Well, if Frontier fails to make it, I doubt any amount of effort will allow anyone to play it, so, yeah, thank you capt. Obvious.
Elite / Frontier What would prevent *you* from buying E4?
- Thread starter DraQ
- Start date
Well, if Frontier fails to make it, I doubt any amount of effort will allow anyone to play it, so, yeah, thank you capt. Obvious.
i think this is not the right place to talk about how it should look after all, but a "real" milky way should be possible when position of systems is given (like a huge starmap) but don't expect much more as a white seam surrounding your actual position in space. layers of thousends of stars will look like a bright white river, even if we say we dim farer objects by a given value. there will be no big difference wether if youre position is located in the perseus arm or in major arm. maybe in galactical center it would look like "woah, it's full of stars".
but remember our galaxy has a thickness of only 3000lj (disc) and 16000lj (bulge) and a diameter of ca. 100000lj, i think,even when you look from the center you wouldn't see much more the the galactical band.
of course i was a bit frustrated after travelling through the galaxy that the background nebula (representing milky way) never changes, but on the other hand.....
really it would look nearly the same, anyway.
but true it is, loads of nebulas placed in the different regions of the games universe is no solution, especially when i think that they won't look that way when you are close by. it's more like if you would stay in a fog, from outside it might have it's charms, but from the inside, unlike in most sci-fi movies, series or games, i think you won't see much of that nebula.
but remember our galaxy has a thickness of only 3000lj (disc) and 16000lj (bulge) and a diameter of ca. 100000lj, i think,even when you look from the center you wouldn't see much more the the galactical band.
of course i was a bit frustrated after travelling through the galaxy that the background nebula (representing milky way) never changes,
but on the other hand.....really it would look nearly the same, anyway.
but true it is, loads of nebulas placed in the different regions of the games universe is no solution, especially when i think that they won't look that way when you are close by. it's more like if you would stay in a fog, from outside it might have it's charms, but from the inside, unlike in most sci-fi movies, series or games, i think you won't see much of that nebula.
Explane bad? As in it was a grude approximation due to the limited or lack of FPU power CPU had in those old day's. Or is it writen bad. Not solid code.
Had put a weitec FPU in our 80387 socker of our old 80386 system. Falcon? supported it.
Now you got compiler who generated code for SSE 1 to 4.x units in current CPU's. Especialy wenn using iNtel plugin compiler.
What would prevent me from playing E4:
- No MMO-version of it available.
- It being an MMOG but no sandbox. That includes I won't play it if it includes RvR (factions), because these severly restrict roleplay choices and freedom. I am convinced a RvR game can't be a sandbox. (I like Jumpgate Classic which has factions, but it is possible - to a cerrtain extent - to stay out of the silly faction wars and to establish interfactional squads. Still it would be much better without factions.)
Adressing some points that were made against MMOGs:
About 10 $ for one month in an exciting parellel universe is a rip off? I don't see that. A MMOG must be maintained and usually the develloping process never ends, implementing further improvements or reacting to suggtestions made by the players. I am willing to pay for that. And you don't have to p(l)ay 12 months a year.
I reached Elite in the original game, so I did spend a lot of time in that singleplayer sim, but never in my life would I do that again. A game that keeps me interested for months or even years nowadays must be an MMOG.
Please stop talking about EVE in that respect. The only MMOGs that come close to an online-Elite because you sit in the cockpit and actually steer your ship (not point and click as in EVE) are Jumpgate Classic and perhaps Vendetta Online (which I haven't played). I don't talk about Jumpgate Evolution or Black Prophecy because these don't exist.
Idiots in MMOGs that "spoil the game": I Think we had AI-versions of those in Elite 1-3, called pirates and Thargoids. (-; Of course there will be idiots in an MMOG, but it is also possible to deal with them in an MMOG. Buy a decent gun and impove your aim. Join a guild made up of sensible people who can back you up. If you are a single trader or miner, hire an escort. These interactions with real people rather than AI-NPCs are what makes MMOGs so fascinating for me.
- No MMO-version of it available.
