Z axis I don't care much about. But having to corkscrew to space anomalies all the time is EXTREMELY annoying. If any devs are reading this, please enable auto-pilot to anomalies just like you have for enemies. It would be great to double click an anomaly and have the ship auto corkscrew to them.
Dear god that was awesome! That has never even entered my train of thought!
Yeah, QFT for sure!
If you won't give us our Z axis, then make it less of a hassle to fly in "space water".
I don't believe it's that they don't want to hear it.
If that were so, Coderanger wouldn't have posted here (and Stormshade would've locked it outright).
It's vitriolic comments that derail threads and force any sensible business to close them.
Fair enough, I have been around since the beta days and watched many threads die because of the Z axis.
So I have a bias perspective I am sure, plus I don't like the Mods here. So that variable comes into play whenever I see a yellow name, especially when they are trying to lie to me.
No worries, I will leave the thread too dense in here (heh no Z axis) I will make a Z thread, that will be deleted like the ones before it. Or I could just play the buggy game, I don't know.
I came in here saying, I'd like the Z cause it is "locked". Someone challenged my usage of the quoted word locked, and this whole mess began. I think we all agree that the ships can't fully use the Z-axis, which was the WHOLE POINT of my first post.
I consider this a flaw, because in space you have a Z-axis that can be fully used. Then the semantics began, ugh.
Anyway, I consider this a victory of sorts. The mods read my words, that is a feat in itself!
Z axis I don't care much about. But having to corkscrew to space anomalies all the time is EXTREMELY annoying. If any devs are reading this, please enable auto-pilot to anomalies j
QFT!
And TRIBBLE autopilot. I wanna do a proper barrel-roll in space already, Kahndammit!
A while back I offered an idea internally for how to be on the bridge while flying in sector space. I didn't have much luck getting anything started but the idea is workable. When some new tech goes in that I am waiting for I plan to re-propose it.
Without going into too much detail it basically works this way. You go to sector space and turn on auto pilot to a system or just go forward. Map move to your bridge. The code stores your auto pilot info and spawns a critter in sector space that looks like you that will follow those auto pilot instructions. Since you know from your auto pilot settings how long it will take to get to your destination your bridge officer will tell you that you have arrived after a certain amount of time has passed.
It would be really nice to have a more complete HTML parser/renderer in the engine. Our custom UI language works really nicely for building stuff like a game HUD, but for a simple dialog HTML would be far easier.
DSTAHL are you listening? I think Coderanger just volunteered to add some HTML parsing and presentation into the game engine. Get that on the schedule!
The thing that makes the engine a problem is the super heavy instancing. That's pretty much all I can see wrong with it.
People say thats not a limitation of the engine. but I dont think I've seen another game with some many loading screens (what most people call 'instancing') and that has got to be the #1 or #2 worst most annoying thing about the game. If it's not a game engine limitation, its a ****-poor policy decision on someones behalf.
I suppose you can phrase it that way. I don't really see that issue as a limitation since it doesn't directly block any functionality we want, it just doesn't work as a workaround to another, deeper issue.
Eeewwww. Losing big points there Coderanger. This is CLEARLY something "we" want. In fact, if there is any doubt on how high a priority it should be, then I think another community poll is in order from TPTB.
A while back I offered an idea internally for how to be on the bridge while flying in sector space. I didn't have much luck getting anything started but the idea is workable. When some new tech goes in that I am waiting for I plan to re-propose it.
Without going into too much detail it basically works this way. You go to sector space and turn on auto pilot to a system or just go forward. Map move to your bridge. The code stores your auto pilot info and spawns a critter in sector space that looks like you that will follow those auto pilot instructions. Since you know from your auto pilot settings how long it will take to get to your destination your bridge officer will tell you that you have arrived after a certain amount of time has passed.
Im curious how that might interact with DSE's but this is very close to what a number of people in this thread have proposed. There is no real need to steer from the bridge, just autopilot.
It does raise the question of auto-piloting across sector borders though (something equally as desirable)
How would your proposal handle DSEs and Sector map changes?
I love it! That gets around the one-avatar in two places issue nicely.
