Can you at least make it so that when you enter a zone your ship will face the same direction it did before the transition, or at least point away from the nearest sector wall. 1 minute Slipstream is practically pointless when you have to make a 180 degree turn or you'll just go back to where you came from.
I agree with this. I'm surprised this hasn't been fixed? Implemented? before. I would've thought this would be already in the game form the beginning - "It's one of those things" people would expect.
Anyways, hoping to look forward to this sometime in the future, if it's possible of course.
My take is that sector space will always be a disappointment as long as the map controls are movement controls with a bunch of greyed out buttons.
Think back to other games that have a map screen. They're almost never handled using standard movement controls.
Mario games have 2D or 2.5D maps. Kingdom Hearts has a standard map screen and a rail shooter. Mega Man has a menu.
By making it literal standard movement, you wind up creating weird expectations about distance. This is one reason I favor interior travel and think it would be more productive to make interior travel feel more social than to make sector travel like space travel.
At the very least, I'd get rid of the action bar or replace the action bar with sector space relevant keybinds/actions.
My take is that sector space will always be a disappointment as long as the map controls are movement controls with a bunch of greyed out buttons.
Think back to other games that have a map screen. They're almost never handled using standard movement controls.
Mario games have 2D or 2.5D maps. Kingdom Hearts has a standard map screen and a rail shooter. Mega Man has a menu.
By making it literal standard movement, you wind up creating weird expectations about distance. This is one reason I favor interior travel and think it would be more productive to make interior travel feel more social than to make sector travel like space travel.
At the very least, I'd get rid of the action bar or replace the action bar with sector space relevant keybinds/actions.
Interior travel, whether advanced enough to allow your party to travel from your bridge with a bridge invitation, would afford players a sliding bar to set for the duration of transit. Those who wish to RP in transit could do so by setting the bar higher while those looking for brutal efficiency could set the transit time to minimum. Thus the level of immersion that both groups are seeking could still be maintained.
Jack Emmert: "Starfleet and Klingon. ... So two factions, full PvE content." Al Rivera hates Klingons Star Trek Online: Agents of Jack Emmert All cloaks should be canon.
I sure hope you guys have the $3000.00 computer rigs to handle rendering 1000 starships sitting outside Sol and keeping you from going into Sol because it is literally a "Fed ball". :eek:
A relatively simple method to skip some of the popup messages without entirely recoding the sector space system might be to have the System List tab show all the systems in the game (sorted by sector block and possibly sector) and let you select your ultimate destination. The game could then automatically skip the sector border messages along the way. (The auto-nav system would need to be capable of avoiding the exploration areas when you want to go somewhere else though, making those areas in-sector objects like a couple are would solve that.)
Last time I checked, which mean around 3years ago, Jita was also the most laggy place in the whole gaming universe.
Does it works ? Yes. Is it effective ? Hell no.
Changing sector to one big map won't bring any landmark improvements to the game, but forcing all players onto one map, multi-instanced though it may be, will definitely increase latency/lag issues in heavily populated instances, something I would not see as an improvement.
A change I would favor is breaking sector down into smaller pieces that load on the fly as you move so that borders between sectors are more transparent. There would never be a loading window, you are constantly in the middle of a 3 by 3 grid of map pieces with new areas loading in the background as you approach the grid piece bordering it.
The only really annoying part of the current system is your Boff bugging you when you approach a border, for that I wouldn't mind if we could have an option to pass borders automatically where we have diplomatic access to enter, saving the prompt only for when approaching an unexplored sector or a region where we don't have access.
Better yet a true operational autopilot that allows us to pick a destination sector on the galaxy map then handles all of the navigation and border crossings automatically to get us there.
If something is not broken, don't fix it, if it is broken, don't leave it broken.
Why not just have the faction's sector space connect and not all of them together? Surely this is a better option? Or at least one which could actually happen and won't create as many, if not any bugs.
As in, all of the Fed space sector's are connected, the Rom side, all those are connected too, but not connected to the Fed, if you get where I'm coming from? etc etc.
I think, although the whole map should be, it would create problems, so what do you think about my idea? At least it meets both sides of the case half way. :P
This would make a whole lot of sense, even if they kept the "clearance" dialogues. Those dialogues would then actually make sense, as you would be asking for permission to enter another faction's territory.
I would still like a borderless (between existing areas in-game) sector space, however.
To be immersive, the contacts would be more specific to the sector block. As not all territories are marked by hard, sector block zone borders. Say, you're traveling Alpha Centauri Sector Block. Starbase 38-Sierra contacts you. Be that Traffic Control or Admiral T'Nae. "You are leaving Federation territory. Current intelligence reports suggest...blah, blah, blah." Give each area some local color. Have this along both the zone border as well as a pop-up (ala a distress signal) when simply crossing through an area like Sierra Sector. That one could be your own BO speaking up to remind you of borders.
Along Klingon/Federation space within Eta Eridani, that contact could be from a Fleet Starbase, if your Captain is attached to one. Otherwise, it would be Deep Space K-7 or Ganalda.
(/\) Exploring Star Trek Online Since July 2008 (/\)
It would be great to have one big sector map but then cryptic would loose thousands of players because not all people play STO on a year 2012 PC.
Most player's would have so much rendering problems because processors would fail .
No that wouldn't work at all for most players.
To keep it short BAD IDEA !!!
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
"Coffee: the finest organic suspension ever devised. It's got me through the worst of the last three years. I beat the Borg with it."
Changing sector to one big map won't bring any landmark improvements to the game, but forcing all players onto one map, multi-instanced though it may be, will definitely increase latency/lag issues in heavily populated instances, something I would not see as an improvement.
