Things I want to see in Rebirth

[belgara]

"Things I want to see in Rebirth"

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Police/custom force at the endpoint (or startpoint) of super highways and gates.
Even symbolic (weak) defense : it could be stationary laser towers, drones, close patrol etc...

It sounded odd -on previous games- to jump in a supposed belonging enemy sector and flying freely long time until retaliation coming, if ever!

---

[cezarip]

I would like to see at least a partially dynamic universe. Have the Unknown Sectors/Unclaimed Space randomly generated (including contents) for each new game. Give it really a feeling of unknown space, let us explore it as such!

[AllIWantisaXenonK]

Yeah, there was a lot of predictability with exploring the X-Universe. The Races and their products have become so well known to us players that they are no longer seem exotic or even alien, and have in a way lost their niche value.

The Unfocused Jump was really cool though. It kinda reminded me how that Battlestar Galactica Series played out..with the human fleet jumping around to almost anywhere where the Cyclons couldn't catch them. Unfocused Jump to somewhere and space seemed dark and forboding.. like it truly was the final frontier.

[Spero]

BEAM weapons that are not over powered and can follow targets with the turret AI.

I'd be happy with beam and area weapons that don't lag. Those things are vicious on CPU time!

That's not true. I can only speak for EVE and Starcraft, but in both, missile attacks are more cpu intensive.

The reason is very simple; a beam is just a line from A to B. A missile is a new entity in the game world that has it's own position, velocity, collision and objective.

By missile, I mean any projectile.

[InFlamesForEver]

BEAM weapons that are not over powered and can follow targets with the turret AI.

I'd be happy with beam and area weapons that don't lag. Those things are vicious on CPU time!

That's not true. I can only speak for EVE and Starcraft, but in both, missile attacks are more cpu intensive.

The reason is very simple; a beam is just a line from A to B. A missile is a new entity in the game world that has it's own position, velocity, collision and objective.

By missile, I mean any projectile.

I think he means vicious on FPS. No their not CPU intensive, but the vanilla beam weapons do take my fps down quite a lot. Lets not even get started on the ion d lol

[Spero]

I think he means vicious on FPS. No their not CPU intensive, but the vanilla beam weapons do take my fps down quite a lot. Lets not even get started on the ion d lol

Well there's no logical reason for that.

http://nargaque.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/warpray.jpg

I play a lot with the starcraft editor, and know that this rather pretty looking beam happens to be a 2-dimensional sprite with about 1 second of animations.

I think it's all down to implementation. Actually I even think X only uses 8 or so interlaced squares to generate their beams, so I'm a little curious why anyone would lag with them?

[InFlamesForEver]

I think he means vicious on FPS. No their not CPU intensive, but the vanilla beam weapons do take my fps down quite a lot. Lets not even get started on the ion d lol

Well there's no logical reason for that.

http://nargaque.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/warpray.jpg

I play a lot with the starcraft editor, and know that this rather pretty looking beam happens to be a 2-dimensional sprite with about 1 second of animations.

I think it's all down to implementation. Actually I even think X only uses 8 or so interlaced squares to generate their beams, so I'm a little curious why anyone would lag with them?

IDK, I don't take much of a hit, its probably more to do with being close to a huge ship. The ion d however, that is not a very frame rate friendly bullet model. I take at least a 10fps hit when using that thing. Its a good job XRM gets rid of it for a bullet instead lol

[toxima]

Hide behind asteroids (or other large objects). This is what i would like to be able to do in Rebirth. After some searching i found it odd nobody had suggested this(here in Rebirth sub-forum). Or i just searched with wrong words.

I don't know about X2 or X1, But this seems impossible in X3, radar/map/enemies see everywhere in their radius; behind stations, asteroids, capitals etc. which i always found a bit odd.

Would be fun to hide a carrier or a cargo ship or just the player ship behind an asteroid, launch surprise attack on hapless trader(s), collect their cargo and hide again.

Or a whole fleet behind a station, moon or a planet. Or inside a nebula or something. Like those dust clouds in Freelancer which limited visibility.

[KRM398]

Toxima...OK hiding behind a planet in X is possible, but your forgetting the huge distances to get TO the planet from the gates. I tried it once, it took me 45 minutes with a Buster to get behind a planet. They are really there, but they aren't as close as they seem and you need to understand we aren't using speeds that are very realistic compared to space. The X games used speeds of 1000 mph or less, so traveling outside the gate system took forever, but it was possible..give it a try. A cap-ship would take an hour, real time to get behind a planet from the gates, and COULD hide there, but it cant 'jump out and attack' because the distance is too great and the ship too slow.

