Now for a completely different scheme :P

There could be 2 different ways to travel system to system. You can fly trough a 'wormhole' (like now) or trough 'hyperspace'.

Hyperspace - think Babylon 5 - would, just like wormholes require the user to enter a 'hole'. But instead of bringing the user to a different system it will bring the user into hyperspace.

Hyperspace would be rather tricky. There would be limited visibility (500 m or so). Winds up to 100 m/s (the ship would drift into random ways and it would also shake, like a plane in turbulence). And there would be random stuff flying trough it at high speeds (roids, bots, other players, etc). So unless you watch out you are going to get killed by something (either a roid smashing into you or a bunch of bots). Also, the radar would get a limited range (500 m), except for where the 'wormholes' to other sectors are (those would be the same like they are now). The wormholes would be about 3 KM ~ 7 KM away from where you enter hyperspace.

To spread the load and make hyperspace even harder, there would be multiple hyperspace sectors. Each time you enter into a hyperspace hole you end up in a random hyperspace sector. If somebody nearby you enters hyperspace at roughly the same time as you he will end up in the same sector.

Because flying trough hyperspace is quite tough only the more experienced players could do it. And only the best could do it in something like a bus.

But it would make traveling faster (and probably more exciting too).

Maybe instead of this idea, we can have "shortcuts" from system to system. After you take the wormhole, it delivers you to another system, this one FULL of sectors that are your idea of hyperspace. After you get into your system, you MUST go straight forward to get to the target wormhole and the system you wanted to get to. Not each, but some of those sectors will have wormholes in them. The ones that dont, however, are next to impossible to navigate. All wormholes in this system are invisible, so the chances of finding a wormhole that you werent supposed to get into are immensly small.

Here's an idea that might satisfy some people with auto nav plotting

Okay, add nav map inside station. You can plot your course in there. You select where you want to go next and depart. When you reach 3000m you won't need to pull the nav menu back up again to click "Plot Course". Instead all you'd have to do is hit the activate key when you reach that magical distance. Simple enough, right? It's flawless. You can't accidentally jump to the plotted area if you have the intention of docking at a station or using a system wormhole, because both appear as "large objects" in space.

Grun,

I wanted to keep the extra coding to the minimal possible. Considering that the powerups have existed, so the code will still exist... I dont know if it is easy to create missions like I stated previously, but it will do multiple things at the same time: immerse the tradingexperience, possibly make it less boring. And give the option to people to travel fast and travel slow by using checkpoints for missions. So you give to both an option, in stead of limiting the options as I see it.

I didnt want to take cargo as a limiting factor since well it gives you less room to put additional cargo and get some extra profit out of your run.

EDIT: Arolte, well I always do that automatically as soon as I enter a sector, hit n and put my next objective, so I just have to hit activate as soon as I enter the 3km mark. It still uses 3 secs of going in a straight line "if your fast", but to eliminate it, you should be able by pressing enter activate the jump after pressing n.

cheers

The only problem I truly see in the game is the "fun factor". This is spread out through everything. Every aspect of the game should be fun in a sense.

Traveling: I love the hyperspace idea, this it'd make it a different adventure every time!

Tradeing: I'd change the system so that not every station has basically the same set of cargo for relatively the same prices. This makes tradeing stupid not fun. Make system specific cargos, some stations have it and some don't, this way it's at least simple and easier to trade.

Leveling: The idea of an ongoing war is cool. But also make some other ways. Botting is boring and monotonous, but always an option. Player killing is a good way to level, and if it's implemented in a way that doesn't cause grief to other players, then that is a true evolution in online gaming.

Factions: Right now, when you kill someone, your faction can sky rocket down in a second, but to bring it back up to formal glory can take a month. That is completely unfair and unbalanced. For major factions (Itani, Serco, NT), it should be a relatively fast process to get one of them to like you again. For minor factions (TPG, Orion, Axia, etc), it should take awhile, and it's fine as is. But it's just frustrating because you are afraid to kill anyone because then you'll be locked out, which is a pain in the ass to get docking privileges. I suggest a system known as "The enemy of my enemy is my friend" system. With this, when I kill an Itani or Serco, the other faction goes "Wait...did he just kill our enemy? Cool! Keep an eye on him...he might be helpful." So you gain a "Significant" or more amount of standing for the opposite faction. This makes the process fun and *faster* then it used to be. There should also be a system like this that raises NT standing if you are NT...

Communication: Once you get to learn and use it, it's actually ok.

Fighting: Excellent, easy, and fun. Hit the nail on the head with this one Guild.

Buying Cargos/Weapons/Ships/etc: Pretty easy, it could be more organized (in order), but the buy all ammo function really helps. I don't think it's supposed to be fun, but it's simple and easy enough that it isn't frustrating.

