Station building is HORRIBLE

[sleepy]

I've just spent the last hour trying to build my first real station, and I am dumbfounded at how unintuitive the controls are. It's so frustrating I had to write something about it. Why isn't the button to rotate stuff 90 degrees R? Why does WASD do NOTHING in the editor except change the name of the station? You use those keys in the entire rest of the game, but they're useless in the builder. Why do the station bits snap on half the time and half the time they just go right next to the rest of the station like there's some sort of building restriction? Why is it that when I place a new piece sometimes it'll place it all the way at the edge of the boundary instead of where I'm actually building? Why is it that the whole time you have to use the mouse button to move the camera, except when you place a big module, using the mouse buttons rotates it? This is so horribly frustrating it's ruining my experience. Like COME ON. I'm not trying to build the most complex super station that's gonna be perfect in every way, I'm trying to place simple pieces onto a base piece, I can't even reliably get a dock to place!!!!!!! This is by far the worst snap builder I've ever used, and I've played hundreds of buildy sandbox games. Spending hours upon hours to figure out the most basic stuff in this game and I push through, I can handle trying to figure out how to get back onto my ship after an eva, and having to google it for 10 minutes,I put up with spending 2 WHOLE HOURS on a "very easy" quest to find x resource in x sector using resource probes, I put up with trying to figure out how to get ships to do station trading, but this.... what should be the most simple interface, putting together structural station bits which should be simple, should be easy click drag onto the station, press R to rotate, maybe shift R to vertically rotate, and snap on and fit just fine. Why is it sooo much worse, why is it so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ terrible?? Can someone help me

[Afro Luigi]

Publicado originalmente por Bar:

didnt really read the wall of text but even though i havent built a station forever some of what i read in your post sounds like the same old complaints i had till someone told me you can just put all the parts you want in the box then hit a button(cant remember name) and it will randomly put all the pieces together for you. not sure if that buttons still there but i hope so cause it made making stations soooo much easier and less annoying especially when the station gets bigger. then all you have to do is keep adding middle connector pieces till the button works without any errors

You're talking about the randomizer, and if I recall it was a little die at the top right of the Plan Build Menu.

[seePyou]

It is not as hard as you make it out to be.

For one, in the latest version, 6.0, each part has gimbals to help. You have three movement gimbals and three rotational ones. Click on any of them and the item turns or moves alond that axis you selected.
Press and hold Shift and you can even snap turn in angles for that perfect 90 degree position.
Also, if you snap an item to another, they snap on perfect 90 degree angles. But even snapped in place, you can still turn them and then they turn ONLY on 90 degree angles without shift or anything.

Also remember that there is a sequence in how the items are built. The first one you placed in the anchor to al others, the second is the anchor to the ones following that, etc. So you can move one and all the others after it move as well to maintain the order of construction.

One tip is this: do not move too close inside the zone you are building. That makes movement sluggish and placing one new part can start it off too far or too close.

As for the WASD, I don't know why your change names. When I press WASD in Plan BUild, my view changes and it goes as one expects. And holding down the right mouse button rotates. Using thesm I can zip around the build easily and even go up adn down and wherever I need to.

I'd say to try it again and try to get to grips with the way it works.

[StarFishon]

you think building station is horrible hh wait until you have money to build big fleet and send it to attack station :)

egosoft doing great things in x series but the ai and ui are not the best..

i have more then 700H in it.. no game come close to x4:f, something always broken with building and fleet commands..

[Bab Peeg]

Paragraph usage is HORRIBLE

[XIII]

Lol why are the answers so defensive?

Clearly the X4 station construction is better than X3, but that doesnt mean that OP isnt correct in that its pretty rough to use. The UI and controls dont make much sense, his comments about WASD, rotation and connections are 100% on the money.

Frankly, the idea of the builder is really good, but the controls are terrible. Theres many games like KSP where you build really complex stuff, but its so much easier to do anything. Games basically got standardized control schemes over for building like this.

You could do some pretty minor improvements to the control scheme, with selection, rotation and stuff, and the builder would be so much more easy to use.

Publicado originalmente por Ebyl:

Enjoy your other games while you wait for that complete overhaul. You apparently won't be playing X4 ever again.

Like, are you actually trying to own OP by telling him that the terrible controls in the station builder will never be improved?

[Salvor Hardin]

I find station building to be much better since 6.0 patch. The only remaining frustration for me is when it is not clear why stuff don't snap in place even though it is clearly within the boundaries of the plot. For example close to piers, the "exclusion" zones are not clear. But this is only a problem if i want to build compact stations, which i tend to do because i am cheap :) Best is to keep piers away from the rest and then all is fine.