- It being an MMOG but no sandbox. That includes I won't play it if it includes RvR (factions), because these severly restrict roleplay choices and freedom. I am convinced a RvR game can't be a sandbox. (I like Jumpgate Classic which has factions, but it is possible - to a cerrtain extent - to stay out of the silly faction wars and to establish interfactional squads. Still it would be much better without factions.)
Adressing some points that were made against MMOGs:
About 10 $ for one month in an exciting parellel universe is a rip off? I don't see that. A MMOG must be maintained and usually the develloping process never ends, implementing further improvements or reacting to suggtestions made by the players. I am willing to pay for that. And you don't have to p(l)ay 12 months a year.
I reached Elite in the original game, so I did spend a lot of time in that singleplayer sim, but never in my life would I do that again. A game that keeps me interested for months or even years nowadays must be an MMOG.
Please stop talking about EVE in that respect. The only MMOGs that come close to an online-Elite because you sit in the cockpit and actually steer your ship (not point and click as in EVE) are Jumpgate Classic and perhaps Vendetta Online (which I haven't played). I don't talk about Jumpgate Evolution or Black Prophecy because these don't exist.
Idiots in MMOGs that "spoil the game": I Think we had AI-versions of those in Elite 1-3, called pirates and Thargoids. (-; Of course there will be idiots in an MMOG, but it is also possible to deal with them in an MMOG. Buy a decent gun and impove your aim. Join a guild made up of sensible people who can back you up. If you are a single trader or miner, hire an escort. These interactions with real people rather than AI-NPCs are what makes MMOGs so fascinating for me.
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You may have played some different version - in mine they didn't 5P34|< 1!|<3 7|-|!$. Even if they did, they would stop when killed.
Will it stop them from using in-game chat service for dispensing garbled inanity?
Unless you mean in RL, but there is just to many of them and spread too widely to make such a solution practical.
I thought you were strictly anti-faction?
It may sound very smug and haughty, but my exposure to things like news and Internet made me redefine "real people" to specifically exclude those who have an IQ lower than 50 or are otherwise incapable of making coherent, intelligible sentences, so sorry, but no.
BTW: Do you have any clever workarounds for requiring constant time and money investment or relying on connection with some server that may not be around when I fire the game up 10 years from now prompted by intense pang of nostalgia?
I'm dying to know, because I like my games bought, not rented.
Every MMOG has a function to turn the chat off or to mute specific users in chat I think. Often you can chose between different chat channels or create your own, for example restricted to members of your own guild.
"Faction" is usually the term used in MMOGs for a sort of nation which you have to join when creating an account. I hate that because it forces me into a direction and state of alliance respectively hostility with people I have not yet met. A "guild" or "squad" on the other hand is usually the term used for a group of players that get to know each other in the game and decide to work together for a certain purpose, and that is a completely different story.
It may sound very smug and haughty, but my exposure to things like news and Internet made me redefine "real people" to specifically exclude those who have an IQ lower than 50 or are otherwise incapable of making coherent, intelligible sentences, so sorry, but no.
You are free to socialize with people you like and restrict contact to a minimum concerning people you don't like. The average IQ of people in an MMOG probably is in relation to the learning curves and skills required in the game, so an out and out commercial arcade shooter should not be the base for judgment here, since I expect Elite IV to target a good balance between achieving commercial success and doing justice to the legacy of Elite.
A MMOG does not necessarily require constant time and money investment. Especially in a space sim I see no problem here. In Jumpgate, you just park your vessel in a space station and it will still be there as you left it when you rejoin the game months later. Some players for instance are only active in the winter.
Come on, you would rather prefer playing Elite V or VI ten years later. And the adventures in an MMOG experienced together with other people who were also there delivers much more reason to be nostalgic in later years, believe me. By the way I have nothing against an offline version of Elite IV. Jumpgate can be played offline, though in a limited environment ("offline simulator"), which I think is a good idea and would also serve your purpose.
Your choice, but it is no rip-off because the reason for the monthly fee lies in the nature of the thing and is justified because of the costs for server maintenance in order to create a persistent world and for the ongoing development process resulting in ongoing improvements. Such things can't be experienced in a conventional game so for me there is a good trade off.
