So...in you opinion, what is the intended purpose of tanks and war ships? For that matter what exactly constitutes cheesing techniques? === Edit === And why is it considered wrong to use the advantages that you worked hard to gain?
Put it this way, if you want to use a tank to blow a hole in the wall then go for it. However don't be surprised if you end up witnessing an npc spawn in thin air because you did so (and yes I hear that far too often to be perfectly frank). Is that cheesing? Not really but it does mean it can create that sort of issue with players. Tunneling under a poi is pure and total cheese, I don't care if someone has built a HV minder expressly for the purpose in doing so. That's the worst form of cheesing in my view. There's others of course but to lesser degrees. Sniping out the core, sorry but pure cheese. Why should poi builders do an inside at all if people are just going to do that? Just put the core on the outside instead so that people can just snipe it easily and it'll save us the trouble of having to do an inside. Targetting the generators, the fact that many people consider this to be the basic default way to take out anything in the game put's it on the cheese list for me. There's not a poi in the game that can withstand the firepower of a CV. Not exactly challenging is it. So what is the purpose of tanks and war ships? They can still be used for their primary purpose, along with SVs too. Now yes I know how you and others will no doubt respond but let me try and help you, because trust me I've heard all the arguments against those points I've made before and my opinion still hasn't changed. The simple fact is if people want interesting fun poi's to do then in some cases admin core's will have to exist. There's no way I am going to spend the time to do certain types of poi's without an admin core. It's simply not worth my time (and yes I know all the arguments against admin core's too and again my opinion remains the same).
I sometimes wonder if some POI designers are more concerned with "let's make this POI difficult" instead of "let's make this POI fun." Sure, difficulty can be fun -- but always to a limit. I've been of the philosophy that a game/dungeon/POI/etc should be designed to maximize the players enjoyment and engagement, rather than a chance for a POI builder/game designer/etc to show how clever they are. I worry, perhaps (hopefully) unfoundedly, that some POI builders are letting their ego get in the way and thinking more of themselves than the player. This, to me, is a very backwards way of thinking when designing challenges for a video game. The player should be the only one that matters here, not the designer. I guess this must be one of the downsides of crowdsourcing POIs in the first place. This is not a bash against POI designers or anything like that. We all absolutely appreciate the time and effort that they put into designing these beautiful and intricate constructions for us to interact with. Without the POI designers, we don't have much content anyway. The game would be very incomplete without their hard work. But I can't help but wonder if a slight shift in future design philosophy could improve the players experience? I mean, the purpose of a POI (unless I wildly misunderstand this game as a whole) is to be something for the player to conquer, not some insurmountable obstacle to irritate them into avoiding. Admittedly it does seem difficult to balance on-foot difficulty with in-ship difficulty. Something nearly impossible to surmount on foot could be very easily dealt with from the pilots seat of an SV/HV/CV -- but I wonder if there can be a reverse of that? Some type of defense that is effective against vehicles, but ineffective against foot soldiers? Anti-vehicle shields or turrets or something that do not and/or cannot hit or shield from players approaching on foot. One thing I wonder, is it possible to do limited shields? Like a BA shield that only covers a few blocks, like, say, a Core or something. A shield that can only be destroyed if you take out X device first (some sort of specialized shield generator, perhaps), which is not necessarily next to the core. So instead of just sniping the core, one has to snipe the shield generators (perhaps in order), THEN they can snipe the core. Then, worrying about players tunneling under the POI and attacking that way -- SURELY this would occur in the game world without any players involved, wouldn't it? I mean all the tech exists already: HVs, drills, explosives, etc. Surely the player is not the only person in the galaxy digging holes in the terrain, are they? Surely there are military groups in the galaxy already that would use such tactics, and other groups who have been victims to such attacks and adjusted their defenses accordingly. You would think it would behoove base designers to consider all potential angles of attack, not just the convenient ones. Perhaps something as simple as layers of wall > air/terrain gap > wall > air/terrain gap, or other such subterranean structures that make it difficult for mining HVs to approach. TL;DR - I dunno, I think overall there may eventually need to be a slight shift in POI philosophy at some point to help encourage players to interact with them, and accept that in a sandbox environment, players will not always interact with them in expected ways. Really, one should expect players to get creative (in a game which encourages creativity no less) to solve the challenges that are presented to them. One shouldn't be surprised or annoyed that players will use any and every tool available to them to complete their objectives: it should be expected and encouraged. In my opinion, POIs are challenges to be overcome: as such, the players experience should always be top priority to a designer.
