X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
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Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
The lack of a Field of View/FoV setting
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
I didn't respond to this one initially as I don't dislike any of the listed features. There are some that I don't partake in, but I don't particularly dislike them. However, there are some specific areas that I don't like so much:
- AI Pathing.
This is the most stand-out feature that causes a lot of frustration for me. Having ships blatantly going the wrong way when they're supposed to be approaching a dock, then subsequently getting stuck and clipping through superstructure is really bad. The thing is, sometimes ships surprise me. I.e. they get it wrong, and don't approach the dock as they should, but then proceed to zig and zag through the stations superstructure like a total pro. Of course, they're going the wrong way but they're showing fantastic object avoidance on the way to their incorrect destination. For whatever reason, the game will often send ships to an additional, invalid, waypoint on their way to dock. Their initial approach might seem fine, then they veer off in the wrong direction. It's this extra waypoint - often inside the station superstructure it seems - that throws everything off.
There's a difference much of the time between ships moving from in-sector and those coming from another sector. At my own station, ships coming in through the Gate - M-Class Miners and Traders - path mostly perfectly to the dock. Even when they get it wrong, they appear to manage to mostly fly the long way around the station and dock ok. If given a move order from in-sector however they fluff it up most of the time.
So, the pathing issues are most noticeable when docking. However, combat pathing is a bit poor too. Any ship given an attack order flies to where the target was at the time the order was given. I've seen ships of mine fly backwards and forwards for 20+ minutes in-game as they constantly fly to where the target was. The comical thing is they regularly pass within turret range and said turrets open fire, but the ships continues its course to where the target was - they just happen to be passing each other while in Travel Mode, the target ship just happening to be going the other way, towards its next waypoint.
It's mostly Small and Medium Class ships that struggle with pathing when Docking, Large ships are generally ok. However, after many hours of working perfectly, my Large mining ships started getting stuck approaching the dock on my station. They'd get within a few ship lengths of the dock, then go super slow. Literally, their speed would not registers (0 m/s) but they would still be very slowly moving towards their dock. Running SETA showed their slow speed. Then, when about a ship length away, they'd suddenly resume normal speed, dock and unload. Needless to say, ships not docking can cause station starvation quite quickly.
I sit and watch my ships a LOT in-game. I'll regularly be a passenger on one of my ships or simply watching them in External View while standing on a dock. It does seem that pathing for docking is very CPU intensive, when lots of ships are docking I can take quite a major FPS hit, going from a steady 50-60fps to 30's and below. So, docking is taking a LOT of CPU power, but it's getting it wrong. I can't help but think that if the ship got its initial approach right - i.e. it actually flew to the dock and didn't try to fly into the super structure - there would be less of a CPU hit as the ship wouldn't be spending 20+ minutes (yes, I've had ships stuck longer than that!) constantly fighting it's self as it appears to try to both fly into and avoid the station super structure.
- AI Trade Logic
I really wonder what the "Managers" are thinking. They'll focus on buying DAYS worth of a resource they already have enough of to feed many hours of production time, totally ignoring things the station is totally out of. Most noticeable with mining ships. ALL of mine focus on Ice alone, until the storage is near full, and only then reliably gather Silicon and Ore for example.
To add to this, the UI gives us options to select which specific resource a given ship should mine. This is FANTASTIC and it works, but only for a single run - the game resets the players selections when it undocks next. That needs to be fixed. Managers are rubbish and they need to be fixed, but in the meantime - and it's a good feature to have in general - PLEASE let player selections stick.
- Performance
The only other thing I'm going to mention isn't a feature, but performance in general, as this impacts ALL gameplay...
Now, my CPU is technically below the minimum spec of "Intel i5-4590 3.3GHz", however, I wonder why that particular CPU is considered so much better for X4 than my 2600k and 4.6ghz. Sure, the 4th Gen Intel will have a slightly better IPC than my old 2nd Gen, but I have an extra 1.3ghz which will more than make up for that, plus I have HT which can be beneficial potentially. Are there some specific features of the newer architecture that are in use? I.e. some new command that 4th Gen and newer have built in, but older CPU's have to do "long-hand" so to speak? I do see high CPU-load in-game, and it's certainly the main limiting factor when my FPS drops below my vSync'd 60. Perhaps my CPU spends a lot of time waiting for my slower DDR3 1600 Memory - that'd still report as the CPU being "busy" while it waits of course, though HT allows for additional efficiencies here...potentially. Or perhaps there's some other issue.
As an aside, I experimented with overriding the games set Timer Resolution, as I noticed it was quite high, setting it to the lowest level did appear to yield a slight uplift in performance. I noticed that this value was actually increased to the maximum in an update. So, I guess the Devs had a peek at this too. I wrote a tool years ago to get Crysis 2 (I think it was) running better as the CPU wasn't running quite a full whack, so my (then) SLI setup wasn't being fully fed. The tweak made quite a marked difference.
Anyway, I'm sure this will be the case, but my hope is that Egosoft dedicate a decent amount of time to both fixing the broken pathing issues - which might free up some performance in theory - as well as work directly on performance. It seems a little odd to me that a 2018 game is so very limited by one heavy thread. I literally have no other games I currently play that exhibit the same performance profile when examining CPU load. X Rebirth doesn't show the same profile - I went back and doubled-checked it - but then that was using DirectX, and perhaps Vulkan cannot take advantage of the "Multi-threaded Optimisations" present in nVidia's drivers DX could. Regardless, the X4 Engine doesn't perform as well as Rebirth's engine on my PC, despite, quite often, X Rebirth appearing a lot busier, with MUCH more complex ships due to significantly more turrets etc.
