Hi Survivalists. You might know me as Scorpion... I've been in and out of discord quite a bit, fighting with other players, fighting with Taelyn and now fighting with other PvP'ers because I have a view. I'll be the first to admit that I never cared enough to join this forum or submit bug reports, because there were always others doing it and I just didn't trust the devs enough. I've finally joined today (yay!), please go easy on me.. I'm writing this post because I really care about the game and it's future, as it is so so unique. So without further adieu I want to give my feedback and collected experience. As a little disclaimer, I have about 2.5k hours across 3 accounts now as I try to convince family and friends continually to play it. I also study Astrophysics and hope my insight into realism is of value, and english isn't my first language.. GENERAL GAMEPLAY: 1. The Multiturret could use AOE. It's tedious af trying to salvage ships. I think that mitigating tedium would accommodate better gameplay and more focused too. 2. In general, I'm going to go against the majority of the PvP community and say that I like the Galaxy Map idea. However, I am very against the copy paste style repetitiveness of it. Firstly, there is a general formula that physicists use to calculate rocky world types depending in star types and orbit distances, I wont go on a tangent here but a toxic planet, snow planet, arid and etc should generally be located in respect of their distance to a star and the age of the star. Resource deposits shouldn't be predictable, but dynamic. I will delve into this more in risk/reward later. 3. I only play multiplayer. SP is too janky and unfinished for me. If I must be honest, I struggle to see how it will ever be non janky. On the official servers Invader vs. Defender is used. Big shoutout to Rexxus, alot of work went into this and its almost perfect. A properly thought out and working economy would be a game changer guys. In just weeks of launch I have watched multiple players join and get bored. There is no direction! When new players buy this game, we really need to get them "hook, line and sinker" from the beginning. 4. The waypoints. Oh dear God... The waypoint system is messed up bad. I understand that the void has lot's of resources but honestly... it's annoying in almost every playfield. We dont need to see the waypoints from another system. Seeing planetary waypoints from space is amazing and welcome, but outside of that.. it's distracting, tedious and annoying at best. Especially if you PvP in the Void, your fps drops to a crawl and you are blinded by them. 5. Alot of traders are so unrealistic. Aunt Mary?? I mean we can relate but it's a bit silly in my opinion. I'd love to see EGS embrace the alien-ness of the world and be more creative as time goes on. THE DYNAMICS OF PvP: Well, this is a hot topic innit? I hope to see EGS build their game around the PvP community. Being a member of said community for a few years now, I understand the frustrations. On one hand we have overly vocal PvP players trying to convince devs to listen, and on the other we have overly vocal PvE players lashing out. The reason why the majority of players is so vocal... is because they care, deeply, like I do. This is something I really want the devs to recognise. I admit, it's taken me this long to write a forum post, hopefully more follow. There are a plethora of issues involved with PvP gameplay. a12 brought some great additions and the least amount of desyncs and lagshots I've seen in a long time. Warp cooldown is amazing, my heart beats out of my chest when I get jumped in PvP, ad so it should. It's a great feeling. My biggest grievance with PvP at the moment is the constant disregard towards it and the creation of multiple metas subsequently as a result. For example, why in God's name is an advanced core available in MP online? Furthermore, why is it only located in bugged POI's that don't shoot back? On top of this, so many servers are adjusting to accommodate their player bases. HWS has a unique config that requires an almost different meta design based on the hitscan values alone. Other servers either abolish CPU and/or Mass/Volume. On top of that, some allow Legacy POI's dropping adv cores and most don't. My question is.. do you see where we are now? We are in limbo..PvP players are confrontational in official discord because they are genuinely upset. I implore Eleon to look past the insults and diatribe to see the general disdain from the broader (and more experienced) PvP community. I am sure many new players seeing the confusion of settings on servers, followed by the division in discord would be left unsure. Is there any way we can band together and find solutions? CURRENT BUGS IN A12: 1. Logic systems in CV's seem to disappear after repairs. Multiple times I have had my teleporter (which is set up on a sensor to disable shield briefly and turn on only when on it) stay turned on in a fight and drain all my fuel, causing me distractions and frustration. 2. Clipping. I have had major clipping issues CV to CV with other players. Is there any way we can stop it? 3. Duping is still possible in a12. 4. Legacy POI ships dont return fire. Easy loot and exploitable. Especially the turrets. I have more to say, but will leave it at that for now. Thank you for taking the time to read. Mars.
