Oolite Bulletins

Posted: **Tue Oct 13, 2009 3:34 pm**

phonebook wrote:
whats so bad about breaking missions? its hard cheese!

It's not hard cheese: it's "oh bugger, well, time to reload from saved." I'm all for having the game pelt us, now and then, with the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, but unless players have some reason to put up with the resulting woe then this would just annoy them, and force a reload. It wouldn't add anything to the game.

The thing to do would be to script a mission which – after checking for clashes with other missions – would instigate a Galactic misjump and throw the player somewhere interesting (at least in the sense of the old Chinese curse, "may you live in interesting times").

Give them some reason to suffer through the hard cheese, and some sort of reward/resolution at the end.

Posted: **Tue Oct 13, 2009 3:51 pm**

phonebook wrote:
but what i'd really like is misjumps that just took you somewhere random- and i mean really random - anywhere in all 8 galaxies

For some reason, the random destination that sprang to my mind is the little alleyway near the church on Melee Island in the game The Secret of Monkey Island.

I only mention this because at one point in Monkey Island 2, Guybrush randomly winds up in that particular part of the first game for reasons I forget.

Hey, you said "random" you didn't say how "random."

Look, if Warp Drive Active can do it......

http://www.warpdriveactive.com/2005/03/19/tempname-95/

Posted: **Tue Oct 13, 2009 4:07 pm**

Disembodied wrote:
The original Elite misjumps were badly thought out. Occasionally, you'd be pitched into a sudden, unexpected and difficult firefight (generally a good thing, from a game point of view). With luck and skill a player could survive (another good thing). Then there was a good chance that the player, despite his heroics, was still stuffed and would have to reload, losing all the kills he'd fought so hard for and losing the feeling of coming through against all the odds. That's a really bad thing.

Isn't that the truth!
In the c64 Elite, I'd often misjump in the middle of Nowhere, surrounded a swarm of angry Bugs hellbent on blowing my Cobby away. So I'd manage to fight off the Thargoids, then still be stuck in Nowhere without the fuel to get me back to civilization. Bleh! Really dirty pool there, Mr Braben! Nothing to do but quit and reload.

With Oolite though, thanks to our oxp-ing geniuses, there's a number of ways to get out of that showstopper and keep on space truckin'.

Posted: **Tue Oct 13, 2009 4:13 pm**

Cmdr Wyvern wrote:
With Oolite though, thanks to our oxp-ing geniuses, there's a number of ways to get out of that showstopper and keep on space truckin'.

That's very true – although I think it would be a good idea (not being the one who would have to do it) if this could be fixed in the core game. Having your original wormhole reappear when you've cleared out the bugs might be a relatively easy fix. Mind you, I don't know what I'm talking about, so ...

Posted: **Wed Oct 14, 2009 1:53 am**

Disembodied wrote:
It's best not to muck the player about too much. It's OK to spice things up with a little misfortune now and again, but it shouldn't be taken too far. All it achieves is annoying the player and forcing a restart from saved.

The original Elite misjumps were badly thought out. Occasionally, you'd be pitched into a sudden, unexpected and difficult firefight (generally a good thing, from a game point of view). With luck and skill a player could survive (another good thing). Then there was a good chance that the player, despite his heroics, was still stuffed and would have to reload, losing all the kills he'd fought so hard for and losing the feeling of coming through against all the odds. That's a really bad thing.

Oolite can cure this to a certain extent, via certain OXPs, but it would be better, IMO, to fix this original boo-boo at source. Maybe the intercepting Thargoids have some sort of wormhole jammer operating in their ships: if you kill all the ships, then your wormhole reappears nearby and you can shoot down it and escape for no extra fuel cost.

Not every version of Elite used up all your fuel before jumping. My version (meant for use on PC's with DOS) consumed fuel "as-you-go". If a player got yanked out of hyperspace by Thargoids, they still had enough fuel to witchspace to their original destination and could escape by jumping to hyperspace again (provided they survived long enough to do so).

With several fuel OXP solutions now available to Oolite players, I see no need to change the mis-jump or Thargoid intercept encounters that drag a player out of hyperspace.

Posted: **Wed Oct 14, 2009 1:56 am**

Disembodied wrote:
Having your original wormhole reappear when you've cleared out the bugs might be a relatively easy fix. Mind you, I don't know what I'm talking about, so ...

Granted, that would be a cool effect. If the devs thought it easy to do, or even wanted to, who knows, it could happen.
But is it necessary, with so many oxp solutions around?

Posted: **Wed Oct 14, 2009 5:59 am**

CptnEcho wrote:
Not every version of Elite used up all your fuel before jumping. My version (meant for use on PC's with DOS) consumed fuel "as-you-go". If a player got yanked out of hyperspace by Thargoids, they still had enough fuel to witchspace to their original destination and could escape by jumping to hyperspace again (provided they survived long enough to do so).

If I recall this right, in the C64 version a misjump used the same amount of fuel as your planned jump would have used, but where you ended up was random, both in direction and distance (< 7 ly). So, if you got ambushed on 6.8ly jump - unless you got Galactic Hyperdrive, tough luck (you're almost certainly out of reach of any system), and likewise if you mis-jumped a short jump - very probably you could carry on to your original destination, or at least some other system. Should fire up my trusty old '64 to verify this, too bad she's in my parents' basement some 550km from where I live...