I'll just finish off with a Merry Christmas to everyone reading
Not long until lunch, where I put on the extra pounds I'll spend the next year losing...good to have my New Years Resolution pre-planned
Scoob.
- AI Pathing.
This is the most stand-out feature that causes a lot of frustration for me. Having ships blatantly going the wrong way when they're supposed to be approaching a dock, then subsequently getting stuck and clipping through superstructure is really bad. The thing is, sometimes ships surprise me. I.e. they get it wrong, and don't approach the dock as they should, but then proceed to zig and zag through the stations superstructure like a total pro. Of course, they're going the wrong way but they're showing fantastic object avoidance on the way to their incorrect destination. For whatever reason, the game will often send ships to an additional, invalid, waypoint on their way to dock. Their initial approach might seem fine, then they veer off in the wrong direction. It's this extra waypoint - often inside the station superstructure it seems - that throws everything off.
There's a difference much of the time between ships moving from in-sector and those coming from another sector. At my own station, ships coming in through the Gate - M-Class Miners and Traders - path mostly perfectly to the dock. Even when they get it wrong, they appear to manage to mostly fly the long way around the station and dock ok. If given a move order from in-sector however they fluff it up most of the time.
So, the pathing issues are most noticeable when docking. However, combat pathing is a bit poor too. Any ship given an attack order flies to where the target was at the time the order was given. I've seen ships of mine fly backwards and forwards for 20+ minutes in-game as they constantly fly to where the target was. The comical thing is they regularly pass within turret range and said turrets open fire, but the ships continues its course to where the target was - they just happen to be passing each other while in Travel Mode, the target ship just happening to be going the other way, towards its next waypoint.
It's mostly Small and Medium Class ships that struggle with pathing when Docking, Large ships are generally ok. However, after many hours of working perfectly, my Large mining ships started getting stuck approaching the dock on my station. They'd get within a few ship lengths of the dock, then go super slow. Literally, their speed would not registers (0 m/s) but they would still be very slowly moving towards their dock. Running SETA showed their slow speed. Then, when about a ship length away, they'd suddenly resume normal speed, dock and unload. Needless to say, ships not docking can cause station starvation quite quickly.
I sit and watch my ships a LOT in-game. I'll regularly be a passenger on one of my ships or simply watching them in External View while standing on a dock. It does seem that pathing for docking is very CPU intensive, when lots of ships are docking I can take quite a major FPS hit, going from a steady 50-60fps to 30's and below. So, docking is taking a LOT of CPU power, but it's getting it wrong. I can't help but think that if the ship got its initial approach right - i.e. it actually flew to the dock and didn't try to fly into the super structure - there would be less of a CPU hit as the ship wouldn't be spending 20+ minutes (yes, I've had ships stuck longer than that!) constantly fighting it's self as it appears to try to both fly into and avoid the station super structure.
- AI Trade Logic
I really wonder what the "Managers" are thinking. They'll focus on buying DAYS worth of a resource they already have enough of to feed many hours of production time, totally ignoring things the station is totally out of. Most noticeable with mining ships. ALL of mine focus on Ice alone, until the storage is near full, and only then reliably gather Silicon and Ore for example.
To add to this, the UI gives us options to select which specific resource a given ship should mine. This is FANTASTIC and it works, but only for a single run - the game resets the players selections when it undocks next. That needs to be fixed. Managers are rubbish and they need to be fixed, but in the meantime - and it's a good feature to have in general - PLEASE let player selections stick.
- Performance
The only other thing I'm going to mention isn't a feature, but performance in general, as this impacts ALL gameplay...
Now, my CPU is technically below the minimum spec of "Intel i5-4590 3.3GHz", however, I wonder why that particular CPU is considered so much better for X4 than my 2600k and 4.6ghz. Sure, the 4th Gen Intel will have a slightly better IPC than my old 2nd Gen, but I have an extra 1.3ghz which will more than make up for that, plus I have HT which can be beneficial potentially. Are there some specific features of the newer architecture that are in use? I.e. some new command that 4th Gen and newer have built in, but older CPU's have to do "long-hand" so to speak? I do see high CPU-load in-game, and it's certainly the main limiting factor when my FPS drops below my vSync'd 60. Perhaps my CPU spends a lot of time waiting for my slower DDR3 1600 Memory - that'd still report as the CPU being "busy" while it waits of course, though HT allows for additional efficiencies here...potentially. Or perhaps there's some other issue.
As an aside, I experimented with overriding the games set Timer Resolution, as I noticed it was quite high, setting it to the lowest level did appear to yield a slight uplift in performance. I noticed that this value was actually increased to the maximum in an update. So, I guess the Devs had a peek at this too. I wrote a tool years ago to get Crysis 2 (I think it was) running better as the CPU wasn't running quite a full whack, so my (then) SLI setup wasn't being fully fed. The tweak made quite a marked difference.
