v1.5 EXP: Reworked story missions

Discussion in 'Experimental Features Discussion' started by Hummel-o-War, May 18, 2021.

  1. Robot Shark

    Robot Shark Rear Admiral

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    During the Emergency Broadcast part of "A Glacial Grave" nobody came to attack me.
    It looks like the game tried to spawn the enemies, but the location looks a little off.

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    #41
  2. Robot Shark

    Robot Shark Rear Admiral

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    FINALLY, the Ilmarien is actually a short teleport from the control station and not on the other side of the system.

    One request, extend this ramp in the control station please.

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    #42
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  3. Robot Shark

    Robot Shark Rear Admiral

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    Cheap shot...

    I am exploring the Ilmarien and I keep hearing an unusual noise, it's not something I recognize, so I have no idea what it is.
    When I got to the bridge I saw the answer, there were 6 drones flying around and my CV was defenseless because I had turned off the weapons to keep them from firing at the Ilmarien.

    A mad dash back to the CV and one intense firefight later my ship is safe. Thank goodness I left the shields on.

    Request: Make it so that CV/HV/SV turrets do not fire at structures with admin cores?
     
    #43
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  4. Radgrim

    Radgrim Ensign

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    Storyline Progression

    Of course, you are well aware of the problem of trying to see the game as a NOOB when you are not. Only a NOOB would attempt to go off on other missions without improving on the Damaged UCH Dart. So, I did! (because that is why we are in Experimental). Naturally, I was shot up pretty badly on the way to the distillery. The point is that you cannot “win” this game by simply following the quest line, as a NOOB would have every reason to believe because there are many games where this is the road to success. But in this game, you are expected to go somewhere and improve things between quests. This should be explained at some point. The simple question by ADA after talking to Kezzel is not enough because it makes it seem like either method is viable, and the secret teleport path is only viable if you intend to stay at the Sky Bar and drink forever… Hmmm. Well, that’s probably a different game.

    Perhaps some pre-quest advice would help this. Something like, “for this mission (or quest), you will need blah blah blah and you should be at least a Level blah.” This doesn’t have to be too specific. In some places, you almost do this by saying “you will need a warp capable vessel”, but no advice about armaments or shields.

    Again, between missions is an excellent time to save a game. Could it be automatic in solo games?
     
    #44
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  5. Radgrim

    Radgrim Ensign

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    Taking the secret teleport to the ObviousWreckage and the escape SV might need a little rebalancing. I was simultaneously attacked by multiple drones, Raptors, and Zirax ground forces. Then incoming troop transports that happened very frequently. My solo game settings are “medium”. After previously dealing with manageable situations, this was like jumping into a volcano. Also, I stupidly did not bring any fuel with me even though the SV did not need anything else. I died a lot and ultimately reloaded a saved game.

    I suggest a little heads up in the dialogue where Ada says that there are two paths. Perhaps this is a good spot to insert advice about saving solo games and how that all works. Also, to be prepared with what you need to get the SV going. This part of the quest should be described as a “run for it” because there is no chance against the enemies of various types. Looking at the map, this is in the heart of Zirax territory. Bringing fuel this time, I was able to run for it and escape after only a couple of deaths. Ada might also mention that it is not necessary to use the damaged SV to escape if you want to build or spawn your own at your base. Maybe a third path?

    When I got into space with the damaged SV, I aimed for the space station and everything was fine for a bit. Then I used the “I” key to coast to the space station, but when I turned autobraking back on, I had no control over the ship. I tried everything, including cutting the power. This didn’t work at first but did after a few tries. I got a message about “generators stopped while moving” or something. It went by too fast to read. Then, after powering up again, control miraculously returned. I remember that in previous versions, the damaged SV needed some engines to be controllable, but they all seemed to be in place on this one. I managed to land at the space station. Later, I tried this with a factory-built SV, just to see if autobraking was broken, but it all seemed to work fine with my spawned vehicle.
     
