Portable batteries

[Johnno]

So now that the patch was rushed onto live version in record time, let's have a fresh discussion about the portable batteries. I actually started trying them out now, and ran into some issues and am wondering about their actual feasibility.

The issue I ran into is that they don't actually charge anything else on the ship, and really just act like portable power sources. Meaning that to operate a ship you have to have enough charging stations to slot in enough portable batteries to get the generation you want, if you've ran out of fuel.

You can't simply go between ships to charge the batteries on one ship, and bring them to the other ship to charge its 'stationary' cells and batteries.

A huge design flaw, in my opinion, making the whole thing practically useless.

Anyone else have a different experience?

[Johnno]

Bit of an update, workaround to use them is to have a separate power group, and power transfer boxes. If you want to both charge and discharge them on the same ship you'll also need an engineering console.

So not useless, just a hassle.

[iO]

Now you understand.... LOL There was no rush by the devs(rude comment)... you just have to be willing to expand your mind and be willing to step outside your box mate... Powergroups and their usefulness just keeps growing and growing...

[Johnno]

Originally posted by iO:

Now you understand.... LOL There was no rush by the devs(rude comment)... you just have to be willing to expand your mind and be willing to step outside your box mate... Powergroups and their usefulness just keeps growing and growing...

Forced use is not usefulness. "Willing to expand your mind" ? Well sure, I guess I must, if the devs aren't capable of making intuitive functionalities that actually work without a hassle of a workaround. I'm all for workarounds if they're necessary for old functionality, this however is brand new functionality that I personally feel wasn't thoroughly tested and considered before implementation.

Rush, actually yes considering some bugs reported during experimental weren't fixed, new ones were introduced, and now more reports are starting to roll in.

[iO]

I can't fault you for your opinion... that was an over step on my part... I look forward to reading more of your work.

[Hawkeye]

Considering the limited capacity of the lower-tier batteries versus the ease of creating hydrogen, is it even worth using the workaround to transfer power between ships? In the time it'd take you to move the batteries between ships and fully transfer their power, then bring the batteries back to the original ship and repeat however many times, would it have been quicker to just refine some hydrogen and put it in the ship that needed power?

[Johnno]

Well, not only that, but consider also the transfer rates.For example, a T0 ship that you put T2 portable batteries into, you need 2 T2 portable batteries per T0 ship battery you want to fill, and they'll be filling at 1/4th of the rate (discharge rate 250, ship battery's charge rate is 1000).

Nah, I don't see these as being useful for emergencies, or barely even for supplemental power, not when comparing to carrying a couple extra boxes of hydrogen, drone refuelling services and water in every system.

With a bit of hassle you can use them as "free power", considering you can make a solar powered charging station you leave out, thought I read about some NPC stations getting chargers as well. But even so, too much of a hassle.

Although, with that said, if I wanted to use them as the sole power for a shuttle or something, the batteries themselves would cost more than the ship, which could just as easily have a few solar panels and be left out charging its shipboard batteries.

Ah well, another ill-conceived toy with halfdone implementation that'll barely see any use.

[iO]

Yes very worth it...

You see not everyone wants to play the game like a robot... where if x times y does not yield xy then its no fun or it does not equal it being worth anything...

So people may be striving for this phantom metric called efficiency... others may be looking for really neat and creative ideas created by the devs and will reward then by using them so they can have the insight to help the devs make them better and or give the dev purpose to keep on developing and making neat kit for us to try out...

Some kids goto library to read... others go to study...
The Smart kids do both...

Originally posted by Hawkeye:

Considering the limited capacity of the lower-tier batteries versus the ease of creating hydrogen, is it even worth using the workaround to transfer power between ships? In the time it'd take you to move the batteries between ships and fully transfer their power, then bring the batteries back to the original ship and repeat however many times, would it have been quicker to just refine some hydrogen and put it in the ship that needed power?

[iO]

Just so the devs know... I will be using them a lot!! And and a major thank you.. I really appreciate the time and effort you put in bringing us new kit...and especially new power kit and something other then a new gun!!!