Anyway, I'm sure this will be the case, but my hope is that Egosoft dedicate a decent amount of time to both fixing the broken pathing issues - which might free up some performance in theory - as well as work directly on performance. It seems a little odd to me that a 2018 game is so very limited by one heavy thread. I literally have no other games I currently play that exhibit the same performance profile when examining CPU load. X Rebirth doesn't show the same profile - I went back and doubled-checked it - but then that was using DirectX, and perhaps Vulkan cannot take advantage of the "Multi-threaded Optimisations" present in nVidia's drivers DX could. Regardless, the X4 Engine doesn't perform as well as Rebirth's engine on my PC, despite, quite often, X Rebirth appearing a lot busier, with MUCH more complex ships due to significantly more turrets etc.
I'll just finish off with a Merry Christmas to everyone reading
Not long until lunch, where I put on the extra pounds I'll spend the next year losing...good to have my New Years Resolution pre-planned Scoob.
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
I would like large scale fleet/faction wars really much, it is just not really happening.
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Brand Emanuel
- Posts: 6
- Joined: Fri, 19. Feb 10, 16:59
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
At this point, I have got 10 hours of gameplay in. And all in all, you made a pretty nice game and the feeling of the old X-Trilogy comes back, alltogether with what actually was good in Rebirth. So I am gonna dive in deeper into the game!
My issues, that I had so far:
Performance: Especially with OBS: Unfortunatelly it seems, that Vulcan Engine is not really compatible with OBS, which causes the game capture not to be accepted, unless I play in windowed mode and with screen capture. I am aware though, that this might be an issue on OBS' side though, but I thought I mention it, since this was the biggest issue, before I could even start up and show the game properlay and in a way it should be presented best.
The problem was basically, that the FPS was under 10 for the most part of the game for the viewers, which is not exactly enjoyable for them. (If there are any fixes or tips, how to improve that would be appreciated)
Ship Loadouts: Relatively early, I managed to capture an S-Class ship in the Teladi Sectors. The Valkyrie load out was for my needs just perfect, with Paranide propulsion systems and all. Unfortunately this ship had the roll bug, which is why I wanted to transfer the loadout to another Valkyrie. Unfortunately, this is not possible. I would wish this wuold be made possible. To sell the ship itself, but being able to transfer upgrades between ships.
Personell Management:
This leads me back to the captured Vessel from before:
I have tried to transfer my personell forth and back inside my ship. I found out, that I can't put a pilot from one to another ship in space. (fair enough, Maybe the teleporter would gain me that ability)
But what I noticed, while I was fiddleing around in the menus: There was practically no possibility to hail the crewmember from menu, which would make things so much easier and convieniant.
Also, in my eyes it makes no sense, that I need to be docked, to tranfer my crew from one position in ship, to another.
So, just my two cents, from what I could gather so far from my experience. I hope it helps, to improve this otherwhise really enjoyable game!
My issues, that I had so far:
Performance: Especially with OBS: Unfortunatelly it seems, that Vulcan Engine is not really compatible with OBS, which causes the game capture not to be accepted, unless I play in windowed mode and with screen capture. I am aware though, that this might be an issue on OBS' side though, but I thought I mention it, since this was the biggest issue, before I could even start up and show the game properlay and in a way it should be presented best.
The problem was basically, that the FPS was under 10 for the most part of the game for the viewers, which is not exactly enjoyable for them. (If there are any fixes or tips, how to improve that would be appreciated)
Ship Loadouts: Relatively early, I managed to capture an S-Class ship in the Teladi Sectors. The Valkyrie load out was for my needs just perfect, with Paranide propulsion systems and all. Unfortunately this ship had the roll bug, which is why I wanted to transfer the loadout to another Valkyrie. Unfortunately, this is not possible. I would wish this wuold be made possible. To sell the ship itself, but being able to transfer upgrades between ships.
Personell Management:
This leads me back to the captured Vessel from before:
I have tried to transfer my personell forth and back inside my ship. I found out, that I can't put a pilot from one to another ship in space. (fair enough, Maybe the teleporter would gain me that ability)
But what I noticed, while I was fiddleing around in the menus: There was practically no possibility to hail the crewmember from menu, which would make things so much easier and convieniant.
Also, in my eyes it makes no sense, that I need to be docked, to tranfer my crew from one position in ship, to another.
So, just my two cents, from what I could gather so far from my experience. I hope it helps, to improve this otherwhise really enjoyable game!
Last edited by Brand Emanuel on Tue, 25. Dec 18, 18:01, edited 1 time in total.
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
Regarding the AI's problems navigating to a Dock, I just did a little test. I built a station that was just a Dock. I plan to expand on this eventually, so I placed the Dock in the South-West corner of the plot. Interestingly, ships still totally miss the dock initially, choosing, it appears, to fly to the centre of the plot.
In my game currently, there's nothing in the centre of the Plot, so there's nothing for them to run into, however, the ships still get very confused. One of mine, as I was watching it attempt to dock, had flown to the centre of the plot and seemed unable to turn around. It then proceeded to strafe sideways and slightly backwards, towards the dock.
It does look like it's this "fly to centre of plot" logic that is mostly responsible for our docking woes. I doubt behaviour at this level is able to be modded at all.
Scoob.