The only down-side that I can see is that travel in sector space may be too quick to really get anything done while you're "in" your ship.
There is no rule saying that you have to travel at maximum warp during autopilot. Double click the destination with your slider at Warp 1 if you are in no hurry.
In Trek canon, maneuvering thrusters allow any ship to move in just about any direction without having to point in that direction. You saw the Enterprise move in the Z axis in the Battle of Mutara Nebula in Star Trek II.
I would be happy being able to do a Z-axis move without changing my inclination as an option. I think some inclination, such as we have, is needed due to the fields of fire for some skills and weapons. I would like to find a solution that removes the need to spiral up or down the Z axis.
A while back I offered an idea internally for how to be on the bridge while flying in sector space. I didn't have much luck getting anything started but the idea is workable. When some new tech goes in that I am waiting for I plan to re-propose it.
Without going into too much detail it basically works this way. You go to sector space and turn on auto pilot to a system or just go forward. Map move to your bridge. The code stores your auto pilot info and spawns a critter in sector space that looks like you that will follow those auto pilot instructions. Since you know from your auto pilot settings how long it will take to get to your destination your bridge officer will tell you that you have arrived after a certain amount of time has passed.
That would work great!, However why do you want to have a pet represented in sector space? It just makes tthe implementation a LOT more complicated without any extra gain. The bridge traveler doesn't see his representation (it may well be a cloacked ship), and doesn't use it.
The guy traverling on his bridge clearly doesn't care about the practical or the social aspect of the sector space at all. At that rate you can just add friendly NPCs flying randomly between stars. That would yield the same result ie. sectors feel more populated.
I don't want to re-hash my entire unified travel/persistency thread. The main points about bridge travel are: Add a simple listbox with all possible destination, add a timer, and "teleport" the ship to the destination when the time is up.
I see people chalk up frustrations, disappointments or things that they dislike about the game to the game engine being shared with Champions.
Now, there are things I think could be better with a longer development timeline or with certain choices re-evaluated.
HOWEVER...
The engine itself is not "old"; it was developed from the ground up for a game that was released five months before STO. I fail to see how it's ill-suited to a Star Trek game or how anything I've ever seen as a complaint about this game is due to the engine's limitations.
An engine handles the networking and graphics. Most of the graphical limitations are not due to the engine but what the target user's computer can handle (ie. polygon budgets). In terms of instancing vs. multiple servers vs. the cap on players per instance... None of that is necessarily tied to the engine. In terms of the combat systems employed? Again, not tied to the engine.
That is one of the absolutely dumbest things I have ever heard. If the engine requirements outpace a large percentage of the user's computers then it IS the engine.
That is one of the absolutely dumbest things I have ever heard. If the engine requirements outpace a large percentage of the user's computers then it IS the engine.
However, what we are talking about here is not the requirements of the engine, but the size and complexity of the art assets.
Heres a question but would the unreal engine have better suited this type of game and game play the engine istelf is very stable and well designed and has been used continuisly for some the best games out there if you wanted to go cheep thats fine but at least use a engine that wasn't buged from the geco as was champions this is the same engine used in that mmo and it was ussless as an engine than it is a useless, bugged, and wasted investment engiine now, gezz I love how you guys don't think about the future rather how fast we can make that future happen rather than how you should be thinking which is how to make the future long turm.
You have a point, unreal is proven and has great graphics. However the cryengine 3 is multi platform and looks just as nice. Might be a better choice, not sure.
DSTAHL are you listening? I think Coderanger just volunteered to add some HTML parsing and presentation into the game engine. Get that on the schedule!
Heh, I've already talked to the software leads, it is on my deep schedule, but probably about a year a out at the current rate.
Eeewwww. Losing big points there Coderanger. This is CLEARLY something "we" want. In fact, if there is any doubt on how high a priority it should be, then I think another community poll is in order from TPTB.
No, what you want is a player to be in two places at once (which I addressed). Not being able to dynamically smush together two maps isn't something I've ever heard a player request and can't imagine why they would :-P
Heres a question but would the unreal engine have better suited this type of game and game play the engine istelf is very stable and well designed and has been used continuisly for some the best games out there if you wanted to go cheep thats fine but at least use a engine that wasn't buged from the geco as was champions this is the same engine used in that mmo and it was ussless as an engine than it is a useless, bugged, and wasted investment engiine now, gezz I love how you guys don't think about the future rather how fast we can make that future happen rather than how you should be thinking which is how to make the future long turm.
