Aliens

[Chairman_Tiel]

The Factions mechanic has been tested time and time again via the plugin (currently the most popular one next to Essentials) and has proven to enhance Minecraft PVP without even touching anything you're throwing out, Iv. Do mega-factions form? Yes. Do they last long? Heck no. I know from experience, I set up a massive thirty player faction on a server once and it fell apart, as you say, humans will always serve their own interests before those of the group. (another example would be my despicable behavior back on Solaris). That in itself almost guarantees a dynamic and diverse war environment.

The concept of AI security ships flying around ala EVE or Freelancer seems pretty good, but how would they be justified? When would they spawn, what would determine it? What ships would they use? It makes no sense to just have them floating about before the players in the solar system even achieve spaceflight. The game could examine player density, but that's an expensive process, and regardless there'd still be the issue of what ships they'd use. The only way this makes sense is if the explanation is that they're security forces deployed by various factions to prevent PVP in an area, but how would this work as far as maintaining style?

Perhaps when a shipyard is built, a schematic can be chosen for the security forces that will spawn in the adjacent region of space? Or if the FCE is still a 'thing', have the explanation be a detachment of ships is dispatched from them to the solar system to maintain order?

[Prototype]

I think policing should be the duties of the ops and admins, they have better judgement than an AI, but they would have to be carefully selected.

[Chairman_Tiel]

I think policing should be the duties of the ops and admins, they have better judgement than an AI, but they would have to be carefully selected.

This isn't about policing. This is about having AI cruisers roaming about under a banner of 'maintaining order', which means any PVP in their radius would mean you'd be marked a target. This would make operations such as run-of-the-mill piracy much more exhilarating and difficult to pull off successfully. The question would be the reason for them being there to begin with; obviously it'd increase gameplay quality but authenticity really helps sci fi games succeed.

The issue of moderation should probably still be decided at some point. Mackeroth insists on his 'moderator fleet', and that'd fit really well into this feature, but I don't think the actual rule-enforcing branch should actually be a 'faction', persay, just selected representatives cruising around in untouchable, unarmed ships. The AI ships could be the 'fleet', though I daresay that's not what he had in mind

[Iv121]

The police AI is patrolling settled planets and space stations. The more people live in a specific area (not actual players) the more patrolling ships it will have and the more "secure" it will be. Also military bases and such are more secure than other areas. Places with low traffic or far away from planets and hubs are not patrolled or patrolled poorly, leaving those areas vulnerable to raids and attacks. If you committed crimes the patrolling ships will chase you and request you to land on a planet where you will have to pay for you crimes (Mostly in money). If you refuse to cooperate they will try to disable your ship and tow you to there or if you are a dangerous criminal or the towing didn't work they will try to destroy you.

BTW A moderating fleet is a no - no. This is pure power abuse. The admin fleet didn't like that someone succeeded in the game (while playing by the rules) so he summons an OP fleet and destroys him. Even if you do it with the purest intentions of keeping the game balanced it is like kicking a pro out of an FPS server because he is too good ... This is power abuse and you should not do it. The simple fact this fleet exists will make the impression you are forceful jerks who try to force everyone to do what they want. The only way to make balanced gameplay in this situation is not to allow such as things happe at all.

[Chairman_Tiel]

NO NO AND NO ! THIS IS PURE POWER ABUSE ! YOU CANNOT AND SHALL NOT USE YOUR POWERS TO DESTROY SHIPS ON WILL !

Dafuq are you going on about?

The police AI is patrolling settled planets and space stations. The more people live in a specific area (not actual players) the more patrolling ships it will have and the more "secure" it will be. Also military bases and such are more secure than other areas. Places with low traffic or far away from planets and hubs are not patrolled or patrolled poorly, leaving those areas vulnerable to raids and attacks. If you committed crimes the patrolling ships will chase you and request you to land on a planet where you will have to pay for you crimes (Mostly in money). If you refuse to cooperate they will try to disable your ship and tow you to there or if you are a dangerous criminal or the towing didn't work they will try to destroy you.

I think you're overestimating the capabilities of Futurecraft's AI. I really doubt NPCs would feasibly be able to colonize, settle, and build, at least not without some serious backend code that'd break the game for anyone not touting a quadcore i5 and 660 GTX

Also, Futurecraft =/= GTA. It'd be much easier on the devs to just have your name logged in the 'police's database as an enemy after committing a crime, after a set duration of time your name would then be removed (think committing crimes in Oblivion or Skyrim - Guards use lethal force but it's easy to escape and wait a while before going in again).