In my game currently, there's nothing in the centre of the Plot, so there's nothing for them to run into, however, the ships still get very confused. One of mine, as I was watching it attempt to dock, had flown to the centre of the plot and seemed unable to turn around. It then proceeded to strafe sideways and slightly backwards, towards the dock.
It does look like it's this "fly to centre of plot" logic that is mostly responsible for our docking woes. I doubt behaviour at this level is able to be modded at all.
Scoob.
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Sam L.R. Griffiths
- Posts: 10522
- Joined: Fri, 12. Mar 04, 19:47
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
From the list... nothing.
My primary complaint is the level of software quality which is below par for Egosoft... very disappointed.
[EDIT]Just to clarify, the primary issue is the software bugs regarding stability, performance, and usability. For example: Menus not always showing when they should even on recommended hardware or above.[/EDIT]
My primary complaint is the level of software quality which is below par for Egosoft... very disappointed.
[EDIT]Just to clarify, the primary issue is the software bugs regarding stability, performance, and usability. For example: Menus not always showing when they should even on recommended hardware or above.[/EDIT]
Lenna (aka [SRK] The_Rabbit)
"Understanding is a three edged sword... your side, their side... and the Truth!" - J.J. Sheriden, Babylon 5 S4E6 T28:55
"May god stand between you and harm in all the dark places you must walk." - Ancient Egyption Proverb
"When eating an elephant take one bite at a time" - Creighton Abrams
"Understanding is a three edged sword... your side, their side... and the Truth!" - J.J. Sheriden, Babylon 5 S4E6 T28:55
"May god stand between you and harm in all the dark places you must walk." - Ancient Egyption Proverb
"When eating an elephant take one bite at a time" - Creighton Abrams
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
I have opted for none, since i still do not own the game.
Major reasons for myself... it has still too much bugs by the looks of it, again this is from what i have read in the past few weeks. Wished that the first task should/could be to iron out bugs first than adding plots/refine ingame balance.
It looks better/sounds better than when it started a few weeks ago but in the grand esqueme its still not worthy for me... for now, sorry.
Personaly i don´t care about nice graphics its nice to have them tough... its the current game mechanics that gives me some thoughts.
Fame
Major reasons for myself... it has still too much bugs by the looks of it, again this is from what i have read in the past few weeks. Wished that the first task should/could be to iron out bugs first than adding plots/refine ingame balance.
It looks better/sounds better than when it started a few weeks ago but in the grand esqueme its still not worthy for me... for now, sorry.
Personaly i don´t care about nice graphics its nice to have them tough... its the current game mechanics that gives me some thoughts.
Fame
Its a problem if you don´t have any problems.
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
Before I get onto the negatives can I just say thank you for listening to the players and for the X universe. X4 is good but has some frustrations!
I don't like the remote trading, I spend most of my time in the map trying to find the pilot that has completed their order (no log goes with this) I can't direct pilots to repeat orders (such as mining) when they video call me and the lack of training/difficulty in increasing pilot skills is just making this frustrating.
The missions - tried the Teladi drop off a cerebus vanguard with a blast mod...!!!??? they don't accept delivery no idea why no further info. Other missions aren't clear what you need to do so I haven't tried so far.
Ships - why can't we swap shields, weapons, deployables etc. between ships?
Can we find a way to store Inventory items, can't sell illegal items and I keep getting scanned, frustrating keep flying away from police especially if doing repair missions!
Venture - Can't see results of missions unclear if I am actually gaining anything unless I look at Inventory (not that I can remember everything!)
Space walking - just soooo frustrating not a good experience at all, X3 did it better, thankfully I can teleport back now which reduces the frustration.
thanks
I don't like the remote trading, I spend most of my time in the map trying to find the pilot that has completed their order (no log goes with this) I can't direct pilots to repeat orders (such as mining) when they video call me and the lack of training/difficulty in increasing pilot skills is just making this frustrating.
The missions - tried the Teladi drop off a cerebus vanguard with a blast mod...!!!??? they don't accept delivery no idea why no further info. Other missions aren't clear what you need to do so I haven't tried so far.
Ships - why can't we swap shields, weapons, deployables etc. between ships?
Can we find a way to store Inventory items, can't sell illegal items and I keep getting scanned, frustrating keep flying away from police especially if doing repair missions!
Venture - Can't see results of missions unclear if I am actually gaining anything unless I look at Inventory (not that I can remember everything!)
Space walking - just soooo frustrating not a good experience at all, X3 did it better, thankfully I can teleport back now which reduces the frustration.
thanks
Windows 7 64 bit, service pack 1; Intel i5-4670 3.4 GHz; Nvidia GTX 770 4 gb; 16 GB ram
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FutileSine
- Posts: 28
- Joined: Sun, 1. Dec 13, 22:45
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
Yeah... having a hard time with this poll, several of these 'features' that I don't like are due to the fact that they're broken or only partially implemented and it shows. It's a little infuriating actually. I'm used to buggy games that need some patches to restore functionality, not patches to attempt to quickly implement incomplete work, and that's really the option I wished this had. "General state of incompleteness". I love remote trading, I don't like how it's currently a nightmare due to a skill system that (mostly) doesn't work, and the sudden removal of right click context options 'because they weren't supposed to be there' - which makes no sense because there's no good replacement for "Import Wares" or "Export Wares" the options made sense, but they provided a workaround to the skill system, so as opposed to fixing the skill implementation to properly gate the context menu, you simply removed it.
