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What does exploration mean to you?
centersolace
Member Posts: 11,178 Arc User
We all say we want it, but what is it that we want?
Post edited by centersolace on
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Well...
Maybe there's one or two out there...
The only way I could see it coming anywhere near happening is to develop a gaming environment where users have access to a "foundry" like set of options for creating races and worlds, and then approve those they consider worthwhile to become part of the game.
To do this properly would be effectively impossible for technical reasons, at least in THIS century.
That game got more crowded, people complained about how long it took to get places, and...it was never the same - even when they tried to introduce other forms of exploration, it just wasn't the same.
This is DS9-like Trek, here...not like TOS, TAS, TNG, VOY, nor ENT. And the thing is, the way so many folks complain about things - I couldn't see it working any other way. It's a combination of folks on their deathbeds realizing how little time they have left and not wanting to waste any and of folks so young that ADHD is the norm...
That's as opposed to picking something off a list; or going to a particular place because the plot demands it.
The fact that I have to go off the beaten track and find something to do, rather than just be given it, is important to me; as trivial a thing as it may seem to others. In some ways, I consider it more important than what there is to actually find.
That's why just adding more stuff to the clusters always seemed to me to be the way forward; because they already did that (not very well, I admit, but they did it).
---EDIT---
For the record, I am opposed to the idea of using the Foundry as the primary source of exploration content. I won't deny that the Foundry could do with being more accessible, but all that requires is a new UI; it should not come at the expense of any other features of the game. It could work as a part of an exploration revamp, but should not serve as an alternative to one.
Replacing exploration with the Foundry gains us absolutely nothing; the Foundry is already there for anyone who wants to use it, so the only result of such a move would be that dev crafted exploration content would be gone for good. That is a loss, not a gain.
On the TV shows, it meant charting star systems and meeting the inhabitant factions.
That's also what it typically means in the RPG sense, although there is a difference in that most RPGs hide the points on the map until you reach them, but in Star Trek the systems are known to exist and the unknown(s) are whats inside the systems.
Some games have also used exploration as a way to learn about routes between star systems (jump gates, wormholes, etc), like leanring where a highway goes, but that model doesnt mesh with the ST model, since there is no equivalent to a highway network in Star Trek (you just warp there).
So, what I'd like to see, is a very large star chart. Star systems within your faction territory are known already and stay updated. Other systems outside of your faction space are learned by you if you have diplomacy to enter them. If you lose access (loss of diplomacy) then information starts dropping off.
Obviously there are prerequisites here, namely the information that is worth learning, things like resources available (mining points, gas clouds, etc), buy/sell pricing on commodiities, mission terminals (take passenger to X), DOFF assignments, and so forth, all of which would have to be provided from additional gameplay elements.
I dont think its possible to implement in this game due to organizational issue, but that is what I think of, and what I would like to see.
There is no way for this game to give us Star Trek exploration - because the game cannot produce enough Missions. When you have people playing this game 15+ hours per week you are looking at 30+ new Missions per week; and that does not even take into account the people who play 40+ hours per week.
I know some people think that just flying off into space and finding random non-Mission things could be exciting, but I do not see it that way. Spending hours sitting and waiting for a scan to complete, or mining to be done, would be exceptionally boring for most of the player-base - and it would be an even bigger time-gate system then the new Crafting, IMO.
One of the main reasons for me wanting to play a Star Trek MMO and something that will never happen around here, aparently.
Flying around freely in the galaxy (not some separate room at the side of a sector map) and visiting the existing star systems. Right now STO has a lot of star system that offer patrol missions, and honestly, that is basically a good idea, but executed poorly, since most missions are just the same in a different colour, and once you've done them they are gone.
This would work in a single player game but not in an MMORPG.
How i imagine it, is a pool of diverse missions, that randomly appear in sector space. Freighter in distress, doomsday machine threatening a colony, a BORG incursion, PIRATES!!!, Escorting a freighter, Evacuating a colony attacked by elachi, ... a whole bunch of missions that are not as big as FE missions. For instance, only being ground OR space, not both at the same time.