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Assuming that:
a) There will be Elite V or VI.
b) It won't suck (due to multitude times legion possible reasons including, but not limited to some big company buying Frontier and ensuing design by committee, or DB going senile).
Those are pretty big assumptions in gaming.
Unless you are of opinion that sequel is always better - that simply ends the discussion here and now and attaches an unflattering label to your person.
Yeah, yeah, I know. Doesn't change the fact that it's no longer buy-have model.
One more reason for Elite IV to not be MMO - it would utterly demolish Frontier's core gameplay and feel revolving around Newtonian flight model, not horribly unreasonable thrust to mass ratios, full scaled planetary systems, imprecise hyperspace and slower than light in system travel - there is no time compression in MMO.
Not being released.
Yes, time compression won't get you anywhere in MMOGs. (-: But the convenience of travel in full scaled systems in a bearable amount of time can be explained in a way that is logical (if not utterly realistic) other than time compression (drugs) (which by the way can hardly be seen as overly realistic):
The solution could simply be a new drive that allows traveling faster than light by "bending space around the ship" or whatever - it's Science Fiction after all. Similar to the "jump motor" in Elite 1 this drive could fall back to lower speeds that allow dogfight as soon as another ship comes in range because the "trans-gravitational wave modulation only works without interference with another drive's emissions nearby" - you get the picture.
In important, thus crowded systems where this might become annoying there could be transporters or jumpgates (not too) near planets and / or stations.
Features like that would also keep relativistic effects out of the way.
Jumpgate uses - not surprising - jumpgates between "sectors" (which are not full scaled systems), and that works very well.
The solution could simply be a new drive that allows traveling faster than light by "bending space around the ship" or whatever - it's Science Fiction after all. Similar to the "jump motor" in Elite 1 this drive could fall back to lower speeds that allow dogfight as soon as another ship comes in range because the "trans-gravitational wave modulation only works without interference with another drive's emissions nearby" - you get the picture.
In important, thus crowded systems where this might become annoying there could be transporters or jumpgates (not too) near planets and / or stations.
Features like that would also keep relativistic effects out of the way.
Jumpgate uses - not surprising - jumpgates between "sectors" (which are not full scaled systems), and that works very well.
I have already stated my musings on FTL in another thread, so I don't think repeating them here would be productive.
As for the jumpgates and sectors, the intuition I developed during my stay on these forums tells me some of the long time frontier/elite fans have just suddenly (and for no particular reason) developed keen interest in whipping people with their own, torn out tendons as a form of entertainment and I'd really hate to stand between them and their fun.
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Hi SuperG
I wouldn't rely to much on game scores if I were you. Wait for a demo before making up your mind. Oh, I remember getting the Elite 2 demo and all it consisted of was the intro. I was disappointed not to get a sample of the game play proper and took a chance and bought it. Lets hope Frontier Developments make a proper demo this time around! Was there a demo of Elite 3 when it first came out? I was in Amigaland then and would have missed it if there was.
I wouldn't rely to much on game scores if I were you. Wait for a demo before making up your mind. Oh, I remember getting the Elite 2 demo and all it consisted of was the intro. I was disappointed not to get a sample of the game play proper and took a chance and bought it. Lets hope Frontier Developments make a proper demo this time around!
Was there a demo of Elite 3 when it first came out? I was in Amigaland then and would have missed it if there was.I have always found it super hilarious that the intro in Frontier looked much worse than the actual game.
Also, the ships in both games behave very differently in intro than in game, and D3DFFE revealed that FFE intro uses super tiny fake planets rather than the real things it already has coded. Lulz?
Why not script intro in actual gamespace instead?
Well that's what I am hoping for DraQ. And yes that was funny and at the same time a massive shock in discovering the flight mechanic. One of my fondest gaming moments that was!