Inside the 'squares' that are the gate system are satellites that help with navigation, we all can buy them and they are used to help scan for enemy's within those closed areas. The game itself imagines they are always present, and the government places them to help travelers, so seeing all around stations is totally possible and just think if you could hide like that, every enemy could how about a Khaak heavy cluster coming popping out from behind the tradings station and attacking you as you fly by?lol

[Blazefree]

what i can see the game is going to be, i will buy it, with one condition. It must be optimized!! i found the optimization problem in terran conflict and i had a nice computer. There are a lot of games with similar requirements and they go far better than X games... i pray for a good optimized game

[toxima]

Toxima...OK hiding behind a planet in X is possible, but your forgetting the huge distances to get TO the planet from the gates. I tried it once, it took me 45 minutes with a Buster to get behind a planet. They are really there, but they aren't as close as they seem and you need to understand we aren't using speeds that are very realistic compared to space. The X games used speeds of 1000 mph or less, so traveling outside the gate system took forever, but it was possible..give it a try. A cap-ship would take an hour, real time to get behind a planet from the gates, and COULD hide there, but it cant 'jump out and attack' because the distance is too great and the ship too slow.

Inside the 'squares' that are the gate system are satellites that help with navigation, we all can buy them and they are used to help scan for enemy's within those closed areas. The game itself imagines they are always present, and the government places them to help travelers, so seeing all around stations is totally possible and just think if you could hide like that, every enemy could how about a Khaak heavy cluster coming popping out from behind the tradings station and attacking you as you fly by?lol

About the planets in previous X games; yes i am fully aware of that. But since the areas are supposed to be much much larger in Rebirth, i got the impression that the trade lanes and whatnot are spread around stars & planets.

And the enemies hiding as well, well personally i would find that refreshing; getting ambushed by a group of pirates(or a Khaak fleet, though they usually tend to shoot at everything, usually a good sign theres trouble ahead). Of course this happening behind every rock and station would become annoying.

[SuckMyNova]

-) Triple screen support please, but without the fisheye effect

-) Loose the ridiculous antennas on all of the ship models

-) Interactive sex scenes

With anything else I pretty much trust Egosoft

[Cissed]

-) Triple screen support please, but without the fisheye effect

-) Loose the ridiculous antennas on all of the ship models

-) Interactive sex scenes

With anything else I pretty much trust Egosoft

Sex scenes?

(imagines boron and argon... )

*facepalm*

why not play ME instead?

Anyway, I would like to see Randomness. Accidents, Natural Disasters.
Like a sector wide solar flare, where an EMP is caused by a supernova, all shields are down for a few mins.
or Docking clamps of a station is damaged. No docking until repair crews arrive.
Station Manager's son is caught for using spaceweed, Station production slowed.

You know what I mean.

-) Interactive sex scenes

[Aragosnat]

-) Triple screen support please, but without the fisheye effect

-) Loose the ridiculous antennas on all of the ship models

-) Interactive sex scenes

With anything else I pretty much trust Egosoft

Sex scenes?

(imagines boron and argon... )

*facepalm*

why not play ME instead?

Anyway, I would like to see Randomness. Accidents, Natural Disasters.
Like a sector wide solar flare, where an EMP is caused by a supernova, all shields are down for a few mins.
or Docking clamps of a station is damaged. No docking until repair crews arrive.
Station Manager's son is caught for using spaceweed, Station production slowed.

You know what I mean.

-) Interactive sex scenes

You forgot station manager having sex with another man. But, any who... Being able to have the PHQ earily on as well as being able to build another one after the first one is destroyed or needs to be destoryed (a.k.a my adopted sector will be kicking me out soon due to to many ships whinding up in my possesion for free).

Being able to salvage those dealict ships and stations for loot that we so often see in some sectors.

Having pirates actually pick up cargo from ships destroyed and then leaving area to go back to their base.

Having cutom avatar looks which may or may not have a slight impact on the universe.

[werewolves?]

i want to be able to upgrade my marines with better weapons and armour. And give the squad a name . Also a specialist marine frigate that trains and delivers them.

