As well as a fictional, virtual game should obey real world physics to fit the limited imangination of how the games asthetic should feel. The law of physics is not the opinion, just that a game should strictly follow it.
We ate not discussing physical laws here. We are discussing if makes sense to intergrade physics into a game or if there is a more fitting alternative since a game does not need to used 100% correct physics but is able to use impossible things unlike reality.
Yes I understand. I have been following it. Only thing I was saying and poorly said, was that what happens on earth is not the same in space. On earth we expect heavy loads to be slow and cumbersome. Because we see it everyday. Where in space we really have no idea as a everyday person how it is, we don't live there. So we relay on what we know on earth. The movies and games tend to be made to the same (as you have said many times) feelings we have about every day things we do know. So a big space ship has to feel cumbersome to us so our sense of realty is maintained. At least to me. Okay that's my 2 cents
I am all on your side. Warp should always be possible, if loaded to the teeth or empty. I just give Eleon the benefit of a doubt that it just has been an overside. And i am not opposed to the idea that balance comes from mass only effecting acceleration either. I am just saying that it is hard to do with those short distances and very limited max speeds we have. The difference is to small, so outrunning or catch up mechanics are not possible at all. The slightly lighter ship only gains a few meters before they both travel side by side for an eternity. No outrunning, no get away and reverse no catching up. Example: If you have a smaller hunter CV and see a big hauler, there is no question of hunting it down. Because unless it is not directly pointing in your direction, you will never reach it. Now IF max speed is way higher and distances would be much longer, the hauler isn't flying max speed to safe fuel, THAN you have a chance to catch up simply because you need 20 seconds to reach CV max speed, the hauler needs 10 minutes. Another way around: You are in your small, light corvette through a astroid field. Somehow you didn't notice that there was a battleship closing in while you are out on your fridge, throwing in some energy bars. You notice that the battleship is in range because of the shoots hitting your shields. With the proposed real space physics system, you can stay at the fridge looking in until your vessel explodes as there is no chance of ever getting out off weapons range. Even if you make some meters because the battleship hasn't been approaching you at full speed, you get shot up while both of you are flying a wooping incredible fast 50 m/s. Those are only two examples of the general gameplay that is actually effected by a change like this. The only way to change that and actually ENABLE engaging gameplay mechanics is having a much higher max speed limit AND bigger playfields. But since bigger playfields heavily impact calculations/performance (besides bigger empty spaces with less chance of ever seeing someone) and higher max speed isn't possible because of technical reasons, adjustung max speed is pretty much the only way to create some kind of balance, meaning having a chance to catch up or getting away with a lighter/smaller vessel. It also adds a risk vs reward system to it, unlike the two examples (2 of thousands in between). There is not risk as in the first nothing ever happens, and in the secaond the situation is over as soon as it occures. 100% the same outcome, every time.
But that's the thing. You can't take your experience from planet and apply it to a completely different environement. That's why we use knowledge instead. And my (albeit limited) knowledge of space travel tells me there is nothing to limit a maximum speed of spacecraft (ok, that is technically incorrect, since there is the speed of light and it gets increasingly harder to accelerate the closer to the speed of light you get, but that's relativistic physic and since we do not travel in relativistic speeds in Empyrion, we can ignore that). So, in game, there is no logical reason why would ships have different max speed. Different accelerations? Oh sure, but different max speed? Not only it's against any logic when the max speed is different between individual ships, but the max speed is different on one single ship, based on which side is pointing in the direction of travel. That brakes my suspension of disbelief in an extremly brutal way.
