Ridiculously large X4 wishlist

[Falcrack]

I spend too much time thinking about what I would want to see in this game, I admit. I suppose this list is more for myself really, as I expect it to be quickly buried in the depths of the forum. Large lists like these invariably do. But, if and when I ever get sweet, sweet modding skills, these are the sort of changes I would make. And hopefully, some talented modder or some egosoft employee might see this list, look it over, and decide that some of the ideas might be both doable and worthwhile to implement. So here it is! In non-alphabetical order:

Taxes
1. Sector taxes
-Each sector generates a steady stream of credits to the owner, dependent on the size of the total sector population, with more populated sectors giving more tax revenue.
-This is essentially money from nowhere, it is an infinite pool, but credits come in at a fixed rate.
-Collected each hour
2. Sales taxes
-A percentage of the value of each sale for each ware, paid by the buyer
-Collected at the time of each transaction, but no immediate notification created on player ship when these are collected
-Start off with very low taxes, and balance upwards

Trade list and economy analysis tools
1. A simple, sortable list of all known wares and stations in the galaxy to better inform our trade decisions, with the following columns
-ware name
-price
-sell amount (how many units the station can sell)
-buy amount (how many units the station can buy)
-station name
-sector
-faction
2. Click on line in trade list to initiate trade run, select from your available freighters, and select how much your freighter will buy or sell.
3. Improved economy graphs for each individual ware, with time along the bottom axis and along the left axis, the ability to select:
-Demand (amount that stations are willing to buy)
-Supply (amount of the ware that stations have on hand)
-Average price (selling price on stations, weighted according to the amount in stock on each selling station)
-In addition, the ability to select where the information comes from, selecting either the whole known universe, specific factions, or some combination of specific sectors.

Trade stations
1. Each sector has a trade station to supply the local workforce.
2. Civilian goods, including food and medicine, are sold to trade stations.
3. Civilian goods are consumed from trade stations in sectors proportional to the amount of workforce present in the sector.
4. If not enough food and medicine are present, workforce numbers on all stations throughout the sector begins to slowly fall.
5. If civilian wares (not food or medicine) are present without shortages, the stations in the sector get a productivity boost. There is a separate boost for each type of civilian ware present, so maximum variety of available goods is ideal.

Narcotics and Pirate Bases
1. Space Weed, Space Fuel, and Maja Dust, sold in hidden pirate stations in sectors, far from main traffic routes, well outside the sector borders and possibly far above or below the ecliptic plane to avoid detection and destruction by local security forces.
2. Different narcotics are consumed by different species
-Argon consume Space Fuel
-Teladi consume Space Weed
-Paranid consume Maja Dust
3. When narcotics are available from pirate stations, they are consumed in the sector at a rate proportional to the local sector workforce size and species makeup, and unlike civilian goods, these produce production efficiency decreases (~10% decrease in efficiency for affected species).

Ship maintenance
1. Ship hulls degrade over time, more when in space travellingand performing functions.
2. Certain activities, like actively mining or travelling through asteroid fields, result in a faster rate of degradation, due to micrometeorites that get through the shielding.
3. Hull degradation is counteracted by service crew. More service crew, and higher level engineers especially, will repair hulls faster, and enough crew will prevent gradual damage in the first place.

NPC boarding ops and bailing
1. NPC pirates and military forces will periodically undertake boarding ops against enemy ships, potentially even player owned ships, in order to capture and convert them.
2. NPC ships (S to M sized) will have a chance to bail regardless of whether the player of another NPC is shooting at them, but NPCs will also attempt to claim abandoned ships.

NPC factions have finite credits
1. Main source of new credits (money from nowhere) is taxes.
2. Selling to civilians from trade stations also generates money from nowhere.
3. Credits are balanced so that even with wages and taxes, a good profit can still be made, but perhaps not in situations where the end product is in very low demand and the resources to create the product are in very high demand.
4. Growth is ultimately limited by the rate of cash coming in via taxes, and going out via wages. When the universe grows to a certain size in terms of stations with workforce and ships with crews, the rate of money coming in as taxes from sector population and going out as wages to workers will reach an equilibrium.
5. Credits coming into the economy (basically money from nowhere) can also come via mission rewards, and selling inventory items to station traders.
6. AI factions are hard coded not to allow creation of more than a certain amount of production modules per sector (in order to prevent too much investment in stations and not enough in ships), but players have no such restrictions.

Workforce and crew
1. Much increased rate of workforce joining stations (10 times the current rate, at least).
2. Regular wages paid each hour
-If unable to pay workforce, they begin to leave stations.
-If unable to pay crew, they will either dock at random station and leave, or they may even hijack and take command of your ship, and join a pirate faction.
-Start off with very low wages, and balance upwards .
3. Stations can barely function at all without workforce (maybe ~10% efficiency), and have 100% efficiency with full workforce.
4. High level pilots can be hired at shipyards and equipment docks.
5. Docks for S and M ships have a small workforce capacity (100 workforce) like habitation modules in order to provide initial workforce for small factories, larger complexes will need separate habitation modules.
6. Habitation module blueprint cost is reduced by about 10 fold, and player starts with a blueprint for a small habitation module depending on their starting race.

Station building
1. Construction ship hiring fee stays the same (50,000 credits).
2. Each module during construction is a separate fee, based on build time.
-1 build time is what can be accomplished by 1 building drone in 1 minute.
-Player charged as construction for each module is started.
-A module with a build time of 100 might cost 10,000 credits, a module with a build time of 200 might cost 20,000 credits, etc.
-No hiring costs obviously if you are using your own construction ship.
3. Multiple construction ships can be hired to speed along station construction. Each construction ship only works on one module at a time, up to 5 construction ships per station can be hired simultaneously.
4. You can use your own builder ship to work on NPC stations, and get paid for constructing modules for them.
5. Ability to change the construction order of modules on station in “plan build”, using arrow keys.
6. The plot icon for a station under construction is not visible to hostile factions until construction is at least started, and there are at least some wares in the build storage.