[STORM]

I like that they are portable; I'll definitely be using them for free energy. I like the idea of a little charge station at home base.

[Johnno]

Please don't derail the thread windyblack, you haven't mentioned a single piece of information on why the system is a good one, or why you'll be using it, beyond your own personal view of "fun", which seems biased and arbitrary because it has to do with power generation. Not once have you even referred to its functionality.

You're not even TRYING to respond to the points I've made, please take your trolling elsewhere. And I'm not calling you a troll because you're disagreeing, I'm calling you a troll because you're not being constructive, you're just being disruptive and typing meta nonsense about some delusional view of how others might enjoy the game, rather than talking about ACTUAL gameplay.

It's actually proving my point that it's just filler functionality, and if "fun" is the only reason to use it, then it likely won't see wide use, in which case I'm wondering if we're really at the "filler" stage of development.

I know you don't like to debate or discuss, if you don't intend to do so please leave the thread alone rather than continually derailing it. If you for some reason actually do want to discuss ACTUAL GAME FUNCTIONALITY, feel free to counter my points with actual information, and not meta nonsense about some lofty delusions.

[iO]

Hi John,

I will ask you this because you seems to like these so called numbers...

Please share with us how you would address the perceived problems you see with the new function...

Please can you do it with bashing the devs and their work? But just share with use how you would make it better if you were programming the function.



I have stated many time I how intend to use them... I will use them they way they are intended to be used... What more can I share on that mate?

You want me to generate a plot graph showing nonsense numbers? I can but what's the point?

[Johnno]

Originally posted by iO:

Hi John,

I will ask you this because you seems to like these so called numbers...

Please share with us how you would address the perceived problems you see with the new function...

Once again windyblack you've failed to introduce anything constructive whatsoever into the discussion. You're skirting the subject and avoiding the clear points I've already made.

But I'll bite.

My suggested changes include increased capacities and charging rates, both could actually be doubled. That way each T0 battery would have the capacity of a T0 medium power cell, each T2 one would have the capacity of a T0 ship battery. It seems arbitrary to me that capacity is at half and charging rate is at a quarter of the actual devices they'll be charging. Then again, who knows how the devs intended their values.

Portable batteries charging everything else in the same power group without the need for transfer boxes or separate power groups, so if you have a ship with low power / no fuel all you have to do is slot in some batteries. No hassle with power groups of power transfer workarounds.

Remove gold as required construction material for T0 and T1 battery.

Please can you do it with bashing the devs and their work?

WITH bashing the devs, or without?

I think I've been pretty clear in the past, and now, about how poorly they implement features, and how poorly they balance things, not to mention how I see the two week dev cycle cramping development. I just think it's sad that this keeps happening, and I'm honestly wondering why they don't change their approach because they just keep cranking out small filler features that barely affect the game as a whole, while some major parts of the game are still suffering from "placeholder" feeling, even though they keep saying they work in an 'iterative' way. These fillers are frankly eating devtime from things that would keep people playing, or quality of life functionality that would increase enjoyment.

Things that are being iterated over and over again at least to me clearly shows that they haven't thought through how they want the game to play, or how things will affect gameplay. It's not that I mind iterative process as such, what I mind is the time wasted on going back and forth rather than having a clear goal and striving toward it.

Changing something every couple of weeks rather than sitting down and thinking it through properly is just disruptive.

I was pleasantly surprised to hear about (potential) player store-o-trons, that actually may well be a game changer and add a whole lot of content, if it gets added.

But just share with use how you would make it better if you were programming the function.

Well to be honest I don't even see the need for it in the first place, not with how simple, fast and easy it is to power ships as things are. And particularly not when you at the same time add water to all systems, it's a contradictory situations, that or it's just lowering the difficulty to the point that it's mundane. Also the refuelling service is in this case a faster way to get out of being stranded.

At best this whole feature is for "free power" as some sort of gimmick, and nerfed to the point of barely being useful / being expensive / a hassle to get working, I highly doubt that was the intended use this was conceived for.

If I were to balance this the portable batteries would match specific devices onboard, as a means to transfer power between ships, or to keep "emergency power" stored away in lockers. T0 would correspond to the medium power cell, T1 to T0 ship battery, T2 to several ship batteries and T3 to the large battery.

