[Mod-AP][In-Dev] X-Timelines: The Syndicate

[TrixX]

You are right about Vanilla, most of the economy is just window dressing and is superfluous. Very little is actually traded and the game spawns stuff left right and centre.

For XTL just like the Rebirth video recently has a living breathing economy. Piracy has an effect on ware distribution, missions are created from attacks on traders, missions are created for trading when there are shortfalls in demand, there are warehouses that stockpile wares to provide buffers for trade within racial clusters.

The races patrol their borders and choose whether to fight or fly in the face of overwhelming odds. They can call in re-enforcements and there are active carrier groups in hostile border areas. Not only that but the player will be able to receive reputation and rewards for assisting in border conflicts as though they had taken a mission.

The other main point was to get missions feeling seamless and part of the experience, rather than only available at stations. The alpha test should have working SOS messages for the player to respond to, with varying degrees of difficulty and reward. (EDIT: The SOS missions are dependant on the Passive Area Mission System which may not make first alpha)

If I made any mistakes above, I'm sure Jack08 will be happy to correct me

[Jack08]

"Were are attempting to accomplish this by making every ware in the game seed from the economy and not spawned from thin air."

First let me start off by saying I'm really looking forward to this mod even though I'm a new fan of these games. I've only been playing X3TC for well almost 400 hours now according to steam.

I just wonder how true the above statement is when it comes to just wares. I'm sure about 80% of the stuff in the game is spawned out of thin air. I've seen pirates just appear in the middle of a sector I've secured with heavy guard on both entrances. No pirate bases in system. So that is true. But for wares like example there are no spawned tractor beams factories in my game. I have not seen one yet, some holds true for many other items that I can't find a factory for I cant remember the name of it but there's a high end Terran weapon I can't find. I would think if the game spawned wares from thin air all the stations would be fully stocked? Is my assessment wrong or have I just not experienced or seen everything yet?

Something TrixX forgot to address... No ship, not even pirates, are spawned from thin air. In-fact the Teladi build pirate ships

We can add factory's to the universe extremely, extremely easily... two script calls i believe it is - so you will have all the factory's you need, from tractor beam to adv sat.

The only excretion to this no spawning rule is the Kha'ak and Xenon, and, when they are implemented, even they will only spawn to get started - they will rely on there own micro economy.

Cool, will it be public alpha? I suppose there will be some bug tracker, will it be public?

Yeah, probably mantis, or forums - not sure which yet - forums probably easier for the majority of people.

[Falcrack]

Questions: How will pirates make a living in XTL? Do they need credits or resources in order to thrive? Will there be any extra rules governing their behavior other than "blow stuff up"? Will they engage in activities to earn themselves money or resources, so as to buy or equip their ships?

[Tiberseptim]

With regard to the new AI - will you mess with the pathing at all so it knows not to attempt to path through a factory complex? It seems that the computational cost of the pathing algorithm probing a several steps into a complex before giving up (it doesn't even always give up and, as people have seen, will actually sometimes attempt to execute a route through one) is a significant part of the performance issues they can create. I wonder if you could create an invisible spherical object around factories - particularly those absorbed into complexes, which any path-finding not towards it's dock would recognize as impassible and immediately path around.

[Jack08]

With regard to the new AI - will you mess with the pathing at all so it knows not to attempt to path through a factory complex? It seems that the computational cost of the pathing algorithm probing a several steps into a complex before giving up (it doesn't even always give up and, as people have seen, will actually sometimes attempt to execute a route through one) is a significant part of the performance issues they can create. I wonder if you could create an invisible spherical object around factories - particularly those absorbed into complexes, which any path-finding not towards it's dock would recognize as impassible and immediately path around.

We have integrated a bounce routine that runs on the AI too, if your not familiar with Litcube's Bounce, it basically inverts the AI's current path and sends them the other way if there about to collide with something. We have also modified the dock script to limit the speed of docking AI ships more aggressively, so you don't run into Weeeeeeee!!... Splat, As much. Unfortunately this is the best we can do, all the pathing is done in the C++ part of the engine, something we have no control over.

