[Predictable idea is predictable] Offline ventures

[Kadatherion]

Well, let's get it out of our system, somebody's going to request it anyway soon enough, it's the latest elephant in the room.

With modded games we can't (for obvious reasons) send our ships on ventures, we can only receive them. As Egosoft, though, provided us with the station modules and UI needed for ventures, I can see a mod for an offline replacement that works natively with them. The ship isn't sent in any other player's universe, of course, but a script could just temporarily remove the ship, calculate the chances of success based on a set amount of variables (ship class, equipment, crew skill level etc, all relative to the "difficulty level" of the venture), and then have her come back (or not) with some appropriate reward, mimicking the vanilla ones (like exceptional ship mods and the like, the crew gaining good XP from ventures is especially appealing imo).

Thoughts? Anybody interested in tackling it? Is there something hardcoded in the UI that could prevent modders from using the ventures assets that we may not yet know of?

[vukica]

there's no reason a script couldn't mimic the behaviour. as always, it'a "just" a matter of coding it.

[Kadatherion]

there's no reason a script couldn't mimic the behaviour. as always, it'a "just" a matter of coding it.

Yeah, sure, but for instance there currently is a bug that prevents us from modifying the UI, so injecting our mod into the vanilla ventures UI *could* be impossible at the moment.

[MutantDwarf]

there's no reason a script couldn't mimic the behaviour. as always, it'a "just" a matter of coding it.

Yeah, sure, but for instance there currently is a bug that prevents us from modifying the UI, so injecting our mod into the vanilla ventures UI *could* be impossible at the moment.

That's not actually true. You can modify the UI - you just can't 'extend' the UI.

You basically have to replace already-existing UI .lua files, you can't create new ones and expect them to work.

[ElectricMoccasin]

there's no reason a script couldn't mimic the behaviour. as always, it'a "just" a matter of coding it.

Yeah, sure, but for instance there currently is a bug that prevents us from modifying the UI, so injecting our mod into the vanilla ventures UI *could* be impossible at the moment.

Something something about prioritizing modding instead of superfluous features. =P

But yeah, I was thinking the same about this being a mod for offline.

[Axeface]

This is how I want it to work and it should already be an option, I loathe having nice cosmetics locked behind this multiplayer un-immersive bloat. Everygame is getting this rubbish added to it, dragon age inquisition did it, mass effect did it, wow did it... "Log on!! Keep logging on little slave! Your mission is ready! Yes its 4am but you can queue up another mission and get the most nice stuff!".

[Requiemfang]

Gee

This is how I want it to work and it should already be an option, I loathe having nice cosmetics locked behind this multiplayer un-immersive bloat. Everygame is getting this rubbish added to it, dragon age inquisition did it, mass effect did it, wow did it... "Log on!! Keep logging on little slave! Your mission is ready! Yes its 4am but you can queue up another mission and get the most nice stuff!".

Gee they must be reading the users guide for how to destroy your franchise and PO your playerbase.

[Axeface]

Gee

This is how I want it to work and it should already be an option, I loathe having nice cosmetics locked behind this multiplayer un-immersive bloat. Everygame is getting this rubbish added to it, dragon age inquisition did it, mass effect did it, wow did it... "Log on!! Keep logging on little slave! Your mission is ready! Yes its 4am but you can queue up another mission and get the most nice stuff!".

Gee they must be reading the users guide for how to destroy your franchise and PO your playerbase.

Most players arnt even going to care or notice so I wouldnt go that far.
The practice of making missions in games where you have to wait real-world time is predatory and repugnant and effects idiots like me the most. Why do you think these things were conjured up in the first place? (by phone-app game devs and blizzard ide expect). And to lock things behind it just makes it worse. Maybe there will be a way to unlock the skins in the game without it in the end, but considering the first flagship skin (the holiday one) is only got from it, and time-limited even, i'm not hopeful. It leaves such a sour taste in my mouth and i've quit other games because of this stuff, and im doing it already... should I go to bed or wait 20 minutes for this mission to end...

Edit: Hillariously, the mission failed and I lost the ship, when the missions are apparently safe in this 'beta'... its almost like the game is saying "Run away".

[Kadatherion]

Content unlocked by ventures is in the game files, meaning it would only need a save edit or a very simple mod to unlock it for everyone who doesn't want to use them/can't because he's playing a modded game. Just like it was for the Collector's Edition paintjobs, which were supposed to be "exclusive", they too are part of the mod already out that puts every paintjob up for sale. There's 56 paintjobs already in the game, many of which are now venture rewards and yet many of us have been playing with them ever since 1.0.