Player Interaction: This will be excellent when the new defence grid is implemented. It's fine as it is until then.

Hanging out: When you put IRC in the Corvus Stronghold and made it so the standing didn't matter there, you made it the new hangout spot!!! WOOOOOO PARTY!!!

Well...I think that covers alot of the thoughts on this forum chain. Remind me of other factors of the game I forgot to comment on and I'll edit them in.

Thanks for your time!

Cheers.

Rene:

Actually, I was responding to the hyperspace idea. No reason to add new code, you'd just need to make some really nasty murky systems that act as shortcuts.

...the one thing I don't like is how the Devs never say "Yes we are/might implement this so you can stop talking about it." or "It's coming soon so don't worry!" We're always left in the dark...

They're not obligated to let us know. They're running a little low on time and money and they need to get the game completed ASAP. If they're absolutely positive about a feature that will be implemented, they'll probably say so. Otherwise I think they want to avoid breaking promises or they themselves are skeptical about whether something could work or not. Be patient. Remember, we'll still be allowed to make suggestions after the game is finalized and we'll still receive major changes to the universe as well.

If they're afraid of breaking promises, then they should say "maybe". Right now, I have absolutely nothing to look forward to in Vendetta, and that's a real bummer. The game has so much potential, but we don't even know if that will be reached.

The problem with "maybe" is that users often read it as "yes". This has happened several times about release dates and the like.

The "News" section hints at some of the things being worked on: ship balance, mentors, guild support, etc.

I think the characterization that the devs "always keep us in the dark" and "never" confirm things is unfair. The user base for Vendetta has unheard-of access to the devs.

Every second the devs spend telling us what to expect is one less second spent on making other things come at this point. They've got a lot of work to bring this game up to a point where it's actually a fun, playable, salable game, and not very much time to do it in.

Much information comes from when the devs go in game for other reasons, and get asked questions, or same thing on IRC. Then the players repeat the answers to their questions.

I'll give you HyperSpaz that the devs aren't as on top of keeping us informed as they once were (obviously since they've got less time), but they're still really quite open, and much more so than many other test games.

As for other things you can look forwards to... there'll be a lot more done to the mission system. When they first released it they said that it was only really supposed to be the beginning training, and "there was no content in the missions yet." Also when I asked him a1k0n said that of course their would be Player vs Player missions.

...let's keep the board alive and off of page 2, shall we?

suggestion for chat:
>>forming groups when you get on allows you to chat a fair amount; it would be nice if you could do trade missions while in a group, and if the group limit were higher (so more people can be invited... you can have 20 people in a group), but besides that I'm not too stressed about the emptiness of chat.

>>about color: I like dark colors, of course, but after experimenting a little, I can't think of any "interesting" colors that, when added, would make a significant difference to the game. before, we couldn't even choose colors, so I'm happy. Dark blue vult is nice camouflage... imagine 8 of those attacking you--you can only target one enemy at a time, so the remaining 7 are invisible-ish! very nice.

>>the new gauss has potential to be scary. :D should the rockets' power be reduced, if there is such a powerful energy weapon? I always thought rockets took a while to learn, but gauss skill comes faster.

The words gauss and skill don't go together. High autoaim weapon with high damage does not a good pilot make. It is my opinion that this weapon still needs to be tweaked majorly, especially its upgrade versions. It's waaaaaay too deadly to be equipped on a fighter.

When you buy your ship, take a look at the second line of colors and tell me whether you can tell the difference between each consecutive color as they are selected one by one from left to right. Tough, huh? The problem is the lack of contrast between most of the colors. We have the brights, but not the darks. There are several tints of one color, but little for others. It's inconsistent.

I'd like to see a feature that would allow the player to truly customize their colors. Entering a hexadecimal value would be better IMO than selected from a limited color palette. And rather than being required to pick your color over again every time you start the game up, I think it should be saved in your preferences so that you wouldn't have to.

/ignores the flame bait

The second line's all white, I agree. Still I think the devs were smart in allowing only bright easily seen colors.

Arolte: it's true gauss isn't a great training weapon if you want to practice aiming; but after you attain skill, why not use it? If a pilot does not have skill, you could probably beat him/her with AGT, jacks/flares, rails... just because they aren't good at dodging; gauss won't make them much better.