Time compression and faster-than-light-speed have the same effect of "accelerating the game" and reducing the "feeling of vastness of space" - that is the point and it appears to me a necessity for a playable space game with full scaled systems. Only time compression is a bit ridiculous in a single player game and luckily impossible in a MMOG. Piracy does not depend on slow police (pirates for instance could disable the transmissions of the ship indicating pirate status at secluded "pirate stations" for the cost of not being able to dock/trade/refuel/equip at regular stations), but police would still be slow enough to allow piracy even with FTL if it is not IFTL (incredibly faster than light). Another solution would be not to have any police in the game, or only in wealthy systems.
I did not suggest to drop full scaled systems in favor of sectors in E4 but pointed out that jumpgates could be an alternative for travel in crowded full scaled systems. The sectors in Jumpgate would then be the equivalent of portions of an important system in E4 that has such infrastructure (jumpgates), for instance in the Sol-system you launch from Earth, have to fly for some minutes to reach the jumpgate leading to Jupiter, then some more minutes from the jumpgate near Jupiter to reach your favourite bar on Ganymede. It would be an option, you could still explore the space of the whole system without using the jumpgates if you wish.
If you simply don't like MMOGs, fair enough, but you will fail if you want to prove that a space sim can only be singleplayer. Perhaps a bit more thinking has to be done for a MMOG, but of course it can be done - it was done.
I guess since some won't bother with singleplayer and others won't bother with MMO, best thing would be to simply offer both.
I did not suggest to drop full scaled systems in favor of sectors in E4 but pointed out that jumpgates could be an alternative for travel in crowded full scaled systems. The sectors in Jumpgate would then be the equivalent of portions of an important system in E4 that has such infrastructure (jumpgates), for instance in the Sol-system you launch from Earth, have to fly for some minutes to reach the jumpgate leading to Jupiter, then some more minutes from the jumpgate near Jupiter to reach your favourite bar on Ganymede. It would be an option, you could still explore the space of the whole system without using the jumpgates if you wish.
If you simply don't like MMOGs, fair enough, but you will fail if you want to prove that a space sim can only be singleplayer. Perhaps a bit more thinking has to be done for a MMOG, but of course it can be done - it was done.
I guess since some won't bother with singleplayer and others won't bother with MMO, best thing would be to simply offer both.
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The effect is not the same - time compression can be turned on and off completely transparently to the gameworld. It has no effect on the mechanics since it's not a part of the mechanics.
FTL, on the other hand is necessarily on when you're going somewhere, if you turn it off you will arrive much later.
FTL also has numerous undesirable side effects on the internal logic of the gameworld and pacing of the game which time compression lacks for a good reason - it's usually not even a part of the gameworld, only of an interface between the gameworld and the player, frontier's silly fluff on stardreamer notwithstanding.
First, sufficiently precise FTL is indistinguishable from a doomsday weapon. Granted a conventional spaceship can make a decent RKV, but with tech level of Frontier, you can reasonably defend yourself against such threat, while a necessarily inertialess FTL would be essentially unstoppable. If an FTL drive allows for precision sufficient to avoid the need for time compression it's sufficiently precise. Simply put, any sufficiently advanced technology introduces a lot of unforeseen consequences, each with their own unforeseen consequences, each... etc.
The effects of such causal explosion on the unprotected internal consistency of the gameworld is comparable to the effect of salvo from GAU-8/A "Avenger" on unprotected human flesh - mangled, barely recognizable shreds dispersed across the huge (plot)hole. I would prefer E4 to avoid the fate of ST where the storywriters had to run around in circles, contradict themselves and engage in all things zany producing copious amounts of gibberish known as treknobabble in the process only to find a way for standard Starfleet technology to not be able to solve the problem in a risk-free unexciting manner in under 5s.
Second, FTL affects pacing a lot. In Frontier a week could pass between ship's departure form one system and arrival in another, additional several days between its arrival in the system and its arrival at its port of destination. This allowed for much more deliberate gameplay as well as helped underline how freakin' big the space is. You know, the feeling you'd probably want space sim to convey. IWar2, using the FTL mechanics you described, on the other hand, completely missed this feeling of vastness - you didn't have to spend days hanging seemingly motionless against the black sky to just build up your speed. Despite of the mighty FTL making the pacing almost slapstick the RL travel times in IWar2 were still noticeably longer than in Frontier (because the time compression wasn't there) and were a major annoyance in this game.