Close minded thinking. I doubt very many people care one whit about whether you (Escarli) want to put any effort into making a poi for fear someone will "cheese" it. Tunneling is valid, sniping the core is valid, blowing holes is valid, using your tank to blast enemy spawns is valid, and so on. I personally refuse to do pois that are admin core in general. With a few exceptions.
=== Edit === Placed in spoiler so people don't have to scroll past my text wall. Spoiler I chalk this up to an inherit weakness of using using 'just-in-time' enemy spawning. See the second post in the thread for my opinion on this. I would agree that this is a cheesy tactic but that doesn't mean it is an invalid tactic. My question to you is why would a player want to waste 20 min digging a tunnel instead of running the POI? If players would rather dig a hole then run a POI then the designers of that POI failed and they failed HARD. It sound like your taking players blowing up your hard work kind of personally. Don't. This is exactly what I meant about Elion needing to curate the POIs being added better. Just ask yourself why people choose to do what they do and work toward better level design. It's ok to have more then one set path for players to take! Reward observant players for spotting that exposed fuel tank half way through the level, that when blown up, opens a path right to the core or lets them bypass a trap! Creativity is what Empyrion is all about. Its right there in the title of one of the modes. The game mode that is used to build these very same POIs. It's on you as a designer to give the player a reason to engage with your work not the other way around. Have a look at the Xeno Fortress. If you build a CV that can take this then you deserve that win. That POI has other problems but using a CV to bomb it flat isn't one of them. Besides, there is a very limited selection of CV weapons that even work in atmosphere. This implies a purpose built ship that the player had to work hard to get. And what is that purpose? Assume I'm stupid and spell it out for me. No need to be nice about it either. I want to know what you really think. I'm sorry but if you feel this way than you shouldn't be making POIs for a sandbox survival game. I know this comes off as flippant, but that isn't my intent. This mentality just doesn't work well with this style of game.
Oh dear, where to start. perhaps with this. You obviously have absolutely no idea what it's like in building poi's. If I put a thin spawner right next to the wall that you happen to make a hole in and you go walking in turn right and bingo you see it spawn in, that's your fault, not the poi builders. Don't go complaining about it because you happen to see something spawn in out of thin air. People need to realise that it's impossible to build a poi with every concievable attack angle in mind. Just cannot be done, so we have to build poi's with an intended route. Simply just the way it is. That has absolutely nothing to do with it. Absolutely nothing. If people ask a question on the forums (whether these, or steam or elsewhere), discord, or perhaps they're giving advice to someone on stream on how to take out a poi they're having trouble with a common response is to tunnel under the poi....problem solved. That's got absolutely nothing to do with how the poi is made. I have witness people tunneling, great folks and I enjoy watching them but it became far too common for me to start watching their stream and they'd be tunneling. So I asked have they ever tried taking on this particula poi without tunneling, they said no as they tunnel every single poi. So to my surprise they took their tanks and went above ground and took it on normally. Not only did they have much more fun but they managed to take out the turrets without any damage to theirs. Why did they start tunneling? Because the builds they made when they first started wasn't able to take on the ones they were trying to defeat. It takes time to learn how to build effectively, nothing negative about it at all. we all go through that learning curve. But instead of keep on going they followed the advise that others told them to the extent that is what they always did. So how exactly is this anything to do with the failure of how poi's are built? Just because the poi is there, doesn't mean to say that you have to take it out before moving on. Your comment there is, and I'm sorry to put it bluntly, is just so wrong on so many levels. This is where things get worse. You have no idea on my intentions when I build a poi. If I got butt hurt every time someone took out a poi every way that I dislike I wouldn't be putting standard cores in, I would be using admin cores for each and every poi to the point that either Taelyn or Hummel would have to tell me "you shouldn't be putting in admin core's on these types of poi's". To date I can safely say they haven't had to. Just because there's certain ways I think is cheesy, some of which is highly cheesy doesn't mean to say I'm taking it personally. I simply find it ludicrous that people don't seem to understand. There's a significant difference. Why would I spend my time building any kind of poi or OPV in the knowledge that I'm going to take it personally if someone blows it up. There is absolutely no logic whatsoever in any way shape of form in that statement. Someone blew up my OPV or my POI; "oh know what am I going to do!!!!" I'm sorry, I really am because I don't mean to be side stepping your question, but my honest opinion is I shouldn't have to go explaining to you what their purpose is. This right here to me shows me someone that simply doesn't understand how things are built and what is involved in them. You need to understand that there are other points of view. People don't like admin core poi's in my view because they can't tunnel under it, they can't blow a hole in the side of things, they can't snipe out the core, they can't target the generators. You want to know when that kind of poi doesn't have an admin core? Bug reports because a poi is "Broken", complaints that poi's are "broken", complaints that npcs spawn out of thin air and not even mentioning negative reviews for the game on steam. Now perhaps that's something you're not aware of but that has happened with various poi's that are now in the game with an admin core. They aren't broken, they've just got stuck because they've gone and blown up a key element of signal logic that has blocked their way. Whether you like it or not, there are some poi's out there that legitimately have an admin core. Now perhaps you find it hard to believe such people do complain about such things, raise bug reports or even give negative reviews on steam but if nothing else I can assure you that it's very much the case.