Or a mission where you need your shuttle, like somebody invites you to race him in your shuttle through a dense asteroid belt.
It would take a lot of these "mini" missions to make a compelling experiance, but the good part is, you don't need to have that many at first, instead add some each month.
Also, fleet actions that have lost most of their popularity could be tight into this. A Gorn minefield ALERT: "Go to system XY, the gorn have taken freighters hostage, free them"
Starbase 24 has been attacked, we need to repell the enemy...
and so on.
So by taking "unused" content, reshaping it a little and adding more to it, maybe sector space would really become more than a travel map. Would make the map feel much more alive and vibrant, which too me would be reason enough to roam around in it, instead of just going from A to B or avoid it completely by using a quicktravel.
Could you imagine if we tuned into a series...where it was just mining, scanning nebulae, finding new stars, or looking at plant life on alien worlds? There are some awesome shows out there along those lines - National Geographic does some, BBC does some, etc, etc, etc. Some folks really dig them, I enjoy them from time to time. But as a primetime show...competing against other shows...hrmm...
Toward that end, the Foundry community is starting a new exploration-themed group project. We're still very early in the planning stages, but in essence we want to set up our own sector or star cluster that people can look at outside the game and explore using Foundry missions inside the game. We're trying to get as many authors involved as we can. There will be some kind of initial storyline and then it will be open to any authors that want to set missions within this area.
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=1155321
1. To me, exploration is the discovery of something new... possibly profound. Once it's discovered, however... duh, it's discovered. There is only so much we can comprehend in our limited understanding.
2. It is NOT a randomly-generated, five-mission roulette-of-a-grindfest that has the name "exploration" slapped on it. Just because something is called exploration, does not mean it is.
3. What should it be in this game? Ultimately, something limited... it should be a lot more than it is, but it should NOT be an endless well of new things. That's not realistic, not for this game, or real life. Practically speaking, I believe (as others have stated, too) that exploration should be directly linked to the Foundry. The Foundry is the only realistic mechanic in the current game structure that would be able to keep up with the demand for more "true exploration."
Just my two (or three) cents.
Imagine cards that have a star with its dimensions and color type but nothing else, we go fill in the blanks regarding planets and anomalies.
As an individual Captain I would visit this system for knowledge, resource exploitation, or first contact possibilities. When I warp to the location of the star, this system card has its planets filled in. I then can click on an individual planet to visit. Using map resources available the random space and ground maps are generated.
If there's a native race there, and it's warp capable, have a first contact. It it's not, report back to Jiro about their status. If the planets are unoccupied, hunt for resources, crafting mats, w/e. If you find a hostile faction in orbit, choose diplomacy or combat. Worst case scenario is I progress my diplomacy cxp and come away with some crafting mats. If I choose to keep the card to trade or sell, I don't get the mission reward from Juro.
From a fleet perspective, It would be good to be able to claim a system to colonize. The cards we get would have the option to be placed in a permanent slot for our fleet. We could then use that map like a foundry map and create infrastructure. This would be a good income source for Cryptic I think. A larger fleet would have more slots available. You could assign groups of fleet members to decorate maps with buildings and defensive structures that the fleet paid for together.
As an individual I may be able to trade these cards to other players or fleets for EC, or simply discard them after I complete the explore mission.
If you find a civilization, the random character generator would populate the map. Why not assign random doff traits, and for a fee, offer the player a chance to hire one of these random doffs. If your fleet colonizes in that star system, use the alien stats to populate some of the fleet maps.
I guess my ideas are a comprehensive system that could involve doffing, crafting, housing, solo and fleet play, as well as pvp. We would need the ability to manipulate and revisit maps that's not been given to us yet.
I feel the devs think they have in fact given us these things already. We can harvest resources from the dil mine, we can change how a map looks by turning on 2k dil projects. What they either don't recognize or are powerless to change is that everyone having the same experience, the same maps with the same aesthetic projects is demoralizing.
If we all were given a foundry map to populate, what are the odds any two would look the same? Even with limited resources we'd all have chairs in different spots, different color walls etc. The devs say Foundry is exploration, but I cannot ever change a mission or map from one play through to the next. They always reset. I affect nothing in the universe.
