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Starsector 0.97a is out! (02/02/24); New blog post: Simulator Enhancements (03/13/24)

Author Topic: [Chain Quests] Legendary Ships  (Read 1351 times)

Nemo089

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[Chain Quests] Legendary Ships
« on: June 29, 2022, 08:52:43 AM »

Hello guys,

How about a difficult chain quest to search and get some "legendary ships"? This is just a very fresh idea but the base is:
during missions, or stops in some station or bar there is a chance that the player can get some rumors (example: the player hear some rumors from drunk pirate) about some legendary old ship from the era before the gates go shutdown.

Those ship was once very powerful and big (battleship class) feared by everyone, but now there are only storytelling for the childs. Forgotten weapons, lost in space many years ago.

The difference with the other mission is that these searching are not tracked, player must discover key element visiting and talking with some key characters (CEO of Tri-Tachyon, Galatia researchers etc etc) or some survey at precise planets.

I suggest this grade of difficulty because of the rewards the player can obtain:
example:

one of those legendary forgotten ship can be the Nautilus (a high-tech phase battleship, resembling a huge submarine, a precursor of the Tri-Tachyon technology and AI), the particularity of this ship is that has no need an officer because has an integrated AI Alpha Core (so is a free officer, with crew requirements lesser than others Battleships),

or the infamous pirate terror ship the Jolly Roger (a low tech cannoner, with a lot of ballistic weapons points) despite the dimension the ship is the most maneuverable of the battleships with Safety Overrides built-in with no penalty to the weapon range (maybe this is a bit exaggerated)

and other ships...(maybe one for factions).

What do you think guys?
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Megas

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Re: [Chain Quests] Legendary Ships
« Reply #1 on: June 29, 2022, 11:24:07 AM »

Ziggurat sort of does this.  It is unique and acquired a little past halfway through the quest for the Janus Device.

I would like to see one or two more unique hero ships the player can find aside from Ziggurat.  Ziggurat is fun, though I would like a non-phase alternative.
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Nemo089

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Re: [Chain Quests] Legendary Ships
« Reply #2 on: June 29, 2022, 03:19:02 PM »

Oh I didn't know the Ziggurat! However a sort of this, with more lore, and the exiciting of the search through the galaxy. Mmm just like the quest to find the scientist for the Galatia Academey.
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BigBrainEnergy

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Re: [Chain Quests] Legendary Ships
« Reply #3 on: June 29, 2022, 05:59:23 PM »

Yeah Starsector has a lot of potential, although it feels silly saying that considering how much work has gone into it already. Having longer quest chains would go a long way to make you feel more involved in the goings-on of the sector instead like an almighty admiral looking down on everyone from a detached position. Given that individual people have relationship meters separate from their faction makes me feel like something more is planned there that just isn't ready yet, maybe your personal connections will give out quests kinda like in the tutorial?
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Harmful Mechanic

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Re: [Chain Quests] Legendary Ships
« Reply #4 on: June 29, 2022, 07:54:51 PM »

If Alex doesn't, I will - already working on something like this.
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Midnight Kitsune

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Re: [Chain Quests] Legendary Ships
« Reply #5 on: June 29, 2022, 10:23:47 PM »

The issue with these quests is building them and building them so that they are mostly meta and or idiot proof resistant. Things like making sure that the quest doesn't break if the player goes after the objective early with knowledge from previous runs or does something stupid like destroy or lose an important item or ship while not also giving it away (like "random" essential/ immortal NPCs)
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Nemo089

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Re: [Chain Quests] Legendary Ships
« Reply #6 on: June 30, 2022, 12:18:07 AM »

Things like making sure that the quest doesn't break if the player goes after the objective early with knowledge from previous runs or does something stupid like destroy or lose an important item or ship while not also giving it away (like "random" essential/ immortal NPCs)

Then just get the items a random spawn every run, maybe some key object has a description that suggests the object has some use. And if the player sell it or destroy it etc etc, too bad for him, see ya next run space cowboy (like some item or quests in games like Dark Souls, you can break them and this is however part of the game).

The rewards are huge, so no mercy for the player, and this encourages players to talk to each other on the forum or also in real life ("I have found this strange satellite it has some description but what do it?" "Oh have you tried to talk with a scientist of the Tri-tachyon faction? I am now struck searching some strange probes near black holes" etc etc).
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SteelHeart

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Re: [Chain Quests] Legendary Ships
« Reply #7 on: June 30, 2022, 04:55:22 PM »

A possible idiot proofing for important items is to just not have the player able to take them out of their inventory. I think the Janus devices does this. The other option for anti meta gaming is to do the same thing with the historian and artifacts. These things just don't spawn in until we meet some trigger.

Honestly, I think that I might be pretty universally ok with idiot proofing things but I'm not so sure it matters quite as much with meta proofing. Though if you don't meta proof you need to make sure the game accepts sequence breaking. It kind of already does since you can visit alpha site and the zig pretty much at game start and the game sort of acknowledges it. Same with transverse jump skill.
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Nemo089

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Re: [Chain Quests] Legendary Ships
« Reply #8 on: July 01, 2022, 12:12:58 AM »

A possible idiot proofing for important items is to just not have the player able to take them out of their inventory. I think the Janus devices does this. The other option for anti meta gaming is to do the same thing with the historian and artifacts. These things just don't spawn in until we meet some trigger.

Honestly, I think that I might be pretty universally ok with idiot proofing things but I'm not so sure it matters quite as much with meta proofing. Though if you don't meta proof you need to make sure the game accepts sequence breaking. It kind of already does since you can visit alpha site and the zig pretty much at game start and the game sort of acknowledges it. Same with transverse jump skill.
Yes, this is a way to make things idiot proof, with some trigger or events in-game.
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Nemo089

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Re: [Chain Quests] Legendary Ships
« Reply #9 on: July 01, 2022, 02:33:10 AM »

I was reading the blogspot on the original site and I found similarity with the new development to "uniquifying" the Factions, the devs are planning to release some ships, loadouts and weapons that are bounded to the Factions.
I'm excited to see the result, if any dev is reading this: hope you insert also some quest to get those new items.
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