Much of what you listed is possible in the game right now, it would just need to be added to the scenarios or vanilla configs. I made a POI that has sensors along the bottom that blow up some of the loot if you go under the POI. I had another POI that would only spawn the "boss" enemy with epic loot if you actually went through the POI. Blowing it up with a ship would mean the boss wouldn't spawn and you wouldn't get all the loot. You can add special shields as decals that can be deactivated. You can set POI turrets to ignore entities so they only shoot at ships. You can add foundation blocks to the outside floor or walls to prevent people from tunneling under it. Multiple cores placed next to loot containers can make it harder to snipe the cores. So there's lots of ways it can be made more difficult to attack a POI without resorting to admin cores. However admin cores might be a good idea for "dungeons", that is large POIs designed for a longer on-foot combat experience such as the abandoned POIs as they usually have no exterior defenses and all the challenge comes from being on foot. They also usually have some of the highest quantities of ultra-rare loot containers so are worth doing. Finding a good risk/reward balance is also very hard because so many things affect both the difficulty of the same POI, as well as player's ability to do it. For example, a level 1 POI on "easy" will be much, much, MUCH easier than a level 10 POI on "hard" yet will give the same loot. A player doing a POI in half damaged armor will take much more damage than a player doing it in fully repaired armor. A player who is good at shooters will have a much easier time than one who isn't. And there's no real way for a POI designer to know how all these variables will be set for a player. I can make a POI, test it in survival and do it with zero deaths, but I'll think it was too hard so I make it easier then I'll get complaints from people saying it's impossible to do. The different variables and skill levels means there's no real way to balance a POI for everyone, so the best I can try to do is make it fun for the intended progression and difficulty level, while minimizing the frustrating or tedious parts of it.
Ohh, I really like these ideas here! If the main goal of raiding a POI is loot (what else would it be, other than fun or to stop drone attacks), then one can control the amount of loot a player receives based on their method of approaching and/or neutralizing the base. Are these sorts of features included in a lot of the current RE POIs? Or is it a system that is likely to be adapted to other POIs in the future? Personally I like that idea. You can get more loot if you do the POI the "correct" way, or you can cheese it and get minimal loot. To me, that's entirely fair. Diegetically, it makes sense for hostiles to destroy their own tech rather than let it fall into enemy hands, and rig their bases to destroy that tech in case of emergency (actually, approaching on-foot, assuming that they detect you, potentially means they have more time to respond and destroy sensitive tech and data so maybe I got that backwards). Quite curious if others agree with that. --- As for the ambiguous difficulty levels of the POIs based on so many factors, I can't help but wonder if some sort of new list of entries in the in-game Empyropedia can offer insight into difficulty of various POIs? I imagine our player character is not the only person in the galaxy raiding POIs. I imagine that some POI raiders would put together very basic guides to assist other insurgents in their quests for freedom (or destruction). Even something as simple as "This POI tends to have on-foot patrols outside, as well as a squad of mechs inside. We recommend at least X level armor and Y level weaponry. Attempting to breach with a vehicle will generally start a self-destruct sequence, so we recommend entering on foot." Yes, it would be tons of work, but it could really help players determine what is and what is not worth attacking at their current level. Edit: To build on this, suppose there was a faction that was dedicated to attacking and destroying Zirax, Pirate, and Kriel POIs, and teaching others how to do so effectively as well. Sort of an insurgent group trying to help the average oppressed citizen break free of the shackles of the Zirax/Pirates/Kriel/whatever other bad guys are out there. Dunno, just spitballing here. Obviously there are improvements that can be made (as with any system), we just need to find solutions that keep every involved party happy about it and offer engaging encounters for users.