AI station management
1. Each AI owned station will seek to have at least 1 subordinate freighter (5 for shipyards and wharfs, 2 for equipment docks), and at least 1 mineral miner and 1 gas miner, if needed based on modules.
-Reduce the number of NPC owned free traders and free miners, as there would be way too many freighters flying around if each station also has subordinates.
-If NPC station subordinate ships are destroyed, the station will prioritize purchasing replacements from local shipyards, if they have sufficient credits.
2. Shipyards, equipment docks, and sector trade stations are owned by the faction, but each other station, while they are aligned with the sector owner, are owned by separate corporations, which are responsible to pay taxes, pay wages, buy materials, sell their products, and earn a profit.
3. If an AI corporation becomes so unprofitable that it runs out of money and cannot cover operating expenses, it disbands unprofitable stations, sells off recycled construction materials, and turns the freighters and miners into free traders and free miners.
4. If an AI corporation gets more money, if can use it to invest in building additional station modules on existing stations, additional stations, or defense ships.

Recycling
1. When equipment is removed from a ship, the equipment is broken down into the original components used to construct it.
2. Ships sold to shipyards are immediately broken down into original component parts and added to the storage, and player receives payment for ships based on wares cost of all components.
3. Wares that exceed the storage of the dock where wares are recycled are ejected into space, and player or NPC is not compensated for the cost of these.

Shipyard modules vs maintenance modules
1. Shipyards can produce ships and add modules and software, but cannot repair.
2. Maintenance modules can repair and add modules and software, but cannot build ships.
3. Certain amount of workforce needed per shipyard or maintenance module, but these S/M production or maintenance modules have living space for enough workforce to run them.
4. L and XL shipyards need building drones, not workforce.
5. Crew added to ships come from nowhere (ie you don’t have to have a pool of hired workforce taking wages until they are hired on to a ship).

Salvaging
1. Wrecks and drops from wars are persistent (or very long lived, maybe 4 hours for small wreck, 24 hours for large wrecks) until salvaged.
2. Regular faction owned, NPC corporation owned, or player owned salvagers will visit these ships and station wrecks and can break them down into a small percentage (~20%) of their original cost in terms of components, and then turn around and sell these materials to shipyards and equipment docks.
3. Time to salvage based on the size of the ship. When salvage is complete, several crates appear near where the wreck was, and salvagers will collect them.
4. Salvagers use mining lasers to break down wrecks, and have container type storage.
5. Salvagers will also pick up free floating containers with wares wherever they are found, and attempt to sell them.

Prebuilt ships at shipyards
1. A stockpile of prebuilt ships on hand, not owned by any faction.
2. Ship trader would not sell the last copy of each ship on hand to NPCs, ensuring that there is always at least one on hand for the player to buy.
3. Would attempt to maintain a certain level of ships in stock.
4. Only sells S and M sized ships, no L or XL.

Economic analysis tools
1. Used to track NPC and faction funds over time to make sure that with wages and tax changes, it is still possible for AI to make a profit and not have economy collapse. It would be necessary to help achieve balance.
2. Graph that shows supply (amount available), demand (amount that can be bought as a resource, or amount consumed over time if an end product), price, and total amount bought/sold for each ware in the universe, as a function of time. This would be added in the encyclopedia.

Ship queues
1. Simple first come, first served system for ships ordered by the player.
2. For NPC ordered ships, there is a countdown timer if the first ship in the queue has insufficient resources to allow time for the resources to be delivered, otherwise it gets moved to the back of the queue.
3. If an NPC ordered ship cannot build due to high end equipment or consumables, it immediately attempts to lower the requirement, and once finished, immediately sends it to an equipment dock to get the desired upgrades and consumables. If not possible there, then it simply goes without the upgrade.

Missile changes
1. Increase speed of tracking missiles.
2. Increase range of tracking missiles.
3. Greatly increase speed of dumbfire missiles.
4. Greatly increase effectiveness of countermeasures.
5. Missiles lead their targets based on missile velocity and target velocity and direction, instead of flying straight towards them.
6. Larger hitbox for missiles, so they are easier to shoot down with turrets.
7. Increase capacity of countermeasures per ship.
8. Decrease ware cost of missiles.
9. Missiles and countermeasures are consumed in OOS combat.
10. Each added missile mount adds to the missile capacity of the ship, maybe 20 missiles per turret.

Improved OOS combat calculations,
1. Chance to hit OOS is calculated using the following variables
-Projectile speed
-Distance to target
-Target speed
-Target size
-Target maneuverability
-Turret tracking speed

Weapon adjustments
1. Increased plasma projectile speed
2. Bolt repeater fire and beam fire is continuous

Combat graphical improvements
1. More colorful plasma bolts, better impact effects, ship fires and smoke.
2. More impressive capital ship explosions (ie Rebirth and X3 shockwave effects).

Mines
1. Mines now work OOS.
2. Mines only appear on radar at very short range.
3. Ships attempt to avoid running into mines.
4. AI ships will place friend/foe mines near gates, or around enemy stations.
5. Turrets on ships will attempt to automatically destroy hostile mines.

Turret commands
1. Customizable turret commands (like X3:AP)
2. Can create list of priorities for alpha, beta, and gamma turret commands, such as prioritizing missiles, then fighters, then capitals, then stations for alpha turret command, etc.
3. Missile defense turret command prioritizes missiles, but will fire at attacking enemy ships when no incoming missile is detected.

AI combat maneuvering
1. AI uses travel drives in pursuit of other ships much more aggressively and effectively, for example if enemy ship is a certain distance away, they will always engage travel drive to arrive more quickly.
2. AI is quicker to respond to hostile threats in the vicinity.
3. AI turrets for NPC combat ships set to attack all enemies by default, instead of “defend”.
4. AI updates target destination more rapidly, especially with moving targets.
5. Player can sit in the crew member seats and take control of turrets or drones for the ship.

Drone commands, given to drone mothership
1. “Recall drones” command brings back all drones, immediately without question.
2. “Drone attack” command causes all combat drones from the mothership to attack a specified target.
3. “Drone repair” command causes all repair drones from the mothership to repair a specified target.
4. Drones can be reassigned to other ships, if they have space for another drones, for instance if drone mothership is destroyed.

