X4 - ten questions for developers

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Ghrathryn
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Post by Ghrathryn » Sat, 20. May 17, 12:33

You know, that's actually another point. Going along with the command crews I mentioned, would ships have normal crews and would those crews (and the losses there of) affect performance in various areas?

Going off the previous post, a combat capital like the Tyranis would probably have a crew of 400-2500 roughly, out of which performance would degrade as it lost crew members true, but the other thing to point out, and this also links to my questions about boarding is how the crew is split up. For instance the Tyranis has 46 guns, of which two are missile launchers that would need loaders and magazine space, around 4 are plasma beams, 6-8 are plasma bolt, 8 shotgun and the rest are HIT/MA so on a crew break down you'd probably expect a minimum of 46 'gunners' plus the fire director/tacitcal officer/defence officer, at least 2 for piloting or pilot/navigation and a few dozen engineers and damcon guys, not to mention the people maintaining the 150-ish drones it can carry and probably as a military vessel a marine compliment for boardings and stop, search and seize ops with shuttles or pods for that which need independant but bunked crews. Of course, military ship so you could presume that it has more than necessary even for multiple shifts at full capacity.

Speaking of, if crews do get split into departments, particularly if boarding is still a thing and if it's expanded on, ship marine compliments should be part of the boarding resistance score along with any 'militia' from the remaining crew, though a crew militia should have less boarding resist than any level marine.

All that said, something else that could come in would be two station potentials, one that's simply a repair and rearm dock so no ship merchants, the other could be a specific crew station or academy area that generates personnel. Maybe even variants for the differing types, depending on how in depth and complex you guys believe would be fun for us as players.

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spankahontis
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Post by spankahontis » Sun, 21. May 17, 21:16

Nanook wrote:
RodentofDoom wrote:...
realism is not very entertaining
even elite is an arcade styled space sim
And Elite lets you fly superfast over long distances and still have local dogfights. If they can do it, so can the X Universe. :P

But there's a much more elegant, and believable, alternative to the silly highways:

•Fighters and small transports stay local. They can be equipped with boost capability in order to travel the relatively short distance between the zones.

•Fighters and small transports can hitch rides aboard big ships (ferries and carriers) to go long distances, i.e., between sectors and systems.

•Big ships are the only ones with jump drive and gate travel capability, both of which require a massive powerplant and other equipment much too large for the smaller ships to carry.

And there you have it, a more believable universe without 'highways' cluttering up the view. :wink:

Of course, it's way too logical for our Universe. We need silliness in it just for the sake of arguing over it. :P

What about the tinier little XS ships you see circle stations and in traffic?

Personally I'd like to see these tiny little auto mobiles built and sold at Stations like a car showroom.

But wont it be more complicated to get these ships onto a larger ferry transport ship to boost them to areas where they will disembark and continue their journey?

A highway system seems more simpler, maybe shrink them for use of these tiny ships only?
Rest with boosters can boost, increase their boost capacity?
Skeeter wrote:

You could introduce a sorta system say.

1. Has been build and no crew so can't move.
2. Has basic crew like captain, engineer, pilot. Can do much except move slowly and no good in a fight as can't fire barely a shot due to say no crew.
3. Has some crew say crew Max is 400 but has 50. It can still do basic things but is better than without a work crew.
4. Has half crew 200/400 is at 50% efficiency can defend itself from weak attacks can move at half Max speed, etc.
5. Has full crew 400/400. Fully functional, can attack decently now, defend best it can depending on specs can use a jump drive now.

Crew can die tho so more they die the worse the ship gets.

Would make for a interesting game especially capship based gameplay.

Could work for stations too. Production and defence limited not just be stock anymore but how many crew are on and working.

I agree that the system we have now with crew is stale. But I can imagine that hiring 400 crewman could be costly and might overwhelm the pocketbook.

I was thinking, like you used to have Marine Barracks in AP, there could be Merchant Navy Academies.
Just as you can order your manager to buy missiles and drones for your station automatically, you can hire a special crewman that handles expenses of the ship and purchases the crewman for the ship.
You need to hire a Chief Engineer, Chief Gunner and Captain separately, but each of these individuals has slots for those particular crewman to make the 400 crew, like an Engineer has 50 slots for drones on the Skunk?