Unreal (in an MMO at least) just gets you a graphics engine, not the actual hard part of the network and database systems. The reason we rebuilt or whole engine was to get full control over the database layer and all intermediary transaction processing (which includes the network systems since thats all automated as part of transactions). Once you have gone that far it is more or less impossible to integrate an external graphics engine due to the differing interfaces.
Unreal (in an MMO at least) just gets you a graphics engine, not the actual hard part of the network and database systems. The reason we rebuilt or whole engine was to get full control over the database layer and all intermediary transaction processing (which includes the network systems since thats all automated as part of transactions). Once you have gone that far it is more or less impossible to integrate an external graphics engine due to the differing interfaces.
This is why I've always argued that reusing the Cryptic Engine isn't a bad thing.
Anything a player could possibly ask to have included would take less time to build into the Crypotic Engine than to build a new engine around.
Any time someone asks for something that you say it would be difficult to support in this engine, what I think is being missed is that it would be even more difficult to build a new engine that supports that feature.
In short:
Player X: "I would like Feature X."
Coderanger/dstahl: "That would be difficult to support in our engine and take some time to implement."
Player Y: "Geez. Get a new engine."
Player Z: "You should have built a new engine for this game to begin with."
Me: "Getting a new engine would take longer than adding almost any feature to the existing engine. By and large, if this engine doesn't currently support it, it's not because Cryptic used this engine, it's because they didn't think people would want this feature or that the game would be better off without this feature."
I apologise if I've reduced anyone's position to a strawman. My point is, whatever feature you want, CAN be added. And it isn't the engine's fault that it doesn't already exist.
There's really very little of this game that would have been different had Cryptic built it from the ground up, IMHO.
Heh, I've already talked to the software leads, it is on my deep schedule, but probably about a year a out at the current rate.
No, what you want is a player to be in two places at once (which I addressed). Not being able to dynamically smush together two maps isn't something I've ever heard a player request and can't imagine why they would :-P
Got a fix for you over here
It does the same thing..but you don't have to deal with the 2 places problem.
No offense, fungus, but it doesn't solve the problem with lack of social interaction and the tech issues and it seems counterintuitive to thrust people into sensor contacts if it's designed "for the RP crowd". Also, what happens to people visiting a ship that engages a sensor contact?
I do have a proposal out there for shipboard navigation that I think is pretty social:
Basically, you have to spend, say, 20 minutes crossing each sector. With 1% completion every 12 seconds. (If you go to tactical view, you spawn in the middle of the sector you'd be crossing.)
However, by playing a nav sensor social minigame (basically a classic game of snakes, only multiplayer) you can cross a sector much faster as you get an extra 1% completion across a sector block for every piece of navigational data your sensor "snake" "eats". But you have to dodge other players' sensor snakes and compete for nav data.
No offense, fungus, but it doesn't solve the problem with lack of social interaction and the tech issues and it seems counterintuitive to thrust people into sensor contacts if it's designed "for the RP crowd". Also, what happens to people visiting a ship that engages a sensor contact?
I do have a proposal out there for shipboard navigation that I think is pretty social:
Basically, you have to spend, say, 20 minutes crossing each sector. With 1% completion every 12 seconds. (If you go to tactical view, you spawn in the middle of the sector you'd be crossing.)
However, by playing a nav sensor social minigame (basically a classic game of snakes, only multiplayer) you can cross a sector much faster as you get an extra 1% completion across a sector block for every piece of navigational data your sensor "snake" "eats". But you have to dodge other players' sensor snakes and compete for nav data.
I don't understand. Sector Space isn't a social location anyway (though I'm aware that Cryptic was pushing for it to be). We lose nothing by inserting a non-socially-oriented substitution anyway. Starbases and planet surfaces should be the social areas (as they are right now). It just doesn't make sense for me, as is, with ships talking to each other. Captains talked to each other. Not only that, but re-socializing sector space would make starbases and planet surfaces that much more illegitimate. Bring life to the areas where our captains can interact in person. Put me on my ship when I'm in space.