Think about what exploration is. We never go looking for a place and just leave it pristine. We want things from it. We want to live on it, take materials from it, learn new tech. We put labs in the antarctic even.
Star Trek space is big. By implication, even in the sector maps of "known space" there are probably thousands of systems that have not been completely cataloged, or that haven't been visited in awhile.
What if every sector had an optional "Chart This Region" interaction that launched a random mission in that sector? And suppose that each of those Chart interactions was also a Foundry mission door, and a Foundry author could choose to link that mission into a particular sector?
There could be a mix of official Cryptic content (Special-built and PvE/PvP queues along with Scanners, First Contact, Aid the Planet, Patrol, Distress Signal, Red Alert, etc.) and Foundry missions.
Along with that, I would like to see an Exploration Preferences UI. This would allow you to specify the kinds of content you want to see in a random mission.
For example, if you don't want to encounter random Foundry missions you could set the preference to 'Foundry Missions - Never'. Or if you only want to see Foundry missions with a rating of 3 star or higher, you should be able to set that. Or from particular authors. Or with particular tags.
The other thing exploration needs is a Campaign mode. A way to experience a series of related missions.
Let's say you get a random Campaign in the Regulus sector. You run through the first mission arc of that campaign. The next time you did an exploration in the Regulus sector, you automatically get the second arc of that campaign. And that continues until you've either quit the campaign or played through the whole thing. The one thing campaign mode wouldn't let you do is to play the arc out of sequence.
Among other things, that would allow content authors to create the illusion of a persistent system to visit, that changes every time you visit it.
It wouldn't be perfect, but it would be better than nothing at all.
Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
Hostile Encounters: Author creates land or space scenario, choose whether a diplomatic resolution is possible. This could stand alone or offer an option to continue to the next mission in a series.
First Contacts: I'm positive foundry authors can outdo cryptic here. Create a back story. Am I sent, do I randomly find these people. Test my ability to be cordial and/or relate for twenty minutes. Again, this could stand alone or give me the option to visit their home world, make contacts etc. in a follow up mission.
Exploring: Create a fun map, let me use my tricorder, create some puzzles. If I succeed, lead me to a resource, a storyline etc. Create a mini-game in space where I have to analyze an anomaly. If I choose the best answers I get a code that leads to follow up missions, If Do meh I just get credit for this mission, If I do really badly you give me a code for an ambush mission or something harrowing.
I would enjoy this as exploration provided every mission had a short form, a guaranteed fifteen minute quickie scenario and anything beyond that would be an optional offer by the author. Give me a code based on my performance that would be essentially the name of a follow up mission if I so chose to take it. If you have multiple choices based on my good or bad decisions that would be wonderful.
If everything we click is 45 minutes +/- not many will continue. Make quickies, teasers that bait us into continuing. This would appeal to all audience types.
Also please identify your missions by category. Hostile encounter, map exploration (space or ground), first contact so Cryptic can manage them properly.
Better yet, categorize them by cxp type. Let that be the reward.
I bet foundry authors could create great missions based on commendation types.
Have me infiltrate for espionage cxp, give guest lectures at the Vulcan Ministry of Science for development cxp, skirmish for military etc. Yes, make those the filters. The intro mission gives cxp plus whatever dil reward Cryptic says and the follow up missions are for fun and dil and can meander away from the intro missions category.
Good points, all.
Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
Now this only included a handfull of planets because of technology limits of the day and the engine, But this is the only instance I can remember where dev's allowed players to shape their world how they wanted, and I miss that! Now, do I think a similar system has a place in STO? Your damn right I do, and I think it would be perfect for exploration. My reasioning...Exploration is not about finding random and unknown systems...come on now...Its about revisiting explored ones and ones that were charted in the exploration expansion of the kirk years when everything "was" new. from then on there have been starships exploring every sector of known space. by the point where we get in game, Starfleet should have a relative map of nearly every system in the milkey way and the transwarp technology to get there.