[Notchi]

Things I would like to see:
- New UI ( more futuristic, user friendly )
- Better micromanagement
- Some nice graphical income reports ( possibly even income per hour/day...)
- Better supply solutions
- Storage system on your stations ( so you can put missiles, shields, weapons for safekeeping/ fleet supply demands.)
- Fleet supply system ( for instance you put 250k credits on a station for fleet supply for the fleet that belongs to that station, and you only get a message do you want to add another 250k after the original money is gone... rather than wasting your own time doing that stuff.)
- Money making you life easier ( e.g. you pay 10% more to get the stuff deliver to you by the selling company and thus saving you some time)
- Various uses for money ( e.g. you can use % of your income to pay of pirates not to attack you... to attack you rival ... to go to the supply system)

[KRM398]

Wow, Notchi is quite the businessman, lol. OK things I would like...:

1) remove the M7M altogether, let corvettes and frigates carry those missiles instead. ( No, no cluster fire or any way to fire more than 4 at once, ever)

2) Use the M7M body for a new attack craft, carrying maybe 50 marines and having heavy shields so that boarding at close range(less than 1 km) is instantaneous, using beaming technology, but the mother ship must stay close until the enemy is captured or their marine are forced to withdraw.

3)Bombers carried on carriers just like heavy fighters, only allowing less, for instance if you build a 'bomber carrier' loaded just with them, the max number of ship it can carry gets cut in half, their bigger and more heavy to haul but they need carrier support just like any heavy fighter. so 1 bomber = 2 fighters as far as cargo goes.

4) Jump drive and transporter devises on every cap ship from the factory, starting with corvettes.

5) cargo life support systems on all ships big enough to carry marines... from the factory also. no one would sell a ship that carries 20 marines without it, thats stupid.

6) enough electrical power to let ships use their equipment well, bombers and TM class ships are energy starved and that makes no sense that they can carry weapons for fighter defense but not enough power to run them, make bombers and TM class have an even 100 meg in power instead of the 34 or so they have now, hows that supposed to run hepts?

[Aragosnat]

Wow, Notchi is quite the businessman, lol. OK things I would like...:

1) remove the M7M altogether, let corvettes and frigates carry those missiles instead. ( No, no cluster fire or any way to fire more than 4 at once, ever)

2) Use the M7M body for a new attack craft, carrying maybe 50 marines and having heavy shields so that boarding at close range(less than 1 km) is instantaneous, using beaming technology, but the mother ship must stay close until the enemy is captured or their marine are forced to withdraw.

3)Bombers carried on carriers just like heavy fighters, only allowing less, for instance if you build a 'bomber carrier' loaded just with them, the max number of ship it can carry gets cut in half, their bigger and more heavy to haul but they need carrier support just like any heavy fighter. so 1 bomber = 2 fighters as far as cargo goes.

4) Jump drive and transporter devises on every cap ship from the factory, starting with corvettes.

5) cargo life support systems on all ships big enough to carry marines... from the factory also. no one would sell a ship that carries 20 marines without it, thats stupid.

6) enough electrical power to let ships use their equipment well, bombers and TM class ships are energy starved and that makes no sense that they can carry weapons for fighter defense but not enough power to run them, make bombers and TM class have an even 100 meg in power instead of the 34 or so they have now, hows that supposed to run hepts?

You're not supposed to use hept's. You're supposed to use IRE's.

Also. Every ship should be able to carry marines too. HEy. Even if you could not use them. We should be able to shuttle them over.

[UberWaffe]

[Off-Topic]Hmm... 10 days old. Hope I am not necro-ing[/Off-Topic]

WARNING: Massive post ahead. Man the life boats!

Ooh, so much to list. I'll split it into sections.
Also, a lot of these already mentioned.
And even if only the means to mod these (i.e. tie-in points, engine, etc.) is done, I'd be more than happy.
Lastly, don't shoot me for naming things from Freelancer. It got the dog-fight and combat down well, so why not learn from it? (Yes, I know it mucked up all capital ships, and had a stale economy, and loads of other stuff, but I say take the good and leave the bad).