Third, it renders Newtonian flight inconsequential, so, again, unlike time compression it strikes a heavy blow against the game mechanics and gameplay - again. When you fly across the system on conventional drive, you have to accept some things. For example, if something happens that would make you want to change your course immediately - tough luck. It doesn't matter if you would pass your newly found object of interest in the distance of 100m or 100AU - it's equally inaccessible. If the object is not particularly time sensitive, reaching it would still mean several days of course alterations and heavy expenditure of fuel. Feels like space, unlike being whisked from one place to another by an FTL fairy.
Only as much as not having to care about regularly vacating your character's bowels in an RPG is.
It allows you to skip the boring and pointless without disrupting the flow of the game or its logic (would you opt for some super-duper hyperdrive in a realistic flight sim too?).
Arguably, the time compression is superior to all the methods of skipping the pointless as it allows you to skip stuff without ever being removed from control.
Again, logic.
I won't attempt exact math here, but a fully loaded Asp has about 3GJ of kinetic energy after giving one second full burn. Idiotically assuming no energy lost with exhaust, it therefore needs at least 3GW powerplant on board. How hard can such a powerplant be to detect in 4K coldness of space? How about several such powerplants shooting each other with lasers? Thermodynamics is a *****.
The pirates can scramble the signals and such to not be identified, but a shootout will, and with powerful FTL, the police will be there in minutes assuming some FTL sensors, but even if pirates could scramble FTL communication (assuming it even exists), you could use FTL equipped sentry drones, even if they would have to carry the messages physically.
No such problem without precise FTL.
Additionally, something that has to be balanced between too boring gameplay and too fast pacing will never prove superior to something that exists outside of the game mechanics and can therefore be arbitrarily powerful without ever affecting anything. Without IFTL your game will be boring, with it - stupid. My game has up to 10000x time compression, can very well have 1000000x should it prove necessary.
And the reason for it would be? If a random punk can purchase a warship (he can) and if human societies tend to band together for protection and develop dedicated forces for this purpose (they do), there is absolutely no reason for police to not exist in game. Plus it always was there in the series.
BTW: Removing features making Frontier distinct from all the Elite clones also removes reasons to pick it over those clones and what you propose is total disembowelment of the core gameplay and gameworld just to provide you with an MMO.
You tell me you get a better feeling of vastness of space by pushing a button and looking at the clock running faster? Even compared to a FTL-Drive that does not accelerate travel to the same degree? Funny. I don't, I simply get the feeling of things being silly.
FTL means a doomsday weapon? First we have shields. Second FTL is no conventional movement in space, because physics does not allow that as I pointed out, so speaking of Newtonian concepts like kinetic energy does not apply to objects using FTL. With FTL you are past conventional science and in science fiction (the same as with time compression), so we are free to "invent" it as it is suitable for a good game experience. FTL could, for instance, have the side effect of altering the matter of the ship in a way that it does not interact with matter below FTL, so if you fly through a planet it won't cause a scratch on ship or planet. Or instead of the interference-thing that I suggested FTL could be disabled simply by a mass of ship-size or higher (stations, planets, suns) coming close. No potential at all for a weapon that way.
I like a (close to) Newtonian flight model, and there is no problem for that with FTL. If you turn off FTL (or it is turned off automatically by a mass of at least ship-size approaching), you fall back to conventional movement immediately and enjoy Newtonian physics. In order to make things not too easy, one should have to build up a certain Newtonian speed before FTL can be activated, and that should be the Newtonian speed that you still have to handle when falling out of FTL.
If you want piracy and police in the same game, this must be balanced somehow, and there are a thousand ways to do that. There must be areas where police is absent or rare or late but which are interesting for traders or miners. Police could simply be restricted to planets and stations so that it takes them, let's say 15 minutes with FTL to the edge of the system where pirates lurk and traders fall out of hyperspace. A pirate must then finish his business within 15 minutes or face the police.