The player doesn't have enough verbs for infantry combat to be interesting. Move around, shoot. That's it. No grenades. No melee. No AOE weapons. No environment manipulation. No crowd control or suppression. No active defense abilities. Even your jetpack is useless when inside the close confines of a POI. You can scout ahead with your drone, try to see what's in the next room. What do you do with that knowledge? Move. Shoot. Bleed. What fun. What skill. What a joke. Meanwhile, Empyrion's incredibly deep building system allows me to create undreamed of varieties of vessels. Attacking POIs is a means of testing my creations. I can take that experience and use it to fine tune them, make them stronger, customize them against different targets. When you use a vessel against POIs, there's variety, agency, a chance to create something new and better. Yes, blasting holes in the side of a POI to destroy the core is a bit of a chore. I wish they'd continue to resist more. But at least I get to do it using tools I crafted myself with my own experience and imagination. Destroying the core is just the killing blow. Traipsing through Your Murder Fun House dungeon with a rifle and a suppressed sense of pattern recognition isn't fun for me. The loot inside isn't worth the trouble to click on when I am so rich from mining and trading. What you think about how I play is immaterial. I am not going to run a given POI the way you think I should. I would rather play a different game than subject myself to the death loop you have waiting for me. I'm playing for fun and stress relief, not to stress myself out even more. Fun such as blasting your POI to holy hell with rockets and artillery. Why POIs are designed in the first place for players to clear on foot instead of using their vessels in a game with such a rich building system, I still can't begin to fathom. Maybe I'd get it if I had ever once touched a Call of Duty or Halo game. Maybe it just never occurred to anyone.
=== Edit === Placed in spoiler so people don't have to scroll past my text wall. Spoiler Maybe you shouldn't have to explaining what their purpose is, but clearly, you do need to explain. Spell it out for me. What do you feel the indented use of tanks and war ships are? Why did I spend all that time gathering resources and waiting for the factory to turn out a highly optimized piece of military hardware? As I said, an inherent problem with the 'just-in-time' spawning system that Empyrion uses. I didn't say anything about builders being able to mitigate it, just that it is an inherent problem. That's exactly the failing of POIs in general. They have such a bad repudiation for being death traps and time wasters that the go-to response is 'don't bother engaging with it'. First impressions MATTER! Its REALLY hard to fight the narrative and change peoples minds once you give a bad first impression. Believe me, know. I've worked retail. To be fair, a major contributing factor in this is game mechanic in general as well as level design...There's plenty in this thread discussing Empyrion's mechanical problems. I'm having some trouble following what your trying to say here. I can't tell what parts of this are sarcasm. Could you clarify please? Again, I'm having some trouble following what your trying to say here. Your seem to be saying that your not upset that players aren't running your POIs the way you think they should but in the very next sentence you say that you would use admin cores all the time to force players to run POIs the way you think they should if you were allowed to. Maybe I'm reading to much into what your saying but it seems like you are contradicting yourself. Your right, I do need to understand that there are other points of view. But that cuts both ways. You need to understand that there are other points of view as well.