More technical details covered in modding and engine section.
==Gameplay - Combat==

1. Complete overhaul of missiles - Weaponslots
--Reason: Missiles should not just be a choice of cargospace vs. damage. (A bit more like Freelancer)
--Aspect: Think/Fight
--Explanation: Like in real life, missiles should take up weapon slots on smaller fighters. Thus a choice between anti-fighter and anti-'large'. I would not make all weapon slots missile-launcher/torpedo compatible though. (I.E. so that you can still have a difference between fighters and bombers).
For smaller missiles this could be a missile launcher pod, carrying multiple missiles, and for larger missiles (Ex. torpedoes) it is a one-shot deal until you can land and rearm.
Larger frigates or capital ships (Real life frigate ships) can have launcher arrays that can auto-reload.

2. Complete overhaul of missile defences
--Reason: Normal weapons should not act as missile defense
--Aspect: Think/Fight
--Explanation: I'd rather see missiles countered by specialized equipment. Counter-measure deployers (chance for smart missile to target countermeasure), missile jammers (smart missile tracking stops, like dumbfire missiles), missile hackers (i.e. redirects smart missile to new enemy target), anti-missile point defense (actually targets and destroyes missiles, but near useless against ships), etc. Maybe even some way-out stuff like EMP blast, disables ship but gives last-ditch attempt to stop missile swarm.
That way there is also an advantage to using a dumbfire missile.

3. Anti-Capital missiles for nearly all fighter classes:
--Reason: Fighters should be able to scuttle large ships when in groups, and specifcally outfitted for that purpose.
--Aspect: Think/Fight
--Explanation: The WW2 Bismarck battleship had over 44 AA guns and yet got torpedo-ed by aircraft. As above, not all fighters (Ex. scouts) can carry the largest missiles, or many of them, but all fighters should be able to pose a threat to capital ships when in groups and properly armed.

4. Less extreme differences between classes (types).
--Reason: Weaker ships become near utterly obsolete once player has enough money.
--Aspect: Fight
--Explanation: I support roles for ships, as in scouts, bombers, fighters, strong-and-slow vs. weak-and-agile. But an M5 has no chance in hell against a M3, unless the M3 has no equipment. I'd rather have scout class ships be the only ones capable of fitting the highest tech scanners, bombers the best torpedoes, fighters the best weapons, etc. One thing that must be tuned is the huge shield gaps between classes.

5. Tone shields down, tone hulls up
--Reason: Ships currently go boom 1 second after shields poof.
--Aspect: Fight
--Explanation: Hulls should be able to take a real beating, possibly even more than shields. I mean, hull costs money to repair, can only be repaired while landed, and you can lose equipment while your hull gets pounded (though currently this rarely happens as you just blow up).
Shields should be weaker, but recharge faster, with an added dead-time when drained completely. (See Freelancer). Downed shields should be serious, not instantly fatal.

6. Equipment damage
--Reason: Currently there but plays no real role other than occasional annoyance
--Aspect: Fight
--Explanation: When taking hull damage, equipment should take damage as well. Equipment should not get destroyed (have to find and buy new one) but get disabled until repaired (cost of repairs vs. performance impact until repaired). Similar to, but less controllable than, capital ship module damage.

7. Weapon damage classes/types
--Reason: Current weapon choices semi bland
--Aspect: Think/Fight
--Explanation: Currently it is a matter of sticking the most damaging weapons on your ship that won't eat the reactor, and maybe make sure you have some anti-fighter capabilities. I'd like to see more diversity. More autocannon (physical slug) weapons that penetrate shields. Weapons that do more damage to one type of shield/hull, and less to another. Etc. X3:TC did ALOT better in this regard, but some more freedom here would be awesome.

8. Shield and hull types
--Reason: No thinking involved with picking shields at the moment
--Aspect: Think/Fight
--Explanation: As above, more diversity. Shields that have lower maximum capacities, but recharge quicker. Shields that have shorter dead-time. Shields that near-nullify one weapon type but are vulnerable to all others. Etc. Hulls that are stronger, but more expensive to repair. Hulls that are weaker, but slowly repair themselves. Etc.




==Gameplay - Economy==

1. Make secondary resources boost production
--Reason: Secondary resources is currently a means to make AI eat useless junk to stimulate economy.
--Aspect: Trade/Build/Think
--Explanation: All stations (now modules) should demand secondary resources of some kind. These should not be required for production, but should boost production if provided. For instance, food should be a secondary resource, as you are paying the workers (see next point) so giving them free food makes them happier and boost production. Also, currently they eat insane amounts of the stuff.
This gives the player more choice. Do I supply the factory with only its primary requirements? Or do I go through the extra effort to boost its production? (I.e. more factories vs. better factories.)