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Post by Andoulline » Sun, 21. May 17, 22:10

I haven't been keeping up with anything Egosoft related for a couple months, but after I got the itch to play some X games again (haven't decided which one yet) I saw that there was this 10 questions thread with actual dev answers and I must say that I'm so glad that you've not decided to abandon all the advancements made in X:Rebirth.

Sure the game was bashed hard (rightfully in a lot of cases), sure it was a downgrade in some aspects but it improved so many things that I'd have been very disappointed if it'd have gotten thrown out of the window. Yes this wasn't really the same style as previous X games but that doesn't mean that it's all bad.

For instance I really liked the idea to make capital ships behave massively different from small ships. The old "it's just a giant fighter" has so many flaws in it. Sure the way it was implemented in the actual game left something to be desired but the underlying principle was good, it just needed further refinement. Station interiors was also a very good sight to see in my opinion. However improvements could have been made there as well. Such as manual docking, the ability to travel between station segments or even stations within the zone using some sort of fast travel system thereby giving a reason for the traffic to exist would have been a welcome addition. Having the ability to actually talk to NPCs was also good but underdeveloped. Pretty much all the criticized (gameplay related) stuff's problem is not that the basic idea was bad, it's the execution did not go far enough.

TLDR: I'm very happy that we're getting something closer to what X3:TC was to X3:R rather than what X:R was to X3.

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Post by koyuka » Fri, 26. May 17, 23:28

It seems a shame they can't share something like a station builder design tool. As Egosoft is a small team relatively speaking, let their fan base who i'm sure some of whom (not myself) would make excellent station interiors for free of good quality. It would provide more unique interiors rather than the same stuff over and over. Top 10 submissions make it into some part of the game. Free development for company, more unique interiors for us the customers....win win....surely? Some amazing mods were made for previous x games, I think Egosoft should utilize their fan base more than they have done previously. I am aware you have incorporated some fan mods into previous games but again this should be encouraged more in my opinion. Half my time playing skyrim for instance went on designing my own house more than playing the actual game. I would like to hear your opinion on this if possible? Thanks. :D

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mr.WHO
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Post by mr.WHO » Sat, 27. May 17, 12:33

Guys please stick to the topic, if you want to post you personal opinions there are wish and anti-wishlist topics not far away.


Back to the topic of questions I have one more that might be interesting:
- Will X4 more faction diversity than X-Rebirth?

By diversity I mean unique ship models and weapon sets.
in XR I hate that despite all system beign separated for decades they still use exactly the same ships (Albion copy/pasta in HoL) and weapons (everyone except Xenons use exactly same weapons).

Even something so simple like texture change and slight model kitbash would make immersion skyrocket (e.g Albion and HoL starting from same Taranis prototype but then end up with their unique ship variant).

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Ketraar
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Post by Ketraar » Sat, 27. May 17, 15:45

Well Albion and HOL are same faction no? They are both Argon Systems, why would they need different ships?

Not saying that having them would be bad though.

MFG

Ketraar

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mr.WHO
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Post by mr.WHO » Sat, 27. May 17, 17:04

Ketraar wrote:Well Albion and HOL are same faction no? They are both Argon Systems, why would they need different ships?
Imagine that we cut all communication between continents on Earth and wait 70 years. You easily can expect that stuff like cars, computers, TV and so on would become diffrent despite starting from the same base.


To me it's semi-plausible that most of the factions use same weapons - perhaps these are "stick and stones" that are easily buildable in isolated economies. Yet I can't imagine all faction having exactly same ships, expecially that several of them were (in Encyclopedia) were described as Albion-made. How the end up beign build by HoL?
To me the only huge weakness of HoL DLC was lack of HoL ship set, which could be easily made by modification of Albion ships (as I mention the prototypes could end up in both systems shotly before the gate shutdown)

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Post by Snafu_X3 » Sun, 28. May 17, 00:53

Good point Mr W!