No offense, fungus, but it doesn't solve the problem with lack of social interaction and the tech issues and it seems counterintuitive to thrust people into sensor contacts if it's designed "for the RP crowd". Also, what happens to people visiting a ship that engages a sensor contact?
Does sector space really need to be a "social" area? Between the various space stations and current social planets I think it would be reasonable to provide a non-social travel mechanic. Also, as originally suggested the shipboard travel would be a second option to sector space, leaving the manual piloting of a ship through sector space an option as well.
If you have people on your bridge and you engage a sensor contact, it could function as bridges do now. If you leave while someone else is on your bridge, they remain on your bridge. If you were teamed up with those people, it could function the same as when a team switches maps currently.
If they do consider turning sector space into something that sounds like PacMan , I hope it's optional. Personally that would be a step backwards for me and it would go further away from how travel in Star Trek was handled.
I don't understand. Sector Space isn't a social location anyway (though I'm aware that Cryptic was pushing for it to be). We lose nothing by inserting a non-socially-oriented substitution anyway. Starbases and planet surfaces should be the social areas (as they are right now). It just doesn't make sense for me, as is, with ships talking to each other. Captains talked to each other. Not only that, but re-socializing sector space would make starbases and planet surfaces that much more illegitimate. Bring life to the areas where our captains can interact in person. Put me on my ship when I'm in space.
I agree but it's supposed to be and I imagine any SS redesign (and it is being redesigned) will push the social aspect.
So if we have a better, more social SS, the bridge nav alternative also needs to be social.
I have proposals on making it more social, among other things making it closer to a real space representation with warp and non-warp travel and changing sensor contacts into combat that occurs on the SS map as opposed to being something that pulls you into another map.
Sector space IS a social space. To remove it as such this late after launch, forcing people who have been playing since launch, to relearn the social topography would actually cause STO to buckle. It is not a NGE scale revision but it is a large enough revision that the social fabric would be fundamentally altered. Cryptic cannot afford even a 25% loss of subs from STO.
To "move" the social space that is sector space to another locus would massively destabilize core features. An engine rewrite would be necessary. An engine rewrite is not going to happen.
Sector space IS a social space. To remove it as such this late after launch, forcing people who have been playing since launch, to relearn the social topography would actually cause STO to buckle. It is not a NGE scale revision but it is a large enough revision that the social fabric would be fundamentally altered. Cryptic cannot afford even a 25% loss of subs from STO.
To "move" the social space that is sector space to another locus would massively destabilize core features. An engine rewrite would be necessary. An engine rewrite is not going to happen.
I agree it's too massive a design change. I imagine SS improvements will improve SS as a social hub.
But I think we're confusing design with engine again. I mean, Champions uses the same engine and it doesn't have sector space.
SS as a social hub is a design consideration and needs clarified and improved because many (myself included) don't see it as the social hub it should be.
But that's a design issue, not an issue of engine technology. Although engine tech may help improve it.
Sector space IS a social space. To remove it as such this late after launch, forcing people who have been playing since launch, to relearn the social topography would actually cause STO to buckle. It is not a NGE scale revision but it is a large enough revision that the social fabric would be fundamentally altered. Cryptic cannot afford even a 25% loss of subs from STO.
To "move" the social space that is sector space to another locus would massively destabilize core features. An engine rewrite would be necessary. An engine rewrite is not going to happen.
Really? I can't say I see sector space as this major social hub. I personally see it as an opportunity for a quick AFK while I traveling from one point to another. I also don't remember reading anywhere that those proposing bridge based travel have asked for sector space to be completely removed. What's being asked is to have an additional method of perceived "travel", one that WOULD work within the current framework. Feel free to read up on the this
It seems pretty intuitive to me that you would socialize on planets, space stations and in orbit around said places. Given the fact nobody is proposing to take ANYTHING away from the game, only adding too it I fail to see why you would be against it?