2. Running costs and salaries
--Reason: You currently can't really lose money
--Aspect: Think/Trade
--Explanation: Currently, other than stuffing their faces, I don't pay the hordes of workers I never see on my factories. If I fail dismally to provide one of my factories with resources, it sits there (not earning anything, yes) but costing me not even a penny until I can fix it. If the factory had running costs it would go bankrupt (and then be scrapped perhaps?) if I did nothing.
I do not advocate massive running costs (to the point where the slightest loss of production is disasterous) but a very poorly placed factory, or massive supply line disruptions (curse you pirates!), should be serious.

3. No hardcoded production and storage numbers for stations (modules)
--Reason: It's unflexible, and limits more interesting economies
--Aspect: Think/Build
--Explanation: I'd like to see some factories that perhaps eat more raw resources per product produced, but produce much faster (10 energy cells per beef patty, as opposed to 8, but it takes only 1 minute, instead of 1:30). This mean more possible variety in factory types as well.
By all means the balancing (the values you assign to these) can be done according to a fixed formulae, but don't hardcode the formulae into the game. If the game comes out with a perfectly-blanaced-everything-produces-20%-more-than-it-consumes-value-wise that's fine, but please let me tweak it per factory type.

4. Multiple products, including Secondary Products
--Reason: Currently not possible
--Aspect: Think/Trade
--Explanation: Allow a module (not multiple modules together, each making its own) to produce multiple products. Allow products for the module to be specified as primary or secondary. Primary simply means that there must be storage for the product before production can begin. Secondary means it will be stored is there is space, but if there isn't, then we simply destroy/vent the excess.
This will allow for interesting things such as factories that produce 'Depleted E-Cells' as secondary products. Solar power plants can then use (recharge) these instead of crystals to produce E-cells. (Also see next point). And other factories that produce 'Toxic Waste' as a primary product, that unless you can haul it away, stops production. (Correct action is to ship it to recycling/disposal plants, but you can illegally dump it in space. Just watch out for police and environmentalists... SAVE THE SPACE FLIES!)

5. Factories should have more complex resources requirements (AND/OR checks)
--Reason: Flexibility in economy
--Aspect: Think
--Explanation: I'd love to see factories be able to substitute one resource for another. For example, as above, using depleted E-cells instead of crystal. Along with adjustable production numbers (point 3) you can make it simply be a partial substitute (still need some crystal) or total (green economy). Other awesome combinations also possible, such as having two ore and two silicon types (low grade and high grade for each). You can use low grade, but require more per product for it.

6. Planetary Docks (Planets eats/makes products at bad trade rates) (This is more a visual thing than a gameplay change)
--Reason: An economy needs consumers and I personally don't like the magical vanishing act at the moment
--Aspect: Trade
--Explanation: I'd simply make stations (low orbit around planets, ships to and from planet population) that consume a lot of products (massive amounts, as much as super-massive stations can produce), but pay very low rates for it. They also produce some goods, but charge very high prices for it.
Additionally, I would make these prices vary very little, so that they are always bad deals, but you can always dump your stuff there, if you have no other choice.

7. Negative prices for products (I.e. you pay me to take this from you)
--Reason: New economy type, waste disposal
--Aspect: Trade
--Explanation: As mentioned before, if you can make factories produce waste, then you can build an economy around it. Example: You can build a waste facility that produces nothing, but consumes toxic waste. People pay the facility to drop waste there.
Normal trade still applies (If the waste producer is willing to pay me 25cr per barrel (I pay -25cr), and the waste facility will charge me 5cr (I pay -5cr), I make 20cr profit (Sell price - Buy price = -5cr - -25cr = +20cr Profit). Where normally for example E-cells (Sell price - Buy price = +11cr - +9cr = +2cr Profit)




==Gameplay - Politics==

1. More factions (closer to Freelancer)
--Reason: X3:TC aimed for this. Just flesh it out more.
--Aspect: Think
--Explanation: Not much to say here.