This one is a really big one for me too. This sometimes seems to drop my FPS to about a third. I don't understand why this is, as its just text being displayed. However, its also really visually confusing and ugly. Perhaps it would be possible to move to a system where just small icons are displayed, especially for common objects like asteroids. Labels could be transparent for objects further away. And perhaps a right click on the radar could allow you to configure what you are scanning for. I think the toxicity for both these groups is really harmful. PvP is great and every opponent is doing you a favour, so a little respect goes a long way - gloating means you're "compensating" for something. And if you defeated or ambushed in PvP, taking it in your stride - you rolled the dice by flying in PvP space, its all part of the fun! I really think all the bizarre toxicity must be putting off the devs from even having PvP in the game (what busy developer would EVER want to put up with an endless stream of toxic sludge), which sucks because its by far the most effective way to have truely compelling and repeatable content for end-game. The big battles I've been in are SO much fun, and hanging with your mates afterwards, showing off the massive holes in your ship or the enemies, nothing beats that. Fighting static, predictable AIs doesn't come close. I actually really like the possibility of differences between servers. One day there might be servers to accommodate all the different playstyles, and if you get sick of one style, you can switch to another! Also, in Alpha it makes sense to have a massive laboratory of different configs as a way of testing different setups, and even after launch who knows what new ideas could be created! This is very true. The adjustment to CPU was quite painful for a lot of people. Although it wasn't implemented in a way everyone was happy with, the custom config combined with CPU is opening up possibilities that are just beginning to be explored. But the advanced core throws all CPU out the window, which is really strange and is hugely unbalancing for PvP and advanced PvE gameplay. Perhaps it could be removed by default on any server with PvP enabled. Nice collection of thoughts Mars! Hope to hear more of those thoughts you hinted at in future posts.
something i'd like to add is regarding the scanner, already discussed this previously but would be handy to eather have some sortability or granular scanning method somewhat similar to turrets have to target stuff, but then in the scanner case show only specific type of things u want to scan for ea: resources, poi's / NPC structures, player structures etc as for the waypoints it indeed becomes quite the clutter, i know from registry u could click reset waypoints but doesnt really help overall sadly
Welcome to the forums, I promise I'll be gentle... I can't say I've ever really had a problem with this. I can strip down pretty much anything I find with it just fine. The only real problem I have is when targeting something that's a little too close, and the turret fails to fire because it thinks you'd hit yourself. Not a game-breaker for me, just a minor annoyance. Single-Player has evolved quite a bit, and is still growing. I do not recognize "janky" as a word. Thing is, not everyone wants to play multiplayer games. Others need to be able to play offline - myself included, such as when I'm on my yacht and don't want to spend the money on marine data service (it's worse than 1980's cell service), the wireless in the marina is sucking, or I'm out in the middle of nowhere with no service at all. This is just one of those things that will take time. Waypoints can get pretty messy, agreed. They can also be impossible to read. But this is the first iteration of it, so again, give it some time, they'll clean it up. I'd rather buy my sprouts from Ѧҷҵ₸ ꟽąԘɏ as well, but at the same time, there is something of a "human factor" here, where we put things in terms we can relate to, rather than trying to wrap our heads around something that really is alien to us. It doesn't bother me that much. I'll speak up and say I hote EGS is not built around the PvP community. There are literally thousands of other games out there that do PvP thousands of times better than EGS. I've followed enough of EGS PvP to make a number of observations - the first, and foremost, is that PvP is not about skill in EGS. It's about exploiting weaknesses in the game, hence PvP builds with 30 generators, 20 RCS, 60 fuel tanks, thrusters embedded within ship structures, and layer upon layer of combat and xeno steel armor, which results in endless hours of people flying around in circles while turrets do all the work. It's boring and inane. You want to "win" in