Elite: Dangerous - Design Decision Forum

[Tricky]

How about including all OXPs into Elite: Dangerous. That would be a start.

[JazHaz]

How about including all OXPs into Elite: Dangerous. That would be a start.

I don't think that will be possible. However, it begs the question, what Oolite OXPs would YOU like to see in E: D?

[Cody]

They've already got random ship names <chortles>, so the ship's cat would have to next.
I've become rather attached to Lord Effingham - and he ain't taken a hit yet!

[xzanfr]

I'm glad they are a good few oolite people in the DDF - I was getting a bit concerned about the whole of the frontier forum in general as there were some mad posts by some frankly scary people!
I'm a founder rather than a DDF as I couldn't justify the time required or the cost (we bought a sofa instead!) but good luck to all of you in there - oolite 1.76 is fantastic so please bring a bit of the magic to E:D - especially the new handling of the cargo/passenger/parcel missions and the initial attacking AI from pirates !

I'm also pleased that there will be a couple of oolite people in the backers forum such as wolfwood - I'm more of a lurker here than a participant due to work pressures but it's great to see some familiar names in the forum (even though you've probably no idea who i am!)
Cheers, xzanfr (Gary)

[Commander McLane]

How about including all OXPs into Elite: Dangerous. That would be a start.

Not really. Also, I think any input from an Oolite point of view will be only of limited value.

Keep in mind that E:D is—as far as I've understood—a sequel to Frontier, not to Elite. Therefore it's fundamentally a different game from Oolite, just like Elite and Frontier are fundamentally different games.

[Selezen]

Keep in mind that E:D is—as far as I've understood—a sequel to Frontier, not to Elite. Therefore it's fundamentally a different game from Oolite, just like Elite and Frontier are fundamentally different games.

That's true, but they have publicly stated that they're trying to get back to the original spirit of Elite and take the franchise back to its roots. It will be, as you say, a unique game in its own right.

[JazHaz]

I'm hoping Trumbles will make an appearance!

[Smivs]

Well it won't be proper Elite without Trumbles!

[Cody]

Well it won't be proper Elite without Trumbles!

I somehow doubt it will proper Elite anyway... more MP Frontier with Elite-style combat (fly-by-wire?), and SP tacked-on.

[CommRLock78]

How about including all OXPs into Elite: Dangerous. That would be a start.

Not really. Also, I think any input from an Oolite point of view will be only of limited value.

Keep in mind that E:D is—as far as I've understood—a sequel to Frontier, not to Elite. Therefore it's fundamentally a different game from Oolite, just like Elite and Frontier are fundamentally different games.

Well it won't be proper Elite without Trumbles!

I somehow doubt it will proper Elite anyway... more MP Frontier with Elite-style combat (fly-by-wire?), and SP tacked-on.

[twocents]I think EV and Commander McLane sum up why I'm not all that interested in E:D (although if I had played Elite and Frontier, my opinion may well have been different). As far as my limited experience can tell, Oolite seems to be the most true to the original game, and I will play it as long as I have a computer that runs it .[/twocents]

[Gimi]

If Frontier try to recreate "proper" Elite they will fail. Any new game in the Elite universe has to stand on it's own merits. Trying to "recreate" one of the previous games will in my opinion just lead to yet another failed sequel. Having said that, I believe that DB and frontier are aware of this, and I do like the information and concept they have presented so far. I don't expect Elite: Dangerous to be either Elite, Frontier or FFE.

[Diziet Sma]

However, it begs the question, what Oolite OXPs would YOU like to see in E: D?

Quirium mines..

(yes, I know that's not strictly an OXP)

[JazHaz]

How the DDF will work is that Frontier will post about a feature, one a week, with discussion throughout the week, finishing with a poll vote.

OK, here's the first discussion in the DDF:

“I see dead people” – Dying in Elite: Dangerous

It’s going to happen.

Sooner or later, your ship’s going to end up as so much glittering space dust, with you mixed in with it. The big question is: what happens next?

Bearing in mind Elite: Dangerous is being constructed from the ground up to support online play we think that dying needs to be handled in a fair and logical manner for victor and victim.

We want to encourage cooperative and competitive player interaction that might legitimately result in player death, whilst protecting against malicious griefing (which we loosely define as actions whose only purpose, outcome and gain is to punish and frustrate other players).

We want to get the balance right so that death is a meaningful threat that really does get the adrenaline pumping, without it being so punitive that it pushes away more casual players.

Current Plan:

To get the ball rolling, here are our current thoughts on shuffling off the mortal coil in the game.

When you die:

• You restart the game from the location at which your ship was last docked (docking records the details of your ship, equipment and cargo)
• All carried cargo is lost (either destroyed or floating where you died)
• If your death was reported as a criminal act, the perpetrator(s) gain a criminal status, bounty and temporary forced inclusion into the “all” player group
• If your death was reported as a criminal act, surviving cargo is flagged as stolen goods for an amount of time
• Your ship suffers some damage to components (that can obviously be repaired at a cost)
• Some missions/events will be flagged as failed
• Your current ratings could be negatively affected (for example, your combat rating)
• We’re also investigating opt-in insurance policies that could cover ship damage and cargo loss. Whilst cargo is never recovered, you could at least get some form of payout in compensation. Of course, this could potentially lead to increased premiums for a while.

Issues:

One of the issues we need to grapple with is how to deal with potential death and network loss. Should your ship attempt to hyperspace out when the host of your session loses your connection, or does your ship simply take punishment from enemies until you re-establish contact or until it is destroyed?

When it comes to ship destruction, another area that we haven’t a solid foundation for yet is how escape pods should work (automatic or manually operated?) and what their benefits are. Should escape pods be required to protect your commander avatar, or is this persona simply too important to ever truly die?

We’d like to hear what you think.

Are we on the right track, or flogging a dead space-horse? Can you see terrible flaws in our proposal? Are there corner cases we aren’t addressing? Perhaps you have a death penalty system in mind that’s simply way cooler.

Thinking caps at the ready!

What do you all think about this?

[Cody]

Player death had to be a priority - I'm mostly interested in the escape pod/insurance thinking.

[cim]

If your death was reported as a criminal act, the perpetrator(s) gain a criminal status, bounty and temporary forced inclusion into the “all” player group

For anyone who wants to actively avoid the "all" group - and clearly many people will for all sorts of reasons - this seems to rule out the less honest career paths where killing another player in "self-defence" might still be "criminal". I think I can see what they're trying to do here, but the approach doesn't seem at all right.
("All" is, thinking about it, an odd name for that group. It definitely won't contain all players from what I've understood so far... "Default", perhaps?)