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1

General Discussion / Storyline Feedback Thread [SPOILERS]

« on: June 01, 2023, 12:02:15 PM »

I'm genuinely missing some talk about the narrative. Sure, Alex's direction and mechanical content deserves the spotlight, but David's been busy this patch, too, and I'm of the opinion his work does deserve some praise as well. I've already voiced some of my opinions in the patch announcement thread, I'm going to dig deeper into individual storylines here:

The Shrines

What a lovely way to get introduced into the Church! I managed to get lucky and not only did my first visit to the Jangala shrine coincide with the protest event, I also nabbed a hitchhiker there on my way to Kumari Aru. All of the visits were memorable and together painted a pretty colorful picture of the Church, a "rainbow road" of sorts if the zealous pardon me. I honestly can't think of anything to improve, it's a neat and simple storyline for new players to pick up to get a good look at a major piece of the core worlds. The only piece it was missing was a peek at the dark side of the Church, which I hoped would be addressed in...

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The Knight Errant

...and it turns out I was right. Sorta. There is no denying that the Path is the dark side of the Church, but I have seen more evidence of the two sides of the Ludd's coin mingling in the Gates storyline through the encounters with Cotton and his knave of Ludd. Admittedly Jethro turning out to have pee'd his pants off to Mazalot was a funny, but ultimately anticlimactic ending, painting him in an arguably unflattering light. I'd have preferred if he ended up being a genuinely resourceful and influential personality active in some kind of an underground action on Mazalot. Perhaps he would end up being an agent of his own that would grow sympathetic to the Luddic radicals, but guilesome enough to influence them towards a more subtle and effective solution to their oppression. Then we could actually make an interesting decision whether to fulfill Jaspis' quest and weaken the faithful of Mazalot in favor of returning one of Gilead's greatest offstage minds home. Or show sympathy to his cause and perhaps eventually see the fruits of such character's efforts come true. I mean, perhaps we could supply him with weapons (or contacts!) if we could do that with...

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The Hood, the Boy and the Bot

..., err, I mean the Volturn Curate. And you might've just ended up puzzled what has the Volturn Padawan quest got to do with the previously mentioned questline. Nothing much except disappointment. I'm not going to write a rant about it again though, it's here for those who are curious. The quest is a fun nod and I appreciate it, but I hope in future it does become an introduction to Sindria's own Chekhov's bot-man.

...Sorry for not coming up with a better joke. But hey! At least it sounds like Batman! 

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The Sentinel Island

IN SPACE!

Boy, is this joke getting old

Didn't arrive to this paragraph by a segue, but neither did I to Sentinel while playing. I mean I didn't encounter this one as fluidly as the other storylines. Which makes sense, the discovery of Sentinel's secret is meant to be sudden and shocking. And what a shocker it is! AI hardwired to Hegemony ships? I choose to read it less as an accident of necessity and more as another proof of Hegemony's hypocrisy. That said, I'm looking forward to see the repercussions of actually handing the PK to anyone in future patches. I'll be disappointed if it doesn't end up being abused by everyone possible. Power corrupts and so on...

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The Usurpers

Speaking of power, the Usurpers questline is steaming, but somewhat undercooked. But that's the cons of tasting the early access for you. On the other hand, the ingredients are amazing! Hyder and Macario are intriguing characters and I would love to see them at each other's throats in the future. I was a bit underwhelmed by Caden coming off as a straight-up idiot, but I suppose that's to be expected of the head of Lion's Guard. I might pretend it to be a case of obfuscating stupidity and perhaps he'll get a chance to show that in future patches. If he doesn't end up dying in a shootout with me over a single double agent, like this time. Either way it looks like Askonia's set up to be a political or even a literal battleground for the four big factions and I can't wait for the theater to start ^^

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All in all, I liked what you got, David. Good job! If you continue at this pace and manage to gently weave the storylines together then we're in for a proper space opera! And no opera would be complete without music, so shout-out to Stian for the new themes! Love the hint of the hyperspace theme in the League ones!

And what do you think, fellow starfarers?