PvP, you build a Borg Cube, 36 layers thick, nothing on the surface but turrets, and you don't even need to move. Zzzzzz. I've also done plenty of my own PvP play, with a group of regulars, some structure and rules we all follow, using non-Cube vehicles, none of which would stand a chance in what passes as PvP now, and have as much fun with it as I possibly can. I'm not overly fond of PvP games in the first place, because PvP gets very boring, very fast, as one of two things happen: 1. You cannot be stopped. You win every battle, no one can stand against you. Dull. 2. You cannot start. You're dead as soon as you spawn in, are taken out in a single shot, rinse and repeat. Also dull. Here's where things get interesting.. first, you've picked up on META-play. There's no getting away from this, it's simply what people do. There's no fixing it, because that requires fixing people, and people cannot be fixed. As for myself, my heart sinks when someone engages me in PvP - see previous block quote. Since skill is not a factor, and evasion is rarely possible, my instinct when the first shot is fired is Warp to the next location. Sure, there's a little warp cooldown, but not enough to keep you rooted in place, not long enough for shields to fail in most cases. Add to this the sheer size of the galaxy now, and finding any give player becomes a needle-hunt in a needle pile. Then there is the matter of the servers themselves - being customizable, configurable, and modifiable, there is no way to create any kind of consistent experience, which means two things: 1. Everyone cannot be satisfied at all times. 2. Everyone can be satisfied at all times. Yes, that is a contradiction, because if you don't like a particular server's configuration, modification, rules, and the like, you can either find one or start one that meets your criteria. Of course, that means anyone else joining may find they hate what you like and may go elsewhere to play. Of course, this also means you might not get to play on the server with the name you happen to like, but when you leave so much in the hands of the server ops, you're going to have this. As for "lagshots" and "desyncs"... this is also a multi-pronged issue. You could have a garbage internet connection. The server could have a garbage internet connection, or someone else, buried deep underground, could have a garbage internet connection that creates too much latency for everyone else. I recall my final days in the 11.x build, in Invader vs. Defender, where we had a fellow we called "Pingapotamus Lagalotomus", because he'd show up with a ping often over 10,000, and the game would become virtually unplayable for everyone else. These aren't really issues that are easily fixed, as many times they are out of the control of development, and dependent on the users and their environments. The "A" in front of the "12" should be a clue. This is still an Alpha Build. There are going to be bugs, and there are far, far more than your list here. I find and report bugs regularly. You should too. Don't count on someone else doing it for you, because they might never experience it. I've never experienced a "lagshot", so I'll never report it. If it doesn't get reported, it will never get fixed. Lastly... I find this rather off-putting. I have participated in hundreds of Open and Closed Alpha, Open and Closed Beta and Early Access games, and Eleon remains at the top of my list for developer activity, interactivity, feedback, and progress.
I strongly disagree for 3 reasons: In EGS you can build your own fighting vehicles and i know of no game that does it better CPU and the ammount of RSS you can gather (minus those you lose in fight) prevent your described Borg Cube When you fight on planets to destroy enemy stations "your cube" quickly becomes useless. As in atmophere bases are much stronger than CVs . Again, I strongly disagree for 3 reasons: Building Skill Tactics (Specially a it is multiplayer) Logistic Organisation Skills (to gather the needed RSS) There are other things like that theres a warp cooldown once you got hit ("first shot fired") or that Servers that allow good PvP don't use the gigantic galaxy and adjust their servers strongly but i don't want tomake this post longer than necessary. I dont know how you play(ed) PvP but as example how i play you can look at this post. Some additional Info: We were fighting on a moon that contains lots of Ressources. The defenders had set there like 20 Bases that support each other. We came with 15 CVs and 16 HVs we left with a few losses. The defenders were 2 to 4 and we were 3 to 4 (it was a 6 hours long battle not all stayed the whole time). We were not able to destroy their settlement. But they lost a couple of turrets, and tanks as well.