I say we need many more perminant areas to explore as well as a much larger galaxy map...like say ...maybe... Galactic in scale. We the federation or klingons or romulans make up a larger section of the Alpha and beta quadrents as could be denoted by racial colors. That leaves two very large quadrents. The Dominion occupies a sizeable portion of the Gamma quadrent...but not near all of it. The Borg and other races own a sizeable portion of the delta quadrent, but not all of it. Actually about half of it might be borg in the north-western region with blob arms streaching down into other teratories. This is how the map looks 30 years ago durring the events of the hobus supernova. From then on the empire has taken more teritory and the federation has accepted many new races into its mix increasing its borders as well.
Let us play in the Star Trek Universe. A more persistant place, where the actions of the captains can have an impact on the events of the game. Lets imagine if you will almost a sandbox with trek flare, where players are part of a living world. Where actual fleets of ships could come toghther and affect some form of massive change. Where faction doesn't matter. Imagine a transwarb network with a large slipstream players fly through until they are no longer within their network anymore, then just fly...or transport more transwarp hubs and gates and build your own network in space. The further outside a factions transwarp network and space the more lilely a group of enemies will attack it. Imagine truely immersive content and random events happening everywhere all the time.
Any of this would take time to create and implement...thats ok, I can wait if I am going to truely experience Star Trek the way it should be. I being a longtime fan of both space games and mmo's as well as Star Trek Would love to help shape this. Now if only the devs actually read this and cared what the players thought. Perhaps one day. This is exploration to me.
For me, they really nailed it with New Romulus. I could beam down with one of my crew and explore that huge map. Split into separate zones each with its own feel. The planet was like a character in its own right.
Coming a close second is Risa, again a big map to explore with things to do.
I know it takes a long time to make something on that level, but my hope is that every planet in STO could be like New Romulus.
I agree with you about what is ideal, but I don't believe it will materialize.
We do have a foundry though and there are tons of missions that are not getting played.
I think there is a great opportunity to replace the Strange New Worlds missions with short foundry missions that are easy to make.
Foundry authors that have created longer missions that are of high quality but buried, could now make short "hook" missions and thus advertise for themselves.
I could do a fifteen minute mission where I examine a derelict ship that leads me to the option of continuing on to a much longer mission of higher quality, or I could just be happy with the cxp I got and move along.
Playing D&D for many years, I know the value of a good hook. We are not really exposed to any as far as the foundry is concerned. This could be a big opportunity. I will have much more incentive to do your hour long or more mission if I have something invested in it.
Unfortunately, such kind of missions can't just be auto-generated with satisfaction story-lines, I think.
Another part of exploration can be - finding something that no one has seen before and being renown as the guy finding "Mustrum's Star" or whatever. But that also requires some kind of generation of meaningful content (no one cares about Mustrum's star if there isn't anything happening there, or if Mustrum is the only one ever seeing it.)
What I could see being somewhat procedurally generated could be:
Generate a set of rules for how a culture is defined, and a culture's relationship with other cultures, and missions that tie into this.
For example:
We all fondly remember the 3rd Borg Dynasty artifacts, right?
What if there was actually a little bit smarter content, where if the mission generator new "Borg => Object of Interest => Omega Molecule" and would create a mission text that actually made sense.
The missions would still repeat, of course - but it would be random and it might actually make sense for a change.
But even that would be a giant undertaking, I suspect. Maybe it could be done with an expansion? But I won't get my hopes up.
My other favorite idea is simple to ensure that all "exploration clusters" act as foundry entrance points. Ideally with a decent interface, so that you only actually find missions that start in that cluster.
Also as others have said, interesting and meaningful exploration is darn hard to achieve within the confines of a game engine. I'm sure we could manage realistic exploration, though - it would be possible to embed, in the game, a procedural generator that could churn out any number of empty maps for barren worlds. (Which, let's face it, is most likely what's out there in 99% of the universe anyway.)
However, we want something better than that, I guess. So here are my thoughts, such as they are.