2

Suggestions / Mastery: Guideline to a Playstyle

« on: April 06, 2023, 04:09:15 PM »

As we are discussing Industry capstones, an idea came to me that both Derelict Ops and Auto Ships appear to be enablers to fringe playstyles, despite the possibility that they could be playstyle guidelines to building a fleet using specific mechanics. They could both be available to the player from the beginning, and their respective power could grow with the player, allowing more enticing options the more the player progresses.

This could allow the player to grow closer to their preferred fleet playstyle, teaching them skills that would benefit them in the long run:

Mastery: Construction

For the first example, one such Mastery could help the player mitigate D-mods, teaching them to make the most out of salvage opportunities and taking calculated losses. Over time, it could reward the player with easier management of zombie ships and better maintenance of veteran ships that took quite a few scars and always came back stronger.

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Mastery: Innovation

As the second example, another Mastery could allow the player to salvage [REDACTED] ships and use [RESTRICTED] technology, teaching them to take calculated risks and to rely on their mechanical skills. Over time, it could reward the player with access to exclusive ships and bonuses rewarding mechanical skill in combat.

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Mastery: Command

Next example, the third Mastery could grant the player access to extra ship modifications and officer training, teaching them the value of individual ships in a fleet composition. Over time, it could reward the player with bonuses based on how well balanced their fleets are, both inside and outside of combat.

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Mastery: Mayhem

But perhaps the player doesn't want their hand held. There should still be an option for those who don't want to conform to guidelines. Maybe a good combat boost for their flagship is all they need to reach perfection. Maybe an extra credit for their audacity is enough to put a smile on their face.

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But technically speaking, how would these 'Masteries' work? Inspired by a mechanic from a different RPG game, the player would choose their Mastery early in the game along with their first skills, and the Mastery's bonuses would improve upon reaching certain milestones in total skill investment. Unlike their insipration, the Masteries wouldn't lock the player into a skill tree, they would just mimic the skill trees thematically (as seen above). I have still quite some details in mind, but I can share those upon asking, let's not make this post longer than it needs to be.

3

Suggestions / Officer limit adjusted by skill total

« on: December 09, 2022, 11:39:24 PM »

 Sorry if someone already came up with this.

As I was thinking about Support Doctrine, I realised there is a potential for a middle ground between the skill and the usual state. What if there was a skill that changed the officer limit from the usual personnel count to 'by the total amount of skills'? E. g. instead of 8 officers, up to, say, 32 officers could be recruited, limited by the total amount of skills in the officer pool.

Do you think the idea has a merit? I can imagine it would take a lot of work. If it's worth it, the benefit should be a potential increase in fleet variety beyond the usual anchors+frigate support build type, especially among wolfpack builds.

4

Bug Reports & Support / Raiding-related bugs in the Elissa Zal questline

« on: September 04, 2022, 08:59:06 AM »

Case 1

After obtaining a randomly generated Ransom Researcher mission from Sebastyen targeting Kanta's Den and subsequently raiding it to extract the researcher, the option to extract Elissa Zal with a raid made me able to carry on with the raid under the same circumstances as the Sebastyen mission (low danger, 10% marine allocation needed).

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Case 2

Prior to starting the Elissa Zal questline, I raided Epiphany twice, once for a Sebastyen Recover Artifact mission and once for a bar Extract Agent mission. Later I was unable to select the option to take a shuttle to meet Brother Cotton until after two in-game months, despite going through the full dialogue with the Epiphany portmaster character before. Only the option to extract Loke by raiding was available.

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5

Lore, Fan Media & Fiction / Challenge: Describe Your Latest Custom Faction

« on: June 29, 2022, 09:25:11 AM »

Fellow starfarers!

I'm stuck.

I can't wait until the next patch drops, but at the same time, I don't want to "spoil" myself with another run. To kill the time before we get there, I devised a challenge for us:

Write a lore-friendly* description of your latest run's faction and the systems it controls, save it as a text file and attach it to your post (or just paste it in the box if you fancy looong posts :). In addition to that, score the previous poster's description on a 10 scale and say something you liked about it. ^^ Feel free to use my style as a template, or create a style of your own!


*alternatively, make it funny, but make sure it's really damn funny or it's the airlock for you >:(

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