Der_Foe, you have made several points about how targeted communication is realistic, but none about how the gameplay it adds is fun. It is certainly true that we use directional transmission and reception to improve long distance communication, and in real life that's a detail we contend with but... what fun does it add? Can you describe the minute to minute gameplay that aiming an antenna provides? What action am I taking in game, and why is it fun rather than frustrating or annoying?

Cornflakes_91 wrote:*flying next to my big-ass C4 ship*
"i'll communicate with my fleet headquarters now...."
*doesnt work because the C4 ship doesnt look at me right now i dont look at the C4 ship in the correct way*
"why cant i communicate with my base?! there is a big COMMUNICATIONS ARRAY right NEXT TO ME!!"

Der_Foe wrote: Whilst being in a civilian area you'd most certainly use the widest possible angle (ergo sphere) anyways, as you'd probably not plan to transmit on a long range. If you were scouting, you'd have to be closer to your own ship than to the enemy, if you wanted to stay hidden and keep a constant connection.

You are using tight beam connections all the time, if you have a stealthy comms device your cone is very tight, if not, then not.

Der_Foe wrote:

Cornflakes_91 wrote:but with pased array beam steering, i dont think that any limitations to cone rotation rate or data rate should be included.

I may be understanding this fundamentally wrong in multiple ways, but you could just insert the coordinates of where your base or station or whatever is and have the device position itself.

Cornflakes_91 wrote:why i think that it doesnt really matter? because my smartphone is using that right now with my router

I assume that
A: You are in close proximity to your router
and
B: You've got satellite TV

the distance to my router doesnt affect the fact that it uses adaptive beam steering, focusing a nice little beam of WiFi on my phone all the time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beam_steering
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phased-array_optics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phased_array

Der_Foe wrote:

Cornflakes_91 wrote:maybe some special purpose unidirectional comms devices, which can only connect to a single target at a time, but have higher effective ranges.
making them suitable for point-to-point communications between fixed locations

That's actually what I'm saying, with the slight difference that i'd rather have it as a generalised system. Allowing with the same concept unidirectional long range and short range omnidirectional communication.

We dont need technological limitations from pre-WW2 to archieve that.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mammut_radar



TL;DR:
there are devices now that steer EM beams in timeframes a thousand times shorter than it takes a human to blink, so any measurable time to change communication direction is quite hilarious in a sci fi game

Cornflakes_91 wrote:some pretty good points

Looks like I've got to look into some of that. When I've got Internet that isn't borderline useless (curse you mobile Internet Providers). But it sounds interesting. I have to admit that I am not that informed when it comes to communication technology. And that I may have been drunk when I posted that reply.

Could there be any fun gameplay added by that system? I don't know. It could be absolute bullocks, it could be something where you ask yourself why you had so much fun with it, the past few hours. It can be fun to be stuck in virtual mud.

One issue with this post I have: "not penalizing casual players" sorry to say this but every game that has tried to do that has sucked.
Need I mention my beloved DA2. No offense to casual players but the games you like suck!

Hadrianus wrote:One issue with this post I have: "not penalizing casual players" sorry to say this but every game that has tried to do that has sucked.
Need I mention my beloved DA2. No offense to casual players but the games you like suck!

"Not penalizing casual players" doesn't necessarily mean "cater only to casual players" - one good example is DCS World, which includes functions that casual players may use, but that don't show up on most servers featuring more hardcore players.

Scytale wrote:

Hadrianus wrote:One issue with this post I have: "not penalizing casual players" sorry to say this but every game that has tried to do that has sucked.
Need I mention my beloved DA2. No offense to casual players but the games you like suck!

"Not penalizing casual players" doesn't necessarily mean "cater only to casual players" - one good example is DCS World, which includes functions that casual players may use, but that don't show up on most servers featuring more hardcore players.

Yes but we are not talking about a mmo here this is a single player game a single player experience!

Hadrianus wrote:
Yes but we are not talking about a mmo here this is a single player game a single player experience!

Right, but I think the DCS world technique here is still applicable - if you don't want the dumbed down version, turn those functions off =P

I think it's possible to not penalize casual players, but then it's very important not to build that sense into the mechanics, which is probably more what you're pointing out.

I suppose the question is: is this game aiming to be a hardcore game at its heart?

Scytale wrote:

Hadrianus wrote:
Yes but we are not talking about a mmo here this is a single player game a single player experience!

Right, but I think the DCS world technique here is still applicable - if you don't want the dumbed down version, turn those functions off =P

I think it's possible to not penalize casual players, but then it's very important not to build that sense into the mechanics, which is probably more what you're pointing out.

I suppose the question is: is this game aiming to be a hardcore game at its heart?

I wish it! I truly do! The reason I like independent developers to major ones is simple. Independent developers cater to a specific segment of gamers. Which though it makes them less coin it also means that they don't try to make everyone happy and thus they don't disappoint as much as major developers.

Look at Bioware, they used to be the RPG big dogs out there, but once they started catering to the casual gamer their games started to suck real fast! Recently they've tried to change that but I wouldn't hold my breath.

Hadrianus wrote:One issue with this post I have: "not penalizing casual players" sorry to say this but every game that has tried to do that has sucked.
Need I mention my beloved DA2. No offense to casual players but the games you like suck!

"Others have failed so you will too!"
"You cannot do this!"