Really? I can't say I see sector space as this major social hub. I personally see it as an opportunity for a quick AFK while I traveling from one point to another. I also don't remember reading anywhere that those proposing bridge based travel have asked for sector space to be completely removed. What's being asked is to have an additional method of perceived "travel", one that WOULD work within the current framework.
I am familiar with the bridge as a locus of travel group and what they say. They have also been informed by Cryptic that sector space is not going anywhere. Cryptic is revamping it but they are not removing it.
I and thousands of people use sector space to communicate and get into PUGs constantly. Just because you don't use it as such does not mean it is not being used.
I am familiar with the bridge as a locus of travel group and what they say. They have also been informed by Cryptic that sector space is not going anywhere. Cryptic is revamping it but they are not removing it.
I and thousands of people use sector space to communicate and get into PUGs constantly. Just because you don't use it as such does not mean it is not being used.
I don't think anyone is saying to remove it. They just want:
A) SS to get improvements (which the devs say are incoming as THEY aren't satisfied with aspects of the look or feel)
I am familiar with the bridge as a locus of travel group and what they say. They have also been informed by Cryptic that sector space is not going anywhere. Cryptic is revamping it but they are not removing it.
I and thousands of people use sector space to communicate and get into PUGs constantly. Just because you don't use it as such does not mean it is not being used.
Yes, it's not going anywhere, and that's great for those who use it. Are we clear that is is an addition to, not a replacement of, sector space right? You get to do it your way, I could do it their way situation?
I'm fully aware that they are revamping sector space, and I truly do hope they improve it for those who find existing Sector Space a good concept, and just would like it to be improved upon.
I personally would love to see this bridge based travel (which really isn't travel but that's not the point) implemented. For those who despise sector space and would prefer an alternative, this would be great. It's also be a great excuse to use your ship interiors while you have time to kill anyway.
Are you simply opposed to adding this to the game because you thought this was supposed to replace sector space or is there some other reason this doesn't seem to sit well with you?
I am familiar with the bridge as a locus of travel group and what they say. They have also been informed by Cryptic that sector space is not going anywhere. Cryptic is revamping it but they are not removing it.
I and thousands of people use sector space to communicate and get into PUGs constantly. Just because you don't use it as such does not mean it is not being used.
So is the problem visual in sector space or communication? If it is visually seeing other ships flying in sector space with you. Then the pseudo travel while on your ship would take away from that. But if it is communication for grouping. Then that can be addressed using the chat system.
The chat system could have sector channels. It could be set up to switch to a sector chat channel when you chose a destination from your ship interior map. There could be a LFG chat channel. There could be a global chat channel.
There are only a limited number of ships per instance anyway. So there could be 1000 players in a sector, but onlu 50 could be in yours at the most. So I believe this is more about communication. That would be an easy fix while traveling in your ship instead of as your ship. I would chose the inside of my ship with a change to the chat system my-self.
Comments
If that were so, Coderanger wouldn't have posted here (and Stormshade would've locked it outright).
It's vitriolic comments that derail threads and force any sensible business to close them.
Dear god that was awesome! That has never even entered my train of thought!
Yeah, QFT for sure!
If you won't give us our Z axis, then make it less of a hassle to fly in "space water".
Fair enough, I have been around since the beta days and watched many threads die because of the Z axis.
So I have a bias perspective I am sure, plus I don't like the Mods here. So that variable comes into play whenever I see a yellow name, especially when they are trying to lie to me.
No worries, I will leave the thread too dense in here (heh no Z axis) I will make a Z thread, that will be deleted like the ones before it. Or I could just play the buggy game, I don't know.
I came in here saying, I'd like the Z cause it is "locked". Someone challenged my usage of the quoted word locked, and this whole mess began. I think we all agree that the ships can't fully use the Z-axis, which was the WHOLE POINT of my first post.
I consider this a flaw, because in space you have a Z-axis that can be fully used. Then the semantics began, ugh.
Anyway, I consider this a victory of sorts. The mods read my words, that is a feat in itself!
And TRIBBLE autopilot. I wanna do a proper barrel-roll in space already, Kahndammit!
Mods read lots of words. They also delete, lock, and move lots of words.
But seriously a Z axis would be nice.