It's stuff like that that hurts this game.
There's a research tree that is an interesting idea, and references needed resources, etc. but due to release day just takes 10 minutes / round and requires no base planning.
There's a great boarding system for large ships, but it's a crap shoot trying to send multiple marines over.
There's a fun combat layer, but the enemy AI is so inept and broken, and the weapon damages so unbalanced and untested, that it makes combat frustrating or just pointless.
There's an encyclopedia for lore (as always) which contains a large number of empty entries.
I haven't put up a negative review, but I'm not recommending it to my fellow space sim friends because the game is just 20% baked. Saying "we have so much more planned" is not a great answer when the things that are preventing me from enjoying the game are broken features, not "bugs".
Right now I have to say almost every feature in the poll is a 'NOT like' - not because of the feature itself, but because of the number of them that don't work as intended, or are only borderline functional. A real disappointment for what I know will be a good game in 2 years... which isn't acceptable for a released title (not early access).
My eventual steam review will be 'pick up at a sale in 2021' similar to when I finally told my friends without a sense of embarrassment about X: Rebirth.
It's stuff like that that hurts this game.
There's a research tree that is an interesting idea, and references needed resources, etc. but due to release day just takes 10 minutes / round and requires no base planning.
There's a great boarding system for large ships, but it's a crap shoot trying to send multiple marines over.
There's a fun combat layer, but the enemy AI is so inept and broken, and the weapon damages so unbalanced and untested, that it makes combat frustrating or just pointless.
There's an encyclopedia for lore (as always) which contains a large number of empty entries.
I haven't put up a negative review, but I'm not recommending it to my fellow space sim friends because the game is just 20% baked. Saying "we have so much more planned" is not a great answer when the things that are preventing me from enjoying the game are broken features, not "bugs".
Right now I have to say almost every feature in the poll is a 'NOT like' - not because of the feature itself, but because of the number of them that don't work as intended, or are only borderline functional. A real disappointment for what I know will be a good game in 2 years... which isn't acceptable for a released title (not early access).
My eventual steam review will be 'pick up at a sale in 2021' similar to when I finally told my friends without a sense of embarrassment about X: Rebirth.
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Reimu Hakurei
- Posts: 1030
- Joined: Fri, 28. Aug 09, 05:29
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
I don't like the walking around stations. I don't even want to walk around my ship. IMO it adds nothing to the game.
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RefocusedLight
- Posts: 188
- Joined: Fri, 23. Dec 11, 20:40
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
Most of the features i actually dislike are not listed.
AI: useless, does something but its the wrong thing (approx at the level of the flasher episode on X-factor). Friendly AI - worse than useless (that feeling when you're an orderly and now have to reverse the consequences of a sunshine bus door accidentally left open 3 hours ago).
Awful lot of generic, flavourless everything - generic ship balancing, generic weapon balancing, generic factions, generic conflict, the whole Elite school of strictly procedural for its own sake genericness except this time encompassing ships too
War on lore - data vault mechanic (and the whole spiral outwards thing) + the spontaneous encyclopedia abortion + faction progression that makes OTAS rank grind and related notifications in x3tc seem atmospheric and awesome + no plot as a pride/selling point. No, Fortnite isn't something to look up to.
Right click context menu getting worse and more useless with updates
Mission surrealism - bring me 8 destroyers for 200K, train 3 marines for 150K, fetch me 2000 anvils 470K. Dali approves, but i otoh have to ignore entire mission types.
No decent personnel hiring, training or management, 5 mins in menus to reassign 1 person. (kind of makes me feel i'm trying to run a network of child pickpockets across 5 supermarkets each in a different area of a large city)
And most of all - THE MMO DESIGN HINTS <<<< HATE!!!!!111!!
AI: useless, does something but its the wrong thing (approx at the level of the flasher episode on X-factor). Friendly AI - worse than useless (that feeling when you're an orderly and now have to reverse the consequences of a sunshine bus door accidentally left open 3 hours ago).
Awful lot of generic, flavourless everything - generic ship balancing, generic weapon balancing, generic factions, generic conflict, the whole Elite school of strictly procedural for its own sake genericness except this time encompassing ships too
War on lore - data vault mechanic (and the whole spiral outwards thing) + the spontaneous encyclopedia abortion + faction progression that makes OTAS rank grind and related notifications in x3tc seem atmospheric and awesome + no plot as a pride/selling point. No, Fortnite isn't something to look up to.
Right click context menu getting worse and more useless with updates
Mission surrealism - bring me 8 destroyers for 200K, train 3 marines for 150K, fetch me 2000 anvils 470K. Dali approves, but i otoh have to ignore entire mission types.
No decent personnel hiring, training or management, 5 mins in menus to reassign 1 person. (kind of makes me feel i'm trying to run a network of child pickpockets across 5 supermarkets each in a different area of a large city)
And most of all - THE MMO DESIGN HINTS <<<< HATE!!!!!111!!
Last edited by RefocusedLight on Thu, 27. Dec 18, 17:49, edited 3 times in total.
Can't create imaginary friends, only enemies
/Dresden Codak/
/Dresden Codak/
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
ok, I'm really enjoying the game, however....