Carrier commands, given to carrier
1. “Recall fighters” causes fighter to return and land, without question.
2. “Launch fighters” causes all fighters to launch from tubes (if available), without question.
3. “Carrier attack” command causes all carrier based fighters to launch (if not already airborne) and attack a specified target.
4. “Carrier attack all” command causes all carrier based fighters to launch (if not already airborne) and attack hostile targets of their choosing.

Wing and fleet changes
1. All ships within a wing will share the set of orders.
2. Fleets have improved fleet cohesion and will do a better job of travelling with the other ships, even when using travel drive.
3. If a carrier is set as wing commander, and there are subwings of fighters based below that, all fighters in the subwings will obey the same order as is given to the wing leader, for example if wing leader is ordered to dock they all dock, or if ordered to attack a target, they all attack the target.
4. Wings can be renamed to whatever you want.

Crew and workforce transfer
1. Ability to easily load large numbers of crew and/or workforce into transports to move from place to place, provided you have a transport ship.

Other combat commands
1. “Disable” causes ship to attack enemy engines, turrets, and shields, and attempt to not destroy the hull.
2. “Attack all” causes all ships within the wing to attack targets of their choosing

Destroying stations
1. Until the first delivery of goods to the build plot, plots for hostile stations are not visible on the map to hostile factions.
2. After all the build storage blocks have been destroyed, the build storage building itself is destroyed, and the station plot disappears from the map.
3. Modules under construction can be destroyed.

Crew and leveling
1. One service crew required to control each turret and drone. If fewer service crew are present than required, some turrets will not fire in combat, drones cannot be used etc.
2. Autotrade and automine distance is not affected by crew level, but time to find trade deals is
-Max level makes 4 deals ahead of time (buy, sell, buy, sell), whereas lower level traders just take variable amounts of time to find the trade.
-Max level miners can find resources without resource probes within the same sector, lower level need to be closer to the resource fields or else they will not find them without probes.
3. All pilots, regardless of level, can autotrade and automine.
4. Crew skill increases faster, and increases whenever they are performing the relevant function, not just when they make a profitable sale.

Research
1. Research starts off as currently, with simple time to research basic, advanced, and exceptional chassis, shield, weapon, and engine improvements. This simple unlocks the ability to conduct research in these areas.
2. You can research improvements to each of these areas that will apply to your ships and items you produce at your shipyards, so that instead of just applying mods to individual ships, you can apply the improved version to all the ships you make. Research in specific branches requires wares needed for the specific line of research.
3. Research takes place at special research modules (not necessarily the HQ, though you could put research modules on the HQ if desired).
-HQ with your Boron scientist may provide a significant boost to research modules on the HQ.
-Increased workforce at stations with research modules increases research speed.
-Each research module can work on one research task at a time, but you can queue up multiple research projects.
-Multiple research modules working on the same task will decrease the total research time.
-Station managers will automatically purchase the wares needed to conduct research.
4. Independent factions conduct research as well, continuously upgrading their ships, weapons, shields, and engines over time.
5. Blueprints purchased from factions represent the base models, they do not share the newest version of their research. They will upgrade their fleets periodically with newer versions.
6. Reverse engineering of ships and equipment is possible, but destroys the original ship or equipment. Reverse engineering gives you blueprint that includes whatever other improvements are present on the ship/module.
7. Multiple lines of research can be added to a single ship/module. Research for a specific module takes longer with each time it is improved upon. For example, the first research on a pulse laser takes 30 minutes, the next improvement that build upon it takes 1 hour, then next 2 hours, etc.
8. Research can only be done on an existing blueprint, it cannot be done to create a new module or ship from scratch without a preexisting blueprint.

Jump drives
1. Jump drives are available to install on L and XL sized ships. Requires refined nividium (made at nividium refinery, a new module), advanced electronics, smart chips, quantum tubes, jump components, others.
2. Jump beacons are modules that can be constructed on stations. Requires refined nividium, hull parts, claytronics, field coils, jump components, others.
3. Jumping requires the use of antimatter cells. Antimatter cells, when loaded onto L and XL ships, does not use cargo bay space, but instead is converted into jump fuel.
4. Refueling occurs at equipment docks, shipyards, and resupply ships.
5. Jumping to gates and jump beacons
-May not jump to gates in sectors that are owned by a hostile faction.
-May not jump to jump beacons on hostile station, unless you have hacked the station.
-Jumping to gates causes ship to appear in vicinity of the gate, not coming through the gate directly.
-Jump fuel amount is proportional to the number of gates the ship would have to pass through.
-The calculated jump route cannot pass through hostile sectors.
-Jump charge time is ~1 minute, or thereabouts,
-Jump charge cancels if you come under fire, like with travel drive. Ships cannot move or maneuver while charging the jump drive.
-XL sized ships can be equipped with their own jump beacon, to act as jump points for other friendly ships to join in the battle.

L and XL gate travel algorithm
1. L and XL ships do not try to go through the back of gates. They simply fly up to the front and go through (provided they are not jumping), none of this “entering from behind” nonsense which adds lots of time to travel.

Ship collisions
1. Damage from collisions between two ships or ship and station only occurs when the player is in direct control (ie driving, not including autopilot) of one of the ships.
2. Damage is proportional to the speed of collision, and the mass of the two colliding ships. They both suffer the same damage, but since larger ships usually have more shielding and hp, they are affected less during collisions.

Boost power bar
1. Instead of draining shields, drains a special “boost power” bar that recharges slowly, depending on the engine type.
2. Reverse boost
-Slows down ships very quickly, but uses boost reserve to do so.
-Not as powerful as forward boost, but still much faster than using reverse engines.

Coordinated ship travel improved
1. Escorting ships travel with the ships they are escorting, not ahead or too far behind, even when using travel drives.

