Elite: Dangerous - Design Decision Forum

[Gimi]

I don't read every post in the DDF. I read the proposal, and then I follow the answers provided by FD to any questions. I will also take note of the posts from a few select members (you learn quickly who you tend to disagree with and who you mostly agree with).
If any concerns I have are not addressed after a few days, I post a question or a proposal. A rather wait and see attitude to the whole process to be honest.

What I do read and follow very carefully are the refined proposals on the different topics from FD. So far they have been quite to my liking though.

I have to admit though, this last topic on groups has been hard to get my head around, and I'm not alone judging by the questions in the DDF.

[Disembodied]

On the whole issue of griefer control, have Frontier - has any MMO - thought about karma? It would be easier to get away with in a fantasy setting, but even in Elite: Dangerous there will presumably be some internal dice rolling for things like misjumps, equipment malfunctions, NPC encounters etc. Might it be possible to give "bad luck" to people who behave badly - by which I mean people who do bad things that are not part of the game, like blowing up tiny newbies for the lolz, not those who do bad things that are part of the game, like attacking a merchant and stealing his cargo? It's maybe a bit of a "gamey" way to confront the problem, but it would only apply to those who were clearly not interested in playing the game.

[Gimi]

On the whole issue of griefer control, have Frontier - has any MMO - thought about karma? It would be easier to get away with in a fantasy setting, but even in Elite: Dangerous there will presumably be some internal dice rolling for things like misjumps, equipment malfunctions, NPC encounters etc. Might it be possible to give "bad luck" to people who behave badly - by which I mean people who do bad things that are not part of the game, like blowing up tiny newbies for the lolz, not those who do bad things that are part of the game, like attacking a merchant and stealing his cargo? It's maybe a bit of a "gamey" way to confront the problem, but it would only apply to those who were clearly not interested in playing the game.

Missed this Disembodied.
FD are already looking at a reputation system, so they have the outlines for something they can use. Not sure if they have thought about using it in this way though, no mention of it as far as I have seen. Use of "bad luck", as is done in other games, as a DRM feature has been discussed on the forum though (players with copied/hacked games can play, but they tend to have engine failures and so on). I don't think Frontier have commented on it.

[Gimi]

"My team works alone, you know that" Revised Player Groups in Elite: Dangerous

Updated proposal on player groups from Frontier. Lots of changes.

Hello!

Here you'll find our updated proposal for grouping that should be far more robust compared to our previous effort. Lots of things have changed so read it carefully before chewing it over.

Cheers,
-Mike

A player can only exist in one of the following groups at a time:

• All Players Group– Players in this group will be matched with each other as much as possible to ensure as many human players can meet and play together
  • A player’s Friend List and Ignore List is used automatically to indicate preferences in match making so that friends will be matched instead of others if a choice exists(though this is a fuzzy system so there are no guarantees)
    • E.g. In a nearly full session a player with more friends in the session than that of another arriving at the same time would mean the first player getting in and the second spawning a new session instead
  • Players can use an option to indicate they would like friends of friends to be included in the preference system described above (which basically expands their friends list for the purposes of preferences under the hood only)
• Private Group – Players in this group will only be matched with other players in the same private group
  • Players can create their own private group and invite people into it
    • To help facilitate inviting players into a private group, players can be indicated as friends in game and can be selected easily for sending invites out too
    • Any player can be invited into a private group regardless of friend status so player name searching and direct in-game selection is possible
    • A player who accepts such an invite will be removed from their current group upon the next hyperspace jump and be placed in the private group of the inviting player
    • A player who refuses such an invite will remain in whatever group they were already in and the option to ignore future requests from that player during the current gaming session is presented
  • Players can save private group settings including players to invite to allow quick selection and set up of groups
  • A player can set an option to allow friends to “quick join” into their private group
    • They can change this option at any time
    • Players will be able to see on their friend list that other friends are in private groups and that some may have a symbol indicated they’re free to “quick join” into the group without needing an invite
    • The “quick join” option can be extended to allow friends of friends in freely also
  • A player wishing to join another player’s private group will have to message them asking for an invite as there is no way to formally request admission into the group
    • Players will thus typically set the “quick join” option if they don’t want the hassle of their friends having to message them when they want to join in with the group
  • Only the original private group creator can invite others into their group. They can also do the following:
    • Kick other players out of the group
    • Disband the group resulting in all the other players entering their own individual private groups with “quick joining” disabled (gives them the opportunity to play solo or decide to join the all players group)
    • Pass their leadership and thus all these options to someone else in the group
    • Upon disconnecting, logging off or leaving the group automatically passes leadership to the oldest private group member, i.e. the first player to accept an invite into the group that is still present
• Solo Group – Players in this group won’t be matched with anyone else ever (effectively a private group with no one else invited) with the following properties:
  • Players in this group are effectively indicating they want to be left alone and not disturbed by anyone else
  • By default group and friend invites are ignored but this can be enabled if desired
  • By default a player’s online status is hidden (set to offline) from others but this can be change if desired
  • A player in this group can still see when other friends come online and can message them
  • A player in this group can still receive messages from friends (possibly revealing the fact that they are online by virtue of return messages but still indicated as being offline)