Then that's an issue for the person who built the poi in the first place. No poi should be built so it's pure death loops. Don't get me wrong even for the best well thought out and built poi ever made it's still possible for the player to get into a death loop purely down to something they have done. So for the record that is not the kind we are talking about here, at least on my part. If I make a poi then it should be balanced, if you have a room inside a poi you should never ever have a situation where if you go into that room....you will die. That there's no chance of escape before you die. I play test each and every single POI I make before submitting it but because I built it, there's always the possibility that it's actually not balanced well enough. The emphasis is then on me to look out for feedback (youtube, twitch, discord, these forums etc) on people commenting about it. If I do see such feedback, then if it's warranted to do an update and submit it to Eleon. Sure it might take a while before they get to it and put the updated copy in but at least the feedback has been received and the update down to it. Now if you have a poi that has such a situation and the builder sees the feedback, and does nothing. Well that's down to the builder themselves. I am against death loops. Case in point of what I call the corridor of death inside the Kriel Nexus. You go into the corridor and you get two sentry guns pop out instantly. The intention is they are already moving back around the corridor they just came around. As they do so then they see another 2, then another 2 etc etc. All together I have approximately 8-10 sentry guns inside one corridor. Es'carli!!! That's precisely what we're talking about perhaps I hear some folks say? Pure death loop? Well not so fast, the first two will pop out instantly, the second two are on a second delay, two after that 2 sec delay and so forth. So you see a whole bunch of sentry guns quickly reveal themselves. The result? After seeing many people do it each and every time they do what I had always planned. There's that initial "Oh......" reaction followed by a quick back track. Not saying no-one has died to it ever but I've never seen anyone. They carefully move around the corner popping the sentry guns without dying. It's actually nice to see. The whole respawning npc's situation, well there are actually some rules in how they should be built, unfortunately historically not everyone has adhered to those rules. I recognise that in itself is a hot topic that people hate, but suffice to say there are rules surrounding them to build to (at least for the vanilla game anyway). Basically what I'm trying to say in this section is death loops can be avoided with careful planning. Case in point, I have made a poi that's coming out in 1.10 that I have made to be medium to challenging in difficulty (though in no way impossible). Had a lot of fun doing it, but I've built it in a way that it can be balanced fairly easily. First you have a warning before hand, second you can avoid the main part of the trap (though you still have to go through it), and third if you know where the switch is, you can deactivate it completely. But even with all that, as I said I can easily adjust it to balance it later on depending o the feedback. If there are poi's with painful unfair death loops, then post about them. Put them on the forums (as long as they're vanilla anyway), because those of us who build those poi's do look at them. That is something I can categorically state is 100% true and accurate. Don't get me wrong however, if the death loop happens to be a result of something the player themself did (you know some people do some daft things sometimes ) then it doesn't mean it'll get changed. One thing that crops up ohhhhhh so many times is "I'm not going to pull that lever because it'll blow up all the loot". Even when I tell them that I am the person who made that poi and I am telling you there is no loot that will be blown up, people still refuse to pull that level even when it's the only way to proceed forwards....and that's in a standard core poi There's so many different aspects to this it's crazy, not every poi is made out to be a death loop unfair loot destroying soul destroying poi. Some of us do try to attempt to make a poi that's fun for players, and death loops is not part of that. Period. Is my position becoming a bit more clearer now by chance? Ok well part of it was sarcasm I admit, but let me try again. My position is this and the reason for my attempt at sarcasm: I make poi's for people to maim, blow up, destroy, eradicate and any other form of destruction you can think of. I do not get upset that people take them out. This is why I said your point about I was taking it personally was not accurate. That's it, it's very very simple If someone wants to cheese something I've made by tunnelling then my view is in all honesty.....well that's their loss. It's not always the case I freely and fully admit, but quite often the root cause of people tunnelling under a poi is because they can't defeat it. For whatever reason the build they have keeps getting destroyed and they either work it out for themselves or, invariable from what I witness myself, they get advise from others who say to tunnel. Some people simply don't even bother to try. It takes time to make these poi's, time and effort. I have seen all sorts of playstyles including one person who was really fun to watch on twitch but didn't like any form of combat at all. Whether that was a poi in space, an opv or planetary poi, just wasn't interested. The whole generator thing, "kill the generators and profit" mentality is also strange to me. Why should poi builders spend the time putting the insides together or even an insides at all if people simple do the generators each and every time? Doesn't exactly make for good balanced gameplay does it? Why should Eleon spend the time on any more devices, deco or anything else for the insides? Does the means justify the efforts? Whether people like it or not that is a very valid line of reasoning in a number of ways. Perhaps you see this as precisely as me taking it personally and if that's the case then that's your prerogative, you're wrong....but that's your prerogative. It has nothing to do with me taking it personally because someone has blown up one of my poi's or ships.....it's why I make them in the first place! If I didn't want them blown up then I wouldn't make them! If Brzez for example wants to fully utilise his CV, then sure. Why not, go for it. Have at it and have fun. But that doesn't change what I've said, I don't say it to upset him or anyone else but for me it's simply the way I see it. Advising players to simply target the generators and tunnelling under poi's is in my view just bad advice and doesn't actually help them in learning the game. Feel free to see it otherwise. p.s. drat...didn't mean to write so much (my bad!)
