Notice: Hyperspace beacons

[Alley]

You wondered why Jumpdrives were disabled yesterday? Here's the reason.
The Hyperspace Matrix is finally here. (Not really, but later today)

For those who didn't hear about this feature, which might have happened as it has been on the shelves for almost a year, the matrix is a calculation device for hyperspace beacons. Once you have acquired this item and have beacons in your cargo hold, when you deploy a beacon in space, the matrix will calculate a hyperspace vector as precisely as possible and give it to the beacon. While the beacon is active (30 seconds), all jumpdrives within the 4 system range will be able to jump to this ship. Due to these time constraints, teamwork and coordination will be essential.

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Usage example:

- [LN]-LNS-Mount.Hood is a LABC equipped with a Hyperspace Matrix and has beacons in its cargo hold. The vessel is in Leeds and is about to be attacked by Gallic vessels.
- [LN]-LNS-Glendale is a carrier equipped with a MK3 Jumpdrive. The vessel is in New York and in group with the Mount Hood, but will never make it there in time. Leeds is four systems away though.
- Glendale starts charging his jumpdrive. He tells Mount Hood to prepare to activate a beacon when the JD is fully charged. Seconds later, the JD is at 95% charge, Glendale tells Mount Hood to activate the beacon. Mount Hood activates his beacon by typing the "/beacon" command.
- Now at 100% charge, Glendale had the command "/jumpbeacon [LN]-LNS-Mount.Hood" ready to go and press enter. The game confirms the beacon is active and begins the 8 seconds jumping process.
- 8 seconds later, Glendale exits Hyperspace right next to the Mount Hood and proceeds to attack the Gallic forces.

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There are many possible uses with this and combined with the possibility to disrupt jump drives, potential benefits and risks have never been greater.
Now, switching to dev color, I'd like to inform you of several ongoing issues with this:
- The Matrix currently uses 25 cargo space. That's not intended and will be fixed with the patch. The intended volume is 150 units.
- The Beacon commodity is currently missing. It's replaced with the use of 250 normal cloak batteries.
- The Hera Torpedo cannot be released on the server in its current form, mostly because it's not possible to buy ammunition for it anywhere in the game. Jumpdrives will be disruptable with cruise disruptors for the time being.

Instead of holding back the feature for an indefinite amount of time, I believe it's better to release it out in the wild even with the few issues mentioned above. The Hyperspace Matrix will be available for assembly on any Hyperspace Scanner Factory. Building requirements will be posted later today as the values are still being refined.

Update: Materials to build a MK1 Hyperspace Matrix:

Code:

x90000 Reinforced Alloys
x5000 Gravity Stabilizers
x15000 Critical Temperature Alloys
x21000 Industrial Hardware
x15000 Robotic Hardware
x20000 Argentium Silver
x15000 Magnetic Superconductors

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Alley was right.

[Jack_Henderson]

Alllllright! This sounds... awesome! 30 seconds time frame might be a little tough, but let's try it and see!
Everything that promotes cooperation is very very welcome!
Also, this reads as if Jumpdrives now were finally not a "get away & come back & be annoying" tool, but got cool uses now.

Tnx! Now I actually might start thinking about getting one.

~ Jack

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[Impyness]

Really concerned about the 30 second time window in all honesty. Should probably be a minute at least, if not more.

Other than that looks neat.

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#Snakded

[Alley]

Really concerned about the 30 second time window in all honesty. Should probably be a minute at least, if not more.

Other than that looks neat.

We can't really know as it hasn't been widely used yet, but it's a very simple value to adjust in a config file so don't be worried, if it's really too tight it'll be adjusted.

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Alley was right.

[Venkman]

Really concerned about the 30 second time window in all honesty. Should probably be a minute at least, if not more.

Other than that looks neat.

I agree with Impy here, a minute or more would be good, less... not so much.

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[Black Widow]

So this means then that individual ships with JDs mounted can no longer jump to any system autonomously just by entering the required coordinates?

They now require a separate ship to deploy a beacon in order to jump to that system?

[Backo]

2 jumps from Tau-23 to New Berlin. That's going to take people across the map pretty fast.

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[Alley]

So this means then that individual ships with JDs mounted can no longer jump to any system autonomously just by entering the required coordinates?

They now require a separate ship to deploy a beacon in order to jump to that system?

Not sure how you got that idea, it doesn't change anything to the current usage. This is an alternative usage.

2 jumps from Tau-23 to New Berlin. That's going to take people across the map pretty fast.

Abuse will be dealt with, I'm not worried about it. As I told Antonio on skype, I rather punish abusers than ruin the feature for all people using it legitimately. Besides, you're still going to need a JD4 with an insane amount of fuel to pull this off, so even with a JD3 it's not really any different from doing it with surveyed coordinates.

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Alley was right.

[Sciamach]

I have my concerns but alot of them are nitpicks or so incredibly minor that I'll save them til I've had a chance to try the new system myself.

Either way, I can appreciate the work that must've gone into it so-- GG alley

You still owe me $400,000 though.

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[ sci·am·ach ]
/sīˈamək/

A simple, angry man casually working his way through life on a personal quest to acquire copious amounts of street cred.

[Karst]

I'm going to be honest here. I don't understand how Jump Drives currently work well enough to really understand what these changes mean.
What I do understand is this

Jumpdrives will be disruptable with cruise disruptors for the time being.

which is awesome. Thanks.

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