As described above a player also has a Friend List that they can manage which helps facilitate inviting players into private groups and allow preferences to be taken into account when joining sessions:

• A player can request friendship with others
  • An accepting player will add themselves to the player’s friend list as well as adding the player to their own list as well
  • A refusing player will remain off the other player’s list and the option to ignore future requests from that player during the current gaming session is presented
• A player can remove a friend from their list at any time and such removal will also take them off that friends list at the same time
• Requesting a friendship can be done inside and outside of the game client
• Friends will be matched with each other as much as possible when entering new sessions
  • If a choice needs to be made between which players to allow access to a session the player with the most friend influence will trump a neutral or ignored player

A player also has the option to add players to an Ignore List which does the following:

• Removes any friendship between the players automatically (players can’t be friends with players they ignore)
• Ignores all communication from them in game
• Ignores any friend requests from them
• Is active across multiple gaming session until changed by the player (this is different from the options presented in the above sections as they only last as long as the current gaming session)
• People on others ignore lists will not be favoured if a choice exists when match making players together
  • If all players in a session have the same player ignored then that player will never be able to join that session
  • If at least one player is neutral or friends with the ignored player above then they will be able to join that session providing there is no better suited players trying to get in at the same time when only one slot is available

In addition to the groups presented above a player can be a part of an Alliance with other players. This is a separate entity that operates within the boundaries of whatever group the players are in:

• A player can only ever be in a single alliance at a time
• Alliances allow players to indicate trust between themselves so they:
  • Can freely jettison and pick up cargo between themselves
  • Can fire upon each other without criminal implications
  • Gain the same criminal fine/bounty if one or more other members commits a crime
  • Have the ability to slave hyperdrive systems together to make travel easier
  • Get matched as a whole during slaved hyperspace travel and if not possible spawn in their own instance at a location rather than splitting the alliance up
• Alliances in the all players group allow those in the alliance to come across other human players as normal except the game is explicitly trying to keep the alliance together when they arrive at the same location through match-making
  • This is in addition to the normal preference system and operates by giving a much higher weighting to alliance members when determining preferences over friends for example
• Alliances in a private group would only meet other players in that private group
  • Depending on the size of the group, players may typically be in an alliance with everyone else in the private group but multiple alliances can exist in a larger private group if desired
• Creating an alliance is handled exactly the same way as creating a private group with the caveat that anyone in the group can invite other players (including non-friend players) into the alliance and no one is the leader
  • In the all players group any player can be invited into the alliance by any alliance member
  • In a private group only the players in the private group can be invited into an alliance by alliance members
  • Players can vote to kick an alliance member out of the alliance
    • After a set time limit the vote is closed and the majority is taken to decide the outcome unless all members have already voted or the required number of votes is reached
  • Players can leave freely of their own accord

[/color]

Clarifications from the thread:

• Friend and Ignore Lists are account based not character based
• Crimes committed by alliance members only affect your criminal standing if you're in the same session when they do it
• Leaving an alliance after earning a criminal fine/bounty from another members actions will remain with you
• You can only add players to your friends list via mutual agreement. You can't just add a player to your list if they don't want you too
• Ignoring a player doesn't ignore any in-game canned dialogue options or game play features like declaring piracy
• Players that can successfully sniff a hyperspace trail or tailgate one, override that other player's ignore rules so that players are less likely to use the ignore feature as a way to escape bounty hunters or pirates on their first encounter and subsequent encounters were they to find themselves in the same session
• Private groups can have the option to kick player-killing bounties back to the all players group or tolerate that kind of player. In addition the private group owner can always choose to kick a player out on a case by case basis as normal
• Sessions will typically have an upper limit of 32 players for the time being (this is the number we're using in design)
• Players in iron man mode will only meet other iron man characters in the all player group. Private groups can have a mix of iron and non-iron man characters if desired
• Players can only guess as to the session capacity at locations when trying to flee others in the hope their ignore list will have a higher relative weighting in the new location thus blocking any pursuers (although as above pursuers have options to mitigate this)

[/color]

Issues:
How does this system work with criminals being pushed to the all players group (potentially out of a private group meaning vengeance can't be taken by private group members)?

