the actual subject of the post. I'm not really very concerned with the physics behind how ships move in Elite. It doesn't need to be hyper-realistic to be enjoyable. In fact, the current model still breaks the issues you're bringing up because even in super cruise we're travelling in a warp bubble and we're able to turn just fine when zipping around a solar system at faster than light speeds. My issue isn't with the physics, it's with the actively repetitive nature of the current method of moving around.

I would definitely prefer a version of interstellar travel that works like super cruise, but as I've said in previous posts, I'm not necessarily opposed to sticking with the jump model of travel. I'd just like to see a new FSD that allows us to jump straight to the furthest star that our fuel can get us to. That would require an adjustment in rate of speed to ensure that it still takes the same amount of time a regular FSD does. Maybe something like the further you're jumping the slower your rate of speed is to accommodate moving your mass a longer distance. Shorter jumps could take about as long as they do now, while longer ones will require more time in witch space, with the goal being to make both a series of short jumps and one long jump take about the same amount of time. This way it is simply a matter of personal preference rather than one FSD having an unfair advantage over the other.

So to be clear, my issue isn't the physics. It's about the fact that even something as boring as just getting from A to B requires very active participation and it really shouldn't.

 

[Arsen Cross]

The idea of a manually controlled layer of travel to replace the existing jump mechanics has been something I've wanted for a long, long time and is what I believe the OP is asking for here.

Many moons ago DJTruthsayer was able to interview Michael Brookes. In that interview one of the topics Michael spoke about was the FrameShift Drive and how it functions both in lore and how it actually functions. In that interview he made two statements that explain the functionality:

"It uses higher dimensions to compress the presence of the ship within real space. That's how it is able to travel over distances or handle accelerations that it couldn't have otherwise."

"If you make space smaller than it really is then when you translate back into it the area that you get put back into is much larger and is why you get some weird discrepancies when you are coming in and out of FrameShift Drive."

For those who may not know the difference the FrameShift Drive specifically refers to the drive that enables supercruise within a system and is not referring to the hyperspace technique used to jump between star systems. The FrameShift Drives we have now combine both technologies. The reason that I bring this up though is to illustrate that any arguments regarding the speed of ships being a limiting factor is largely irrelevant because Elite already has the mechanics necessary to account for this kind of added travel layer.

For me personally I have long fantasized about gaining access to Witchspace and imagined it similar to supercruise. My personal hope/theory is that finding Raxxla would unlock the technology needed to freely travel within Witchspace in the same way Thargoids are able to reportedly "hover" within it. The Faraway jump network built by Galcop in my opinion is evidence of this being a possibility as the lore on such indicates that not only were buoys placed within Witchspace, but structures in the form of rescue stations were also deployed within it. This is a technology reportedly lost to us and I hold a theory that Galcop's collapse was engineered to obtain and control said technology and that uncovering Raxxla which rumor indicates was also secreted away, could lead to being able to access Witchspace in that manner.


The gameplay experience of such a system could be implimented in many different ways. Especially if you want to take into account the MMO aspect and downsides of p2p networking reliability. Detection of other vessels, objects or bodies within Witchspace could be it's own set of mechanics and as a result any implimentation could be designed to account for either having or not having the presence of other players.The possible implimentations could be pretty wild and I like to imagine a system where finding things in Witchspace left behind by humans, such as the Faraway network or even Thargoid related things and any other number of amazing things.

As far as traveling Witchspace in this manner, it'd be much like supercruise in the sense that as you approach star systems you could target them and drop at them similar to stations or bodies like when traveling around a system now. Traveling long distances could require you to navigate around hazards and obstacles manually (because lets face it, we don't actually know what's in Witchspace and our ships handle everything for us currently).

Combined with space legs, this kind of third layer of travel is part of my fantasy picture of an ultimate version of Elite.


oh and edit... I personally believe that the old Faraway jump network or technology derived from it is still being utilized by the Club. The possibilities of things we could find in Witchspace to uncover mysteries of humanities past and nefarious doings is insane.

So I just want to clarify that in my post where I go on about how I see this third layer operating... I started it by saying "replace existing jump mechanics" and I want to clarify I do not want to actually replace the existing jump mechanics. I feel that they should actually sit side by side and people should be able to use both. Maybe even choose between different types of FSD's based on how they want to travel with Hybrid drives capable of both would have higher power/mass costs or whatever other balancing factors applied to them.

All in all I want the choice between the different methods because sometimes I really just want to fly through space and weave through obstacles while traveling long distances and just keep on going until my fuel is low enough that I need to drop down into a star system and scoop fuel.

Well, and on topic - I really love - frameshift drive charging - 4 3 2 1 - engage - that gives me goose bumps anytime - and I like as well supercruise and the big payouts I get from those missions, which are a little further out in a system (like 50,000+ Ls) - those pay really well.

Frameshift Drive Charging. Warning! All hands prepare for manual telemetry control within witchspace.
ominous sounding FSD charge begins
4..
sound becomes more ominous
3..
sounds increase in volume and begin to sound creepy
2..
the ship begins to creak, moan and almost sound as if the ship itself is screaming
1..
a hole is ripped into witchspace and the ship is thrown into it, 'screaming' louder
Entering Witchspace.
Warning, manual control established. Auto navigation will not address hazards.
the ships screams begin to quiet as you slowly coast away from the the star system you just left, ominous sounds and visuals remain as you pitch and roll your ship towards your destination.

 

[Lysette]

I can see this one is going to come down to a familiar argument between:

a) players who want travel to be an opportunity for combat
b) players who want travel to be an opportunity to get where they're going

And there is the 3rd group, for whom the route is the goal - the act of passing through a system and experiencing it's vastness even with up to 2001-times light speed. I was never a friend of fast travel and I like to actually travel through a system - but the distance between systems is too huge, there hyperspace jumps make a lot of sense.