    #45
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  6. rdunham3

    rdunham3 Ensign

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    Heidelberg re-fit now makes it possible to fall into the room with medical equipment and be unable to get out if you have no suit, and therefore can't jump more than about half a block. Now that it has a core you can't salvage your way out.

    The quests still break in multiplayer, although they keep triggering so the players feel compelled to try. Could the storyline either be disabled in multiplayer until/unless it is made multiplayer-friendly, or avoid the use of non-resetting trapdoors etc. so more than the first player to trigger them can do the quests? Manually marking each stage complete all the time is lame.

    Neutral bugs are too aggressive. Very difficult to loot ruins near initial crash because the bugs everywhere attack all the time. I couldn't make bandages fast enough despite all the plant protein in that area. Attempting to mine starter area resources would have been suicidal.

    That first part of the storyline involving the Talon chief was nicer than the old one.
     
    #46
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  7. Radgrim

    Radgrim Ensign

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    Beer or Root Beer?

    Although I have lived in South America before, I have never lived in Europe. Anyway, in the US, beer and root beer are not interchangeable terms. However, they seem to be used that way in the distillery mission. I suggest picking one, probably based on your desired ESRB rating.

    Don’t show up at the bar without any money or anything to sell. Luckily, I had 12 credits and the beer was only 11, lol. After buying the beer, or maybe it was after accepting the mission, I got the alarm “5 minutes left until self-destruct…”

    The POI is spelled wrong. TOP Destillery is POI name, but it correctly says Distillery in PDA. It also says, “Approach Station” in the PDA which is mildly confusing since it is not referred to as a station anywhere else. Should perhaps be “Approach Distillery”.

    I was able to loot containers at the distillery with no penalty, just like at the Civilian Trading Station where I bought the “root” beer. Good loot. The pirate containers correctly give the rep warning.

    I wonder if there is some way to either get away from having both Platinum Bars and Platinum Ingots available in the game, or maybe just to emphasize that they are two different things. I realize that we have Platinum Plates later and that somewhere you are told where to buy the Bars. But it seems like an unnecessary chance for confusion for new players, and you already have to annoyingly trek back to the Station to get the Bar from the bar, anyway.
     
    #47
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  8. Escarli

    Escarli Rear Admiral

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    Unless I misunderstand, if they did that then the admin core poi's that have turrets that attack you would not be able to be damaged
     
    #48
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  9. Kassonnade

    Kassonnade Rear Admiral

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    Following what @Escarli just wrote, here is an option for when players park a ship outside a POI and want it to protect itself from "other" threats than the POI itself, because obviously such threats are "moving" threats : drones, ships or critters/ foot soldiers.

    To block the first "objection" i see coming up, when having lots of turrets this can be tedious, but players can simply turn off all weapons with the main switch in the Control Panel, then only turn a few turrets on (maybe even have a custom signal for this) that only target "NPC, Drones, Players" so enemy drones that always seem to creep up when players have their backs turned when exploring dungeons can be fend off by the ship left outside.

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    #49
    Last edited: May 21, 2021
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  10. Escarli

    Escarli Rear Admiral

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    There seems to be a problem with Story Chapter 5: Ancient Revelations> Main Control Deck (L5)

    Watching a streamer and he essentially flicked the lever in the ventilation maintenance room first before finding the system console. So what happened is the "Fix Problems" didn't complete, he did everything he needed to just out of the order it's shows in the PDA.

    So he ended up having to manually complete it.

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    #50
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  11. Kassonnade

    Kassonnade Rear Admiral

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    Multi-step instructions don't work well. Players have very little visual clues, and one mistake breaks everything. Having access to more than 1 switch or just having the possibility to interact with any other part of the puzzle apart the one that is mandatory relies way too much on "player obedience to instructions".

    Missions can't break if they are designed with the premiss that "players are dumb and need to be held tightly by the hand".

    Some will complain about this, but quests will not break. Much less of a problem.
     