2. More guilds, more active guilds
--Reason: Guilds don't really exist at the moment, mostly introduced by mods
--Aspect: Trade/Fight/Build
--Explanation: All guilds should have a HQ, and should always offer multiple missions related to them. Trade guild, buy-and-sell, transport. Bounty hunter's guild, search and destroy. Miner's guild, scan asteroid fields, mine X. Etc.
Random missions should still be available round and about, but you should be guaranteed of a specific mission type at the guild HQ.
I'd also like to see the player being able to hire a guild for a specific mission. Trade guild, bring me X amount of Y product, at max price + fee (as the mission for you, just you dish it out). Assassin's guild, kill ship or station X for fee. Etc.

3. Avoid "Everyone loves me!" possibilities.
--Reason: Being a pure trader is fine, but having not even the pirate attack you is boring
--Aspect: Think/Fight
--Explanation: The improved races mod(s) clearly showcases why this is awesome.

4. Perpetual Conflict
--Reason: Some people just don't get along
--Aspect: Fight
--Explanation: There should be factions that always hate one another. Ties in to above two points.

5. Political Fringe Benefits
--Reason: Expand on the 'We will sell you this when we like you this much' concept
--Aspect: Trade/Fight (possibly .../Build/Think)
--Explanation: More benefits (ultimate rewards) to being perfect friends. Higher selling prices, lower buying prices at planetary docks/trade docks. Faction will actively protect you (not just help out if they are around, but actually send response fighters to help you). Shares manufacturing/management infrastructure (higher production at factories/type of factory). Etc.
Motivates the player with more than just 'I want to buy/sell X with you'. I would make the ultimate rewards of fighting factions (military) be active protection. Of corporations, improved prices/production. Of pirates, increased raids against your foes. Of police, no longer scans you for illegal cargo (trust you... the fools).
You should lose fringe benefits when your relationship drops.

6. Scaling Animosity
--Reason: Harder endgame
--Aspect: Trade/Fight/Build/Think
--Explanation: Usually once you have credits flowing in at a good pace, things become bland rather quickly. [Oh, so the Paranid hate me? Well say hello to my ten battleships.] I suggest that the greater the player grows, the more specifically other corporations and powers targets him/her. Especially those that hate the player. I mean, full scale raids that target unprotected factories, fake raids to pull away defenders and then real raids to take down factories, pirates specifically targeting your traders, other corporations underpricing your goods, secret political deals to put trade embargoes against you.
Things to mix it up, essentially.




==Engine and Modding==
This section repeats much of what is already listed, just with added technical detail.

1. Price range modifiers for station types
--Reason: Some special stations (like planetary docks above, or current trade/equipment/etc. docks) need their price ranges to be fixed, or different from normal supply/demand
--Aspect: Modding
--Explanation: For modders to define more flexible stations (a trade dock that has slightly varying prices).
--Technical Detail: Station Class should have '.MinPriceMultiplier', '.MaxPriceMultiplier', '.AveragePriceMultiplier' for both resources and products. I would not do it per product/resource, but hey, maybe useful?

2. Shield/Weapon/Hull types, damage modifiers, recharge/repair rates, dead-time, maximum capacity, weapon damage, weapon mount type
--Reason: To create some (NOTE: SOME) rock/paper/scissors relations and other way-out combinations
--Aspect: Modding
--Explanation: Allows more diversity with weapons/shields/hulls. Allows modders to create more content and expand game life (<- Yeah, blatant marketing there)
--Technical Detail: New tables (in files) that define Shield types, Weapon Types, Hull types.
I'd dissociate weapon types to what a ship can mount. I'd rather give weapons a new attribute '.MountType', that defines on what type of slot this weapon can be mounted. Ships then define what '.MountType' they can handle in their separate hardpoints. (Exactly like X3:TC works now, just a syntax change really, which would allow more weapon types)
I'd give similar '.MountType' to shields and hulls, so that you can define
New tables (in files) that define for each weapon type, a multiplier to damage against each shield and hull type. I'd include missiles in having weapon types.
I wouldn't make the rock/paper/scissors relations too extreme, except for way-out cases. I'd keep damage multiplier range for different types within 0.7 to 1.4 range.
I'd also use the multipliers to bring into effect the shield and hull damage, so you don't specify separate shield and hull damage for a weapon, just multipliers. If hull damage should be very low, and shield high (ion weapon), just give hull damage multipliers of 0.02, and shield of 2.0, or some such.
Also, I'd specify penetration percentage (0.0 to 1.0) for shields to weapon types that specify how much of that weapon's damage will bypass the shield. (That way it is easy to specify new shield ignoring weapons).
Shield Class should have '.Type' (To do the shield type multiplier of damage upon impacts), '.RechargeRate' (How quickly it recharges), '.DeadTime' (How long it stays down when complete drained), '.InstantRechargeAfterDeadTime' (What percentage of the maximum it instantly recharges to after recovering from dead time), '.MountType' (For mounting similar to weapons, allowing only certain ships to mount certain shields, which would not only limit maximum shield strength as now, but also shield types), other current attributes such as '.maximum'
Hull (Armor) Class should have '.Type' (To do the hull type multiplier of damage upon impacts), '.RepairRate' (How quickly it repairs itself, typically 0 for hulls), '.RepairCostMultiplier' (The cost of repairing this hull is multiplied by this), '.MountType' (For mounting similar to weapons, allowing cheaper fighter armor and more expensive capital ship armor, and such), '.EquipmentDamageRate' (How easily equipment can get damaged, as multiple of normal)
NOTE: The hull mentioned here would not specify the amount of hitpoints a ship has (the ship type does that) it would specify the armor plating added (i.e. damage multipliers used). I'd specify one hull (armor) type as unarmored (that simply has a 1.0 multiplier to all damages, 0.5 multiplier to repaircost, and 0 repairrate, and make all new ships start out with that).