I'm not disagreeing with that at all. How the ships are limited is just wrong. There is no head winds. Nothing slowing you down. Nor am I taking what we know of earth. The only thing limiting us is our own systems. An ion drive will keep going faster and faster as time goes on. But the windup or the time to get up to speed that you wish to travel at will take a longer time then a ship with thrusters to get to the same speed. But trusters take more fuel then ion drives. Sadly we have been influenced by TV and movies. Trust me not everyone is logical. Not everyone enjoys math. Heck even kids really aren't being taught how to do math now. It comes out of a electronic device. Some people can't even count out change unless the register tells them how much change to give back. But that's another topic and sadly I have a bad habit of going off topic. The only thing that get's me is how come the dev's can't see that speed shouldn't be reduced in space because of the size of our ships. Many of you have been saying the same thing over and over. Yet not one dev has come out and given a logical reason as to why the speeds have been changed like this. I don't know maybe they have watched too much star trek. Anyways I will bow out and go back to watching the 1 dolor hotel room in Japan. But then the current women in the room is most likely asleep
That might be right for scientific environment, but defintely wrong for games. That is exactly how creating games work that is believeable for everybody of all ages and all education levels, not just for the knowing few. Reading this and reading other peoples texts about what common knowledge should be gives me a brief idea about how far off their understanding actually is of what commen knowledge really is. The majority actually cares less about if a game is physically correct as they care for "is it fun". If something correct isn't fun it should stay out of a game. Best example: running and gunning with a minigun. You have those die hard weapons and/or physics fans telling you how impossible it is to such in long long texts loaded with formulas and calculations.... and the correct answer to this is "who cares, it looks cool and it is fun". Case closed. People do play those types of games to be able to do things that are not possible in reality.
So... having your freighter to move at snails's pace through the space just because you loaded it up with ore is fun? Or miner CV loosing max speed gradualy as you mine more and more ore? Afaik, the so called "common knowledge" is that the space between planets, stars and moons is empty. Even by this "common knowledge" there is nothing that should affect your max speed in space.
I already said, the way it is done is a bitvover the top. But you are right: looking at those single isolated cases, ignoring the bigvwhole thing it seems wrong. Wrong again. There is a reason: a gameplay reason. Mass only effecting acceleration with current small distances and very low max speed is not working as a balancing factor. Read the examples where i explained why it isn't working.
So, making a space game feel less like space somehow makes it better? I fail to see the reasoning behind that. Flying in space right now feels more like sailing a submarine with omnidirectional propulsion then flying a spacecraft. Gameplay purposes are all well and good, but when the feature brakes the illusion the game is trying to sell I'd argue the feature shouldn't be there. Also, wrong and right is relative. I am not wrong by simply stating facts, and whether limiting accel and torque is enough or not is a matter of an opinion not a right/wrong situation.
Because you actually be been doing both, steering a submarine and flying a spaceship. The reason i guess is for feeling reasons. But how does a massive ship feel massive when its as fast as a much smaller ship of the same class "CV"? And feeling alone is only important for single player. In multiplayer it is about balance. Once you reach max speed which is the same as every other vessel, you are safe. No thread will ever catch up. On the otherhand, if stationatry you will never get away from any threat, even if your ship is smaller and accellerates quicker. Only the illusion of people knowing it should be different because of physic laws and caring that it isn't correctly calculated. The others will feel massive ships neing massive, and smaller ships being less massive. Sorry my fault. You stated an opinion that there is no reason to do that. It sounded like a fact, which "there is no reason to do that" is actually not a fact. Cause there is. Not a physical one though.
We dont need to talk about math or other. Is tue who my shjp ia bigger, but it have also bigger trusther and bigger fuel usage. Really dont understan the reason to put a cap anf make a bigger ship slower. Is that funny? I dont believe is it funny. And i dont believe other people enjoy go at 20 m/s....so what logic is in place here? Game balance.....what the hell is going on here?