Yes this as well. I would love if I could put down little sentry turrets to help me fight, put down a shield barrier or equip myself with a recharging shield, throw grenades or flash bangs, etc. Would also love to see some of the NPCs have similar abilities. Zirax engineers that spawn turrets and repair nearby mechanical NPCs. Medics that heal, heavies that have a recharging shield, specialists that put down shield barriers, etc. Right now even in custom scenarios our ability to give NPCs new mechanics are very limited. We can adjust their weapons, rate of fire, etc, but we can't do something like allow them to spawn shields or other NPCs (in POIs). It would make fighting on foot more interesting and I think fun, plus open up another level of progression as people can obtain and upgrade these new tools to feel more powerful as they progress through the game.
I think some POIs should be designed to be mostly taken on foot. Maybe you disable the exterior defenses with your ship first then go inside. Some should be designed to be almost purely something you fight with your ship, probably more for space POIs than planetary ones. And most that could be taken on either way. There is nothing wrong with variety and that gives each player the option of choosing which type of POI they want to attack. For example the abandoned POIs are most definitely meant to be taken on foot, so a player who enjoys ship combat wouldn't be looking for abandoned POIs. A drone base is designed to be taken on with a ship and then you go inside on foot. Something like the RE drone swarm or bandits are almost purely ship combat oriented, including reinforced cargo containers that can survive the battle so you can focus on fighting without worrying about losing loot.
CVs at least have targets where attacking its devices with turrets does happen to be the intended strategy; OPVs and freighters. SVs and HVs have no such peer opponents to test their mettle against. POIs in the game aren't categorized by designer. They're just random structures you find in the world. At best, you can see what faction they're part of and roughly guess what sort of NPC generally populate it, and even that's not completely reliable. If it's okay for one POI to have a dumb puzzle that blows you up or a random kill squad of death commandos, than any POI might have that puzzle or squad. Why shouldn't it? What's to stop it? Why should you ever assume otherwise? What reason do you have to ever trust the intent behind a dungeon POI? As much as dungeon POIs are held up as some sort of endgame peak, they're really just a very specific type of content for a very specific type of FPS-focused player. As others have explained, they have very little intrinsic connection to the rest of the game by design. They're a gameplay tumor. They've pushed everything else out. There are no quiet puzzle boxes you don't need a weapon for, no Star Fox/Descent-style space bases you fly a small SV through. Not eager for yet another FPS level? Too bad. They're the vast majority of the game's pve content.
I have a micro HV that is literally just a generator, fuel tank, ammo box, gat turret and a little bit of armor. I uses them when I think I'm likely to be flanked in a new POI. I like to have one or two lined up in the factory for when I go a raiding. Its not exactly ideal but it sort of works. The problem is, its not always obvious (or even logical) when your going to be flanked. An example of a POI that does this well is the Abandoned Reactor in the bottom floor. The spawns happen out of sight and happen after unlocking the generator/core room. It uses environmental story telling (they were having a...party...in the core room) to explain why your suddenly being swarmed. This is good. This POI also has a REALLY cool shortcut that lets you bypass the entire bottom floor for people who pay attention and wonder what happens if they blow up a oddly placed, exposed device. An example of POIs that do this really badly are the Abandoned Assembly Yard, right after destroying the core and the Abandoned Bunker, right before the core blows up. In the Abandoned Assembly Yard, you blow the core and all of a sudden the walls explode for no reason, and spew out soldiers that kill you with one burst of fire. You then have to go and reequip just to fight your way back through them and get your backpack. This section isn't just annoying and unfair, its apparently random. There is NO way to avoid this trap short of not flipping the switch and blowing the core. Now to be fair, having a bunch of trash enemies come out of the walls as you fight your way through is a really cool idea but that's NOT what this is. The Abandoned Bunker is even worse because the soldiers 'teleport' in, possible behind or worse, all around you. This trap CAN be avoided by taking cover in a corner or planting explosives on the 'teleporters' but that requires foreknowledge of what is about to happen. The funny part is that both POIs are really pretty good up until the very end. Unfortunately people don't remember the parts were done right, just that they were trolled in the end. I no longer engage with the Bunker or Assembly Yard on foot for this reason. I just dig out the cores with railguns and call it a day. Also, by any chance, do you have a list somewhere of the non-vanilla POIs in RE? There's too much here to for me to unpack right now but I did want to at least acknowledge it. The rest of my post is mostly relevant to it anyway. Not all the POI design criticism was directed at you. I have no idea which ones are yours...But if you want to make a list I'm sure people here would be more then happy to give you all the feedback you ever wanted, and then some. === Edit === Here's some quick screenshots of the turret Spoiler === Edit 2 === A link to the blueprint attached to my post in What did you do in Empyrion today.