The only difference would be that with the "official" ventures, you unlock content that's available account wide (paintjobs, for instance, are tied to your account, meaning you'd have them still even if you start a new game), while if you unlock them via modding they are tied to that savegame only. As of now, there's nothing that you can't have access to if you don't play the official ventures (not even the ghastly christmas paintjob afaik: it's "exclusive" and "time limited" only if you play vanilla), and I doubt it's going to be any different in the future, because of how the game file structure is. Or at least I hope so.

Still, the point is we do have quite some content already in game that's not natively accessible without ventures. Paintjobs, as stated, but also other rewards like exceptional ship mods (which do indeed drop in the normal game too, their drop rate is just abysmal, on par with some korean MMO). The ventures framework, the "minigame" they represent, would offer a decent platform to allow us to get this content in a more... balanced, immersive and involved way. Sure, we could just find how to crank up drop rates, but then they wouldn't feel special anymore, so why not take the chance? The paintjobs for sale mod, as another example, just places them in the inventory of traders and that's it, but it has some bad balance: if you have the Collector's Edition, for instance, you start with ~50 millions worth of paintjobs, and since the mod gives them variable prices you can easily make *billions* just buying them low at a trader and selling to the next one. Mimicking vanilla would make them a reward you have to work for and avoid exploitability. At least until someone comes up with an even more ambitious mod for them, but that's going to at least take quite some time.

Other kind of rewards could also be imagined, the sky is the limit. I mod a new, custom Cerberus with two more turrets? Sure, I can just have it spawn in front of you as soon as you load a save - as other mods currently do - or I could put it up for sale. It kinda works, although it's a bit jury rigged and constrained by the limitations of a new game we still are beginning to understand and for which we still have few modding tools. An offline venture mod could actually even become a more involved, community shared default framework to make your custom content obtainable only as a reward, so that it feels more special, unique, something you have to earn and work for. Granted, it would still be pretty much a minigame, nothing to really rip your hair off in excitement, but it's still better than nothing, and we can't expect every modder who knows how to create a new ship to also, let's say, script a special mission to get it.

To be honest, the freedom we have with modding would likely make it so an offline equivalent to ventures could quickly grow to be a much more fun feature than the official one, constrained and limited by the multiplayer requirements.

[babayZ]

With modded games we can't (for obvious reasons) send our ships on ventures, we can only receive them.

You're wrong. It is obvious that there is no reasons to block ventures from modded games. And there are obvious reasons to verify venturing ships on server side.
I'll explain.
The only reason to block send ventures feature is to protect receiving party from any harm that modded ship might do. For example, receiving party might be unable to understand modded ship and game might crash or even savegame might corrupt.
So, you should ensure that sent ship is correct and can't break a game.
There are some ways to do that:
1. Ask the client side (game) if a savegame is modified.
2. Ask the client side (game) if a ship is modified.
3. Check on server side, if a ship is modified.

The only trustworthy option is 3.
Because client side virification is always unreliable. You can't trust a code that can be modified by anyone.

Savegame file is protected with a signature. I bet that savegame files are signed on client side. (at least it is required to save game while disconnected from internet).
That mean that certificate used for signing is available on client side. That mean a hacker can extract certificate and generate altered savegame with no *modified* flag.
Even if a server is used for signing savegame, it is possible to alter game files and create an altered savegame without *modidied* flag.

If I were a hacker and a bad guy, I could modify game to send malicious ships to a venture. To chash other player's games.
The only way to block malicious ships from being sent is to verify them on server side.
And if you do that, you don't need to block players with *modidied* flag. You need to block ships that don't pass server verification.

I hope that the only reason Egosoft blocked ventures from *modified* games is they had no time to write server-side checks. And that block is just a quick patch.

[Kadatherion]

With modded games we can't (for obvious reasons) send our ships on ventures, we can only receive them.

You're wrong. It is obvious that there is no reasons to block ventures from modded games. And there are obvious reasons to verify venturing ships on server side.
I'll explain.
The only reason to block send ventures feature is to protect receiving party from any harm that modded ship might do. For example, receiving party might be unable to understand modded ship and game might crash or even savegame might corrupt.
So, you should ensure that sent ship is correct and can't break a game.
There are some ways to do that:
1. Ask the client side (game) if a savegame is modified.
2. Ask the client side (game) if a ship is modified.
3. Check on server side, if a ship is modified.