Not interested in Venture (yet) but I do want my squads and wings to work, along with my bots doing what they are told to do. Spending 45 minutes to sort out simple dock and wait + protect ship instructions is plain wrong. Can we either sort out the software or / and sort the UI.
I have to say the UI is almost at university degree level of learning at times and trust me, I am not intellectually challenged in any way. (member of Mensa, just IQ stuff but I am gifted at making connections....) It is spoiling the gameplay to the extent that farming crystals makes more and is easier to do as a solo effort than sorting out the bots. Time sink.....
Not interested in Venture (yet) but I do want my squads and wings to work, along with my bots doing what they are told to do. Spending 45 minutes to sort out simple dock and wait + protect ship instructions is plain wrong. Can we either sort out the software or / and sort the UI.
I have to say the UI is almost at university degree level of learning at times and trust me, I am not intellectually challenged in any way. (member of Mensa, just IQ stuff but I am gifted at making connections....) It is spoiling the gameplay to the extent that farming crystals makes more and is easier to do as a solo effort than sorting out the bots. Time sink.....
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Socratatus
- Posts: 1502
- Joined: Tue, 11. May 04, 15:34
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
I didn`t dislike any of those options. So I didn`t vote.
It`s the question you don`t ask that makes me wonder, such as, "Do you like Ventures?"
But maybe you don`t want to know because you don`t intend to stop it.
It`s the question you don`t ask that makes me wonder, such as, "Do you like Ventures?"
But maybe you don`t want to know because you don`t intend to stop it.
"If you`re looking for that one person who can change your life, take a look in the mirror."
"No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking."
"Don`t raise your voice. improve your argument."
"Some men are morally opposed to violence. They are protected by men who are not."
"No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking."
"Don`t raise your voice. improve your argument."
"Some men are morally opposed to violence. They are protected by men who are not."
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
Biggest problem for me is the fleet mechanics around orders and formations. Formations should be really tight, only breaking for combat, obstacles, docking and travelling through highways and gates, but they're all over the place. I have a squadron of five fighters following a lead corvette and they don't seem to stay in formation for more than 10 seconds. Most of the time the fighters are lagging way behind, sometimes just stopped still, travelling slowly or worse still they've taken it upon themselves to defend a position for no apparent reason and I have to constantly hit the 'recall subordinates' option for the leader, which invariably takes another half an hour for them to reassemble. They also get dragged in to attacking enemies long after the lead has moved on so I have to micromanage the implied orders of each ship, cancelling the attack order for each ship until they clear the area and rejoin the lead. I know you can set their response so they do not respond in kind when attacked, but in most cases you want this to be the case and its only when you have ordered the lead to move on somewhere else that you would expect the followers to do the same.
I also have a fighter escort for all my autotraders and autominers where I would expect the fighter to stay close to the lead ship at all times but all they seem to do is travel ahead to the target destination, leaving the transporter vulnerable. I've lost two big ships due to this mechanic.
Generally I think the order queue is great, it allows for fine control of what your ships do and when but some of it seems really broken - the implied orders added to the queue (e.g. defend position) for no apparent reason, the lack of formation discipline and odd interpretation of escort duty.
I also have a fighter escort for all my autotraders and autominers where I would expect the fighter to stay close to the lead ship at all times but all they seem to do is travel ahead to the target destination, leaving the transporter vulnerable. I've lost two big ships due to this mechanic.
Generally I think the order queue is great, it allows for fine control of what your ships do and when but some of it seems really broken - the implied orders added to the queue (e.g. defend position) for no apparent reason, the lack of formation discipline and odd interpretation of escort duty.
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
Missile fire probability, apparently it's 100% for all AI controlled craft. I let an AI pilot take over control of my ship during a combat situation and watched while he unloaded every missile in the ships inventory in the space of a couple of minutes, only one of which hit anything. I have a frigate which I tooled up with 108 missiles and left to it's own devices, imagine my horror when he hailed me about an hour later to tell me he was out of projectiles and asking what he should do. 'Fire less missiles' was my desired response but was not available as an option. Where is the missile fire probability setting that was present in X3?
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
the thing I dislike the most isn't in the pool:
I am struggling with the absence of the feeling of progression, it's both too easy to make credits and too shallow the progress curve that when you get your first M ship you don't feel the achievement like you did in X3 or X2
as an example the argon ships have all very similar price range, there isn't the progression like when you go from an m4 to an m3 that is five times more costly than an m4, but also way more durable and powerful
and even less when you go from a fighter to a Corvette (bombers and frigates too in X4) or from a Corvette to a powerful destroyer
as you can see below there isn't enough gap from different ship classes (both between the same size as a heavy fighter is less than twice expensive than the interceptor; and between different classes, as the M ship are barely three times more expensive than the S fighters)
the only almost balanced difference is between the M and L ships (that are 5-10 time more expensive than M ships) but they are still too cheap:
preset: -------- min | mid | high --- (i used for every preset the same weapon laserMK1 because weapons choice depends more on the role of the ship than the class itself)
elite ----------- 320k | 670k | 1060k
nova ----------- 430k | 930k | 1390k
eclipse -------- 530k | 1250k | 1550k
minotaur ---- 1500k | 2070k | 4000k
cerberus ----- 1850k | 2630k | 6230k
behemoth -- 12000k | 14600k | 21100k
another problem that is being discussed already is the capital ship problem, they have too few turrets and are kind of imbalanced, as example the Odysseus has almost twice the turret of the behemoth (4L, 12M vs 2L 8M), while the Odysseus feel ok (not considering that turret doesn't work properly but that's a different problem) the behemoth feel "empty", it's weird to see a big ship with so few turret, it could benefit a lot (both visually and balance wise) from having more M turret.