I support this!
DSTAHL are you listening? I think Coderanger just volunteered to add some HTML parsing and presentation into the game engine. Get that on the schedule!
People say thats not a limitation of the engine. but I dont think I've seen another game with some many loading screens (what most people call 'instancing') and that has got to be the #1 or #2 worst most annoying thing about the game. If it's not a game engine limitation, its a ****-poor policy decision on someones behalf.
Eeewwww. Losing big points there Coderanger. This is CLEARLY something "we" want. In fact, if there is any doubt on how high a priority it should be, then I think another community poll is in order from TPTB.
Im curious how that might interact with DSE's but this is very close to what a number of people in this thread have proposed. There is no real need to steer from the bridge, just autopilot.
It does raise the question of auto-piloting across sector borders though (something equally as desirable)
How would your proposal handle DSEs and Sector map changes?
There is no rule saying that you have to travel at maximum warp during autopilot. Double click the destination with your slider at Warp 1 if you are in no hurry.
I would be happy being able to do a Z-axis move without changing my inclination as an option. I think some inclination, such as we have, is needed due to the fields of fire for some skills and weapons. I would like to find a solution that removes the need to spiral up or down the Z axis.
That would work great!, However why do you want to have a pet represented in sector space? It just makes tthe implementation a LOT more complicated without any extra gain. The bridge traveler doesn't see his representation (it may well be a cloacked ship), and doesn't use it.
The guy traverling on his bridge clearly doesn't care about the practical or the social aspect of the sector space at all. At that rate you can just add friendly NPCs flying randomly between stars. That would yield the same result ie. sectors feel more populated.
I don't want to re-hash my entire unified travel/persistency thread. The main points about bridge travel are: Add a simple listbox with all possible destination, add a timer, and "teleport" the ship to the destination when the time is up.
That is one of the absolutely dumbest things I have ever heard. If the engine requirements outpace a large percentage of the user's computers then it IS the engine.
However, what we are talking about here is not the requirements of the engine, but the size and complexity of the art assets.
No, what you want is a player to be in two places at once (which I addressed). Not being able to dynamically smush together two maps isn't something I've ever heard a player request and can't imagine why they would :-P
This is why I've always argued that reusing the Cryptic Engine isn't a bad thing.
Anything a player could possibly ask to have included would take less time to build into the Crypotic Engine than to build a new engine around.
Any time someone asks for something that you say it would be difficult to support in this engine, what I think is being missed is that it would be even more difficult to build a new engine that supports that feature.
In short:
Player X: "I would like Feature X."
Coderanger/dstahl: "That would be difficult to support in our engine and take some time to implement."
Player Y: "Geez. Get a new engine."
Player Z: "You should have built a new engine for this game to begin with."
Me: "Getting a new engine would take longer than adding almost any feature to the existing engine. By and large, if this engine doesn't currently support it, it's not because Cryptic used this engine, it's because they didn't think people would want this feature or that the game would be better off without this feature."
I apologise if I've reduced anyone's position to a strawman. My point is, whatever feature you want, CAN be added. And it isn't the engine's fault that it doesn't already exist.
There's really very little of this game that would have been different had Cryptic built it from the ground up, IMHO.
Got a fix for you over here
It does the same thing..but you don't have to deal with the 2 places problem.
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=164164
Peace
No offense, fungus, but it doesn't solve the problem with lack of social interaction and the tech issues and it seems counterintuitive to thrust people into sensor contacts if it's designed "for the RP crowd". Also, what happens to people visiting a ship that engages a sensor contact?
I do have a proposal out there for shipboard navigation that I think is pretty social:
Shipboard Navigation Minigame: Navigational Sensor Snakes
Basically, you have to spend, say, 20 minutes crossing each sector. With 1% completion every 12 seconds. (If you go to tactical view, you spawn in the middle of the sector you'd be crossing.)
However, by playing a nav sensor social minigame (basically a classic game of snakes, only multiplayer) you can cross a sector much faster as you get an extra 1% completion across a sector block for every piece of navigational data your sensor "snake" "eats". But you have to dodge other players' sensor snakes and compete for nav data.
