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[Majestic7]

Bought this for liking the genre. First impression: seems interesting, but two things that could improve the game vastly come immediately to mind. First, the solar systems are tiny. If there were more points of interests than just one and jump points in the corner, it would improve the feeling of the game vastly. Second, only getting XP and bounty for kills is annoying, there should be some kind of assistance bonus per damage inflicted at least. Or just for sticking around - something.

[Halfgeek]

Second, only getting XP and bounty for kills is annoying, there should be some kind of assistance bonus per damage inflicted at least. Or just for sticking around - something.

Even if you did nothing but stuck around, you can pick up the lifepods which you can exchange for credits. So it's a small prize for sticking around.

I intentionally made Bounty Hunting a competitive process. Those "friendly" NPC Hunters or Security, they aren't your friend. They are your competitor and they are chasing their paycheck.

It's the same for traders, resolving a trade crisis is a competitive process. Those NPC merchants? They aren't your friend either, they are your competitors, they are trying to ship the goods in demand to those ports. If you are too slow at it, you will miss out on resolving the crisis (EXP, faction standing, rep) as they cash in.

[Zangi]

Watching these posts

[Astral]

I saw what appeared to be a flashing green exclamation mark on a trade frigate, though moving close to it didn't appear to do anything, and targeting it, then pressing Tab to attempt communication, stated that this was not possible either.

Any idea what that's supposed to do?

[Halfgeek]

I saw what appeared to be a flashing green exclamation mark on a trade frigate, though moving close to it didn't appear to do anything, and targeting it, then pressing Tab to attempt communication, stated that this was not possible either.

Any idea what that's supposed to do?

Click on the icon it's on. It's a random encounter.

Choose wisely. There are multiple outcomes for most encounters, similar to FTL. Some of them are long chain quests.

[Astral]

I've seen Gravonite for sale before, but I can't quite recall where. Any ideas where I might find this, aside from random pirate loot? I checked Forge, but they had basic materials.

I do sort of like the "participation award" change, as it at least gives incentive to learn to hunt, without completely gimping the ability to even dock at a station due to low funds, but I feel it was unnecessary, at least to me.

Some random thoughts/suggestions I had while playing:

A way of setting a minimum amount of energy that you want to reserve if your guns are on auto-fire. I normally use them manually, if only so three volleys don't completely deplete my energy bar, but I would still like a way of keeping a reserve of energy so that I'm not completely left sitting.

Some sort of quest log, or even a basic notepad where I can jot down the details of whatever random event I picked up, should I forget the name three random pirate battles later. Better yet, a chat history, as sometimes during combat I see messages that would pique my interest, if they weren't scrolling past so quickly.

Clicking on stations/quest points/cargo/escape pods doesn't fire your guns, if set to manual. Or a generic interact hotkey that allows you to dock and accept/pick up cargo/etc without clicking.

The ability to zoom out further. I'm still in the starter ship, and got the entry level railguns, but the targeting reticle extends past the top/bottom of my screen, even on a 1920x1080 monitor, making all that extra range pretty useless unless I'm running horizontal to them, and even then the shots make it past the edge ever so slightly.

Showing the health/shields of your current target in the top right. Something that would make it easier if the target goes off screen, which some fights tend to have happen.

A scanner module that would interact with the above, showing numerical value, and allowing you to better gauge the strength of an enemy for kill shots.

A little more clarification to the YES/NO answers for quests, or potentially multiple choices for them. One such quest

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

had me talking to this guy looking for his relative, taken by slavers. I was under the assumption that choosing Yes was supposed to be an offer of help, but instead it told me that I simply lied and he ran off.

So something to prevent misunderstandings of that nature, such as a bit of text indicating exactly what your intention is when clicking either option.

[Halfgeek]

Astral, thanks for playing it!

Gravonite is mostly from mining asteroids, explore and find them, there's a lot of asteroid types, randomly generated in fields with each new game.

You can also buy them from some mining worlds, some have more than others. They drop from Zerker loot, as well as faction Cruisers & Capital. Same for Elypsium.

Quest Log is something I'm going to included in the Port News UI update, where it tracks current events on the global level, as well as your missions you get from encounters.

Clicking won't fire guns anymore, I fixed that recently in an update. Patch it up!

The long range weapons are intended to be used to horizontal to them due to the 16:9 ratio. In manual mode their range is much greater than auto (which most ppl use for some reason, i much prefer manual!) which you can exploit. But the zoom is already approaching a point where my 2D sprites would look total crap if I zoom out more.

Targeting showing shields/hull for target is a good idea, I was thinking of it but decided it may be necessary clutter, but I'll try it and see.

If I do add it, I can show the real-time shield/hull values above those bars, no need for a module.

The random encounter Yes/No is something you have to decide yourself. In your example, you have no idea who this person is, total stranger, he comes up and ask whether you know the whereabouts of his loved one... surely you have no idea, how could you? So you could pick Yes and it would be a total lie...

Most encounters have multiple outcomes in the vein of FTL.

[Sean Mirrsen]

The random encounter Yes/No is something you have to decide yourself. In your example, you have no idea who this person is, total stranger, he comes up and ask whether you know the whereabouts of his loved one... surely you have no idea, how could you? So you could pick Yes and it would be a total lie...

Most encounters have multiple outcomes in the vein of FTL.

I believe the point is, that you don't know. What if you fought the slavers and actually know of a survivor that could be who he's looking for? What if you (as a character) do know and you (as a player) have no way to tell because it's a game and a lot of details are omitted or forgotten between sessions?

[Majestic7]

I noticed a little bug - if you meet a quest marked ship that turns hostile after the interaction, your autofire-weapons won't fire on him.