Useful headings:
Alliances
Private Group
All Players Group
Solo Group
Friend List
Ignore List
Bounty Hunting

[Disembodied]

Issues:
How does this system work with criminals being pushed to the all players group (potentially out of a private group meaning vengeance can't be taken by private group members)?

I think this is still a problem. Perhaps it would be possible to set rules for private groups? Or at least a couple of broad settings? E.g.

Play Nice: PvP is frowned on, and will result in criminals getting kicked into the all players group as per the current setup.

Play Nasty: PvP is accepted within the group, as are criminal actions. Criminals are not automatically kicked out into the all players group. If group creators can expel people from a group, then it can be left up to them to moderate their own groups.

The latter setting would allow a player group to contain members of different factions or teams, who are OK with fighting each other. At the moment, all the groups seem to be set up with the assumption that all PvP is bad, and needs to be discouraged: within a private group, though, that's not necessarily the case. I don't see why there shouldn't be private groups where some members are Feds, some are Imperials, some are independent, some are pirates, and some like to walk a wandering path between them all. If all the group members know that at the outset, and can be relied on to tangle with each other in friendly contest, why should the game step in and slap them for it?

[Gimi]

Perhaps it would be possible to set rules for private groups? Or at least a couple of broad settings? E.g.

Play Nice: PvP is frowned on, and will result in criminals getting kicked into the all players group as per the current setup.

Play Nasty: PvP is accepted within the group, as are criminal actions. Criminals are not automatically kicked out into the all players group. If group creators can expel people from a group, then it can be left up to them to moderate their own groups.

Your issue is being discussed. This was just proposed by one of the designers:

How would you feel about the following system:

Only crimes committed against player ships can affect a players grouping.

When creating a group, the creator can select to either boot a player that earns a bounty automatically back to all-players (the next hyperspace jump after the bounty is earned), or choose to tolerate crimes on players in their group. The player who created the group can boot a player from it at a time of their choosing if a tolerated player is greifing.

This way if players have made a group to play in effectively co-op mode, and they want to be able to commit crimes with their friends, they can do so without compromising the sanctity of their private group.

[Gimi]

Added some clarifications from Frontier to the revised My team works alone, you know that" Revised Player Groups in Elite: Dangerous post above.
See text in dark blue.

[Gimi]

Next topic up for discussion in the DDF.

"go straight to LUDICROUS SPEED!!" Travelling between planets in Elite: Dangerous

The player travels from one system to another using Hyperspace travel. Although the distances between planets are not as vast as inter-stellar distances they still require the player to travel faster than normal flying speeds in order to traverse between them in a reasonable time. Fast travel is a way of travelling between planets that allows the player to jump quickly across a system:

• Arrival From Hyperspace – When players arrive in a system from hyperspace travel they will arrive at the outskirts of the system
  • In inhabited systems the player could arrive at a designated edge of system point of interest such as an orbital station or planet (complete with information boards relevant to the system)
  • In uninhabited or undeveloped systems the player could arrive at a random point at the edge of the system
    • Once a player has arrived and generated a random arrival point, any other players jumping to the system will jump to that point
    • The point remains until there are no players in it, at which point any new player jumping to the system will generate a new arrival point
• System Maps – Show the player the details of the system they are in. Points of interest are shown on the system map
  • Planets, large planetoids, and discovered features for known systems can be found in the players navigation computer
  • Players can buy additional ‘map details’ from information brokers that add extra points of interest (instances) to systems
    • Map details can include treasure maps, locations of valuable asteroids for mining and other such generated places of interest
• Selecting an Fast Travel Destination – The player opens a map of the system they are in and can select objects and known points of interest in the system
  • The player uses this map to select which planet/station/other point of interest they wish to visit
  • The player can only select destinations they know about or have discovered

Once the player has selected a target for their fast travel jump they can activate fast travel to begin the jumping process:

• Preparing to Jump – The player presses the ‘jump button’ to begin the fast travel transit
  • The player is shown GUI to show the direction they must face their ship to trigger the jump
    • If something is blocking the path of the players ship the GUI will adjust so that the player will jump around it without colliding
  • The Fast Travel system will go through a quick warm-up sequence (a couple of seconds) before the jump begins
  • If the player does not have enough fuel to complete the jump the jump process is cancelled
• Once the player’s fast travel system has charged the player will enter fast travel and begin travelling towards their selected destination
  • Once in transit the destination cannot be changed and the player does not have control of their ship
  • Other players can ally with the player and slave their ship to the players to jump as a group

Players are mass locked by large objects and must be a minimum distance from in space away from them before they can initiate a jump

• Distances are short (100s of metres) and can be crossed in a few seconds
  • The larger the object the larger the distance is required
• If a player is near a larger ship they will be mass locked and unable to jump
  • Players must fly clear of large ships to begin a fast travel jump
  • Ships have considerably smaller mass lock ranges than stations/planets etc.