the same problem of the behemoth affect even more severely XL carriers, they feel weird, they should have twice or more turrets (maybe only M turrets and just one or two L turrets, to be able to defend themselves from fighters and M ships)
I think that it should be added XL battleship with a lot more turret and another L ship (cruiser or whatever) in between the current L ship and the hypothetical XL battleship
and that's what bothers me the most
that being said I think that X4 is going to be a great game and a wonderful "foundation" to build upon, and I think EGO did a great job with it, can't wait to see how it will evolve!
I am struggling with the absence of the feeling of progression, it's both too easy to make credits and too shallow the progress curve that when you get your first M ship you don't feel the achievement like you did in X3 or X2
as an example the argon ships have all very similar price range, there isn't the progression like when you go from an m4 to an m3 that is five times more costly than an m4, but also way more durable and powerful
and even less when you go from a fighter to a Corvette (bombers and frigates too in X4) or from a Corvette to a powerful destroyer
as you can see below there isn't enough gap from different ship classes (both between the same size as a heavy fighter is less than twice expensive than the interceptor; and between different classes, as the M ship are barely three times more expensive than the S fighters)
the only almost balanced difference is between the M and L ships (that are 5-10 time more expensive than M ships) but they are still too cheap:
preset: -------- min | mid | high --- (i used for every preset the same weapon laserMK1 because weapons choice depends more on the role of the ship than the class itself)
elite ----------- 320k | 670k | 1060k
nova ----------- 430k | 930k | 1390k
eclipse -------- 530k | 1250k | 1550k
minotaur ---- 1500k | 2070k | 4000k
cerberus ----- 1850k | 2630k | 6230k
behemoth -- 12000k | 14600k | 21100k
another problem that is being discussed already is the capital ship problem, they have too few turrets and are kind of imbalanced, as example the Odysseus has almost twice the turret of the behemoth (4L, 12M vs 2L 8M), while the Odysseus feel ok (not considering that turret doesn't work properly but that's a different problem) the behemoth feel "empty", it's weird to see a big ship with so few turret, it could benefit a lot (both visually and balance wise) from having more M turret.
the same problem of the behemoth affect even more severely XL carriers, they feel weird, they should have twice or more turrets (maybe only M turrets and just one or two L turrets, to be able to defend themselves from fighters and M ships)
I think that it should be added XL battleship with a lot more turret and another L ship (cruiser or whatever) in between the current L ship and the hypothetical XL battleship
and that's what bothers me the most
that being said I think that X4 is going to be a great game and a wonderful "foundation" to build upon, and I think EGO did a great job with it, can't wait to see how it will evolve!
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
There is nothing in that list that I can select as to what I did NOT like. However, there is this:
- Bugs
X4 Foundations is an awesome game but the bugs are just everywhere. I have not played for two days now because it takes all the fun out. Are the developers also doing the QA? That is not a good idea. You need another pair of eyes and a different mind set to test such complicated software. Also consider using unit tests that can run on their own for a few hours and simulate input, and test the results against what is expected.
The patches are coming thick and fast but I find most of the bugs listed as fixed still remain after the patches. There are most likely more than one different cause that trigger each bug so maybe all it will take is some time to find them all. Each build seem to introduce more and more instability, however.
As of build 1.50 these issues are affecting me:
- Bugs
X4 Foundations is an awesome game but the bugs are just everywhere. I have not played for two days now because it takes all the fun out. Are the developers also doing the QA? That is not a good idea. You need another pair of eyes and a different mind set to test such complicated software. Also consider using unit tests that can run on their own for a few hours and simulate input, and test the results against what is expected.
The patches are coming thick and fast but I find most of the bugs listed as fixed still remain after the patches. There are most likely more than one different cause that trigger each bug so maybe all it will take is some time to find them all. Each build seem to introduce more and more instability, however.
As of build 1.50 these issues are affecting me:
- Build 1.50 removed the right click option for auto trade. That is fine because it can still be set via behavior, except that it seems not only was the right click menu option removed, the whole auto trade logic got messed up. For my game setting behavior to auto trade made my traders grind to a halt where they were working before 1.50. Now they just sit in one spot, rotating in different directions but never moving.
- AI assigned to escort/defend ships follow the assigned ship almost half a sector behind. I thought this may be because they have slower engines so I assigned a slower engine to the main ship, with the same effect.
- I can no longer repair the pressure leaks on data vaults. My repair laser has no effect. I even tried shooting with the normal laser to damage them first and then repair, but neither laser has any effect on the leaks panels.
- The venture results panel stop responding.
- The encyclopedia is showing unread count even when I triggered each item, tried many times.
- After returning to normal view from external view there seems to be memory corruption. Slowly other ships show they names as my ship that I viewed in external view, eventually filling the screen with the same name all over and then crash.