3. No difference between missiles and lasers
--Reason: For missile overhaul and more diversity
--Aspect: Modding
--Explanation: As described way above, I'd replace missiles with launchers. In fact, there should be no difference between any weapons (lasers or missiles). A missile launcher is simply a weapon with an ammo requirement, that launches a projectile that may be capable of tracking. In fact, if you properly define a 'Projectile' class, there should be no difference whatsoever. In fact, X3:TC already does this for lasers, it just handles missiles separately for legacy reasons (I assume).
A torpedo launcher would be dirt cheap, as it is literally a clamp. It is the torpedo that is the expensive part.
In fact, I'd keep all missile launchers very cheap, as the cost is in the ammo you buy for them.
--Technical Detail: Projectile class. The stuff spawned by a weapon when it fires. A projectile has stats such as '.Type' (WeaponType), '.Damage' (Actual weapon doesn't have this), '.Speed', '.RateOfTurn' (Can it turn? Like a missile? And what stops me from defining some energy weapon that guides it projectiles with a magnetic field or somesuch?), etc.
So a dumbfire missile is no different from a PPC projectile, and smart missiles simply have a Rate Of Turn greater than 0.
In code you could define child classes for DumbProjectiles/Lasers (no RateOfTurn) and SmartProjectiles/Missiles (RateOfTurn), as only smartprojectiles need to be processed for course adjustments. But I'd keep the method for spawning them (by mounted weapons) the same.
A projectile can simply have a flag to indicate it is a missile of not (I.E. can be affected by missile countermeasures/defenses).

4. Station modules, resources and products
--Reason: For mentioned economy changes, ease of modding
--Aspect: Modding
--Explanation: What is needed should be apparent from the ==Gameplay - Economy== sections
--Technical Detail: Examples

Code: Select all

Module.ProductionBatch[1].ResourcesNeeded = (([Item:Quanity] AND [Item:Quanity]) OR [Item:Quanity]) AND [Item:Quanity]
Module.ProductionBatch[1].ProductsCreated = [Item:Quanity] AND [Item:Quanity]
Module.ProductionBatch[1].TimePerBatch = 60 (in seconds)
Module.Storage = [Item:MaxQuanity:ResourcePrimary/ResourceSecondary/ProductPrimary/ProductSecondary]
Module.RunningCost = 50 (per minute perhaps? Represents salaries + operating costs)

{to fascilitate secondary resources boosting production, allow multiple batches to be specified, and a production line for each batch. So that one batch, if busy, can prevent another.
Then simply let the station check through the batches, 1 to X, executing as many as possible.}
Consider the solar power plant, deciding to use either crystals or depleted e-cells (do-able in one batch), and can have its production boosted by using an 'overcharge conduit'.
Module.ProductionBatch[1].ResourcesNeeded = ([Depleted E cells:5000] AND [Crystal:10] AND [Conduit:1]) OR ([Crystal:50] AND [Conduit:1])
Module.ProductionBatch[1].ProductsCreated = [E cells:14000]
Module.ProductionBatch[1].TimePerBatch = 40 (in seconds)
Module.ProductionBatch[1].ProductionLineOccupied = 1 (just a number, but once a line is occupied, another batch that also wants to use the line cannot start until that line is free)