The only trustworthy option is 3.
Because client side virification is always unreliable. You can't trust a code that can be modified by anyone.

Savegame file is protected with a signature. I bet that savegame files are signed on client side. (at least it is required to save game while disconnected from internet).
That mean that certificate used for signing is available on client side. That mean a hacker can extract certificate and generate altered savegame with no *modified* flag.
Even if a server is used for signing savegame, it is possible to alter game files and create an altered savegame without *modidied* flag.

If I were a hacker and a bad guy, I could modify game to send malicious ships to a venture. To chash other player's games.
The only way to block malicious ships from being sent is to verify them on server side.
And if you do that, you don't need to block players with *modidied* flag. You need to block ships that don't pass server verification.

I hope that the only reason Egosoft blocked ventures from *modified* games is they had no time to write server-side checks. And that block is just a quick patch.

Actually, those would precisely be the "obvious reasons"... although there's no need to imagine hacker conspiracies, the even more obvious reason is it's much simplier, lighter and quicker to simply block modded content from the equation at all. The two players, anyway, never have any kind of packet exchange, it all passes through Egosoft's servers, so a server side check has to be already in place. Even if a "hacker" (hacking is a completely different thing, this would be laming at best, but oh well, semantics) were to manage to counterfeit a savegame, only one of two things can happen: the server would recognize the offending, counterfeit content as vanilla and, as such... vanilla content would be set to spawn into another player's universe (so, perfectly safe, nothing changes, nothing happens), or the server, not recognizing the content, would not know what to send and simply flag it as corrupt and block it anyway: nothing happens, nothing changes. The "server side check" itself is the very fact the server isn't set up to work with anything but vanilla content. And as such, nothing but vanilla content can be set to spawn.

Which is the way simplier and more obvious reason for the system in place: it's a hundred times easier to code (and manage) a system that simply discards all modded content, rather than one that somehow has to discern between what content would be perfectly compatible with vanilla and what not. Precisely in line with your "scenario": if I only allow vanilla content, and the system can recognize only vanilla content, then nothing but vanilla content can be injected into people's games, whatever creative way someone could imagine to try and send to the server unexpected data.

[babayZ]

it all passes through Egosoft's servers, so a server side check has to be already in place.

If you have the server validation, you don't need client validation. If you need client validation, you don't have server validation.

Which is the way simplier and more obvious reason for the system in place: it's a hundred times easier to code (and manage) a system that simply discards all modded content, rather than one that somehow has to discern between what content would be perfectly compatible with vanilla and what not. Precisely in line with your "scenario": if I only allow vanilla content, and the system can recognize only vanilla content, then nothing but vanilla content can be injected into people's games, whatever creative way someone could imagine to try and send to the server unexpected data.

Moreover, the easiest way is not to block players with modded games, but to allow them to send modified ventures. But do not send modified ships to any other player.
That's the obvious solution: pretend it's OK and simply do not send modified ships to other players.

[aerojet029]

this feature is exactly what is implemented in No Man's sky.. why did it have to be online? your ship goes into the nether, and returns with rewards. ships from other dimensions appear in your universe, except you can't really interact. if you blow up their ship; you don't gain much of any value. and they don't lose their ship. what's the point? I second offline ventures.

[Kadatherion]

this feature is exactly what is implemented in No Man's sky.. why did it have to be online? your ship goes into the nether, and returns with rewards. ships from other dimensions appear in your universe, except you can't really interact. if you blow up their ship; you don't gain much of any value. and they don't lose their ship. what's the point? I second offline ventures.

They likely made it an online only feature because, if you want to sell (or, anyway, capitalize on them if nothing else in interest) cosmetic or vanity items like paintjobs, then that works only if you can "show them off" to other people. Which is why I'm fairly sure they won't ever make an offline equivalent and we'll have to do it ourselves. As long as the reward content is still available to modders - as it is now, which is the best solution for us all - this is another reason why modded games won't be allowed to participate: want to follow the multiplayer lure? Then you've got to unlock those paintjobs in vanilla, if you want to play with them "for free" via modding, go ahead, but you won't be able to use the multiplayer features to show them off. Seems only fair (regardless of how and if egocredits will translate into irl currency).