- When mining crystals and using the magnet 'O' key half the time I see them getting closer if I target one fragment... 400m...300m...200m...100m...55km?!! Other times it work just fine.
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
Seems like it has a very limited range, like 30 or so meters. It may look like it's hitting stuff but it doesn't actually do anything.
X:BtF: 7/10 | X2: 8/10 | X3:R/TC/AP: 8/10 | X:R: 3/10 | X4: 0/10 (3 points for split ships and stations, 4.0 -> -50 points).
If you are raising pirate activity, give me meaningful ways to deal with them PERMANENTLY. Better things to do than replacing ships every 10 minutes, or babysitting ships getting harassed.
Stopped playing X4 with 4.0 due to outrageous, needless and pointless nerfs to everything. Don't change what wasn't broken in the first place.
If you are raising pirate activity, give me meaningful ways to deal with them PERMANENTLY. Better things to do than replacing ships every 10 minutes, or babysitting ships getting harassed.
Stopped playing X4 with 4.0 due to outrageous, needless and pointless nerfs to everything. Don't change what wasn't broken in the first place.
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
That's not it, the data vaults do seem to go passive. But seemingly only when they were activated once.
Workaround for it: shoot the pressure leak panels with the ship's lasers and then repair them - they will work then.
Re: X4 Foundations Poll #3: What did you NOT like?
I think that basically I don't like following things:
1) Boarding - only because completely idiotic GUi that require me to transfer 50 marines from captured ship ONE BY FRICKIN' ONE!!!!!!! That is huge downgrade even from X-Rebirth. You need to make mass crew/marine transfer GUI. We also need dedicated shuttle/TP class to ferry larger amount of presonel. Even maybe some dedicated dropship/capture ship.
2) Missions - no progression (e.g. better, bigger, garder missions as you progress the reputation and fight rank), missions lack of variety within type (same amount of spawned mines, lasertowers), as well as lack of various types (e.g. no assasinate pirate).
3) Wars - Argon vs. Xenon - mission chains suffer from same issues as point 2 - not only lack variety, but are for most part very strange pack of mission within chain - when I join war I want combat missions, not hunting for 3 star engineers. As for mission variety, why we only have "hunt x2 Xenon P"? why no more similar like "hunt 10x Xenon fighters", "hunt 5x Miners", "hunt destroyer" - you can easily make dozen different variants of the same "hunt mission". Why no "attack Xenon defence platform"? You cound have tons of COMBAT missions, but now we only have "hunt 2x P".
4) Large scale fights - this is mainly because M and L size weapons are very underpowered. Also L size weapons lack variety - why there is no railgun battery? No Torpedo launcher? Why there is no "huge blob" weapon from X-Rebirth (HIVI/MA turret)?
Also some minor things:
- lack of anti-missile flares - just 1 flare per fighter? 10 per Carrier? This is useless.
- most of ships have copy/paste stats - e.g. Dozen Argon freighters which are nearly identical.
- Carriers are useless - they should repair and rearm missiles of docked fighters to be useful.
- no way to rearm/resupply missiles mid-flight - I have to recall my ship to docks to resupply my missiles.
- Xenons lack variety - why there is no new/old Xenon ships? Where is Q, J, LX? Where is Xenon bomber?
- Khaak doesn't have any point other that artifically spawn within your vicinity - either scrap them or make them "real" with economy and more ships like Xenons.
1) Boarding - only because completely idiotic GUi that require me to transfer 50 marines from captured ship ONE BY FRICKIN' ONE!!!!!!! That is huge downgrade even from X-Rebirth. You need to make mass crew/marine transfer GUI. We also need dedicated shuttle/TP class to ferry larger amount of presonel. Even maybe some dedicated dropship/capture ship.
2) Missions - no progression (e.g. better, bigger, garder missions as you progress the reputation and fight rank), missions lack of variety within type (same amount of spawned mines, lasertowers), as well as lack of various types (e.g. no assasinate pirate).
3) Wars - Argon vs. Xenon - mission chains suffer from same issues as point 2 - not only lack variety, but are for most part very strange pack of mission within chain - when I join war I want combat missions, not hunting for 3 star engineers. As for mission variety, why we only have "hunt x2 Xenon P"? why no more similar like "hunt 10x Xenon fighters", "hunt 5x Miners", "hunt destroyer" - you can easily make dozen different variants of the same "hunt mission". Why no "attack Xenon defence platform"? You cound have tons of COMBAT missions, but now we only have "hunt 2x P".
4) Large scale fights - this is mainly because M and L size weapons are very underpowered. Also L size weapons lack variety - why there is no railgun battery? No Torpedo launcher? Why there is no "huge blob" weapon from X-Rebirth (HIVI/MA turret)?
Also some minor things:
- lack of anti-missile flares - just 1 flare per fighter? 10 per Carrier? This is useless.
- most of ships have copy/paste stats - e.g. Dozen Argon freighters which are nearly identical.
- Carriers are useless - they should repair and rearm missiles of docked fighters to be useful.
- no way to rearm/resupply missiles mid-flight - I have to recall my ship to docks to resupply my missiles.
- Xenons lack variety - why there is no new/old Xenon ships? Where is Q, J, LX? Where is Xenon bomber?
- Khaak doesn't have any point other that artifically spawn within your vicinity - either scrap them or make them "real" with economy and more ships like Xenons.