What Roadmap Feature are you most looking forward to?

[Scoob]

Hey all,

Happy I got this game in early access and have had some fun times already. However, I've not played in some time at this point. The main reason for this is a lack of AI for my own ships and, perhaps, not the smartest AI currently applied to the ships of other factions. I'm fine with this, I understand how early access works.

One of the things I'm really looking forward to from the Roadmap is "Configurable Ship A.I." so I'm not constantly micro-managing my own ships in Combat. At first, it's quite fun to have the control and knowing that my tactics - and only my tactics - win or lose the fight. However, as time goes on, I find myself wishing my ships had some degree of autonomy based on behavioural guide-lines provided by me.

I do wonder how expansive this behaviour will end up being and, how any abilities granted the player's ships can enhanced non-player ships. Can I have ships follow in formation automatically with their leader? Will I see them break off to actively seek out nearby foes, or perhaps only respond when their leader is attacked? What other non-combat tasks might I be able to assign them? Can I maybe say to a ship "You, fly there and sell this, then return to this position" type thing? Perhaps assign a ship to a Station and have it Mine for it, or Buy wares, if the station is asking for something. Can I rely on my ships to reliably exploit weaknesses in other vessels, or will I still have to micro-manage that. Will an AI crew get better over time, making experience crew a valuable asset, with their loss being a significant blow to a ship's autonomy.

Behaviours like this would enhance the game massively for me and, with these abilities able to be applied to non-player ships also, would greatly enhance the feel of the universe as being a living and breathing one. So, if a shipment of goods is intercepted, the buyer of those goods cannot repair the damage from a recent Pirate raid, or build some additional ships to reinforce their fleet.

Not talking mad levels of realism here, but just making things count a little more when ships are destroyed or a cargo is intercepted. Good, solid AI able to be applied to our ships, facilitates like behaviour for the various other Factions in the game.

From reading the roadmap, it sounds like the AI for our ships will be fairly rudimentary, largely mirroring current AI behaviour we see in non-Player ships. However, I hope this will be expanded upon along the lines I mention above.

What Roadmap feature are you looking forward to, and why? I'd find it interesting to hear how people have interpreted the future features on offer, and what they hope from them perhaps beyond what is implied.

[Wind Ark]

I am looking forward to more weapons/armors/shields/utility options of course, but more than anything I am looking forward to Hinge joints and other similar options to change ships up. Could make ships that look like bugs and have pincers that function, could have your walls on the side of your ship rotate towards the front to provide concentrated fire or wider protections, could create locking mechanisms for multiple ships to combine and work together, etc. Basically transform according to your design depending on what you are facing. May not be the strongest mechanic, but it's the most interesting to build with for sure.

[Butter Bot]

More weapon/ship module
Crez vs crez combat
And last but not least
Faction vs faction (I really really need this)

[Jan]

I wonder how they want to implement bording and carriers.

Bording sound cool, however how usefull will it be? I fear that fights are too short for bording to be good. It would need really fast bording capsules.

Carriers could work with some kind of hangar module that needs iron, copper and a rare mineral to build little ships that swarm a target.

Also more world events and simulation, simulated eco, faction warfare. Maybe even a settlement system like in Starsector.

[Scoob]

I love the idea of more weapons etc. too - indeed, I've used mods that expand on such things already - however, for me, it's the AI that holds it all together. Being able to apply that AI to ships, have that AI able to use new weapons - even, perhaps, those added by mods - and fly / perform tasks effectively is key to this game's longevity I feel.

I like having a small fleet of ships, but having to manually control each of them got old, fast, for me. That's why enhancements to the AI are what will hold everything together in my view.

Imagine we, and the various Factions in the game, gain Carrier-class ships, with the ability to launch multiple smaller vessels. That feature is dead in the water if *I* have to manually control each ship or the existing AI does a bad job with them.

AI is very very rudimentary at the moment, improvements to it will be transformative from a game-play perspective, and many new features are going to need it to work in the hands of non-player ships.

Perhaps I'm expecting to much, but once our own ship have AI there's bound to be a LOT more feedback on how it performs, resulting in further improvements to the AI's ability to control ships across the board.

I really think it'll be a solid AI that holds the entire game together moving forward. Having a rudimentary AI implemented for player-owned ships is where it starts. Sure, there's already AI applied to non-Player ships but it's really rather basic. The AI is currently capable of basic flight, docking, trading and fighting. No real tactics or advanced features such as Mining and *real* trading - aka flying to other sectors to deliver goods - which will come with the economic enhancements, duein Phase 2, but we don't know yet how deep that will go.

I love shiny stuff like new weapons, ships, tactics etc. but the AI is such a core part of making that work, that I'd like to see it worked on sooner than some of the other things.

Happy to be along for the ride, this game has great potential. It's already fun, but sadly does become repetitive after a while. Having to do everything *myself* becomes tiresome. I'd like to see a time when I can give a ship a task and it'll carry it out. I.e. a ship is tasked to Mine a select list of resources and deliver them to a player station. Said station then manufactures things the player needs. Other ships can be tasked to try to sell produced wares for a good price, while yet other ships are assigned to protect the Miners, Stations and Traders. You see how this can build up?

This is potentially a lot of stuff to keep track of so, a "Low attention" type process is required to efficiently simulate stuff going on that cannot currently be seen.

I ramble, I know, but it's when games start getting *deeper* like this that I get excited.

[manax]

Definitely looking forward to a better economy. And I really want more crew-to-crew combat and all things boarding. I'd really like to be able to shoot out a weapon on an enemy craft that frees up an arc so i can send units over to take over the ship...

Oh, and faction vs faction would be nice to make the universe feel more alive.

[Scoob]

Faction vs. Faction will be fun. We currently see the odd skirmish between factions, or come across a wrecked ship from combat (not the spawned wrecks) but these are small scale encounters rather than a wider-spread conflict.

[arrow_2536]

I look forward to more weapons and armor and shields and utilities.

[IronSides]

Originally posted by Jan:

I wonder how they want to implement bording and carriers.

Bording sound cool, however how usefull will it be? I fear that fights are too short for bording to be good. It would need really fast bording capsules.

Carriers could work with some kind of hangar module that needs iron, copper and a rare mineral to build little ships that swarm a target.

Also more world events and simulation, simulated eco, faction warfare. Maybe even a settlement system like in Starsector.

Im hoping boarding shuttles.... they already have cargo bays in game that open from top of ship for men in EVA suits so they just make it a shuttle bay instead. Would def look cool to see them parked in the bays and taking off and landing..... How they would "attack Enemy ships idk maybe raming? or some sort of boarding cables to get close enough to eva IDK.....

Pacing in this game seems to be very fast I agree. To the point I fight most battles on slower game speed.