Sometime, preferably soon, in the game's storyline, peace breaks out. The Undine and the Voth realize they've been played for suckers by the Iconians, they give up their attack-on-sight mentality and join with Federation, Empire and Republic to fight the real enemy. But we still know frighteningly little about the Iconians (are they the same enemy that's behind the Fek'lhri, for example?), so the overwhelming imperative is to find out more.
So, our ships fan out across the galaxy, exploring those new worlds, visiting new star systems...
... exploring, I guess, mostly procedurally-generated maps, but with a chance, in each one, of finding something. Maybe it's something boring like a hostile ship of some kind, or some encounter like those in the soon-to-be-defunct exploration clusters. But maybe it is a lost relic of some ancient culture, or a fragment of technology, a cache of information, or something that bears on the overall quest.
You could make a new rep grind out of it, if you had a mind to. You might make it an open-ended grind, even, so that rather than levelling up to tier 5 and stopping, you could go on collecting these ancient relics and information. And, perhaps, using them. After a few serious exploring missions, my Klingon skipper might have enough insights and bits-and-bobs to cobble together an Ancient Hur'q Warp Core for her ship, with all sorts of nifty abilities (that need not be the same as anyone else's Ancient Hur'q Warp Core, either). Or my Romulan captain could discover ancient metalworking techniques and go into battle with a Masterwork Blade after the manner of S'Harien. Something like that. You would gather information, and you would use it, to create unique (or at least highly flexible) results.
And, once you got enough fragments of ancient relics or strange technologies or whatever... you could see something of the "big picture" - and move on to the next season of the game.
It's an idea. I believe it could be realized within a game engine... and, to be honest, it would be a bit more Star Trek than a battle zone where you shoot lots of aliens.
Freelancer uses a setup where systems are described with star sphere background, placement and color of the sun(s), placement and material/color of the planets and asteroid belts, etc. Systems are described in text INI files. and simply reference the appropriate art elements. That whole working model could be replicated in a dynamic model pretty easily.
But its meeting interesting aliens and blowing them up that we are actually looking for.
That would require a lot of hardware power though.
are you about to call the great Hikaru sulu a liar?
http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Star_Trek_VI:_The_Undiscovered_Country
"It appears we have lost our sex appeal, captain."- Tuvok
Let's face it, we have to have plants and gaseous anomalies.
There is a 30 year old PC game called Starflight that was heavily inspired by Star Trek and it had litearlly 1000x more exploration than STO ever did. That's saying a lot. There are videos up on youtube.
In this game, when you started off, you had 0 knowledge of what was in the next Star System, if it was owned by a friendly race, a hostile race, of nobody owning it. You entered it, and you go planet to planet, scanning it. You had to level up your science officer to get a better understanding of what the world was, if you could land on it or get crushed by the high gravity. Or discover its a planet with life or a planet with resources to be mined. You gathered up these lifeforms and minerals, then sold it to upgrade your ship.
Pretty much, this is what STO should've been, more or less.
The First taste of exploration, those players fresh out of the tutorial could've been tasked to start off evaluations and to known systems in Sirius Sector and start off. Then after you graduate, you go into empty sector blocks, go to star system to star system, entering it and cataloging worlds. To us they are worlds we never been to before, but to the STO server, they are premade worlds that have certain outcomes (not quite the random generator of the Exploration Clusters with the Genesis system). And you could discover new resources. Also, you never know you might run into a new race. Could they be a race that just discovered warp? Or a race that travels the stars and are far from home? Maybe you discover an alien ruins that becomes a classic MMO dungeon and you gather a team to brave the challenge for whatever reward that nobody might not have.
Given the size of STO (50 Light years from Earth), and given the Galaxy is 100,000 Light Years wide, Cryptic has golden opportunity to open the gates and let us out into the galaxy to explore. And intergalactic sectors obviously wouldn't be scaled to STO's current size, which would save them server space.
And you could very well encounter known species like the Sheliak or brave the Great Barrier and visit Sha'ka'Ree. Go towards the Delta Quadrant the old fashion way and eventually run into the unknown and dangerous Fen Domar that Admiral Janeway mentioned. Or head to the Galactic South East and follow V'ger to it's origin?
So many possibilities when I think of Exploration. But not some overgrown random mission generator. :P