Thanks for your reply. Firstly I would like to reply by saying that I regularly become extremely bored slavaging blocks one by one at a time. AOE would make it so much better. Secondly. I must admit, I'm slightly perturbed by your perception of PvP. Now, you had some red flags of your own there. "Borg Cube" being the most alarming. As a very seasoned PvP'er I want to educate you on the current state of PvP in Empyrion. "Borg" Cubes never and cannot work. The main reason being that LOS of turrets is not high enough due to that elongated nose that needs to protect your decoy turrets. Usually when I see the words 'Borg' and 'Cube' it basically tells me that you never PvP openly, and therefor you literally have no idea what you are talking about. I don't mean to offend you, but if you have not played PvP in Empyrion without being in a weird modded server.. you probably shouldn't give your 2 cents in this regard. Furthermore, to expand on your lack of understanding... you claim that no skill is involved and you let all the turrets do the work. .... Well I'm sorry to tell you but you are so wrong. Perhaps this is an excuse you tell yourself why you avoid PvP, but the reality is that manual rockets are the deciding factor of almost all fights. You see, first the skill lies in your ship build. Your thrust, how much, the balance of it. Then your manouvrability, the ability to outmanouvre your opponent. Then there is your redundancies. Using your manual rockets to snipe the turrets off of an opponent is the key period. I disagree with you 110% percent because all of that.... REQUIRES ALOT OF SKILL AND CREATIVITY. I'm more than happy to digress further if you wish, but I have to call you out on your warped perception ov PvP. Thank you for your reply.
I can only agree with that, there is actually the misconception that Borg cubes are good PvP vessels. PvP is a competition for creative shipbuilding and a Borg cube is not one of them.
Absolutely and thank you. This game is special because we can build creative ships that we like and work them into pvp. I'm looking forward to Average's workshop realises coming up and I have a few myself. One of them being a scaleable Nostromo from Alien 1979.
Well, thank you for the least uncivilized reply on this topic I've ever received. You've illustrated my major point very clearly with this: The very notion of a "decoy turret" highlights in the brightest of neon colors, that PvP in Empyrion is not at all about skill, but about exploiting game mechanics. Then, top that off with your assumptions: This tells me you're not really interested in any sort of discussion, just in "winning" a conversation, which cannot be done. I've been playing Empyrion since A7, and I've had plenty of exposure to PvP, and not just in Borg Cubes - which if build correctly, are unstoppable, especially since the addition of the shield generator. Yes, they can be badly built, turrets can't target correctly, and maneuverability can be utter garbage. Of course, if built right, you'd stand a better chance shooting a planet from orbit than stopping one. But that's not my preferred design for combat ships. In A10 and earlier, I used composite ships - CV's with an attached HV that covered enough of the CV, and parked atop of a repair bay, that acted as a shield for the ship. Since A10, I've moved to a completely different ship design, one far more difficult to even attack, that rendered your manually-fired rockets almost useless as well, since your turrets aren't able to decide on what to actually target - my take on the exploitation of combat mechanics. Not at all. The reason I avoid PvP in Empyrion is because it sucks to be blunt, and the majority of PvP players I've met and talked with fall into two categories - the casual PvP player who isn't META-building and exploiting everything they can for every advantage they can get, and the Obsessed With Winning, who just generally suck at being people as well. I don't know about you, but I'd rather not waste my time dealing with people who just aren't any good at being people, and there isn't a whole lot of middle-ground here either, at least not on the servers I've been on in the past few years.
This is another realm of contention as well - yes, as you've noted, WE Can build creative ships that we like, but 99% of the players I come in contact with couldn't build a rectangle with picture-instructions, two youtube how-to videos and a Lego Engineer holding their hand, and race right to the workshop to download something and call it "creative" - and then half of them complain because the blueprint they downloaded was from A9, hasn't been updated since it was posted, and is far outside of CPU/M/V specs and is nearly unusable, and then have the gall to whine in here that their "creativity is being stifled".