Resource probes
1. In order for your autominers to function, they must have data from resource probes available, though depending on the skill level, they may detect resources at certain distances without one.
2. Probes are dropped automatically in a region where an autominer chooses to mine, unless there is already a nearby probe providing data.
3. Using the “mine” command does not reveal whether the resource is actually there or not. For instance, you can use a mine ship, click on a region of space, and select mine for ore, even though no ore may be present at the spot. This prevents cheating to discover mining fields.
4. Better correlation between the data revealed by resource probes and actual asteroids seen in sector. For instance, a region of space for which the resource probe says there is no ore should not be surrounded by ore asteroids in sector, and a region which does not reveal any resources by the resource probes should not be surrounded by resource rich asteroids.

Sensors
1. Ship sensors are made using wares, like weapons or shields, and installed on a “sensor” slot on each ship.
2. Different classes of ships can equip small, medium, or large sensors, with different ranges
3. Dedicated scout ships might have no weapons slots, but instead are able to be outfitted with a single L sized sensor. They also have fast engines.
4. Sensor class affects radar range and range of long range scanner (this is no longer a software item).
5. Long range scan ping temporarily reveals ships, stations, gates, anomalies, etc, beyond regular radar range, but uses a sensor power reserve that takes time to recharge (not the scanning minigame where you listen to time your ping just right).
6. Sensor data for stationary objects (ie wrecks, anomalies, data vaults, lockboxes, etc) is persistent on your map after you leave an area.
7. New satellite type (trade satellite) gathers data from all stations in a sector, but provides no radar coverage.

Stealth
1. Stealth modules can be installed in the sensor slot, so instead of a long range radar, they will have a very short range radar, but will cut the detection range by other ships down by a certain percentage.
2. For example, a dedicated scout ship with an L class stealth module can be very stealthy indeed, even though it may need to get very close in order for its own radar to function.

Exploration
1. NPC ships set to explore will use long range sensors at certain intervals, will fly up to stations, drop satellites if ordered in the behaviors tab, and purchase satellites if ordered in the behaviors tab.
2. You can manually order an NPC to perform a long range scan at a location.
3. Explorers will drop nav beacons at anomalies, wrecks, and data vaults if ordered in the behavior tab.
4. Explorers can be limited to a single sector, or can be set to travel through gates and explore the universe.

Map changes
1. You can resize individual sector zoom level in case your exploration has made sector borders too large.
2. You can change the map elevation which is displayed for each sector. The map view only currently shows a horizontal slice of each sector.
-Moving the map plane up or down will change the revealed fog areas, for example you may have explored around a certain radius at an elevation of 0, but change map elevation to an elevation of 100 km where you have not explored, and the map will show unexplored fog.
-Also will change whether mineral fields are shown or not, as a mineral field visible at 0 km elevation may also not be visible at 100 km elevation.
3. Ability to reset all map changes to default.

Collect deployables
1. Command NPC to pick up satellites, resource probes, nav beacons, laser towers, etc. Also, eliminate requirement to deactivate probes and satellites to pick them up. Picking them up deactivates them.

Renaming ships, stations, nav beacons etc
1. Clicking on name to rename it dot not erase the previous name when you start typing. So you can easily add letters or numbers to an existing name without having to rename the whole thing. You can use arrow keys to move back and forth in the text.

Moving waypoint commands
1. All commands for a location (like explore, collect drops, and many others) can be moved after being given, like is currently the case with “fly to” waypoints.
2. Waypoints can be moved along all three axes (x, y, and z).
3. Moving in y axis (up and down) accomplished by moving screen to horizontal then moving up and down, just like can be done with moving station plots.

Command queues
1. Any new command automatically overrides the previous command or set of commands, unless you press “shift” while issuing the command. An exception might be for trade related commands, or perhaps even they are subject to this rule.

Station comms
1. Contact station manager/faction rep remotely (from within the sector) to accept missions, receive ranks, buy licenses, pay fines, etc.

Scanning stations and ships
1. Scan range increased 10 fold for ships.
2. Scan range out to maybe 20 km for stations, and all station modules are scanned at once when you get within range.
3. Can order NPCs under your control to scan ships and stations remotely.
4. Scan ships and stations uses the secondary fire button when in scan mode, just like long range scan uses secondary fire button in long range scan mode.

Modes (long range scan, ship scan, fast travel, SETA)
1. Cockpit modes are no longer a thing, you can long range scan, use SETA, scan ships, and use travel mode all at the same time, using other buttons.

Encounters mechanism
1. Get rid of it. I personally have no use for it, at all, in any format.

Music
1. Plays ALL sector music from ALL X games without preference for X4 tracks.
2. Remove dark ambient soundtracks.
3. Music does not change tracks when changing sectors, and will only change tracks after one track is finished.
4. Plays music all the time, except at stations.
5. No more combat music. I hate it, all of it. Especially during combat.

Missions
1. Retrieval missions
-Requirement to actually deliver the item you retrieved, rather than just keep it, to fulfill the mission. I have enough precious rings, fine art, and sensitive data containers already!
2. More combat missions
-Based on existing situations rather than scripted pirates or Xenon suddenly appearing the moment you accept the mission.
3. Multipart mission chains
-Change it so we can accomplish any part of the mission chain in any order, rather than having to complete them in a specific order.
4. Mission visibility
-Missions are generated and visible in all sectors, not just the sector your ship is physically in, and are persistent for a while.
5. More time limits on missions

Faction war behavior
1. Factions actively protect defense stations that are under construction, and if they can no longer defend it, they cancel production so as to avoid sending freighters to their doom on suicide missions.
2. Factions actively and aggressively attempt to destroy enemy defense stations under construction and intercept and destroy any ships sending construction materials.
3. Factions have war goals, usually only a few sectors, and once they accomplish this, they will not continue to seek to expand their territory, but the defenders will seek to drive them out, recover lost territory, and take a few sectors of their own.
4. Xenon are the exception, they seek to expand relentlessly.
5. Factions build up forces until they have enough to launch a large scale assault, instead of sending ships in piecemeal.

Inventory storage limit
1. You can only have on your person like maybe 20 items, and have to either store in lockboxes or store in your station the rest.
2. Trying to pick up more inventory items will fail, with the message “inventory storage limit reached!”