    #51
    Last edited: May 22, 2021
  12. Stroichik

    Stroichik Ensign

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    I`ve started 1.5 but cant start any story quest or tutorial.
     
    #52
  13. Robot Shark

    Robot Shark Rear Admiral

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    If you approach an admin POI that belongs to an enemy faction, your turrets will start shooting at it.
    Even though they cannot damage it, your build will continue to burn through ammo trying to take it out.

    I guess I will try what @Kassonnade suggested and try tweaking the targeting.
     
    #53
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  14. Kassonnade

    Kassonnade Rear Admiral

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    Of course the ship's turrets can still target NPCs inside the POI so I would tend to park the ship at max range of the turrets I leave activated for ship defense.
     
    #54
  15. Robot Shark

    Robot Shark Rear Admiral

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    I just finished the Ilmarien and I can tell that someone put a LOT of work into it.
    The new waypoints really helped, but I found that I sometimes triggered them while I was in a separate room because I got close enough to them, so the detection radius needs to be tweaked.

    The new text made the ship creepier and gave the impression that the Legacy is a hive mind.
    What would make it worse would be .WAV files of whispering that get triggered in certain areas.

    I then started Uncertain Outcomes but ran into a glitch in the end when I returned to the Waystation to talk to Sectioneer 32, the event failed to trigger when I entered the room with the smiley face.

    On a hunch I returned to the orbital base in the starter system and the "close enough" trigger worked in my favor because the doors were locked but I was able to get close enough to trigger the event and finish the mission.

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    #55
  16. DredKnght

    DredKnght Ensign

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    You can destroy the core on the heidleberg.. either dig under the core or at the bottom of the 1/4 ramp on top you can shoot through an invisible gap.. your choice.. but the core can be destroyed and swapped out
     
    #56
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  17. tezerakt

    tezerakt Ensign

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    Hello and good Afternoon, i played Multiplayer with a Friend today the Talon Quest and right at the start of the Ancient Tower i could not kill enough spiders for proceed with the Quest, while my friend was alrdy done with it. And there where no more spiders for me left.

    at the Moment the Quest system is stressfull to play with somebody else, you have to watch carefully at every step that you mate has the same
    progress state. He accidently fired then of the prisoner with left click instead of right click to proceed the text.

    i suggest that player in same faction share the quest progress. There are two ways, instead of counting kills, count living enemys of a type. on that way the problem ist totally bypassed and its much includable for story-telling to speak of remaining spiders for example instead of dead ones.

    the other way would be that each player contributes to te progress quest if he is also near the quest side present.

    The tiny part of the Quest system that i seen so far is really pretty and asome, good work. thx !
     
    #57
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  18. Thorwine

    Thorwine Commander

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    Did I do something wrong, or did I miss something?
    The Teleporter to find the Small Vessel after Story Chapter 2 "Crashed Birds" is not active for me...

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    [Edit] I also talked to Kezzel first accidentally. Is this the end for the Small Vessel thingy, or can it be found otherwise?
     
    #58
    Last edited: May 22, 2021
  19. Germanicus

    Germanicus Rear Admiral

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    You talked to the Guard who sent you to the Commander, 1st Floor, who sent you to Kezzel, 2nd Floor, right?
    Kezzel said to find something in the nearby Elder tomb. When you brought it to him he rewarded you with a Transporter and told you the two Choices - using this one here or mounting the gifted one in your Base. So far so all clear.
    No you choose this way in the Transport is inactive...
    Or did you miss something of the above?
     
    #59
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  20. Thorwine

    Thorwine Commander

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    Ah, I chose the Teleporter ITEM. Didn't recognize that it was a matter of choice :D Ok then, thank you!
    By the way, a Teleporter with full inventory is a shocker! Had put put all my stuff in the Cargo Palette nearby. Not that simple to check for Newbies. But ok, it's Story Mission.. not the RP anymore.
     
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