Plausible reasons for police being completely absent would be poor or completely unsettled systems. I myself am not too keen on many occupied, AI-driven systems at all. I'm dreaming of a space MMOG where the players and guilds themselves settle in systems, gather resources, start building the infrastructure and so on - and if a guild wants "police" in their system, they can set up the infrastructure to produce AI-drones or have their own human pilots patrolling the system or a combination of both.
For me space flight is the core fun in a space sim and not boring. In Jumpgate you need several minutes to a station in the neighbor sector up to an hour or so to the most distant sector which is absolutely ok for me. Space in a game though must be an interesting and also dangerous place (to varying degrees, depending on your route) to make it exciting, and that can be successfully balanced, Jumpgate proves that for me.
Please stop saying "this or that is not exactly how it was in FFE so it would completely ruin the Elite brand". If you want FFE with a graphics update why don't you go for that Russian thing?
And as I said before:
I think as soon as Frontier have made up their minds that this will happen (or otherwise), it would be nice to communicate this to us so that we could make different threads discussing the singleplayer-version and the MMO-version (or otherwise can save the energy discussing the version that will not happen).
FTL means a doomsday weapon? First we have shields. Second FTL is no conventional movement in space, because physics does not allow that as I pointed out, so speaking of Newtonian concepts like kinetic energy does not apply to objects using FTL. With FTL you are past conventional science and in science fiction (the same as with time compression), so we are free to "invent" it as it is suitable for a good game experience. FTL could, for instance, have the side effect of altering the matter of the ship in a way that it does not interact with matter below FTL, so if you fly through a planet it won't cause a scratch on ship or planet. Or instead of the interference-thing that I suggested FTL could be disabled simply by a mass of ship-size or higher (stations, planets, suns) coming close. No potential at all for a weapon that way.
I like a (close to) Newtonian flight model, and there is no problem for that with FTL. If you turn off FTL (or it is turned off automatically by a mass of at least ship-size approaching), you fall back to conventional movement immediately and enjoy Newtonian physics. In order to make things not too easy, one should have to build up a certain Newtonian speed before FTL can be activated, and that should be the Newtonian speed that you still have to handle when falling out of FTL.
If you want piracy and police in the same game, this must be balanced somehow, and there are a thousand ways to do that. There must be areas where police is absent or rare or late but which are interesting for traders or miners. Police could simply be restricted to planets and stations so that it takes them, let's say 15 minutes with FTL to the edge of the system where pirates lurk and traders fall out of hyperspace. A pirate must then finish his business within 15 minutes or face the police.
Plausible reasons for police being completely absent would be poor or completely unsettled systems. I myself am not too keen on many occupied, AI-driven systems at all. I'm dreaming of a space MMOG where the players and guilds themselves settle in systems, gather resources, start building the infrastructure and so on - and if a guild wants "police" in their system, they can set up the infrastructure to produce AI-drones or have their own human pilots patrolling the system or a combination of both.
For me space flight is the core fun in a space sim and not boring. In Jumpgate you need several minutes to a station in the neighbor sector up to an hour or so to the most distant sector which is absolutely ok for me. Space in a game though must be an interesting and also dangerous place (to varying degrees, depending on your route) to make it exciting, and that can be successfully balanced, Jumpgate proves that for me.
Please stop saying "this or that is not exactly how it was in FFE so it would completely ruin the Elite brand". If you want FFE with a graphics update why don't you go for that Russian thing?
And as I said before:
I think as soon as Frontier have made up their minds that this will happen (or otherwise), it would be nice to communicate this to us so that we could make different threads discussing the singleplayer-version and the MMO-version (or otherwise can save the energy discussing the version that will not happen).
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Reading comprehension. If at first you don't succeed, try, try again.
I already explained how time compression is completely irrelevant to mechanics or pacing because of not being part of this mechanics, and how FTL is not.
I do not intend to repeat myself, nor do I have to.
So? At worst you have means of deploying any payload anywhere in stupidly short time.
Still not a doomsday weapon?
Without sufficient time for reaction on part of the system defences or ability to discern potential threats based on their flight behaviour.
How about now?