War reports
1. Separate tab in logbook that applies specifically to the state of warfare between factions.
2. Lists when invasion fleets are launched (you receive these reports if you are allied with them), when enemy fleets arrive, setting up defense stations, etc, in order to give the player a better indication of where military action is taking place.

Stations
1. Each station automatically has a bar, where you are more likely to find qualified pilots, marines, managers, engineers, etc to hire, for a bit extra money.
2. Big planted area in front of faction reps is removed.
3. Any player owned station can be designated your HQ, “Deposit inventory” will drop items off at any station designated your HQ.

Ship changes
1. More heavy fighters for factions other than Argon.
2. XL sized battleships for all factions.
3. Greatly increased cargo capacity of L freighters.
4. Increased cost of L freighters.
5. Increased cost and durability of capital ships.
6. Crafting benches located onboard L and XL ships.
7. Additional rooms to have seats and control stations for all the potential crew of a ship.

Reputation changes
1. Faction embargos
-Selling wares to a faction that is embargoed by another faction will result in a reputation loss with the faction that established the embargo.
-Selling wares to a faction increases reputation.
-The more you sell to one faction in a conflict, the more the other faction with the embargo will dislike you.
2. Stray shots
-Stray shots by NPCs (shots fired at a ship that was not targeted) never result in a rep loss.
-Stray shots by the player’s main guns (not turrets) can result in a temporary rep loss, but only with sustained fire, like it is right now.
3. Shooting build storage results in a reputation loss, just like shooting the station itself.
4. It is more difficult to recover rep when you have lost a lot of rep.
5. You can declare was on factions before firing a shot, all your units now treat them as hostiles.
6. Paying fines can restore some reputation loss.

Licenses and blueprints
1. Privateer license
-Faction pays you to accept this license, but immediately results in a very large rep loss to the factions which are enemy to the license issuing faction.
-You are paid a certain amount for each enemy ship you destroy, even in enemy territory (maybe ~5-10% of the cost of the ship).
2. Trade license
-Decrease cost from 10 million credits to maybe 2 million credits.
3. Individual sector maps are for sale by faction reps, maybe ~100,000 credits each.
4. If you research an improved version of ship or equipment, you can sell this improved version to factions, provided what you have researched is superior to what they have.

[sh1pman]

I did it, I read it all! Phew. That’s a wishlist for a litcubes-sized mod. Or at least an XRM-sized one. Agree with pretty much everything here, but have a couple of thoughts:

1) Narcotics shouldn’t affect productivity in the sector that much. Otherwise it’s a telltale sign of a pirate base somewhere in the sector. I don’t like the concept of a dedicated pirate base at all, to be honest. In X4 setting it would be far too easy for sector security to find it and blow it up, just follow the ships flying in weird directions where no known stations exist.

2) Salvaging should have much higher return (~80%), but only for the hull itself. Makes sense if AIs could rebuild their ships from recycled stuff, but in order to outfit them with upgrades, weapons and other hightech, they’d need a proper developed economy. Also prevents AIs that win a battle in their sector from having a massive economic advantage in the form of all the wrecks from both sides’ destroyed ships.

3) I’d like to expand weapon changes a bit. Specifically, turrets on L and XL ships. They’re awful and unrealistic. Rebirth had it right. But if rebuilding the whole system is impractical, they should be at least tweaked somewhat. Increase the range and power, decrease the rate of fire for L turrets. Opposite for M turrets, but also increase the projectile speed massively. They’re supposed to be point defenses, not damage dealers. Also, shields should regenerate in combat with no delay. Delay doesn’t make sense, and in order to kill a big ship, you need to bring big guns. Shield regen may be stopped for a while with disruptor missiles, gives them a purpose.

[Fazmaster]

Have to admit that I just flew over it, but want to pick on two of them:

Mines

I think if the AI massively placing mines in front of gates could alter gameplay in an unfavorable direction. Not everyone goes for a large economy and fleets. If you just want to engage the war effort han solo-style or go for a more pirate gamestyle with a couple of S/M ships you might end up getting "game over" screens just by entering a hostile sector (and the game over screen really sucks eversince, not solely because the game is over). Furthermore I also like to see more massive battles around stations and in space and not shipwrecks all over the place near gates while fleets entering it getting serverly damaged before the action starts.

What might be interesting imo heads to the opposite direction. Gates have an intense gravity and drag/accelerate things towards them with those too small to pass (like mines) eventually getting destroyed. Gates would be less static objects in space and this would also possibly make up for some nice flight manouvres/mechanics (thinking about the sector where two gates are close nearby and you come from one of them to go to or miss the other).

Penalties

I absolutely agree players should get more penalties from enemies of the fractions they support. In Rebirth half the universe is against you and this should also be the case if you grow big and/or take sides. Currently (havent played it that way, but from what I've read) it seems you can quickly snowball yourself to become the biggest fraction without getting in troubles.

[teleportationwars]

You care wayyyy too much not to be modding.

[Falcrack]

You care wayyyy too much not to be modding.

I know right? I just lack any programming skills whatsoever. But, I figure for my job, some rudimentary programming skills would be a plus, so I think I'll "practice" programming at home by learning some programming skills using X4 mods.

[graphicboy]

I know right? I just lack any programming skills whatsoever. But, I figure for my job, some rudimentary programming skills would be a plus, so I think I'll "practice" programming at home by learning some programming skills using X4 mods.

The best advice I can give you (dev for >20 years) - before you start looking at mod code, figure out how you would instruct an alien to make a PB&J sandwich.

As an example, "put the peanut butter on the bread" would result in the peanut butter jar being placed on the loaf.

When you sort through that (and it should take you 1-2 days, seriously), then jump in.

[graphicboy]

It might help if I gave a positive example rather than a negative one -

Open the refrigerator (do they know what a fridge is?).
Reach for the loaf of bread (or a loaf? ... pedantic).
Grab the loaf of bread.
Remove the loaf of bread from the refrigerator.
Close the refrigerator.
Place the loaf of bread on the counter.
Un-twist the tie.
Remove tie from loaf.
Un-twist bag opening.
Reach into bag opening.
Gently grab 1 piece of bread...