When I first encounter a POI, I like to try to experience it as (I assume) the designer intended. I gear up - usually a more nimble build - and go in on foot, methodically going through each room and clearing it, if possible. If I have a bad time - not a hard time - through either design choices (bad spawn placement, Sentries that cannot be shot etc.) or due to game glitches (delayed / failed spawns, being hit through walls and various other little annoying gremlins) then I might look at alternate ways to take on the POI. Through whatever method - still usually on-foot - I'd eventually discover where the Core is. If I then encounter another POI of that model, I might run it again if I had a good time last time, or I might bypass that to kill the Core and loot it if it wasn't so fun. Both perfectly valid gameplay options. I may even just fly on by, considering it not worth my time. While I do like to generally experience a POI as the designer intended, I'm NOT going to do something I don't enjoy in a game. So, I might choose to use the tools available to find a better option. People cannot say, with any authority what so ever, that it's wrong to use a weapon in the game to shoot a block to destroy it. The tools are there, do what's fun. If the POI designer hasn't put in a counter to tunnelling underneath for example, that's on the designer not the player. Indeed, I've found POI's that appear to have a "soft spot" underneath, meaning gaining entry is easy, almost like the designer intended for that to be an option. Other's are heavily armoured, making it a chore. One I did, after boring through the floor, dropped LOADS of Zirax right on top of me, evidently the designer had considered that approach too...quite funny that lol. Not tunnelled under a POI in an age, so I'm unaware if any of the new POI's have taken this valid tactic into consideration. If the game presents the player with the tools and options, it's not up to anyone else how the player chooses to act. The biggest issue for me though remains game bugs. I might be in a great POI, but if I'm constantly being hit through blocks, having enemies pop in on top of me, or totally failing to land a hit due to bugged collision detection, then I'm gonna be rethinking my approach very quickly. Regarding cheese. One could argue that in many POI's doing it anything other than Solo is the ultimate cheese. Often just having a buddy along can make all the difference - and it helps negate "late" spawns - having a team of four say, and it's a breeze. I touch on this in my difficultly scaling remarks earlier. Is that group "wrong" for teaming up to take on a POI? Absolutely not. It's a totally different experience though and can genuinely make what is a challenging solo experience trivial. We've been given multiple ways to tackle POI's, do what's fun for you. I wish the game was less glitchy so the "as intended" experience was better, and I'd hope POI designers would not create unavoidable situations where the death/repeat grind isn't the tactic. When a POI cheeses me I'm more inclined to cheese the POI. Here's the thing, I can see how from a design perspective that it's quite amusing to have those Sentries pop out after the Player thinks the room in clear and they're moving on, for example. Classic trap. However, if the player has no direct counter to that, no warning that there are sentries, then it can go one of two ways. First you have the "tank" player, fully heavy armour and boosts, a backback full of meds and ammo, who can take the hits and return fire. If they have better weapons, it might only be a couple of shots. Maybe he has buddies with him, who see the turrets pop out, as their following behind. Easy counter. Next you have the nimble solo player (me) who takes a hit or two and is dead. No warning, minimal armour, no buddies helping out. The insta-hit nature of the Sentries combined with the incorrect sound postitioning means I get no warning that's useful to me. Simple things like subtly different textures for concealed sentries and spawers can make a huge difference to the experience. A mindful player is effectively forewarned of the potential trap and can counter it. Having to look at every surface with the Multi-tool equipped due to perfectly blended textures is not so good. The Sentry at the top of an elevator thing, while great from the perspective of an effective trap, is far from ideal from a player perspective. This is due to the limitations of the player - we cannot aim straight up - plus, due to bugs, there are numerous things that can hit us, but we cannot hit them already - we don't need more lol. Of course, we don't know where that sentry firing sound is coming from to start with... Pondering; If the player had more tools in their arsenal, POI designers would have more options. For example, what if the player had a device that enabled them to "see" concealed Sentries. Lore: "they give of a slight EM signature that this device can detect". Then there's a counter to the surprise. By using different textures, POI designers are already communicating this to the player, albeit subtly and not consistently across multiple designers. I did ask, in another thread, about the ability to "hack" devices, making them (temporarily) aligned with the player. Got a tricky room full of Sentries and critters? Hack the turret, let it do the work. Not possible currently sadly. What I'm saying is that the game needs more features that can be exploited by both the designer and player alike. To be clear, the heavily armoured group with all guns blazing approach is a perfectly valid tactic that works really really well in many instances, perhaps too well unless the POI is over powered (I've seen a few that are basically impossible solo). However, having options for the solo player is perhaps what's missing. Stealth and hacking would be cool. Anyway, I rambled again and I really need to crack on with RW stuff lol.