Nobody told me that, so i just did it.


Its not punishing casuals because it doesnt matter much to casuals.
If you dont care for comms systems you just accept that your data rate goes down with distance and you may loose connection to other things when someone else uses a jammer on you.
You can still use the system without much thought on it and it still works, likely far from optimal but you can still use it.

Casuals also likely wont build vast empires and giant armadas where communications start to matter.
For most purposes a simple "max range" displays is suffecient with the note that bandwith gets lower with distance.


@Der_Foe:
Well, its hard to beat a communications engineer in communications engineering if you arent one yourself

We could use the cone system still, but in another form.
There is (are) a radiation cone(s) going out from you when you are communicating.
To every object you have an active link to.

So when you are sending to the trade station on the other side of the asteroid field the pirate lurking there might cross your comms beam and detect you (and maybe even reads your data).

A tighter beam lowers the probability of interception and reduces the energy needs
in rl tighter beams only have advantages, so i dont really know what we could use to balance this, maybe bigger comms array size, as phased arrays get better beam forming capabilities with size.

So if you want a stealthy ship you have to use tight beam comms, but you have to live with a too big array for its available bandwith

Cornflakes_91 wrote:

Hadrianus wrote:One issue with this post I have: "not penalizing casual players" sorry to say this but every game that has tried to do that has sucked.
Need I mention my beloved DA2. No offense to casual players but the games you like suck!

"Others have failed so you will too!"
"You cannot do this!"

Nobody told me that, so i just did it.


Its not punishing casuals because it doesnt matter much to casuals.
If you dont care for comms systems you just accept that your data rate goes down with distance and you may loose connection to other things when someone else uses a jammer on you.
You can still use the system without much thought on it and it still works, likely far from optimal but you can still use it.

Casuals also likely wont build vast empires and giant armadas where communications start to matter.
For most purposes a simple "max range" displays is suffecient with the note that bandwith gets lower with distance.


@Der_Foe:
Well, its hard to beat a communications engineer in communications engineering if you arent one yourself

We could use the cone system still, but in another form.
There is (are) a radiation cone(s) going out from you when you are communicating.
To every object you have an active link to.

So when you are sending to the trade station on the other side of the asteroid field the pirate lurking there might cross your comms beam and detect you (and maybe even reads your data).

A tighter beam lowers the probability of interception and reduces the energy needs
in rl tighter beams only have advantages, so i dont really know what we could use to balance this, maybe bigger comms array size, as phased arrays get better beam forming capabilities with size.

So if you want a stealthy ship you have to use tight beam comms, but you have to live with a too big array for its available bandwith

I don't disagree with anything you state here but what does it have to do with my comment?

P.S.

I did not say that you can't do something (straw man on your side dare I say) I was simply stating my previous experience with games that catered to casual players in order to explain why I am skeptical in this regard.

Hadrianus wrote: I don't disagree with anything you state here but what does it have to do with my comment?

P.S.

I did not say that you can't do something (straw man on your side dare I say) I was simply stating my previous experience with games that catered to casual players in order to explain why I am skeptical in this regard.

im saying that i dont cater for casuals, i try not to squash them unintentionally while catering for the non-casuals

Cornflakes_91 wrote:

Hadrianus wrote: I don't disagree with anything you state here but what does it have to do with my comment?

P.S.

I did not say that you can't do something (straw man on your side dare I say) I was simply stating my previous experience with games that catered to casual players in order to explain why I am skeptical in this regard.

im saying that i dont cater for casuals, i try not to squash them unintentionally while catering for the non-casuals

The arguments put forth here unfortunately do penalize casual players. Anything where you try to give non-casuals an advantage is always seen the other way as penalizing the other party.

Let me put it into perspective a little bit;

You drive a car with an automatic transmission. You get from place A to B. You can do the same with a manual transmission. It used to be that with a manual transmission, you would get better gas mileage. This would be akin to providing those with a manual transmission an advantage--the hardcore drivers.

Now, with DCTs, CVTs, CVVTs, you can actually get better gas mileage with an automatic. So the question is, 'why not drive an automatic'? Different people will have responses; Some will say that is more involving to drive a manual, some will say it is more fun, and some will say it has more control. The reality is, all those responses are valid. If you're driving a stick-shift over an automatic, the fuel economy is the least of your worries and for the most part is minor enough that it isn't really used as a selling point on vehicles.

So if anything, make that more 'difficult' method more 'fun'. Make people want to learn the more difficult method for other reasons than 'its better'.

Case in point: My wife doesn't know how to drive an automatic. She's seen me drive trucks, vans, and other vehicles. She has had absolutely no interest. Now that we're in the market for a second vehicle and I wanted to get a sports car, she's seen me drive that and actually wants to learn.

I think the ideas apply here too.

Well put. What's more, this viewpoint doesn't categorise people into casuals and non-casuals, with whatever connotations those words may have.

i'd find messing around with this fun

Cornflakes_91 wrote:i'd find messing around with this fun

I'm not saying that this isn't fun. I'm just saying that instead of penalizing or whatever, make it something people want to do. I'm the same way. It's the difference in Roller Coaster Tycoon from building your own coaster vs. selecting a pre-made one. Sure, you could get better ratings from a custom one, but sometimes you just want to use a pre-made one for whatever reason.

Honestly, I'd find fun messing around with this fun as well.