Granted, one day ventures may grow to offer something really interesting with some more involved "multiplayer" (targeted "invasions" against a specific player in your friendlist, or something like that, to make an example), but as they are now they're just a little waiting minigame which, from the player's perspective, doesn't really change whether it's really online or not. Quite the opposite, given how much freedom we'd have with them in modded games. How about "venture critical "failure", your ship didn't come back, but that Kha'ak destroyer sure did in her stead, now have fun"?

[aerojet029]

They likely made it an online only feature because, if you want to sell (or, anyway, capitalize on them if nothing else in interest) cosmetic or vanity items like paintjobs, then that works only if you can "show them off" to other people. Which is why I'm fairly sure they won't ever make an offline equivalent and we'll have to do it ourselves. As long as the reward content is still available to modders - as it is now, which is the best solution for us all - this is another reason why modded games won't be allowed to participate: want to follow the multiplayer lure? Then you've got to unlock those paintjobs in vanilla, if you want to play with them "for free" via modding, go ahead, but you won't be able to use the multiplayer features to show them off. Seems only fair (regardless of how and if egocredits will translate into irl currency).

Granted, one day ventures may grow to offer something really interesting with some more involved "multiplayer" (targeted "invasions" against a specific player in your friendlist, or something like that, to make an example), but as they are now they're just a little waiting minigame which, from the player's perspective, doesn't really change whether it's really online or not. Quite the opposite, given how much freedom we'd have with them in modded games. How about "venture critical "failure", your ship didn't come back, but that Kha'ak destroyer sure did in her stead, now have fun"?

I'm fine with the way it is set up in terms of leaving the choice open to consumers; modders and purist alike.
I'm just afraid of Egosoft changing the dynamic and make me choose between modding my game or accepting the game as it is. What if the feature was expanded and I couldn't earn server based points rewards because I wanted to change something minor?
I mean, this game isn't built from the ground up to be "secure" in preventing cheating or modding, so for this game at least not much to worry about. I'm just curious what their roadmap for these online features are.

[Kadatherion]

I mean, this game isn't built from the ground up to be "secure" in preventing cheating or modding, so for this game at least not much to worry about. I'm just curious what their roadmap for these online features are.

Going by Bernd's own words... they don't really have one yet, they are probing the unexplored territory (and they already faced quite the serious, in part unwarranted backlash, so their going to be very cautious). Depending on how many people will play with them, they'll decide if and how much invest into them. But as long as everything is in the game files and we can access it via modding, it won't be an issue. I mean, with 9 out of 10 of the games out there we have to stay vanilla if we want to play multi, and we can only mod the singleplayer campaign/sandbox/whatever. So, why should it be an issue here?

Fingers crossed, but I really believe they won't risk alienating their modding community. They are still selling X3 only thanks to mods, and what really killed Rebirth wasn't just the fact it was a mess at launch, it's the fact it was so uninteresting that there also were very few people interested in modding it, not much was made for it and so pretty much nobody bought it down the line even when it was brought to a decently playable state via intensive patching. If they want to have decent sales when the first X4 expansion comes out, they need to have a healthy modding community by then.

[Fladger]

I do agree that major features (modding and ventures) shouldn't be mutually exclusive. Possibly touchy to get working right though!

[Requiemfang]

In honesty it would be in poor taste and insight for ES to exclude modders and people that mod the game to make it more enjoyable. It would be a step in the wrong direction, so hopefully they will add something at some point that makes it possible for people with modified games to also send out venture ships

[babayZ]

They likely made it an online only feature because, if you want to sell (or, anyway, capitalize on them if nothing else in interest) cosmetic or vanity items like paintjobs, then that works only if you can "show them off" to other people. Which is why I'm fairly sure they won't ever make an offline equivalent and we'll have to do it ourselves. As long as the reward content is still available to modders - as it is now, which is the best solution for us all - this is another reason why modded games won't be allowed to participate: want to follow the multiplayer lure? Then you've got to unlock those paintjobs in vanilla, if you want to play with them "for free" via modding, go ahead, but you won't be able to use the multiplayer features to show them off. Seems only fair (regardless of how and if egocredits will translate into irl currency).

It's very easy to solve this issue. Egosoft definitelly tracks at server, what paint mods people get. And it is easy to track every game session.
And it's very easy to ensure, that a player can't send a ship with paint mod which he didn't get in the right way.