Looks like we're getting pretty far off the CPU discussion. On the topic of gameplay vs realism though (especially in regards to ship movement and speed caps/acceleration/etc discussed above), I will say that Empyrion is attempting to capture the feel of a space opera like Star Wars, not realistic space movement like The Expanse. Space combat in Star Wars is heavily influenced by WW2 naval combat (as are most sci-fi games, including some of my favorites like Freelancer). It's unfortunate that this unrealistic interpretation of space is what has ended up in popular culture, but for technical purposes it's significantly easier to implement rather than having to deal with extremely high relative velocities that would be present in a more realistic model, and for gameplay it better captures the pop culture scifi feel than realism would. That said, I do think the space playfield size and speed limit do need to be increased. Right now SVs in space are significantly slower than the WW2 fighter craft that inspired them, and that's just wrong. Anyways, as long as there's some internal game logic and consistency and it's fun, this particular aspect of the game doesn't bother me as much as CPU because: 1. It fits with the thematic material, but no scifi ever has had ships become nonfunctional because their computer couldn't handle the size of the ship (also see the fallout SW:TLJ had when it randomly added fuel considerations that had never been in the franchise before). 2. It doesn't arbitrarily limit my building options like CPU does
Actually very few people know how space feels. And if the game feels more like starwars and less like a nasa simulation, than yes it probably makes the game better for many people. Yes that might be your subjective feeling. My subjective feeling is that a massive space craft should feel massive. Which means not as quick and fast as smaller vessels. Especially not for "duuuuuh, its science and realistic" reasons. Again. It is only breaking your illusion and the other five people complaining here that it is not realistic. The great majority, and i am willing to bet any amount of money, expects space game to be more like starwars and way less than realism. That is the illusion they expect to be sold on. For realistic behavior, there is Kerbal Space program.
That actually isn't possible as it seems, due to the voxel building/world and their calculation. That is the price we have to pay to have a freeform detailed building system in a fully destructible environment. So they can up the numbers by a factor of ten, but it would actually change nothing. If you travel ten times the way with ten times the speed you need the same amount of time. So Eleon could actually fake it by leaving it as it is, just change the displayed values.... at least for space. ;-) Maybe because there is not much to discuss about. Most people don't like the system as it is in its current form. I actually have only seen a hand full of people actually liking that system.
I just want to have fun in a game... I dont care much with physics and total realism... too much to bother with when trying to enjoy a game. However, having my ships top speed nerfed by it being too heavy, is just dumb and annoying, immersion breaking. Good luck ever making a CV tug (or SV hauler for that matter) that can warp with that BS in place. I expect ships to be worse to 'control', when heavy. That is, terrible to turn, slow to get-up-n-go, insane to try and stop once gotten to top speed. That alone creates the gate for going too heavy with something. Don't need this extra nonsense with mass-lowering-top-speed on top of the rest. Its a bad game design choice.
All gravity is, is acceleration. A feather and lead fall at the same speed because they accelerate at (effectively) the same rate BECAUSE there are no countervailing forces. Left alone, they will hit the same maximum velocity (depending on the vacuum quality, near lightspeed)
Here's a fun fact about star wars. Star dreadnaughts actually have better acceleration than starfighters due to their engine mass. I see no reason why an appropriately thrustered capital ship should not have an acceleration greater than a small craft. Being that big of a craft also allows thruster technology options that might not fit in the smaller one. As for top speed, all craft should have the same maximum speed in space, or no max speed (allowing for the speed of light and increased force required to accelerate closer to that speed, at least).
