Discovery Gaming Community

Okay, I know that it's like a 10001th thread about NPCs at all but I feel like getting some ideas out. Generally it should be for good to generate some ideas and make some thoughts towards the place of the NPCs in our (real players) life.

The new mod have shown us some new features, including but not limiting with new NPC patrols'n'stuff. However it rises some points which should be cleaned up.

First is - what place NPCs are taking in the gameplay? We got a hundreds of real players here so I guess the whole idea is to promote player to player interactions. I may be wrong, but still. My opinion is that NPCs are just an environmental improvement for very those interactions. You know, trade ships passing around, few police thingies annoys you with their scan, some pesky pirates wants you to drop your 5000 ores, etc. That's nice and fancy since it gives a look of populated space (especially when NPCs don't rain down on your head from all directions which makes a look like the space is filled with various ships so you feel like in a bus in a rush hour). So that should be the NPC place - environment. But the trend is going straight to the point where NPCs are effectively replacing player to player interactions.

It's not a wise decision from my point of view since, well, what is this game about? It's basically a pews with some roll play involved to make pews more cool and atmospheric.

Second question leads up from the first question's answer: How many\How strong and how armed must be NPCs to fit in their role.

My answers for those questions are only few of many. Here are they.

First - NPCs, as I said before, are represents an environmental tool. So let them be as such. Currently NPCs are a annoying issue since they are powerful enough to ruin any p2p interaction.

Battleship patrols, cruiser patrols, gb patrols. They spawn a lot, and sometimes, in a places where they should not spawn at all. Like Bret BS patrols near the Cambridge hole in Leeds. It's like, freaking away from anything.

I know where all this "buff npc" thing comes from. Let's not voice it there as well since everyone know the answer.

But back to the NPC. My suggestion is to review the whole situation with p2p interaction idea of playing the online game.

So if they are an environmental tool, lets remake them to be as such.

First, (and it's the main issue) NPCs are utilizing the unlimited power cores. That gives them an ability to spray around indefinitely any weapon you give to them.

NPCs shouldn't be armed with weapons like player ships does. Mean battleship patrol should be using, from my pov, some weapons like BS pulses + special NPC turrets with not that much damage so they can't be an issue. De shielding is fine as it is. So the really good example of NPC armament is a docking ring which uses some turrets with low alpha damage and pulses. Stations are fine as well. So why not stationed battleships are armed as such? That's a mystery.

So.

BS: BS Pulses + Some generic turrets with around 4k damage and low refire.
Destroyers: Cruiser pulses + some generic turrets with around 2k damage and refire on around 2.0
Gbs: GB pulse + turrets with refire around 3.0 and low damage.

Same goes for stationed things like BSes, Destroyers, etc.

That will still make a look of a populated space without placing a bold dot on a p2p interaction.

Edit: Also I forgot about tweaking the npc spawn areas. Capital ships are ain't that many so they should not shown up in any corner of the the system. Make very few places where you can see them for a whole house, like an orbit of a capital planet. BSes spawning in 70k from any game object just in a middle of nowhere is stupid.

Suggestions, ideas, rage?

Roles of NPCs:
- Target practise for players. Some people enjoy hunting the odd NPC.
- Shooing folk away from areas they have no business being in. IE: Making sure no pirate transport goes 2milordai-ing in front of a house capital planet for instance, and on occasion get harassed on the lanes.
- Being cargo-laden cashcows. Mainly for unlawful factions (although a lawful blockading a jumphole and pewing the NPCs going through can end up being profitable too - note to self, set area_trader to include a freighter or two)

NPCs do have an infinite core. However, they do still have a relatively basic and in most cases stupid AI that doesn't allow them to do much in the way of planning their movement. They make up for them being idiots with spraying more firepower, and usually being a lot less armored.

Capital ships being in areas they should not be (Leeds is a prime example of that) is a problem that should be remedied yes.

Pirate transport pirating near the capital planet is stupid hello, transport can just dock at any possible place laughing. I don't see why battleships are needed for it.

Missions are good for those who want to shoot some NPCs. And it's fine, leave missions to be challenging. Because if you don't want to get into the mess with NPCs you simply not taking one right?

All the other places filled with caps are stupid at best.

Also ain't that a player business to keep other hostile players away from the places they should not be in? Or soon navy will be just sitting on top of another BS watching for swarm of NPC doing what they should do themselves?

That's some kind of a mistake no?

'm sorry you feel that way. Can't say I agree with it. It's not just transports pirating - but also groups of fighters, bombers, gunboats and other assorted riffraff that can prevent a player from leaving the area if the unlawfuls are zapping the tradelanes, essentially blockading a core world base area with just a small team. A BS patrol tends to dislodge those or even cause a few blue messages. Heavy patrols are meant to ensure no unlawful lolwuts will stick around indefinately.

Smaller snubs are mainly for flavor - we took away their CDs to prevent them from having too much of an impact on the actual game. Only in large (6+) numbers do they become dangerous to anything that isn't a snub - and even then you can simply cruise off. They should give an impression of which factions have a presence in the area.

The transports zipping around the lanes are another story. I think we'll need to rethink this for 4.87 - it was more fun (I think) to have the bigger transports have cargo pods which you could blow up. Maybe we can make the house trains into something that can carry those standard cargo module, as well.

But what about the simple fact that you can just go somewhere else if there is a trouble? So you're once again saying that NPC are here to do the player's job because players can't be arsed.

And I'm sorry that you, as a dev, feel that way.

' Wrote:So you're once again saying that NPC are here to do the player's job because players <strike>can't be arsed</strike> aren't there all the time.

Fixed that for you.

' Wrote:But what about the simple fact that you can just go somewhere else if there is a trouble? So you're once again saying that NPC are here to do the player's job because players can't be arsed.

And I'm sorry that you, as a dev, feel that way.

really are you going there?

ok how about, a galaxy, with 200 people in it tops. oh wait no, because that would be stupid.

NPC's represent exactly what their name suggests, Non Player Characters. as in all the rest of the trillions of people in sirius. 'players not being arsed' doesnt even come into the equasion because even if the server was 100% full every day around the clock. thats only 225 people, in the whole of sirius. explain to us how every faction can have all of their members online at once anyway even in the best possible cenario.

oh wait, you cant... because its impossible zzzz

Why should faction with all it's members be online 24\7 if there would not be that much\strong npcs?