[teleportationwars]

You care wayyyy too much not to be modding.

I know right? I just lack any programming skills whatsoever. But, I figure for my job, some rudimentary programming skills would be a plus, so I think I'll "practice" programming at home by learning some programming skills using X4 mods.

if you need some help come to the discord. someone is always willing to help.

[radcapricorn]

- Buy a head of cheese, and if they have eggs, buy a dozen.
...
- Hello, do you have eggs?
- Yes.
- A dozen heads of cheese, please.

[chew-ie]

- Buy a head of cheese, and if they have eggs, buy a dozen.
...
- Hello, do you have eggs?
- Yes.
- A dozen heads of cheese, please.

Was waiting for that one - thanks!

[Hairless-Ape]

Your post is ridiculously long.

Try X3 Mayhem mod. Someone gets it there.

X4, you have so much more to do, but you're not getting there. Hire Litcube, Hire Joubarbe, and you will be happy. They get it.

[graphicboy]

- Buy a head of cheese, and if they have eggs, buy a dozen.
...
- Hello, do you have eggs?
- Yes.
- A dozen heads of cheese, please.

That statement throws an exception, sorry.

[Falcrack]

Your post is ridiculously long.

Try X3 Mayhem mod. Someone gets it there.

X4, you have so much more to do, but you're not getting there. Hire Litcube, Hire Joubarbe, and you will be happy. They get it.

Oh, I've played the heck out of Litcubes mod, plus Mayhem. I think Joubarbe has done a brilliant job. My only wish is that he would take his skills over to X4. If I was a multimillionaire, the thought of dangling large sums of money in front of modders such as Litcube or Joubarbe in order to implement some ideas for mods I've had has crossed my mind. But, I am not so wealthy as to be able to do such a thing without risking the severe ire of my wife!

[Buzz2005]

Your post is ridiculously long.

Try X3 Mayhem mod. Someone gets it there.

X4, you have so much more to do, but you're not getting there. Hire Litcube, Hire Joubarbe, and you will be happy. They get it.

Oh, I've played the heck out of Litcubes mod, plus Mayhem. I think Joubarbe has done a brilliant job. My only wish is that he would take his skills over to X4. If I was a multimillionaire, the thought of dangling large sums of money in front of modders such as Litcube or Joubarbe in order to implement some ideas for mods I've had has crossed my mind. But, I am not so wealthy as to be able to do such a thing without risking the severe ire of my wife!

I would give money to ego to hire new people

If you build it they will come ( modders of course)

[j.harshaw]

It might help if I gave a positive example rather than a negative one -

Open the refrigerator (do they know what a fridge is?).
Reach for the loaf of bread (or a loaf? ... pedantic).
Grab the loaf of bread.
Remove the loaf of bread from the refrigerator.

Had to stop at step four since it already got a lot longer than i had anticipated. But i had fun, thanks for that!

Code: Select all

<label name="start"/>

<set_value name="$refrigerators" exact="this.room.refrigerators"/>
<do_if value="not $refrigerators.count">
  <set_value name="$err" exact="'No refrigerators available'"/>
  <set_value name="$loopback"/>
</do_if>
<do_else>
  <resume label="open_fridge"/>
</do_else>

<label name="wait_to_try_again"/>

<set_value name="$errcounter" exact="@$errcounter + 1"/>
<do_if value="($errcounter gt 10) or (not $loopback? and not $refrigerators.count)">
  <debug_text text="'Unable to make sandwich at this time due to: \n\n' + @$err + '\n'" filter="error"/>
  <return/>
</do_if>

<wait min="5min" max="10min"/>
<do_if value="$loopback?">
  <remove_value name="$loopback"/>
  <resume label name="start"/>
</do_if>

<label name="open_fridge"/>

<set_value name="$thechosenone" exact="$refrigerators.random"/>
<do_if value="this.combinedskill gt 20">
  <do_all exact="$refrigerators.count" counter="$i">
    <set_value name="$locfridge" exact="$refrigerators.{$i}"/>
    <do_if value="$locfridge.isoperational and $locfridge.cargo.{ware.bread}.count and (this.distanceto.{$locfridge} lt this.distanceto.{$thechosenone})">
      <set_value name="$thechosenone" exact="$locfridge"/>
    </do_if>
  </do_all>
  <remove_value name="$locfridge"/>
</do_if>

<do_if value="not $thechosenone.isoperational">
  <remove_from_list name="$refrigerators" exact="$thechosenone"/>
  <set_value name="$err" exact="'Chosen fridge: %s %s %s is not operational. %s refrigerators remaining.'.[@$thechosenone.idcode, @$thechosenone.knownname, $thechosenone, $refrigerators.count]"/>
  <resume label="wait_to_try_again"/>
</do_if>

<open_object object="$thechosenone" result="$success"/>

<do_if value="not $success">
  <remove_from_list name="$refrigerators" exact="$thechosenone"/>
  <set_value name="$err" exact="'Cannot open chosen fridge: %s %s %s. %s refrigerators remaining.'.[@$thechosenone.idcode, @$thechosenone.knownname, $thechosenone, $refrigerators.count]"/>
  <resume label="wait_to_try_again"/>
</do_if>

<label name="get_bread"/>

<do_if value="not $thechosenone.cargo.{ware.bread}.count">
  <remove_from_list name="$refrigerators" exact="$thechosenone"/>
  <set_value name="$err" exact="'Selected fridge: %s %s %s does not contain bread. %s refrigerators remaining.'.[@$thechosenone.idcode, @$thechosenone.knownname, $thechosenone, $refrigerators.count]"/>
  <resume label="wait_to_try_again"/>
</do_if>