Even if the ships' stats were the same (or so similar as not to make an effective difference), there would be subtle design changes (eg something as simple as a colour change for the paint job)

Also, remember that HoL are fighting different enemies. In the Campaign Xenon aren't discovered until fairly late (when they breach thru from Maelstrom), but in HoL they're there pretty much from the outset; this would require different weapon loadout/config to battle those enemies, even if the basic hull design remained the same. This would imply at least some different ship designs even if they're only 'prototypes'

How hard that would be to incorporate into the current & future game design I've no idea.. but it's a possibility worth mentioning
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Never played AP; all X3 advice is based on vanilla+bonus pack TC or before: AP has not changed much WRT general advice.

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Post by Nanook » Tue, 30. May 17, 19:37

Ketraar wrote:Well Albion and HOL are same faction no? They are both Argon Systems, why would they need different ships?...
Umm, no. Albion and Omicron Lyrae are both Argon. HoL is Terran. (Odd, right, since you'd think that HoL would be Argon, and OL might have been taken over by the Terrans. :? ) So Albion and OL should have similar ships. HoL should have totally different ships, not the same as Albion at all. :gruebel:
Have a great idea for the current or a future game? You can post it in the [L3+] Ideas forum.

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Nikola515
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Post by Nikola515 » Tue, 30. May 17, 20:06

I think that infrastructure and development of systems should have been based on its local economy. For example in DV there was not much development because its broken economy. OL in the other hand had working economy with influence of Terran tech. Albion was not as advanced but they still managed to change their technology somewhat compared to old X universe. HoL should have totally different infrastructure as well do to their isolation like everyone else. But I think this is more egos copy & paste issue rather than plot. Remember how at beginning when XR was out OL had same ships as Albion than OL ships wore added around 2.0(I think).... Also DV shipyards wore producing Albion ships as well....

My pint is they probably decided not to wasted time on them and use assets for next game do to XR decline (some will probably disagree :P ).
It's not world hunger because we can't feed poor,it's because there will never be enough to feed the rich .....

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Ketraar
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Post by Ketraar » Tue, 30. May 17, 20:20

@Nanook
I think you are mistaken. OL and HoL are BOTH Argon systems. Terracorp =! Terran, other than it was founded by one.
XR Wiki wrote:Home of Light is the "home system" of the once-influential Terracorp, now alone and separated by the realignment of gates. Its economy is based on Food Rations. Currently it is controlled by the Terracorp, with its economy assisted by Toride Colonists, and harrased by the Atlas Pirates. Before the gates shut down, Argon Prime could be accessed by one of the Jump Gates in Home of Light.
Toride Colonist have Terran origin, but their influence is minimal, me thinks.

MFG

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Post by Snafu_X3 » Thu, 1. Jun 17, 02:38

Ketraar wrote:Toride Colonist have Terran origin, but their influence is minimal, me thinks.
ISTR the XCyclopedia says that Toride colonists are Terran, but needed help to defend their systems from Xenon, therefore called in TerraCorp (Argons) as allies. Since the gate shutdown (unlocked by <player>) effectively cut them off from tech they'd been living in a subsistence economy similar to DV until outside help arrived, dependent upon TerraCorp tech for defence

(cf hotgiraffe.narod.ru/books/1066.html) 1066 And All That: ch. 2 Important Note: Picts vs Scots) - for some reason the URL link won't work :( :)
Last edited by Snafu_X3 on Wed, 7. Jun 17, 02:37, edited 2 times in total.
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Never played AP; all X3 advice is based on vanilla+bonus pack TC or before: AP has not changed much WRT general advice.

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BigBANGtheory
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Post by BigBANGtheory » Mon, 5. Jun 17, 23:57

ezra-r wrote:@BigBANGtheory has made a very important question
One tries 8) Doesn't promise an answer though...

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Post by seePyou » Fri, 16. Jun 17, 17:46

BigBANGtheory wrote:
ezra-r wrote:@BigBANGtheory has made a very important question
One tries 8) Doesn't promise an answer though...
One can still hope for one though!

Can we get any official comment on whether or not we will be able to fly all of the ships in the universe, from the lowest M5 (or lesser if it is made) to the biggest M1/TL (or equivalent)?

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Post by AleksMain » Fri, 16. Jun 17, 19:37

seePyou wrote:...