[Bar]

Publicado originalmente por Afro Luigi:

Publicado originalmente por Bar:

didnt really read the wall of text but even though i havent built a station forever some of what i read in your post sounds like the same old complaints i had till someone told me you can just put all the parts you want in the box then hit a button(cant remember name) and it will randomly put all the pieces together for you. not sure if that buttons still there but i hope so cause it made making stations soooo much easier and less annoying especially when the station gets bigger. then all you have to do is keep adding middle connector pieces till the button works without any errors

You're talking about the randomizer, and if I recall it was a little die at the top right of the Plan Build Menu.

so i just tried to do this on my play through and i agree. it is absolutely horrible even with the button when adding docks especially. eventually i got so frustrated i just alt f4'd the game.

its like trying to build 1D in a 3D square with no clue on controls at all and no help. my problem ran into notta clue what dock to use as theres no info so no clue on whats best so i tried to put them all in then added tons of each connector modules to try and get the shuffle button to work but it never did.

i always hated making stations so i try not to. now i remember why

anyways at the top is a gear button you hit then hit the shuffle modules button.

[Zane87]

Publicado originalmente por JustAnotherThorn:

Publicado originalmente por Duke Flapjack:

I love it when random internet people get EDGY. That particular threat rather loses a lot of momentum when you already have the mouse symbol next to your name.

Random internet people ? How am I random when as you have already pointed out, I have the game. It's not like i am someone who does not own it and so has no reason to be commenting here. I have it, I have played it and it is abysmal.

I have the X Superbox here as well as individual boxes from when I got them all at release. They were all awesome when they came out and I played them all to death. This has changed so much, it is no longer an X series title.

I never said refuse to buy, I said refuse to play.

Because you are a random internet stranger, we all are. The fact that you own the game doesn't change that at all?

Also about the rest: ok

[Tiberius]

Camera control needs a bit of work, but its serviceable. Sometimes, you need to tick the "allow station overlap" to allow the modules to snap.

But yea its still soooo much better than x3 station builder (the construction complex sphagetti 🗿)

If you hate the control, just grab some station templates on the internet

[XIII]

Publicado originalmente por Tiberius:

Camera control needs a bit of work, but its serviceable. Sometimes, you need to tick the "allow station overlap" to allow the modules to snap.

It could be so much easier though. Imagine you could just use WSAD+RT to rotate modules, like every other game.

Or imagine you could just click a free connector, and then a module, and the module would automatically placed on that connector.

Basic stuff like that probably would save you hours of station building over a big game. Such a simple thing.

[Alpha-methyl]

Publicado originalmente por Meme Turtle:

This is your first Egosoft game, isn't it?

hehe, appropriate question.

You get used to it, my friend. I know the learning curve in general is high for these games. even after you think you got a handle on things, something jarring confuses the piss out of you...

...but I have to say this is still a vast improvement over X3: all of 'em... and certainly much improved over the initial state of X4. They're always rough. Super rough.... I still don't regret the vast amounts of time I spent "learning" that game just so I could actually do as I please among the stars for even more vast amounts of time.

I really hope more and more legendary X series modders return and the game's current state can attract even more talent, because the potential here is higher and miracles a-plenty were performed with X3. Miracles.

[sleepy]

I figured out the building stuff, it's no so bad once you get the hang of it.

[Colmaniac]

This is one of my biggest hates of the game, though this does need alot of improvement.
Also, what is the easiest way to flip a part? Either from horizontal to vertical and flip upside down? It takes me more than 5 mins to get the part to adjust the way I need it and no clear indicators on doing this, yes it has slider bars to move a placed item up & down, left & right, in & out. But not on 360 rotation in all directions :(.

[ick.bins]

I have had the same experience:
Building stations is no longer possible - the developers are immediately offended when you criticize this.
In addition, the research for the ship modifications is only possible with tips from the net.
Version 6.00 is a very bad shot.

[Ebyl]

Publicado originalmente por XIII:

Lol why are the answers so defensive?

Publicado originalmente por Ebyl:

Enjoy your other games while you wait for that complete overhaul. You apparently won't be playing X4 ever again.

Like, are you actually trying to own OP by telling him that the terrible controls in the station builder will never be improved?

Own the OP? Do people still talk like that? lol

I'm telling the OP that there is basically zero chance the station building controls will get a complete overhaul. Notice there is a big difference between what I said and what you implied I said. In fact, the station building controls recently got an improvement.

But the controls appear, by the OP's own posts, to be a gamebreaker for them. That's fair, and it's also fair for me to let them know there really isn't much of a chance of a complete overhaul, so they might as well enjoy other games.

It's not complicated to figure out.