Just a side note... I occasionally see people remark that we aren't Rambo, we're just a dude in a spacesuit and need to think that way (presumably, regarding pois and the way we should think of our combat abilities and inability to tank more than a couple hits even in heavy armor). And honestly, I can kind of agree. We aren't Rambo. But then, why in the world am I attacking a fortified installation full of dozens to hundreds of elite enemy troops? I'm just some doofus in a spacesuit. Well, my answer is because I have overwhelming force on my side. But if the intent of a poi is to force me to do it in a way that literally no one would actually do in real life (throw away all advantages, just go in as one doofus, on foot, with a boom stick, vs 150+ bullet-sponge auto-aiming insta-gibbing enemies), I'm likely to skip that poi. Derelict delta station comes to mind. Great design but forced to play a certain way. I can't imagine anyone would attack that place in the "intended" manner if that story actually unfolded in real life. Not a dig at the poi itself, but the thought process behind what's "intended."
That's very relevant to my point. I'm not Rambo, never thought I was Rambo, I'm just a squishy human in a space suit that tries not to get hit. The thing is, my agility over resistance approach doesn't really work in many instances. Be it due to POI design, "you will get shot, a lot, just accept it" through to bugs causing the player to take damage when they should not. Bugs and intentionally designed traps aside, AI is where things will improve I think. When the AI has to first detect, then react, then track the player (or other target) before firing / striking that's a more even playing field. That needs to be combined with the mob in question being accurately visually represented. Being shot / hit by foes that aren't even facing you isn't fun. When their "aim" is able to snap instantly to you, no amount of agility can help outside of coded inaccuracies with the weapon. It's tiring when the player gets "hit" by a Melee attacker, as they jet-pack jump over them several metres away. Seeing the critter still facing where the player was knowing you dodged that attack perfectly, is annoying. Or when the attacker clearly strikes the block physically preventing them from touching you, yet you still take damage. Same with ranged attackers. They seem to snap to face the player horizontally and fire, there's no sequence to it. It's worse when above / below as their animations don't match where they're facing - not that it really matters, with how the AI works currently. I think a more advanced AI, rather than the "I know where you are, boom" one we have now will really enhance the whole Player vs. AI and even AI vs. AI experience. It's almost a case of "slow it down" make me think that the AI Critter or Trooper doesn't absolutely know where I am, but takes a moment to react and aim, perhaps (RNG on level) getting it wrong sometimes and shooting wildly. It's like I can pop my head out of cover and be instantly under fire, no reaction time at all. I then move, under cover, to another location, pop mu head up and the enemy instantly snap to face me and are shooting again. Trying to use cover is totally hit or miss. I might be under cover, visually but still be hit, I might have perfect LoS on an enemy but I cannot hit them. Sometimes that goes in the player's favour, but it's not as common. POI's can be a funny experience sometimes. From things spawning right on top of you, literally clipping, unavoidable ambushes, hit through blocks, stuck in walls, through to totally unresponsive even when hit. This core gameplay needs refining, as it's been bad for too long. I feel for POI designers who get grief for cheesy tactics vs. the player, when perhaps that wasn't the intent at all. Imagine how amazing a POI might be if Stealth was a thing, if NPC's actually had to detect you, then react. Imagine if they knew to scatter when you employed an AoE type weapon, or try to flank you. Imagine if that mob rush didn't just clip through each other, and you, to get to you. Imagine if heavier weapons actually caused the target to stagger or at least react outside of a default animation. It would be transformative. While I'm primarily talking about Tactics in regards to on-foot inside a POI, the approach is relevant too. I've taken out a POI's turrets in an SV, landed, then approached on foot. All is clear then, suddenly, several Zirax pop in and are instantly shooting me. Where's the fun in that? If a door opened and previously spawned Zirax flooded out, that's GOOD. The other way is not. With core game features working better, POI designers would be able to create far better experiences for the players I feel.