[jocan2003]

Second, only getting XP and bounty for kills is annoying, there should be some kind of assistance bonus per damage inflicted at least. Or just for sticking around - something.

Even if you did nothing but stuck around, you can pick up the lifepods which you can exchange for credits. So it's a small prize for sticking around.

I intentionally made Bounty Hunting a competitive process. Those "friendly" NPC Hunters or Security, they aren't your friend. They are your competitor and they are chasing their paycheck.

It's the same for traders, resolving a trade crisis is a competitive process. Those NPC merchants? They aren't your friend either, they are your competitors, they are trying to ship the goods in demand to those ports. If you are too slow at it, you will miss out on resolving the crisis (EXP, faction standing, rep) as they cash in.

Sadly if you shoot a bounty hunter you get the full weight of everything going after you.... You cant really tell them piss off without incuring major repercussion....

[Halfgeek]

Sadly if you shoot a bounty hunter you get the full weight of everything going after you.... You cant really tell them piss off without incuring major repercussion....
[/quote]

You can if you provoke them into attacking you first. Target them, TAB to direct coms, and threaten them. You lose a tiny bit of rep with the Hunter Guild, but if they take the bait and attack you (going hostile), you are free to kill them in self defense.

There was some friendly fire bug with player missiles not checking for self defense earlier but I've fixed it yesterday.

[Astral]

I did note an odd friendly fire issue with a specific ship; I taunted a Hunter to the point where he began attacking me (the one with a single shield bar, and what appears to be a medium shotgun turret), yet my basic Mega Flare guns didn't do anything to his shields. Later, I switched out for the medium Omni Collective firefly launchers, which were able to take him down when we ran into each other, but an odd issue nonetheless.

So far, I upgraded to the Typhoon II, with two medium turrets and a third small one. Currently running it with the firefly launchers on manual, and the small repeater railgun on auto fire, and having a much easier time of taking out pirates.

I did note that the size of the missiles don't seem to matter or scale, though. I equipped the same medium sized long range missiles after upgrading, and still only have 12 total. Are there different classes of ship or missile types that have more/less ammunition capacity for those missiles?

[Halfgeek]

I did note an odd friendly fire issue with a specific ship; I taunted a Hunter to the point where he began attacking me (the one with a single shield bar, and what appears to be a medium shotgun turret), yet my basic Mega Flare guns didn't do anything to his shields. Later, I switched out for the medium Omni Collective firefly launchers, which were able to take him down when we ran into each other, but an odd issue nonetheless.

So far, I upgraded to the Typhoon II, with two medium turrets and a third small one. Currently running it with the firefly launchers on manual, and the small repeater railgun on auto fire, and having a much easier time of taking out pirates.

I did note that the size of the missiles don't seem to matter or scale, though. I equipped the same medium sized long range missiles after upgrading, and still only have 12 total. Are there different classes of ship or missile types that have more/less ammunition capacity for those missiles?

Hunters are very evasive against bigger weapons (M & L Class Turrets have a very difficult time vs them). The only exception is the Omni Fireflies, since they behave like guided missiles that lock onto your target.

Ships have 3 types of Launcher Bays, S/M/L. The size is universe in that you can fit an M or L type missile/torp into the S-Launcher, but it will have less ammo.

The larger the bay, the more ammo it can hold. So if you like missiles, the Katana Frigate is cheap and effective. The bigger missile Cruiser gets 3x3L Launchers and some S-Turrets, but it can volley and keep doing so for a long time before running out of ammo.

[Astral]

I've taken a liking to the Omni, and decided to side with them. Problem is, their ships seem somewhat lacking in... something. They're perfectly capable of winning simulated battles, but if I decide to join them, they tend to win only by virtue of sheer numbers. Most of the time, a bunch of them will tend to die before they even start getting through the shields of Empire or Starborn ships. I

I'm not sure if it's due to a lack of burst damage, since they all seem to be equipped with the Firefly/Firestorm modules, but I don't see them doing the massive amounts of damage that comparable ships seem to do. While I do want to like the Firefly modules, the drawbacks as noted are crippling when used on a player ship, as it doesn't appear that NPCs are limited to the same energy or ammo constraints as the player is.

It could also be due to their near suicidal AI, as despite using long range, accurate weapons they want to be as close as possible to enemy ships, unaware of the comparative squishiness of their own craft. While they may have an equal amount of health to other ships if comparing shield+armor strength, they're lacking in the fact that those shield values are essentially doubled for their opponents, since the shield separately covers (and recovers) on either half of the vessel, while they're stuck with a single bar and regeneration rate.

I would like to see some diversity in NPC ship loadouts as this game goes forward though. For example, an 80% chance that the Omni's larger ships have the Firefly/Firestorm, as applicable to turret size, and perhaps a 20% chance for them to have the plasma launcher instead, or a MIRV launcher instead of their basic plasma missile. It would add an element of randomness to battles that you join, as you couldn't be assured you would face one weapon or another, but at least against the factions you can gear differently with shield/armor boosters against those damage types.

So far though, I thoroughly am enjoying the game overall.

[Halfgeek]

That's a good point, I overhauled their Capital AI awhile ago for more long range stand-off (it's weapons are long range + drones), but I hadn't gone over the smaller ships, which are still acting as close range brawlers. I'll change them soon, it's something I totally forgot.

Firefly/Storm are good in that they rarely miss, due to tracking, and no evasion checks unlike other main turrets. Basically they should be abusing their range advantage and you are spot on!

Adding more weapons for NPC atm needs a lot of testing to ensure its balanced so it's something for later as there's a few key features I want in asap.

Very glad you are enjoying it!