So apart from blessing us with extra treknobabble you want to relieve us of the ability to land on planets (surface distant, FTL disabled) as well? Truly, there is no end to the miracles contained within your person.
Ah, yes spending 15' staring at the stars each time I hyperspace into a system. I didn't know the sheer amount of fun I have always missed.
If it was spaceflight rather than riding an inertialess flutterby, I could agree.
I want FFE with massive graphics and gameplay update. I can admit this. FFE/FE2 make for very sound conceptual framework for Elite IV and the common wisdom dictates that you should not break something that works well to begin with with misguided attempts to fix it.If you want FFE with a graphics update why don't you go for that Russian thing?
Pretty good idea. I won't mind if the MMO version exists or not, as long as I will be able to play SP E4 without it's MMO-specific "improvements" or ****ty DRM or transaction model.
I did read your stuff quite thoroughly, even read what you linked and looked up all the abbreviations you use, but just don't agree with it and I certainly don't want to get into a flame war over it. What counts for me in the end is the time I spend in RL in front of the screen between starting at point A until reaching point B. I have more of a feeling of vastness if this takes longer and not if my game clock runs faster. We probably won't ever agree about whether a time machine on board is reasonable, and I think we have both made our points concerning this without further need of repetition.
There is no reason why FTL-objects should not be tracked on radar.
No. The planet approaches, you fall out of FTL and back to Newtonian speed, decrease that by turning 180 degrees and firing your main thruster, then you land on the planet.
Make up your mind whether FTL is too fast or too slow please.
15 minutes was a first suggestion, could be 10 minutes or 5 minutes. Plus: Remember space travel can be made interesting (encounters with other players or AI-aliens, things to explore, valuable asteroids or artifacts to be found etc.). And remember optional jumpgates could shorten the travel if you just want to reach a destination and are not in the mood to explore or hunt. Jumpgates could also be used by police though, but then if you are a pirate and feel you have to prey in an advanced system with jumpgates make sure you can handle police arriving quicker (by cooperating with other pirates for instance).
It's all about balance. Things have to be and can be balanced.
FTL and Newtonian flight in one direction for weeks speeded up by time compression is not much of a different experience. Newtonian flight as soon as something interesting approaches and one actually has to do something other than heading in one direction is safely in place in both concepts.
You say everything with a specific singleplayer game in mind that you played many years ago (FFE), not considering a second what that would mean for a MMOG, whereas I say everything with a MMOG in mind that is based on the common ground of Elite, FE2 and FFE, trying to work out something that would not be impossible in a singleplayer game as well. Plus I have experienced both MMO and singleplayer space games and you seem to have only experienced the latter. I have the impression these differences contribute to our communication problem.
There is no reason why FTL-objects should not be tracked on radar.
No. The planet approaches, you fall out of FTL and back to Newtonian speed, decrease that by turning 180 degrees and firing your main thruster, then you land on the planet.
Make up your mind whether FTL is too fast or too slow please.
15 minutes was a first suggestion, could be 10 minutes or 5 minutes. Plus: Remember space travel can be made interesting (encounters with other players or AI-aliens, things to explore, valuable asteroids or artifacts to be found etc.). And remember optional jumpgates could shorten the travel if you just want to reach a destination and are not in the mood to explore or hunt. Jumpgates could also be used by police though, but then if you are a pirate and feel you have to prey in an advanced system with jumpgates make sure you can handle police arriving quicker (by cooperating with other pirates for instance).
It's all about balance. Things have to be and can be balanced.
FTL and Newtonian flight in one direction for weeks speeded up by time compression is not much of a different experience. Newtonian flight as soon as something interesting approaches and one actually has to do something other than heading in one direction is safely in place in both concepts.
You say everything with a specific singleplayer game in mind that you played many years ago (FFE), not considering a second what that would mean for a MMOG, whereas I say everything with a MMOG in mind that is based on the common ground of Elite, FE2 and FFE, trying to work out something that would not be impossible in a singleplayer game as well. Plus I have experienced both MMO and singleplayer space games and you seem to have only experienced the latter. I have the impression these differences contribute to our communication problem.
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