Can we get any official comment on whether or not we will be able to fly all of the ships in the universe, from the lowest M5 (or lesser if it is made) to the biggest M1/TL (or equivalent)?
I had seen it. Here is one of the comments:
Bernd wrote:Hi guys,
....
While I cannot say much about its features yet, what I can tell you about it so far is that it will allow you to fly many different ships, it will give you an all-new interface to manage large fleets, and it will give you full freedom when building stations from individual modules.

Please be patient with this and we promise to show some really cool things later in 2017!
...
Bernd Lehahn, Egosoft
...

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Post by Santi » Fri, 16. Jun 17, 20:59

seePyou wrote:One can still hope for one though!

Can we get any official comment on whether or not we will be able to fly all of the ships in the universe, from the lowest M5 (or lesser if it is made) to the biggest M1/TL (or equivalent)?
For X4 you will be able to fly ships of the Small and Medium Class, so far there is no specific number to the amount of ships you can fly. It was posted some time ago that the number will be "more than 3". Maybe we can get an update in that statement.
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Post by Xenon_Slayer » Sat, 17. Jun 17, 00:16

Santi wrote:
seePyou wrote:One can still hope for one though!

Can we get any official comment on whether or not we will be able to fly all of the ships in the universe, from the lowest M5 (or lesser if it is made) to the biggest M1/TL (or equivalent)?
For X4 you will be able to fly ships of the Small and Medium Class, so far there is no specific number to the amount of ships you can fly. It was posted some time ago that the number will be "more than 3". Maybe we can get an update in that statement.
whimsical friday statement incoming
More than 4.

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Post by seePyou » Mon, 19. Jun 17, 10:03

I do hope this changes in the future. While it is an improvement on X:Rebirth, it is a much greater downgrade to X3:TC / X3:AP. Many people have weighed in that they do want the freedom offered by X3 to pilot massive ships, and that includes me. Piloting only S and M ships (which number can be 5 or bigger) means no flying in a TS, no flying in a TL, no flying in an M6 or M7 as most people who ever played X3 had been using as their personal ship. Means not seeing up front and personal a large engagement with enemy forces, not being able to help the M1 into battle with all the support M2s, M7s playing fighter screen and M7Ms and M8 destroying caps while your interceptors launched from your M1 handle the enemy fighters... and you being RIGHT IN THERE, in the lead ship, leading!

Just trying to convey how great X3 was and to urge everyone at Egosoft to remember that.

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Post by GCU Grey Area » Mon, 19. Jun 17, 11:34

seePyou wrote:Piloting only S and M ships (which number can be 5 or bigger) means no flying in a TS, no flying in a TL, no flying in an M6 or M7 as most people who ever played X3 had been using as their personal ship.
Why do you assume no TS or M6? Ships equivalent to these classes exist in XR - small freighters with around 10-15k cargo (e.g. Gigurum), Katana & Xenon P. These are all classified as M ships, so they may well be available to fly.

As for bigger ships, not really all that interested in flying them personally - M6 was always my favourite combat class (bigger than that they tended to get too sluggish & didn't find them much fun to fly), so as long as ships equivalent to the old M6 class are flyable I'll be happy.

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Post by seePyou » Mon, 19. Jun 17, 13:00

Well then what is small and medium? If they go up to M6 and cover TS, then we have: M5, M4, M6, TS.

That's four classes of ships, and the official word is that we will be able to fly "more than four" ships. So one of each and a second, maybe a TP? What about a TM? What about a TS+, or M6+?

What about an M7? We are already way past the "more than four" minimum of 5 ships.

Finally, while everyone's opinion needs to be heard and counted, it is not in the interest of the game to simply ignore other people's views on the game. If I'm ok with only flying one ship, then my comment "I'm fine with only flying one ship, never understood what flying more would bring me, bigger ships are boring anyway" does not further the game or the discussion. It is a perfectly valid opinion for me to hold, or for whoever else holds this opinion, but there is also in there an inherent disparagement about the opinions of others that do want to fly more (or in fact all of the) ships in the game.

We should expect more of our favorite games! It's not good to hear that the next Far Cry will have "more than four" weapons. It's not good to hear that the next Grand Theft Auto will let you steal and drive "more than four" vehicles. It's not good to hear that the next Eurotruck Simulator will let you drive "more than four" trucks!

Especially when each game's previous instalment had the capability to use any and all of their respective tools.

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