When a player enters fast travel any players who had them targeted will be shown their destination

• Players targeting a ship entering fast travel will be shown the likely destination of that ship and can use that to pursue fleeing ships
  • A brief visual indicator shows the point and direction where a ship entered fast travel
• When a player enters fast travel they leave their current session and disconnect from other players
  • Any players that were targeting the fleeing ship (and so received their destination) reserve themselves a place in the players next session for a short period of time, allowing players to be pursued
• As the player is in transit the game begins connecting them (plus any allies and pursuers travelling with them) to a session in their destination
  • The rate at which the player decelerates is controlled to allow the system time to connect to other players before dropping out of fast travel transit
• The player’s ship will follow its course and make its way towards the player’s chosen destination
• Once the player has reached their destination they come out of fast travel transit
  • Their selected fast travel jump destination should now be cleared
  • The players fast travel jump destination is cleared if the player leaves the system
  • Miss-jumps should not be possible using fast travel transit

The player can activate their hyperdrive from any point of interest in the system to leave that system and begin interstellar travel, however they must meet the following conditions:

• The player must have correctly gone through the hyper-drive setup process, as detailed in the hyperdrive proposal
• The player’s ship must be a suitable distance from any objects to avoid being mass locked by objects/other ships

Issues
Do we want players to be able to have mis-jumps fast travel with damaged/poorly serviced equipments? Is this enriching or annoying? What would be the consequences of a mis-jump?
Does the player have enough tools to detect discoverable points of interest? Do we need a scan button the player can use in transit etc.?
Does the player have enough to do while in transit?
Should there be equipment that can stop/delay/interrupt a fast travel jump?[/color]

[Cody]

Very interesting indeed - thanks, Gimi.

[Disembodied]

I can think of one other issue:

If the player does not have enough fuel to complete the jump the jump process is cancelled

This could mean that players, through accident, inattention, or enemy action, end up a billion miles from anywhere with nothing but an uncontrolled flight into nothingness in front of them. Fair enough, some people might think that is suitable punishment for inattention (perhaps less suitable for bad luck or being forced to flee), but to me it seems like the wrong kind of punishment for a game. Death is a punishment: it's bad, but over quite quickly and you can get back to the game. Out-of-fuel-so-sorry would be nothing more than forcing the player to suffer (possibly eternal) boredom as a punishment - not a good idea in a game.

Of course, I don't know how E:D is going to handle fuel. Personally, I hope they've got away from the picky "realism" of Frontier, where it was deemed "more realistic" to have reaction drives that could somehow allow you to achieve impossible rates of acceleration (which, moreover, somehow didn't reduce the pilot to paté). Fuel management is, in my opinion, a task best suited to games like Lunar Lander and its inheritors: nothing wrong with them, but not really much cop in a dogfight. Fuel required for interstellar jumps, fine; fuel required for torus-drive-esque intrasystem jumps, maybe (see below); fuel required for dogfighting fun and action - no. Dear god, no.

Unless there is a process whereby ships can (perhaps quite gradually) scoop new fuel "from the stellar winds" or whatever, this is going to result in players going ballistic, literally and probably metaphorically, as their ship, fuel-less, shoots across a billion miles of empty nothing with all the fun and fury dwindling to a dot behind them. At best, they might have a long (maybe very long), real-time cruise to a destination, running on fumes and hoping. Most players, I think, would at this point just trigger some sort of restart - which is immersion-breaking, at least - assuming that they don't just quit altogether and go play something more fun instead. Such a fuel-related demise would be death by accountancy failure. And even if players can slowly scoop new fuel, how many will be prepared to sit and wait while a progress bar slowly fills up, before they can effectively rejoin the game?

[cim]

If the player does not have enough fuel to complete the jump the jump process is cancelled

If there's a mechanism for transferring fuel between ships or salvaging from wreckage, you could obtain it from NPCs. It looks from the description that it will essentially be discontinuous space, so the only places you're likely to end up are "interesting" ones, so NPCs of some sort are likely to be about.