Module.ProductionBatch[2].ResourcesNeeded = ([Depleted E cells:5000] AND [Crystal:10]) OR [Crystal:50]
Module.ProductionBatch[2].ProductsCreated = [E cells:7000]
Module.ProductionBatch[2].TimePerBatch = 60 (in seconds)
Module.ProductionBatch[2].ProductionLineOccupied = 1 (Also line one, so if the solar power plant had a conduit and sufficient resources, it would have already started batch 1 on line 1, so batch 2 cannot start on line 1, so is not executed.)
{As long as enough of the secondary resource is provided, the solar power plant module will always execute the higher boosted production batch, eating the secondary resources}
{No special handling for boosting production from secondary resources is needed, just proper handling of the normal production queues}

{for doing planetary docks, it should be possible to specify no products per batch, and no resources per batch, as well as multiple batches per module}
{to eat resources}
Module.ProductionBatch[1].ResourcesNeeded = [Item:Quanity]
Module.ProductionBatch[1].ProductsCreated = none
Module.ProductionBatch[1].TimePerBatch = 60 (in seconds)
Module.ProductionBatch[1].ProductionLineOccupied = 1 (Note that all the production lines differ, so these batches never have to wait for one another)
Module.ProductionBatch[2].ResourcesNeeded = [Item:Quanity]
Module.ProductionBatch[2].ProductsCreated = none
Module.ProductionBatch[2].TimePerBatch = 60 (in seconds)
Module.ProductionBatch[2].ProductionLineOccupied = 2
Module.ProductionBatch[3].ResourcesNeeded = [Item:Quanity]
Module.ProductionBatch[3].ProductsCreated = none
Module.ProductionBatch[3].TimePerBatch = 60 (in seconds)
Module.ProductionBatch[3].ProductionLineOccupied = 3
{to spawn resources}
Module.ProductionBatch[4].ResourcesNeeded = none
Module.ProductionBatch[4].ProductsCreated = [Item:Quanity]
Module.ProductionBatch[4].TimePerBatch = 60 (in seconds)
Module.ProductionBatch[4].ProductionLineOccupied = 4
Module.ProductionBatch[5].ResourcesNeeded = [Item:Quanity]
Module.ProductionBatch[5].ProductsCreated = none
Module.ProductionBatch[5].TimePerBatch = 60 (in seconds)
Module.ProductionBatch[5].ProductionLineOccupied = 5
Module.ProductionBatch[6].ResourcesNeeded = [Item:Quanity]
Module.ProductionBatch[6].ProductsCreated = none
Module.ProductionBatch[6].TimePerBatch = 60 (in seconds)
Module.ProductionBatch[6].ProductionLineOccupied = 6

{For waste disposal}
Product.MinPrice = -40
Product.AveragePrice = -50
Product.MaxPrice = -60

{For running a casino}
Module_Casino.ProductionBatch[1].ResourcesNeeded = [SpaceFuel:100] AND [Vacationers:50] AND [Spaceweed:50]
Module_Casino.ProductionBatch[1].ProductsCreated = [Credits:25000] AND [Moneyless Vacationers:50]
Module_Casino.ProductionBatch[1].TimePerBatch = 60 (in seconds)
Module_Casino.Storage = [Vacationers:500:ResourcePrimary] AND [Spacefuel:500:ResourcePrimary] AND [Spaceweed:500:ResourcePrimary] AND [Moneyless Vacationers:500:ProductPrimary] (Credits need no storage)

Okay, I'm done.

EDIT: Okay, I wasn't. Please don't ban me.
Added a point under politics.
EDIT2: Fixed silly spelling mistakes and a really dumb math error.

[Dr2i]

^
Can I have your brain?

I first thought: "what the... I'm not gonna read all that!". Then I read 1 or 2 points and well now I'v read the whole thing.

Very nice ideas/ observations, even though some are already present or being taken care off. The developers should well get inspired by this (hopefully).

BTW I especially like the casino idea, it makes a lot more sense then sending the space fuel/ space weed to trading docks where it'll just disappear. You actually got the consumers in the production.