Making them have lower capacities and charging rates makes them undesirable and just a time sink, when compared to simply carrying hydrogen or calling in refuelling drones.

I have stated many time I how intend to use them... I will use them they way they are intended to be used... What more can I share on that mate?

Explain their intended use.

You want me to generate a plot graph showing nonsense numbers? I can but what's the point?

Yes, please do. There are many different metrics to explore to show this system's feasibility, feel free to explore any one of them and I'd love some graphs. The point would be that you STILL haven't made a single ACTUAL comment about the specific ingame feature, are continuing to skirt around the subject and really just refusing to actually stick to the topic.

So please, stay on topic, bring me some graphs, numbers, even some specific maths on how long you'll be sitting and waiting to charge the batteries, move them between ships, and transfer power using power transfer boxes.

Anything, literally anything tangible about the ACTUAL ingame functionality, and again not some delusional biased view of how you'll use them just because they're ingame. Give me some actual use situations and even just some simple maths to show that you grasp their actual functionality ingame.

Otherwise you're just continuing to avoid the subject, not being constructive in any way.

So please, write something tangible, something with actual content.

[CaptainC11]

Clearly, the main driving thought for portables is the idea of not having to install H2 tanks and generators, allowing for either smaller builds or for the space to be allocated for other facilities.

The concept is sound and reasonable; the numbers just need a bit of tweaking to get it to a point that it becomes a viable solution. Don't forget that this feature just got added and is likely to be tweaked within the first few weeks as all of us early access playtesters give our feedback.

[NathanTheZealot]

Originally posted by CaptainC11:

Clearly, the main driving thought for portables is the idea of not having to install H2 tanks and generators, allowing for either smaller builds or for the space to be allocated for other facilities.

The concept is sound and reasonable; the numbers just need a bit of tweaking to get it to a point that it becomes a viable solution. Don't forget that this feature just got added and is likely to be tweaked within the first few weeks as all of us early access playtesters give our feedback.

This is my understanding of the system as well, so I'm not sure why people continue to judge it based on the idea it's supposed to supplement other power systems. Of course it's poorly balanced for that as well, capacity is far too low.

[Johnno]

Originally posted by CaptainC11:

Clearly, the main driving thought for portables is the idea of not having to install H2 tanks and generators, allowing for either smaller builds or for the space to be allocated for other facilities.

If that's the intended use, well then I can agree with its functionality (convoluted way of charging other devices, straightforward off the wall use). But if it is, then the numbers clearly don't add up, to the point that someone dropped the ball entirely, and it'd be baffling to think why someone would, with the minimum of experience of ship building and ingame mechanics.

The concept is sound and reasonable; the numbers just need a bit of tweaking to get it to a point that it becomes a viable solution.

For that intended use, sound and reasonable, sure, but as I've pointed out the batteries themselves would end up costing more than the ship, so that's another contradiction. And I genuinely can't see how someone would be able to drop the ball this bad with the numbers if that was the intended use.

Don't forget that this feature just got added and is likely to be tweaked within the first few weeks as all of us early access playtesters give our feedback.

I haven't forgotten, what I'm pointing out however is that we've had the experimental period to test this, it wasn't tested properly and even the feedback that was being presented was ignored, and it was introduced anyway in its current state.

And that's my whole point, the continued introduction of halfassed mechanics with halfway thought through balancing, that ultimately has to be revisited several times over to become viable. If there was a clear intention behind this functionality, why wasn't it implemented properly?

I'm sure the devs will get around to it, I'm just bothered by this halfassed approach of "iterating" things by looking for feedback, when it's otherwise a filler functionality that doesn't really bring anything new to the game. I know the devs keep saying they can't get everything right the first time, but most of the time it feels like they're not even trying. Halfway thought through functionality, with arbitrary numbers, slap it in without actually considering its implications.

There's so much that's been discussed, suggested, or even that the devs even themselves have said "this is what we want to do", yet we get poorly implemented filler stuff that really has no impact.