>>smart in allowing only bright easily seen colors<<
why's that?
we've had dark, hard to see colors such as itani blue in previous versions too. Since most ships aren't of "solid" color (like the vulture only has some black markings), you'd be fine fighting anything, 'cept a large pack of blue vultures. (valk is mostly white, atlas is mostly white.. you can see the hornet and hog ok... etc etc)
colors are definitely not a priority at the moment, but I would welcome shades of "not bright, hard to see colors" in the far future =D

harvestmouse, and if they are good at dodging you're screwed. Right now there are no S-port weapons that can compete against a 190m/s Gauss MkII cannon. High autoaim, high damage, quicker speed, etc. If these stats are going to stay, some of other energy S-port weapons and L-port weapons are going to need beefing up. Otherwise the game will be dominated by Gauss MkII fighters.

I know there's a Tachyon MkII available, but it's still weaker and has little autoaim compared to the Gauss MkII. I don't quite understand what purpose the Gauss cannon serves anyway. Can someone explain to me why a high agility fighter needs to be equipped with a high autoaim weapon while heavier ships are stuck with weaker weapons? You could argue it's a luxury, but it's also killing game balance in the process.

The only chance I see of the heavier ships surviving is to beef up the AGT and beef up the L-port plasma cannons. The ammo based weapons are fine. It's just the energy weapons that are out of whack with balance. The L-port plasma cannon should be given higher autoaim than the S-port gauss cannons, to compensate for the lack of agility on these heavier ships. It drives me nuts to see how the weapons don't complement their appropriate ship classes.

I can see how a grav vs. gauss MkII cannon duel can get nasty...

(what about rail + flare against dual gauss? it's hard to be on the offensive with just one rail and one flare, but I believe such a setup could easily hold its own... the gauss would always be slightly out of range. the rails can hit at a greater distance, and the flares can keep the opponent from closing in too fast. but if you run out of ammo... gahhh.)

I've got to admit that I've only read half of the thread. But it's really huge. Here are my 5 cents:

1. Communication:
Currently it's really confusing because no one knows what the different chats do. I would propose this system:
Have a sector chat not limited to 3km but to the sector. Have nation bulletin board available in all nation stations. (Maybe different boards with different expiration durations). Have a pm function available within stations. Enemy nation won't tranceive calls. So you have to stick to the information your nation has. ("Pilot X is unreachable. Left friendly space at Y towards system Z.) Have a group chat that goes only through the sector. PM in sector is possible, too from outside a station.

2. Travel
I remember this nice game Frontier which you seemed to borrow from heavily. It had a really nice travel system, though it's not possible for online play.
How about this:
Inter-System-Travel as it is now:
In-System-Travel is possible through jump-gates located at important sectors (stations, wormholes). This costs a small fee and isn't available to enemies. But you also have the short warp option left. Maybe not all ships can warp since it's not nescessary anymore. (Heavy freighters can only use jump gates or something. Or maybe very big ships can't use them, because the gates are too small. Maybe different sized gates at different stations?)
Now for the short warp:
1. Make it range limited.(maybe 3-8 sectors)
2. Make it take some time. Not too much, so you don't get the people bored. Maybe something like a maximum of 30 seconds if you do a full range jump and shorter if you jump not as far as you could. Think about something the people can do during this period. This is so that faster ships can overtake slower ships in hyperspace (pirates want to do this). Make ships that started the same jump at about the same time appear near each other.
3. Make the hyperspace clouds last at least 30 seconds. Maybe not as bright. And then bring in the hyperspace cloud analyzer so someone can find out where this ship went (show ship mass, destination sector and eta). Currently there are no means of finding out where a ship has gone.

4. Things that didn't fit into the other categories

Make a jump key so you don't need this stupid screen for jumping.

Make it you need at least a certain amount of energy for shortwarp.

Make the nav screen available during waiting periods.

Give some info about the system/planet/stations in the nav screen so we have at least a slight hint about which trade routes are profitable. (mining station, tourist attraction, you know like in Frontier)

5. Some things for the more distant future of Vendetta

Make a larger universe with the stuff centered around the existing universe.

Let players construct/destroy stations. (mining, manufacturing)
Maybe only in factionless sectors so that people won't get upset and the sectors will get cluttered with stations. Maybe faction stations and warpgates will get rebuild by the computer within a certain time.

Let players construct/destroy warp gates, same.

Let us mine asteroids.


I want these big vessels:
1. A ferry can carry smaller ships and can do inter system jumps without gates

2. Constructor which can build (or transform into) stations (or at least something to build one from) and jumpgates. This one has to do inter system jumps, too.

3. Interdictor as in T-Figher prevents short (long?) range warp in the sector or at least it's vincinity. Maybe it can crash ships from hyperspace.

That's it for now.

How about you guys implement the old chat system in a new update before the release, and put the current chat back in for the release. Now there are only about 10 people on at once, and I think it's depressing to be all alone and not have anyone to talk to. After the release, you should have more players, so the chat will fill up. Can ya?