[Keon]

How about Eve's sector security status? In .75 space or above, godships come in and kill any attacker who isn't attacking an enemy or a criminal. Sector security also effects bombing in a manner similar to your server's factions, Tiel. Enemy ships slowly lower sector security status, and bombing a planet lowers it even more. (This wouldn't block the explosions though.) The sector security also forms a mesh, so if you bomb a low-sec planet into nullsec, then the planets around it would suddenly be low-sec, allowing them to be bombed without summoning the godships of police.

[fr0stbyte124]

Problem is that nobody can win this argument until the mod is out and you will see for yourself.

Technically I can, but I'll try not to abuse that privilege.

What we'll probably do is in Alpha testing, we'll set up sandboxes with different rules and quarantine players from traveling between sandboxes with a single character. See what works best.

[Chairman_Tiel]

How about Eve's sector security status? In .75 space or above, godships come in and kill any attacker who isn't attacking an enemy or a criminal. Sector security also effects bombing in a manner similar to your server's factions, Tiel. Enemy ships slowly lower sector security status, and bombing a planet lowers it even more. (This wouldn't block the explosions though.) The sector security also forms a mesh, so if you bomb a low-sec planet into nullsec, then the planets around it would suddenly be low-sec, allowing them to be bombed without summoning the godships of police.

I'm not saying this is a bad idea or that it'd break gameplay, but I'm just thinking that from a coding standpoint it just isn't practical.

[fr0stbyte124]

I've got no problem making complicated scripts if it is a necessary game mechanic, but I just wonder how much we should be copying EVE's example for everything. Admittedly, they do have the most fleshed out system of any space game I've seen, but there is no guarantee it will work as well here. There is going to be a constituency dead-set on bullying and ruining the game for everybody regardless of risk or profitability, especially if there is only one persistent galaxy and nobody can escape them once a server's gate is online. We may very well need something a bit more authoritarian than a security deterrent for this group.

[Chairman_Tiel]

I think gates should be able to be knocked offline temporarily. Terrorist attacks, if you will.

[Iv121]

Well nobody can force a jump node to stop working but recharge times on jump drives should do the trick. Also nothing that is god-mode is good because it feels unfair, limiting and surreal.

In addition I don't want to teach NPCs to colonize planets. I want ready planets with ready NPCs (because it is much easier and gives the same results). Also AI does not effect graphic cards but CPUs and even this is not serious in comparison to other stuff futurecraft will have. While initially I believed myself it will be hard to make a clever AI I thought about it and came to the conclusion it's not that hard after all and can be handled with simple math and a bit of variables, after all the space is empty.

[Chairman_Tiel]

Well nobody can force a jump node to stop working but recharge times on jump drives should do the trick. Also nothing that is god-mode is good because it feels unfair, limiting and surreal.

In addition I don't want to teach NPCs to colonize planets. I want ready planets with ready NPCs (because it is much easier and gives the same results). Also AI does not effect graphic cards but CPUs and even this is not serious in comparison to other stuff futurecraft will have. While initially I believed myself it will be hard to make a clever AI I thought about it and came to the conclusion it's not that hard after all and can be handled with simple math and a bit of variables, after all the space is empty.

Right, you code the AI for the mod, then we'll talk. fr0st is under enough stress as it is.

[҉]

While initially I believed myself it will be hard to make a clever AI I thought about it and came to the conclusion it's not that hard after all and can be handled with simple math and a bit of variables, after all the space is empty.

You have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.

[Iv121]

Would you stop please saying the same "Get out of here " all the time and be more specific ? If you want I can even describe you a basic AI frame for battles ...

[҉]

Would you stop please saying the same "Get out of here " all the time and be more specific ? If you want I can even describe you a basic AI frame for battles ...

Of course you can. I could describe one too. But that's not even vaguely the same thing as being able to program one. You seem to be approaching this discussion from the point of view of "I know exactly what everything must be, and you're all just too dumb to see my brilliance. Moreover, everything I want is easy to do, and everything you want is impossible. This is because I am great and wise and I have the forethought to think about these things while you poor, foolish people struggle to understand." That's likely not what you mean, but that's definitely what I'm getting out of your comments, and it's not an attitude I appreciate. I don't know about anyone else here, but I want you to just stop @#$%ing arguing.