I bought Starsector as of 0.8.1a a few months ago--and it's been fantastic, thank you Alex and all involved. So a few comments from a relatively new player:
Hi, and welcome to the forum!
1. I've largely avoided trying to understand the current economy in the game because I found the UI difficult, so I both appreciate your aside about the role of UI in the design of mechanics, and am happy to say that I find these screens to be an enormous improvement. I wouldn't quite call them intuitive, but I can say that after looking at them for a while today, I do feel like they now make sense to me and would work well; and I'm sure playing the game with them would further enhance that.
Glad you've found it... let's say, "comprehensible"
My one thought here: given that every faction seems to have its own color, and that red typically means pirate faction/illegal, did you consider having goods supplied by a faction outlined in the color of that faction in the Commodities list for the market, and having unmet demand be dimmed; rather than dim meaning imported and red-outlined meaning unmet demand, as you have it now?
I see what you're saying - I think that would make the UI look more cluttered and obscure some important information. Green/red outlines being tied to low/high prices is a very nice property to have. If a lot of icons have colorful outlines, it's going to be harder to pick out important information, while dim icons for imports contibute less to the clutter due to being dim. On the flip side, a shortage is important, so making it dim doesn't seem like a good idea.
Relying on many colors here would make it less usable for someone that's color blind. Red/orange and green are ok, since there's an (admittedly somewhat hidden) setting to turn those into something a color blind person can distinguish. Not to say that the game does a perfect job of being accessible, but I generally prefer not to solely use color to indicate something.
Finally, mods add more factions, and the color space gets crowded. Basically, this is a case of the faction crest being used to do precisely the job it's meant to do.
2. Regarding the pseudo-logarithmic conception of market size: for whatever it's worth, I'm having more success understanding it myself if I think of it as being not only about production scalability but also about commerce infrastructure and facilities. If a market just physically can't support large freighters docking and loading on a regular basis, for example, then it makes some sense that the market could be able to support more smaller freighters (thus allowing exports to more markets of the same smaller size), but wouldn't be able to efficiently supply any markets of a larger scale. Kind of. Maybe.
3. A thought on terminology: with "market size," sequential numbers plus the word "size" tends to imply a linear scale, I think. Whereas if it was something like "Market Class" or "Tier n Market" that might help put people in the right conceptual frame of mind, because "class" and "tier" are more often understood to represent non-linear categories. (Indeed "market category" would work, although the word length of "category" makes the UI more difficult.)
I think you're right, but since gameplay-wise (rather than conceptually), things based on market size tend to be linear or close to it, market size is - by the same logic - probably better
4. Regarding outpost fleets: as I've been playing, I have been inexorably accumulating a large number of ships in storage. It's past the point of them being a safety net in case my active fleet is wiped out; there just hasn't been any compelling reason to either scrap them or sell them, and many have sentimental value/memories. So while I can understand it being outside the core areas of the game, I'll just say that it would be very nice in terms of both player asset utilization and role-playing to be able to assign these currently extraneous stored ships to an outpost as part of its fleet so that they can continue to be of service, rather than the "immersion eyesore" they currently are.
Hmm, interesting idea! Will keep it in mind when figuring out just how ship production works.
I hope bounty hunting isn't one of the cash flow nerfs that we are going to get. It took a big (too be to me) hit with the procedural content addition and I would hate to see combat disincentivized even more than it has been
Some rebalancing may happen, but I'll just say that I think bounty hunting is in a pretty good place right now in terms of income. Other stuff would likely be balanced around that level.
Questions:
- How will the colonies be set up: colony ship (O-Game), colony structure in cargo (X-Series), just dump people and supplies on a planet and wish them luck?
It'll require crew/cargo/machinery. Possibly with a later-game option to just dump credits into it and have someone else take care of it (say, once you've already got a sizeable outpost).
- Will there be any pirate bribery to remotely obstruct/destroy competing trade fleets (especially without being held responsible)?
Maybe? As I think I mentioned in the blog post, there definitely need to be a bunch of options for moving up on the list of "preferred suppliers".
- Will colonies/outposts/waystations/planets be destructible? Able to be abandoned? Conquerable? Tradeable?
- Any thoughts on how faction commission works in relation to trade optimization? Will factions who declare war avoid your commissioned outpost, or is it possible they'd focus on your assets exclusively? Plans for semi/permanent faction joining?
- Will you allow factions to (try to) colonize in REDACTED space, or will there be a 'safety factor' when the factions try to expand?
- How will taxes work in relation to this? Will you still be the one paying the transaction tax to the other faction, whether buying or selling? Can you set local tax rates?
I guess that to some extent, Outposts can be abandonned and/or totally destroyed. Where will be the limit with already established outposts/world? Can Asharu can be totally eradicated because it has a low level market and population?
All good questions, but I really can't say until this gets further along and I can do some playtesting.
It got me thinking about the current way relationships work between faction: I guess with the new system, trading will need to also consider if the other factions are at war, or not with the current market? And it also means that it could be several states of relationships which influences directly trading (which was introduced in the Ironclad mod) : 2 factions in "cold-war" state might want to engage combat fleets but spare trading fleets, allowing some level of trade between them, while a total war would mean no quarter. In the same vein, what about alliance? Askonia, as an ally of Pearsean League, could be treated as a "same faction" market in regard for trading with PL worlds. This also ask about "how much the relationships between 2 factions can change in regards of initial status between them.
If the factions are hostile, trade between the two markets is considered smuggling and is limited to 3 units per commodity.
About Outpost : How about others factions? Can they established new ones too?
Probably/maybe? Definitely not on a large scale, though, if anything I could see "faction X wants to establish an outpost somewhere" being a major event.
And does outpost include Space Station?
An orbital station is a "structure" you can build at an outpost. Exactly what it does is somewhat TBD, which is to say I have something in mind but haven't done/tried it yet.
Hmm, that could be a market condition: impoverished. Reduces stability and drastically how much trading profit it gives?
Hmm, a possibility. What I had in mind originally, though, is "grant autonomy" still keeps the outpost as belonging to your faction, so there's no money for exporting to them, and you're still responsible - in some sense - for providing protection. On the plus side, you wouldn't get a stability penalty for importing from one of these. But the details are extremely up in the air here.