Killjaeden wrote:They have not provided a good answer for example why they did remove SETA in XR initially for example. The explanation they gave us back then in development was extremely simple to challenge.
Unfortunately the reality is that no answer is going to be considered a "good answer" if the reader doesn't happen agree with the decision. Pretty much every design decision comes with a whole range of value judgements; we have to weigh the inputs up against one another, assigning priorities and balancing gameplay upsides against downsides, development costs against benefits, and the opinions of one group of players against those of another. Every such decision can be "challenged" by giving different weights to the various inputs, or indeed simply dismissed as lies or incompetence, as also tends to happen depressingly often even on a relatively civilised forum such as this one. This is one reason why developers tend not to spend much time trying to explain design decisions in public.
However, in this case I will give it a go, and we'll see whether the explanation is considered "good" or just dismissed!
In a game like this, the universe needs to feel "big" otherwise it doesn't feel much like a space game. However, while sitting looking at the universe pass by can be really enjoyable for a while, most players don't actually want to do this indefinitely; they want to get to the action reasonably quickly. Now of course these two fundamental goals are actually contradictory, and they are not the only contradiction. Players want the game to be tactical, with variation in the universe, importance placed on where resources are gathered, and where stations are built and where fleets are stationed, yet they don't want to spend precious gaming time travelling between different parts of their empire. They want there to be dangers, yet they also don't like it being too hard to get to their trading ships quickly to protect them. The list goes on.
Both SETA and jumpdrives are solutions to some of these problems, but both of them are "blunt instruments". We didn't initially implement them in XR because we wanted to see if we could find better, more subtle, ways to achieve the same results. Highways and engine boosters were the main tools for this, but there were mixed reactions to the highways (not helped by some design issues in early versions which made them less enjoyable to use than they should have been). Boosters proved more widely popular, with the possible exceptions of our chosen "cost" for use, namely the shields, but came with the downside that the player would tend to spend more time in empty space, not seeing any other traffic.
However, neither of these solutions addressed one key player scenario, namely the situation where the player really does just want to allow more time to pass, for example to allow production or station-building to complete. We had hoped that players would be too busy doing other things to be too bothered about not being able to accelerate time, but it turned out that that wasn't the case. With no better alternative solutions to that particular problem in sight (and with the functionality to accelerate time already available in the game for development purposes) we decided to restore SETA. That remains the situation with SETA as we work towards X4, and I will leave discussion of SETA at that.
Jumpdrives were popular, but they pretty much completely destroyed both the feeling of size, and the tactical, territory-controlling element of the game. Sure, there are ways to mitigate some of their effect (jump target limitations, range limitations, fuel cost) but none of them remove the fundamental problem that you cannot place an obstacle in the way of an invading fleet in an interesting way. Note that adding another gameplay mechanism to prevent jumpdrives being used doesn't really count as interesting for these purposes; it just stops the jumpdrive from being useful, making it redundant. So, thinking again about which features of a jumpdrive we wanted in the game, and which we didn't, we realised that there were two separate scenarios. One was getting a ship or fleet from A to B, and the other was getting the
player from A to B so that they could be "in on the action".
For the first scenario highways have a place, allowing ships in densely-populated areas to move quickly. This not only makes sense logically, in the same way that roads and motorways make sense in busy areas, but it also helps with the
perception of how busy such an area is since a player travelling along through the area will see more ships. In less populated ares, ships would still be able to use boost drives, and the player not seeing so many of them would help create the corresponding more empty atmosphere.
That leaves the player case. In particular it leaves the case of the player being frustrated to see their ships being attacked on the far side of the universe, but having no means to get there and apply their skills to try and save the situation. Allowing them to jump in at will with a fleet is too overpowered and takes away any real danger, but allowing them to be there in person and maybe try and fly the ship to safety, or perhaps man a hero escort ship and fend off the enemy single-handed, makes for good, exciting gameplay. That's where teleportation comes in, and I'm sure you can work out numerous other possibilities it brings up.
One final thing for those saying that jumpdrives "can't" be removed because it "doesn't make sense" from a lore perspective: I'm afraid that argument is back to front. The lore needs to be made to fit the gameplay, not the other way around.
Now, I'm sure you will read through this and say "yes, but...." and come up with some counter-argument that you feel supports your view that jumpdrives should stay, and of course you are entitled to your opinion. However, please don't try to claim that we didn't think through the decision, nor that we just "threw away" something that you liked without considering it properly. We have thought about it very carefully, and who knows? Maybe the fact that we came to a different conclusion to the one you would perhaps have come, might even mean that it wasn't
us who missed something important.
).
Xenon Love! \#/ 
Grill the Borons! 
Real pirates (ab)use Jumpdrive (and Rum) 
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