I don't understand. Sector Space isn't a social location anyway (though I'm aware that Cryptic was pushing for it to be). We lose nothing by inserting a non-socially-oriented substitution anyway. Starbases and planet surfaces should be the social areas (as they are right now). It just doesn't make sense for me, as is, with ships talking to each other. Captains talked to each other. Not only that, but re-socializing sector space would make starbases and planet surfaces that much more illegitimate. Bring life to the areas where our captains can interact in person. Put me on my ship when I'm in space.
Does sector space really need to be a "social" area? Between the various space stations and current social planets I think it would be reasonable to provide a non-social travel mechanic. Also, as originally suggested the shipboard travel would be a second option to sector space, leaving the manual piloting of a ship through sector space an option as well.
If you have people on your bridge and you engage a sensor contact, it could function as bridges do now. If you leave while someone else is on your bridge, they remain on your bridge. If you were teamed up with those people, it could function the same as when a team switches maps currently.
If they do consider turning sector space into something that sounds like PacMan
I agree but it's supposed to be and I imagine any SS redesign (and it is being redesigned) will push the social aspect.
So if we have a better, more social SS, the bridge nav alternative also needs to be social.
I have proposals on making it more social, among other things making it closer to a real space representation with warp and non-warp travel and changing sensor contacts into combat that occurs on the SS map as opposed to being something that pulls you into another map.
To "move" the social space that is sector space to another locus would massively destabilize core features. An engine rewrite would be necessary. An engine rewrite is not going to happen.
I agree it's too massive a design change. I imagine SS improvements will improve SS as a social hub.
But I think we're confusing design with engine again. I mean, Champions uses the same engine and it doesn't have sector space.
SS as a social hub is a design consideration and needs clarified and improved because many (myself included) don't see it as the social hub it should be.
But that's a design issue, not an issue of engine technology. Although engine tech may help improve it.
Really? I can't say I see sector space as this major social hub. I personally see it as an opportunity for a quick AFK while I traveling from one point to another. I also don't remember reading anywhere that those proposing bridge based travel have asked for sector space to be completely removed. What's being asked is to have an additional method of perceived "travel", one that WOULD work within the current framework. Feel free to read up on the this
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=164164
to understand what's being proposed.
It seems pretty intuitive to me that you would socialize on planets, space stations and in orbit around said places. Given the fact nobody is proposing to take ANYTHING away from the game, only adding too it I fail to see why you would be against it?
I am familiar with the bridge as a locus of travel group and what they say. They have also been informed by Cryptic that sector space is not going anywhere. Cryptic is revamping it but they are not removing it.
I and thousands of people use sector space to communicate and get into PUGs constantly. Just because you don't use it as such does not mean it is not being used.
I don't think anyone is saying to remove it. They just want:
A) SS to get improvements (which the devs say are incoming as THEY aren't satisfied with aspects of the look or feel)
Yes, it's not going anywhere, and that's great for those who use it. Are we clear that is is an addition to, not a replacement of, sector space right? You get to do it your way, I could do it their way situation?
I'm fully aware that they are revamping sector space, and I truly do hope they improve it for those who find existing Sector Space a good concept, and just would like it to be improved upon.
I personally would love to see this bridge based travel (which really isn't travel but that's not the point) implemented. For those who despise sector space and would prefer an alternative, this would be great. It's also be a great excuse to use your ship interiors while you have time to kill anyway.
Are you simply opposed to adding this to the game because you thought this was supposed to replace sector space or is there some other reason this doesn't seem to sit well with you?
So is the problem visual in sector space or communication? If it is visually seeing other ships flying in sector space with you. Then the pseudo travel while on your ship would take away from that. But if it is communication for grouping. Then that can be addressed using the chat system.
The chat system could have sector channels. It could be set up to switch to a sector chat channel when you chose a destination from your ship interior map. There could be a LFG chat channel. There could be a global chat channel.
There are only a limited number of ships per instance anyway. So there could be 1000 players in a sector, but onlu 50 could be in yours at the most. So I believe this is more about communication. That would be an easy fix while traveling in your ship instead of as your ship. I would chose the inside of my ship with a change to the chat system my-self.