The early game is -intentionally- slower. We have mechanics to teach that cannot be glossed over.

If you aren't trying to bum-rush to end tier, you don't have research grind. On your first planet the "timer" for progression to off-world is approximately 30 minutes to one hour (including the Cavern and intro quests) for those who know what they are doing. This gives them enough time to create a starting base, set up basic resource producers, and hammer through some of the tuto quests to quickly amass bonus research from them. Casual players will take longer than this hour, usually substantially.

Starbound vanilla is too fast, with progression that can be skipped with a single space jump if you know what to do and where to look. FU is not vanilla. Our system is designed so that players will experiment, build, explore and use things they unlock rather than speed-running. We have no plans to "speed things up" in that regard.

While waiting on research to build up, the intent is for players to visit other worlds, gather weird resources, do missions and quests, bounties, space missions, build their base , etc. So long as you aren't sitting still waiting, you'll find things go a lot faster. But if you know how to use that system you can still min-max your research income quite easily.


The Numbers:

Starting research rate is 1 per second. That means 60 Research per minute. 3600 research per hour.

If a player is in game for an hour, they will gain an additional +1 on that world. This doubles that research income to 7200 for their second hour. If they are online for an *additional* hour, they get a further +1. 10800 research for their third hour. (the passive bonuses are new, if you weren't aware that they are now a thing. Every hour of play [up to 3 hours] yields an additional +1 research.)

10800 + 7200 + 3600 = 21,600 research.

That's from just sitting there and playing the game at a slow pace. Without any bonuses from crew, armor, consumables, protheon or planet tier bonuses.

If you travel off-world, and get to a t2 world within the first hour you get an additional +1 bonus for a tier 2 world (forest or desert, which are your next stop in progression). This is in *addition* to the passive +1 gain if you play over an hour (and the additional bonus for the second hour).

This means you get at least as much research in approximately the exact same time-frame. If you speed-run to a t3 world, you get an additional +1 bonus to that rate (or whatever tier the world is, up to t6)

Add to that, the Research crew mate. Add to that, Protheon bonuses. Add to that, Computer research income. Add to that, Microscope income for research as well. Plus Neuropod (through Metaphysics), and you can have a crazy high Research income.

In short, pretty much everyone gets an equivalent increase in research through simply playing, regardless of what sort of gameplay they prefer.



I appreciate the feedback , by the way. It's good to get a handle on what people feel in regards to systems like this!

I definitely don't dislike a slower pace. I in fact enjoy a slower pace compared to the quick and linear vanilla experience. In some parts it just feels too slow and forced.

Let me provide a bit of a backstory to explain my concerns better. Roughly 2 weeks ago, a good friend of mine and I started a multiplayer world. We intended on just playing casually. We didn't want to rush anything, we just went with "Once we have one tier of equipment, we work for the next." My friend and I were eventually hit by the wall of research. So we wanted to skip time and tried to do dungeons. after completing 2 dungeons/quests in a row, and still not having accumulated enough research for what we needed, at which point he ended up quitting with frustration because he didn't know what to do. If it helps, our stage was roughly at the point of accessing worlds which provided Penumbrite, Zerchesium and Protocite, in the process of getting things like Irradium, Prisilite or Trianglium. Since we couldn't play long or frequently, our sessions usually stood below the 2-hour mark. So not many bonuses could have been accumulated.

Higher tier missions required higher tier equipment for the most part. Which we couldn't access. And for most materials, we required research. So even if we wanted to make armor so we could access different planets, we would have needed some more exotic materials, their previous research and whatnot.

Of course, it could very well be that we played in the wrong fashion, and we didn't split up research enough... Even if I believe there isn't really a right or wrong in that case. But at least in my personal opinion, we should keep in mind that we have two types of players. Those who don't care about progression and focus on building, and plays for many hours on. Others prefer to progress and want to explore the game in an open fashion. I'm somewhat of a mix. So in singleplayer worlds, I don't have much of a problem spending a good half an hour building an outpost and accumulating some research, but at the same time I want to achieve something. But I think in Multiplayer this becomes a bit critical. Especially when different types of players meet in the same game.

My personal idea is this. Idle-time research. I'm actually talking about the time when the player doesn't play the game. I'm not sure to what extend that would be possible. Perhaps the game compares the computer clock when the game was closed with when it was opened again, and accumulates a research up to a set maximum. That would - at least - help people with shorter play sessions that can't play long/often.

Alternatively, I believe adding a "Casual" mode and a "The way it's meant to be played" mode isn't all that bad. As every player then has the choice whether they want to have a simple and quicker playthrough, or an actual, exploration based run.

There are probably better ideas that one can come up with if the time was put into thinking about it. But I believe the general thought is conveyed rather well.

Well, I try to provide feedback as good as I can.

Idle time research will not be added. That defeats the whole purpose, and would just result in people creating a character, and then returning later for free research and doing no effort into progression. No thanks. That, and it would require checking the system clock, which would cause issues with players on Servers.

And yea, sounds like you tried to do "too much" and ran into research walls, which is part of the issue. You're supposed to have to follow the breadcrumbs, as it were, to gradually unlock things. You are NEVER completely barred from exploration at any tier.

anyhow, appreciate the feedback, but we wont be changing research rewards in the suggested ways...just doesn't suit the goals of the system.

And no, multiplayer is not critical. It's not even an afterthought. You can trade research via research discs. Otherwise, the system is not intended for multiplayer beyond "im gonna do these nodes, you do those ones". FU is first and foremost a singleplayer experience.

If it helps, our stage was roughly at the point of accessing worlds which provided Penumbrite, Zerchesium and Protocite, in the process of getting things like Irradium, Prisilite or Trianglium. Since we couldn't play long or frequently, our sessions usually stood below the 2-hour mark

exploredthose biomes, and get the resources on them. By the time you were done that, youd have had 20k research in the bank. There are enough gear options at tier 2 and tier 3 to make all of those biomes a simple matter to access in the order you choose!