Well, I played the game a little after this update, then I have read 10 pages of this feature, understood a lot better the how the CPU points are working and the influence it can have in the gameplay or ship creation. The thing is: I still don't understand how it can improve the game's experience as it is working now. Here is my feedback: -As it's made right now, this feature is a complicate restriction that needs to be understood to make anything working correctly. -Even a small combat SV needs to have T4 CPU to work normally if it's created the way they used to be until now. (I understood that the amount of needed thrusters have been reduced by the new features & modifications on the flight system, but I'm a bit at a loss to understand how we are supposed to proceed to make a nimble and balanced one now... before it was 3 jet S on L/R, 2-3 for Up/Down/Forward/Backward and that's it! Now, I can't tell how to make a good one at a lesser tier than T4, or what must be taken into account when we make a cheap one to allow it to lvl up easily the levels of it's CPU.)-I'm having a hard time understanding how much/which thrusters I'm supposed to take off on an old blueprint to allow it to work normally with low CPU. So: =>It make ship creation a lot harder -It will ask to have luck on POI raiding, or to grind enough of them to buy parts in the trade stations to make your different vessels working correctly (or having only Cheap/lesser vessels until then). -I didn't felt enjoyment with it, nor challenge. Only brain exhaustion in the creation mode to try to make things right. (I precise that I'm not at all the kind of person wanting to see everything easily served on a silver plate without the slightest effort neither) If I misunderstood something, please feel free to enlight me on what I missed. Don't misunderstand my point: I'm not at all against the concept of this feature. In fact I appreciate it. I just think it's just too complicate and penalysing as it is and how it seems to be evolving. I know there is a switch off, but I'm sure that it could be made easier to understand, and above all more fluid. For example, to keep most of the current logic, something like: Having 4 kind CPU, compatible for every kind of ship just like a core (but refering to different tables between HV/SV/CV or BA for the thresholds & corresponding values): Lvl1 CPU of 1 block Lvl1 CPU of 2 blocks (as efficient as 2x1block, but a bit more resillient and a bit less costly in energy) Lvl2 CPU of 1 block (upgrade of the lvl1, allow T4) Lvl2 CPU of 2 blocks (upgrade of the lvl1, allow T4) T1 =Core = Basic vessel working normally (ex: a hoover with 2 gatlings & 4 basic drills / a SV with 2-3 gatlings flying correctly) T2 = 1 bloc lvl1 = Light vessels working normally (ex: a nimble SV fighter with 4 gatlings & able to evade normally) (or would be like the last resort when having a normal ship heavily damaged to keep enough speed to have a chance to go out of range of a POI before being blew up) T3 = 2 or+ blocs lvl1 - [4 for full potential] = Heavy vessels (ex: a loot raider SV with 6 gatlings, 4 rocket launchers & able to use boosts) (being 4x1, 2x2 or [2x1+1x2] doesn't matter) T4 = blocs lvl2 - [8 to full potential] = Massive vessels/ Big CV (with a little button in the CPU pannel that would allow to upgrade the CPU parts lvl 1 to lvl 2 in exchange for it's cost)And about the loss of CPU due to damages, it could affect like this: T1 = Basic CPU efficiency given x blocs lost = % of loss from supplementary CPU efficiency ex: On a T3 vessel of 4 blocs, with: 1 bloc destroyed, it loose 25% 2 destroyed 50% etc... Another little thing that would help would be a color code added with a little indicator in the description of ship parts to indicate the kind of tiers corresponding to it's CPU consumption. ex: descriptions of :SV's "Thruster M":_______Hoover's "Rocket Laucher turret"_______"Artillery" Hp: X____________________Hp: X__________________ ... Energy cost: X______________ ..._____________________... CPU: X (T1 recommended)_____CPU: X (T2-T3 recommended)__CPU: X (T4 recommended) With all that said, i'd appreciate to know if all the CPU thing is going to continue being only more restrictive and with it's current complexity (in which case I think that an official and proper tutorial about "How to create balanced ships and how to prepare them to make later improvements easy" would definitly be needed), or if we can hope to see it polished in a more instinctive & easy to aprehend way. Anyway, thanks a lot for all of your hard work, sorry for the legth of the feedback, keep up the good work and have a wonderful day!
If I had to take a guess as to the reason behind why higher mass caps max speed, i'd say it's a side-effect of an artificial limit placed on a different aspect of ships. Which was to create the feeling that a massive capital ship moves slower than a fighter. Where by "heavier" means "bigger" and bigger ships in Sci-Fi move slower than their fighters. So higher ship mass indicates that this heavy ship is a massive capital ship and should be slowed down in comparison to the lighter ships around it. Unfortunately, this is being applied to cargo mass as well since the devs didn't differentiate between a heavily-armored ship and a heavily-laden ship. Acceleration is seperate from thrust force in Empyrion, so the devs could've left max speed alone and artificially restricted just acceleration for the same, if not better effect. Thus, a heavy ship has the same top max speed (for the environment) as a light ship and can move huge loads, but suffers an artificial acceleration penalty so it takes longer to get up to speed. Sure, it doesn't follow the actual laws of physics. But it follows the feeling of sci-fi.