Questions: How will pirates make a living in XTL? Do they need credits or resources in order to thrive? Will there be any extra rules governing their behavior other than "blow stuff up"? Will they engage in activities to earn themselves money or resources, so as to buy or equip their ships?

The syndicate are intergalactic arms dealers, They build weapons and ship them to the black market, the Teladi traders then ship them to the rest of the universe, or under-cover pirate traders. It is actually possible to sabotage a races economy my attacking the syndicate as the syndicate are the main weapons produces of the galaxy.

There is a backstory to the syndicate, but its incomplete - basically, the Pirates are now controlled by the Teladi - hence why the Teladi build the ships for the pirates, and pirate shipyards are just a shell that hold a scrapyard, the scrapyard can also ship resources from scrapped ships back to Teladi space.

A potential feature in R2/R2+ is the "Exiles" - they live in space cut off from the rest of the galaxy, and use wormhole projectors to access any system the please at any time, in order to pillage and steal. Naturally the player will be able to join them.

[alex4501]

How will you handle game starts, one of my biggest complaints is the restrictive nature of the native game starts, personally I would like to see a system more like mount and blades, where you pick your race some background options and the resulting choices alter where you start, what ship, how much money, what your factions relation are etc etc.

[TrixX]

TBH we haven't looked into a true sandbox start. We had a few ideas for starts, but they are something that will be addressed later in the process. We are currently focusing on getting an alpha out that's fully playable

[Jack08]

We have just finalized the universe map for XTL. I will make a more user friendly version of this when we get to release which includes shipyard locations, but for now, here is a dev preview:
http://download.xtimelines.net/Bod2.svg

Red Lines are Hostile Jumps
Green Lines are Friendly Jumps
Black (dashed) lines are Piracy Routes
Black (solid) lines are standard connections

Dashed Lines are Gate Connections
Solid Lines are TOA's (unless linking to a NULL sector, in which case its a gate)

(Note: Null means Unknown)

This has all been imported into the game (using Python, XTL would be dead without python!) - and were going through and setting up all the asteroid fields.

[alex4501]

What happens if you make a hostile jump from one sector to another if, do your current faction standings make a difference.

Looks like an interesting setup though

[Jack08]

What happens if you make a hostile jump from one sector to another if, do your current faction standings make a difference.

Looks like an interesting setup though

There's nothing special about the jump or gate itself. Its just that they are border systems - with military bases, so they are usually patrolled.

Perhaps not in the first release, but just after, XTL will have the next evolution of True Relations (From improved races) built in, which makes it impossible to be friendly with the entire universe, meaning that if you do allot of work for the argon, and get your Argon rep high - naturally your paranid rep is going to sink. The only race in the galaxy you can interact with without effecting other's is the Teladi.

[alex4501]

Will there be stock exchanges? I find it quiet nice when long hauling to play the stocks

[Jack08]

Will there be stock exchanges? I find it quiet nice when long hauling to play the stocks

No, They were the first things to be permanently disabled in XTL when we migrated to AP. They violate all sandbox economic rules by spawning credits from thin air.

[Vayde]

I never use them in AP, to easy to get credits. The initial concept was a really nice idea though, pity it came up against human nature

Vayde

[TrixX]

Will there be stock exchanges? I find it quiet nice when long hauling to play the stocks

No, They were the first things to be permanently disabled in XTL when we migrated to AP. They violate all sandbox economic rules by spawning credits from thin air.

Much like in real life hence our lovely financial situations

[alex4501]

Any chance of some new screenshots maybe showing mining drones or other interesting things

[TrixX]

Just getting the sectors organised at the moment, once we have a few good shots we'll be sure to up them

[bluenog143]

Will there be stock exchanges? I find it quiet nice when long hauling to play the stocks

No, They were the first things to be permanently disabled in XTL when we migrated to AP. They violate all sandbox economic rules by spawning credits from thin air.

Yeah, the stock exchanges are basically in-game cheats; as if there weren't enough spawning and GoD tricks in X3

Much like in real life hence our lovely financial situations

[xfromxbtf]

is this likely to happen before rebirth?

[alex4501]

I hope so, It will be a different game experience but I would prefer to play them separately at least for a while any how :/

[alex4501]

Any news how's that pre alpha build coming along?