A change I would favor is breaking sector down into smaller pieces that load on the fly as you move so that borders between sectors are more transparent. There would never be a loading window, you are constantly in the middle of a 3 by 3 grid of map pieces with new areas loading in the background as you approach the grid piece bordering it.
The only really annoying part of the current system is your Boff bugging you when you approach a border, for that I wouldn't mind if we could have an option to pass borders automatically where we have diplomatic access to enter, saving the prompt only for when approaching an unexplored sector or a region where we don't have access.
Better yet a true operational autopilot that allows us to pick a destination sector on the galaxy map then handles all of the navigation and border crossings automatically to get us there.
If they replaced Sector Space with a ferry service, you'd see both problems eliminated. My 'net died for a bit earlier today, swallowing my post.
But basically, you have convoys of ships traveling "by extending their warp bubble for more rapid transport." You queue for a travel destination.
Each starting to ending point is a unique zone.
So Beta Ursae to Tau Dewa is one social zone, say the U.S.S. Manheim. Pa Canis to Tau Dewa is the U.S.S. Janeway or whatever.
So you queue for travel. You get put aboard a ship interior (with an option to cut to external view of the ship convoy; I can outline how this works) and events happening on the ship. Each starting point/destination gets a unique convoy assigned to it.
The big conceit here is that groups can travel faster than solo ships.
You have a personal timer for your travel time. Exiting early resets your progress or possibly deposits you at the nearest Starbase.
Each ship is an adventure zone. Each ship has its own DOff assignments and event timer for social missions. If you just want to "gryphon ride", hang out in the transporter room where you spawn or toggle to the exterior view of the ships at warp (there's a simple trick for this). If you want social/active gameplay, explore the ship and participate in public adventure zone missions while your travel timer ticks down.
Interior travel on your own ship is reserved for exploration missions. Travel to known destinations occurs in convoys.
Comments
I agree with this. I'm surprised this hasn't been fixed? Implemented? before. I would've thought this would be already in the game form the beginning - "It's one of those things" people would expect.
Anyways, hoping to look forward to this sometime in the future, if it's possible of course.
Think back to other games that have a map screen. They're almost never handled using standard movement controls.
Mario games have 2D or 2.5D maps. Kingdom Hearts has a standard map screen and a rail shooter. Mega Man has a menu.
By making it literal standard movement, you wind up creating weird expectations about distance. This is one reason I favor interior travel and think it would be more productive to make interior travel feel more social than to make sector travel like space travel.
At the very least, I'd get rid of the action bar or replace the action bar with sector space relevant keybinds/actions.
Interior travel, whether advanced enough to allow your party to travel from your bridge with a bridge invitation, would afford players a sliding bar to set for the duration of transit. Those who wish to RP in transit could do so by setting the bar higher while those looking for brutal efficiency could set the transit time to minimum. Thus the level of immersion that both groups are seeking could still be maintained.
Al Rivera hates Klingons
Star Trek Online: Agents of Jack Emmert
All cloaks should be canon.
Does it works ? Yes. Is it effective ? Hell no.
A change I would favor is breaking sector down into smaller pieces that load on the fly as you move so that borders between sectors are more transparent. There would never be a loading window, you are constantly in the middle of a 3 by 3 grid of map pieces with new areas loading in the background as you approach the grid piece bordering it.
The only really annoying part of the current system is your Boff bugging you when you approach a border, for that I wouldn't mind if we could have an option to pass borders automatically where we have diplomatic access to enter, saving the prompt only for when approaching an unexplored sector or a region where we don't have access.
Better yet a true operational autopilot that allows us to pick a destination sector on the galaxy map then handles all of the navigation and border crossings automatically to get us there.
To be immersive, the contacts would be more specific to the sector block. As not all territories are marked by hard, sector block zone borders. Say, you're traveling Alpha Centauri Sector Block. Starbase 38-Sierra contacts you. Be that Traffic Control or Admiral T'Nae. "You are leaving Federation territory. Current intelligence reports suggest...blah, blah, blah." Give each area some local color. Have this along both the zone border as well as a pop-up (ala a distress signal) when simply crossing through an area like Sierra Sector. That one could be your own BO speaking up to remind you of borders.
Along Klingon/Federation space within Eta Eridani, that contact could be from a Fleet Starbase, if your Captain is attached to one. Otherwise, it would be Deep Space K-7 or Ganalda.
Most player's would have so much rendering problems because processors would fail .
No that wouldn't work at all for most players.
To keep it short BAD IDEA !!!
"Coffee: the finest organic suspension ever devised. It's got me through the worst of the last three years. I beat the Borg with it."
If they replaced Sector Space with a ferry service, you'd see both problems eliminated. My 'net died for a bit earlier today, swallowing my post.
But basically, you have convoys of ships traveling "by extending their warp bubble for more rapid transport." You queue for a travel destination.
Each starting to ending point is a unique zone.
So Beta Ursae to Tau Dewa is one social zone, say the U.S.S. Manheim. Pa Canis to Tau Dewa is the U.S.S. Janeway or whatever.
So you queue for travel. You get put aboard a ship interior (with an option to cut to external view of the ship convoy; I can outline how this works) and events happening on the ship. Each starting point/destination gets a unique convoy assigned to it.
The big conceit here is that groups can travel faster than solo ships.
You have a personal timer for your travel time. Exiting early resets your progress or possibly deposits you at the nearest Starbase.
Each ship is an adventure zone. Each ship has its own DOff assignments and event timer for social missions. If you just want to "gryphon ride", hang out in the transporter room where you spawn or toggle to the exterior view of the ships at warp (there's a simple trick for this). If you want social/active gameplay, explore the ship and participate in public adventure zone missions while your travel timer ticks down.
Interior travel on your own ship is reserved for exploration missions. Travel to known destinations occurs in convoys.