You can have escape pods with independent fuel supplies, according to the previous threads, so that could give you a way out at a penalty. (No fuel, no escape pod, and no comms for distress calls to NPCs or other players? Maybe there's a way to fix the comms system, at least, or tweaks to random chance will ensure an NPC shows up relatively quickly even if there aren't other human players in the area, and rescue you for an inflated price)

Of course, I don't know how E:D is going to handle fuel. Personally, I hope they've got away from the picky "realism" of Frontier, where it was deemed "more realistic" to have reaction drives that could somehow allow you to achieve impossible rates of acceleration

Though even in Frontier you were never going to run out of fuel mid-dogfight except through massively bad luck, because the rate of usage was so slow.

[Disembodied]

It's always possible (I hope probable) that they've thought of in-game ways around this problem, but I still get worried. I was pleased when they showed that their combat system was dogfighty and not "let's do orbital mechanics with lasers!", but I suspect I've still never forgiven them for the mess they made of Frontier with their "it's less fun, but more realistic" (for a given, non-realistic value of "realistic"). Tsk.

[Gimi]

After an initial thumbs up from a lot of people, this proposal is slowly being picked apart in a major way (in my view). I have voiced several concerns I have regarding single point of arrival and what amounts to something akin to warp gates and an intra system "rail system" between points of interest. Frontier seem to be very keen on ensuring player interaction (understandable considering it's multi-player). I'm more concerned with freedom of movement. Given the huge model of the universe they are planning on using, there are going to be some compromises here I think.

[Disembodied]

After an initial thumbs up from a lot of people, this proposal is slowly being picked apart in a major way (in my view). I have voiced several concerns I have regarding single point of arrival and what amounts to something akin to warp gates and an intra system "rail system" between points of interest. Frontier seem to be very keen on ensuring player interaction (understandable considering it's multi-player). I'm more concerned with freedom of movement. Given the huge model of the universe they are planning on using, there are going to be some compromises here I think.

Hmm ... personally I think the single arrival points and "rail system" between points of interest are probably good things. Like Cim said, it's essentially discontinuous space. Frankly, for any sort of space game with pretensions towards giving players a sense of the true vastness of space, multiplayer or not, this is required. It has to be done, because otherwise nobody will ever meet anybody, PC or NPC, except just outside stations - and then you have to wonder why these wouldn't be heavily patrolled. The trick is to give people the illusion of vast space, while still ensuring that we can bump into other ships and have fun dogfights. The only alternative is to do what the X games did, and give total freedom of movement within in a tight little box of space. That wasn't a happy solution, as far as I'm concerned.

Unless ... unless it's possible to "see" (at FTL speeds) across the system, and allow players to intercept each other (and try to dodge each other). But if you want anything like a sense of an even semi-realistically proportioned solar system, I think that's a non-starter.

It might be possible to make more of the "rail system" notion, and have more game in there. Perhaps the "on rails" jump route could be something other than straight? A more-or-less twisty "tunnel through subspace" or what have you, which a player moving on their jump drive has to follow. The closer they stick to the centre of the route, the faster they go - so a better pilot might be able to outrun a worse one. And a smaller ship might be quicker than a big one, just because it can keep more of its mass in the middle of the tunnel. Some systems could have twistier jump tunnels than others, which would add a sense of varying geography: maybe big, active stars have more disturbed subspace, or greater subspace tides, or something.

My main concern is still the amount of fuel management players will be expected to do. I'm less concerned with the game placing limits on my movement - as long as it seems free, and it seems like I'm in a gigantic void, I'm happy - than I am with the game placing limits, via a fuel tank, on my capacity for fun.

[Gimi]

Some good points there D.
My initial concern was with using a single point of arrival. Too much like a jump gate, so I suggested that, as more players arrive in a system, additional points are generated. Frontier didn't like this as they want players to be able to meet up at the arrival point. So I suggested a compromise combining something like this:

• Having an expiry time on the arrival points. If no ship has arrived within X min, a new arrival point is generated.
• In-system markers which are present in all systems, both explored and unexplored. The L1 and L2 points for the outermost and innermost celestial bodies of a system may be a solution. This would give the players some standard points they could arrange to meet at, but would ultimately lead to less player interaction.
• In system grid, where the players can arrange to meet at agreed coordinates. Implementing this would of course mean that anyone can fast-travel anywhere in a system.

So I'm not suggesting to remove the "rail system", but I do want to have more options available.

With regards to fuel, Frontier has deferred questions about this (there has been a few) to a future topic. It is quite clear though, that they intend to implement the need for fuel management for both inter and intra system travel. My view would be that for Inter system travel, fuel is a big thing, for intra system travel it should be a minor thing.