<set_value name="$loaves" exact="$thechosenone.cargo.{ware.bread}.list"/>
<set_value name="$thechosenone" exact="$loaves.random"/>
<do_if value="this.combinedskill gt 40">
  <set_value name="$evalvalue" exact="(@$thechosenone.expirydate - player.age) / ($thechosenone.efforttoprepare * $thechosenone.timetoprepare)"/>
  <set_value name="$evalvalue" min="$evalvalue * 0.8" max="$evalvalue * 1.2"/>
  <do_all exact="$loaves.count" counter="$i">
    <set_value name="$locbread" exact="$loaves.{$i}"/>
    <set_value name="$loctimetoexpire" exact="@$locbread.expirydate - player.age"/>
    <do_if value="$loctimetoexpire lt 0">
      <continue/>
    </do_if>

    <set_value name="$locvalue" exact="$loctimetoexpire / ($locbread.efforttoprepare * $locbread.timetoprepare)"/>
    <set_value name="$locvalue" min="$locvalue * 0.8" max="$locvalue * 1.2"/>
    <do_if value="$locvalue gt $evalvalue">
      <set_value name="$thechosenone" exact="$locbread"/>
      <set_value name="$evalvalue" exact="(@$thechosenone.expirydate - player.age) / ($thechosenone.efforttoprepare * $thechosenone.timetoprepare)"/>
      <set_value name="$evalvalue" min="$evalvalue * 0.8" max="$evalvalue * 1.2"/>
    </do_if>
  </do_all>
  <remove_value name="$locvalue"/>
  <remove_value name="$loctimetoexpire"/>
  <remove_value name="$locbread"/>
</do_if>

<do_if value="not $thechosenone.exists or ($thechosenone.expirydate lt player.age)">
  <set_value name="$err" exact="'Bread %s %s %s does not exist or has already expired! %s loaves remaining.'.[@$thechosenone.idcode, @$thechosenone.knownname, $thechosenone, $loaves.count]"/>
  <resume label="wait_to_try_again"/>
</do_if>

<pickup_target target="$thechosenone" ship="this"/>

...

EDIT: typo

[graphicboy]

Had to stop at step four since it already got a lot longer than i had anticipated. But i had fun, thanks for that!

That's awesome!

[radcapricorn]

Had to stop at step four since it already got a lot longer than i had anticipated. But i had fun, thanks for that!

All that valuable time taken away from working on the game? How could you!

[Imperial Good]

Taxes

Not too good an idea from a game balance perspective. Players make enough money as is, let alone once they cheese control of every sector and have all AI assets paying them just to function and exist.

Lore wise such tax is a drop in the ocean compared with the money being received from habitable planets. Where as the entire population of all stations in the known universe might be a few hundred thousand, a single planet can have 10 billion or more people on it. This is why the major factions have infinite money since lore wise they practically do.

Trade stations

Does not really make sense. You expect workers to fly huge distances in their XS ships? Also does this mean that station workforce can use a trade station despite being enemy to the trade station owner? Also why per sector and not per cluster? Does not sound like a well thought out plan.

Workers living at factories and needing food and medicine is mirroring the life of modern oil rig or mining workers which have to live at their place of work for many weeks at a time. Any sort of civilian goods system should be separate from that. For example one could have to pay workers wages and to make much of those wages back one could setup leisure or shopping stations. Nearness to such stations attracts workers. One could even have dedicated apartment modules which do not generate workforce but do provide economic consumption.

Narcotics and Pirate Bases

This also does not really make sense. Nothing stops an Argon from consuming Space Fuel, smoking Spaceweed and... doing something with Maja Dust. This is why stations accept all 3 currently.

Additionally these are not hard drugs like in real life and are not meant to have major detrimental effects to society. Hence why all of them are legal in Teladi space and Space Fuel is only illegal in Argon space because of lore based strict licencing laws (in XR you could purchase such licence to ship legally). The reason pirates smuggle them is because some are illegal in some areas of space and hence the people living there are willing to pay premiums for access to them.

Availability of such products should encourage people to move in nearby. They could also serve as a way to make back some of the wages spent on workforce. Their legal or illegal nature would allow one to shift spending patterns onto other goods.

Ship maintenance

Does not make sense from a lore perspective. One can fire an atomic torpedo at a ship and the hull is not even scratched. However you saying pieces of low speed meteorite somehow penetrate the shields and cause damage to hulls? Why is this not a weapon that all factions are using to bypass shields?

There are many ways the need for crew as well as consistent upkeep could be implemented. No need to have ships take damage for no reason.

NPC factions have finite credits

The NPC factions lore wise have access to planet taxation and funding. Hence they practically have infinite money and resources. Although giving them a very large cash injection every hour to simulate this might work.

Making their economy entirely self sufficient (no external source of money) makes them very prone to deadlock. Players could destroy entire NPC factions simply by causing the most costly damage that they cannot recover from.

Workforce and crew

This is prone to economic deadlock. Especially with your previous suggestion. The player might enter a state they cannot recover from due to a downward spiral of more wages than they can afford as well as no factory production due to lack of workers.

6. Habitation module blueprint cost is reduced by about 10 fold, and player starts with a blueprint for a small habitation module depending on their starting race.

You can get L habitation for free by scanning data leaks. One can make data leaks with spacesuit EMP. Not like 10M is even much considering how much money warfs and shipyards print.

AI station management

The AI use their own distribution logic. Their traders move product around based on some black box logic. They purposely avoid shipping too much around so the player can still make a profit by trading.

Shipyard modules vs maintenance modules

Makes no sense that a shipyard or warf cannot refit a ship. The differentiating factor between the two is that shipyards and warfs should cost a lot more to build and run.

L and XL shipyards already do require building drones to work efficiently. Without then each ship can take nearly an hour or more to build.

Crew for ships already comes from nowhere... The exception are resupply ships and carriers which will transfer the crew from them instead.

Prebuilt ships at shipyards

Ship queues

Far better to fix build queues so an actual queue is used rather than the ship which is cheapest being built first.

There used to be such a queue but it prioritized owner orders over others as well as clogged up all production space of the station which could making docking to deliver supplies difficult. Hence it was removed and replaced with no queue instead with ships being built in cheapest order.