1. Yes, you can build your own fighting vehicles, and Empyrion does have one of the best sets of construction tools out there. 2. Not true, and not sure what RSS is other than Really Simple Syndication, but I'm assuming you're talking about resources. Resources are insanely abundant, and easily gathered within the first couple hours of gameplay while you're working your way up to level 25. On the CPU side of things, you either wind up with a T4 CV, or now, searching out an Advanced Core to eliminate the CPU limitations entirely. 3. As do most CV's, as only Minigun, Cannon and Sentry weapons work in atmospheres, and these hobbled behemoths become easy targets for SV's and boarding parties. 1. Only applies to actual builders. Workshop downloaders do not count. 2. I'll concede tactics to a point. I recall when the best "tactic" was to land an SV on someone's CV and immobilize it. Nowdays, the tactical aspect is improving, but still has a very long way to go. The best you get now is really finding the blind spots and timing the firing of turrets. 3. Applicable to group-play, not so for lone-wolves. Also, given how easy it is to amass tremendous resources from the start, this isn't really applicable. How have I played PvP here? Well.... 1. I've had the standard-issue out-of-nowhere attacker come at me while I was "mining my own business", claiming ownership of everything, blah, blah, blah. A fortunate few have caught me in otherwise unarmed mining craft that are cheap to build. Some the less fortunate have run into my more formidable combat craft, one that is built "backwards" on purpose and not only confuses the heck out of people, but is actually faster in reverse than it is going forward. One had the misfortune of running into one of my Swarm ships, and their poor turrets couldn't get in range of anything vital, while all my turrets and manual weapons remained in range. Not a fun fight, but very funny, with lots of bad foreign language. 2. I've done small-scale engagements with a couple friends - mixed battles of CV's, HV's and bases. These usually wind up being very long, drawn out conflicts, though they can be a good deal of fun, for PvP. 3. Larger-scale, structured conflicts, usually on Thursday afternoons, with a large group of folks I work with - we blow off steam and blow up each other, but we've also long since established some rules of engagement and follow them, and usually end up laughing at each other over some goof or another. All of this, plus quite a bit of observation of other peoples' PvP engagements, have led me to the conclusion that PvP here is far less dependent on skill, far more dependent on simply knowing and taking advantage of certain mechanics, and very far from "mature" in terms of the actual combat mechanics. A large portion of this can be addressed by server admins customizing configuration files and tweaking settings, but the larger part of it will have to come in the form of programmatic growth and development of game systems. One such example: Target Sync I want all my turrets to fire on the same target, at the same time. In most cases, I want to hit your cockpit with 8 missiles, 4 plasma, and an artillary shot at the same time. This usually means the end for you, and I can disassemble your ship while your menu is coming up asking where you want to respawn. We don't have this. Turrets target whatever target they think is close enough, and will regularly change from one target to another without destroying the first target first.
Empyrion is unlikely to be refocused as a PvP game for four main reasons: It's built as a single player or coop game from the start. The PvP community is relatively small in comparison (the survey of 11,000 players puts it at about 10-15% of the players). The PvP community has certain vocal members who attack PvE game play, especially in Discord, leading to a bad opinion of the PvP community as a whole. PvP players seem unwilling to put in any effort to create PvP focused scenarios or servers, and will resort to insults whenever a scenario author or modder attempts to help them (personal experience with this myself). For reference, the PvE community has a very active group of modders who create amazing custom content, some of which even includes PvP content but you'd never know that speaking with self proclaimed PvP players. Asking for Empyrion to focus on PvP game play is asking for the developers to do a complete 180 on their game design and ignore 90% of the player base. This is why so many people seem to dislike PvP players, because whenever a cool new feature is added, there's this weird uproar in the PvP "community" about it. Regardless of whether these vocal PvP players are the minority of the PvP community or not, they do speak the loudest and until the PvP community comes together and speaks out against them, other players will have a bad view of PvP in this game.
Come into to PVP with your cube itll be destroyed in 2 minutes. We dont use exploits we use what the game gives us. decoy turrets and guns are not exploits its part of the game and we use it because the game allows us to do so. I mean if you want we can test your theory that PVP requires no skill. I'd even allow you to use the best PVP ship around. LiCorp Monsoon DDG.
I think that most complaints from the PVP community, and indeed, the PVE community can be answered simply: Alpha
i want salvaging drill or at last multi tool spray .... dah f.... it's so long to salvage a ship with a lone targeting multitool... block by block ...