Posted: **Wed Oct 14, 2009 7:25 am**

Zieman wrote:
CptnEcho wrote:
Not every version of Elite used up all your fuel before jumping. My version (meant for use on PC's with DOS) consumed fuel "as-you-go". If a player got yanked out of hyperspace by Thargoids, they still had enough fuel to witchspace to their original destination and could escape by jumping to hyperspace again (provided they survived long enough to do so).
If I recall this right, in the C64 version a misjump used the same amount of fuel as your planned jump would have used, but where you ended up was random, both in direction and distance (< 7 ly). So, if you got ambushed on 6.8ly jump - unless you got Galactic Hyperdrive, tough luck (you're almost certainly out of reach of any system), and likewise if you mis-jumped a short jump - very probably you could carry on to your original destination, or at least some other system. Should fire up my trusty old '64 to verify this, too bad she's in my parents' basement some 550km from where I live...

I still have my C64 - and I confirm this is true - all fuel used - irrespective of whether you made the actual jump or not (I played it a few months ago before boxing it up and putting it under the bed due to lack of storage around the TV)

Posted: **Wed Oct 14, 2009 9:27 am**

Quote from Ian Bell's ELITE FAQ:
Mis-jumps take the ammount of fuel required for the intended jump. If the remaining fuel is adequate you can hyperspace again.

Posted: **Wed Oct 14, 2009 9:34 am**

CptnEcho wrote:
With several fuel OXP solutions now available to Oolite players, I see no need to change the mis-jump or Thargoid intercept encounters that drag a player out of hyperspace.

Cmdr Wyvern wrote:
Granted, that would be a cool effect. If the devs thought it easy to do, or even wanted to, who knows, it could happen.
But is it necessary, with so many oxp solutions around?

There are OXPs which fix this issue – but is it a good idea to have to download an OXP to fix what would be regarded in any modern game as a bug?

The original setup isn't Elite's fault, really: it was very early days, and it was the first open-ended game ever. It was also the era of adventure games where, on occasion, if you went North from some location, you died – usually without warning. Over time, games designers have learned not to do these things to players. Imagine getting into a secret area, having a big boss fight, beating the boss and finding that – ho ho – you're trapped and have to go back to the last save point.

It's not vital to fix this: as you point out, there are numerous OXP ways around the problem. But it's still a core-game problem. If it's easy to fix, then I would vote for fixing it. If it's not easy, then there are plenty of other things the devs have on their plates!

Posted: **Wed Oct 14, 2009 10:41 am**

DH's quote from the dark wheel in the "Whichspace?" thread:

No-one has ever stopped and gone outside to find out. Only robot remotes exist there, switching stations, monitors, rescue Droids and the like. Whatever lives in Witch-Space, in the Faraway tunnels, will remain a mystery always.

It would be great if the Thragoids drew you out of witchspace by jamming the switching stations, so whenever you got into a tangle with them in witchspace there was always a switching station placed somewhere nearby, maybe after zapping all the thargoids (or their jamming device on the station or whatever) you got your tunnel back so you could continue on your way?

edit: oo, maybe you could sabotage the switching station yourself to trap an assassination target in witchspace

Posted: **Wed Oct 14, 2009 10:52 am**

Disembodied wrote:
CptnEcho wrote:
With several fuel OXP solutions now available to Oolite players, I see no need to change the mis-jump or Thargoid intercept encounters that drag a player out of hyperspace.

Cmdr Wyvern wrote:
Granted, that would be a cool effect. If the devs thought it easy to do, or even wanted to, who knows, it could happen.
But is it necessary, with so many oxp solutions around?
There are OXPs which fix this issue – but is it a good idea to have to download an OXP to fix what would be regarded in any modern game as a bug?

The original setup isn't Elite's fault, really: it was very early days, and it was the first open-ended game ever. It was also the era of adventure games where, on occasion, if you went North from some location, you died – usually without warning. Over time, games designers have learned not to do these things to players. Imagine getting into a secret area, having a big boss fight, beating the boss and finding that – ho ho – you're trapped and have to go back to the last save point.

It's not vital to fix this: as you point out, there are numerous OXP ways around the problem. But it's still a core-game problem. If it's easy to fix, then I would vote for fixing it. If it's not easy, then there are plenty of other things the devs have on their plates!

Well argued.. I vote for fixing too.

Posted: **Wed Oct 14, 2009 11:00 am**

I don't see misjumps etc being a bug. it's part of the mythos, when you jump there's a chance Thargoids can stuff your journey and catapult you out into a firefight. that's not a bug, in my mind, it's all part of the game, that little tingle you'd get as the counter counted down, wonder if THIS time you'd end up somewhere you really didn't want to go. the fact that sometimes you were cast adrift w/out enough fuel is paramount to this, if it's "fixed" then there'd be no legends of ghosts of lost pilots etc, there wouldn't be as much threat in the event or apprehension.
personally, i think the fuel cannister thing is about as far as we need to go. that, or a missile replacement that's a high energy beacon : launch it and it broadcasts an SOS. after a given time, a helper can arrive to give fuel or a tow via their wormhole. alternatively, maybe pirates will respond....or more Thargoids....

Posted: **Wed Oct 14, 2009 11:19 am**

Killer Wolf wrote:
... a missile replacement that's a high energy beacon : launch it and it broadcasts an SOS. after a given time, a helper can arrive to give fuel or a tow via their wormhole. alternatively, maybe pirates will respond....or more Thargoids....

Now that would be an epic addition to the core game, methinks. There would be the possibility, albeit small, of rescue; or of further trouble. Maybe even an epic tale to tell the grandchildren about how Cmdr Whoever heroically fought off three thargoid raiding parties in witchspace, before being rescued at the fourth beacon attempt ...

My 0.2Cr

L

Posted: **Wed Oct 14, 2009 11:23 am**

i was just going to add - the beacon would be a continuous thing too, so if you attracted pirates and fought them off you could wait to see who came next. you could be lucky or unlucky - repeat until eventually saved.

a sly OXP might be programmed to slant the odds depending on your rank : Harmless etc, you get help virtually straight away. Deadly, and maybe the Help response is only a 1:10 chance!

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