Improved OOS combat calculations,

Already does factor in a lot of that for turrets. It is just guns which always hit out of sector...

Your M Plasma turret will not be hitting an S ship any time soon OoS. On the other hand an M Pulse Laser turret will fairly regularly land hits on S ships. However a M Plasma Cannon Mk2 gun or worse still, an M Ion Blaster Mk2 gun, will always land no matter the size or speed of the target, and in the case of Ion Blaster deal full shield damage as hull making it the most powerful OoS gun in the game.

Weapon adjustments

I would rather they fixed auto aiming so it factors in the movement of the firing ship.

Destroying stations

Not viable. One needs to be able to see the plots to avoid overlapping them.

3. Modules under construction can be destroyed.

They already can be destroyed... There is a bug with them preventing them from being targeted automatically as well causing them to regenerate to full hull every time a change to the station is made. This bug will be fixed in a future update.

4. Crew skill increases faster, and increases whenever they are performing the relevant function, not just when they make a profitable sale.

They do increase for unprofitable sales as well. One can even exploit this with an owned station since transfers do not generate experience but trades do.

Jump drives

Defeats the purpose of L and XL ships having such long travel drive wind up time. The lack of them is core to X4 design. For player convenience we have personal teleporter.

1. L and XL ships do not try to go through the back of gates. They simply fly up to the front and go through (provided they are not jumping), none of this “entering from behind” nonsense which adds lots of time to travel.

This "nonsense" is required to avoid L and XL ships shunting other ships when going through gates. Was especially important when collision hull damage was still a concept (removed shortly after release).

L ships should enter through the front except from a side of the top half of the gate. This would allow L ships to enter gates at speed like S and M ships and is viable due to how small L ships are. XL ships should still enter and exit from the back of gates due to how big they are (too much shunting hazard).

Ship collisions

This already exists for shields. It used to exist for Hulls but was removed because too many players complained how difficult it made the game. 90% of my deaths playing X4 have been due to collision hull damage, and seeing how soon that was removed after launch gives one an idea of how hard it is to die in X4.

1. Get rid of it. I personally have no use for it, at all, in any format.

So you want a mechanic removed for everyone just because you do not like it? There is such a thing as a mod...

1. Retrieval missions
-Requirement to actually deliver the item you retrieved, rather than just keep it, to fulfill the mission. I have enough precious rings, fine art, and sensitive data containers already!

The items you keep are not the requested items. The requested items are not tracked and can be considered as tagged along with the items you get.

2. More combat missions
-Based on existing situations rather than scripted pirates or Xenon suddenly appearing the moment you accept the mission.

They are already based on existing situations... When the missions are generated it selects a victim ship from the universe and generates the missions around that.

This is not XR...

4. Mission visibility
-Missions are generated and visible in all sectors, not just the sector your ship is physically in, and are persistent for a while.

Defeats the purpose of the player having to find a mission. They might as well park on the first station they find and never leave.

4. Xenon are the exception, they seek to expand relentlessly.

This is not possible because it would cause the universe to enter a doomed state unless the player intervenes. If this was a 4X game with clear winning conditions and goals it would make sense but for a sandbox where new players might spend the first 40 hours of play accomplishing as good as nothing it does not. If the Xenon are under-tuned to prevent the doomed state from occurring the inverse happens where the Xenon will naturally go extinct after some period of time as the major factions exterminate them.

The way the faction macro logic is set up is designed with this in mind. This is why it looks like not much is happening at times and why the AI is so bad at conquering sectors.

5. Factions build up forces until they have enough to launch a large scale assault, instead of sending ships in piecemeal.

They do this already. The problem is that they build up at the gate to the target sector. Enemy scout ships can end up luring some fraction of the built up fleet into enemy space where it meets its doom. Like wise some defence ships might chase after scout ships and suicide into enemy space.

For example I observed TEL buy dozens of S ships from me which they then placed in Company Regard by the gate to Scale Plate Green. When there were around 70 or 90 of such ships they launched an attack against Scale Plate Green and managed to secure enough footing to build multiple defence platforms. Most of the fleet was eventually killed by the Shipyard because it would lure them in single file and they did not retaliate due to bad fleet logic.

1. You can only have on your person like maybe 20 items, and have to either store in lockboxes or store in your station the rest.

20 is a stupidly low limit. A single destroyed XL ship can drop more. 500 or a 1,000 is more practical.

3. Any player owned station can be designated your HQ, “Deposit inventory” will drop items off at any station designated your HQ.

The feature requires the vacuum tube. This is only available in the Boron tank room area which is only available on the player headquarter.

They do plan to allow one to move the HQ to another sector in a future update.

1. Faction embargos

Does not really make much sense. If you are supplying both sides of a conflict with 50% of their weapons and one of them decides to slam an embargo on the other they are basically shooting themselves in the foot since now you will be supplying 100% of the weapons to their enemy leaving them undersupplied with weapons and likely launch your own doom fleet at them to retaliate for their stupid nonsense.

A better solution is that if one of the factions feels your trading or help is biased towards their enemies then they start making demands from you. Demands are forced missions which failure to accept or complete in time result in massive reputation loss with the demanding faction. Completing them raises your reputation with the demanding faction and rewards you similar to standard missions. Demands might be anything from building stations, delivering combat ships or supplying stations.

[Falcrack]

Not a good idea

I can always count on you to be a Debbie Downer!

But thanks for the feedback! Bear in mind this is my personal wishlist, not a demand for changes to the base game. It represents stuff I would have in my own mod, if I had the skills to make it, and I'm not personally 100% committed to all of the ideas here either, in some cases I was just throwing around ideas. I understand some things would not be to everyone's taste, just stuff that would be to my taste.

[csaba]

On the exploration note I'd wish larger ships had more options, better radar, bigger range on the LRS etc. Maybe trade out some hardpoints or ship stats for these modifiers.

Also wouldn't mind a random sector generator where you can fly through anomalies to find random systems that disappear after you leave them as to not permanently increase the map and cause problems. Would be inline with the lore of the gate shutdowns and be a good mission chain for the ALI faction.