Kvallning wrote:If you continue to post like this, I may vomit...

Well... better get a bucket ready then buddy.

I guess what Kvallning is trying to say, is that we're used to a more mature style of discussing things there on this forum.
Not to mean you should stop posting the way you do... You just might find it beneficial to the actual conversation to at least adhere to some internet etiquette.
For instance, double posting & quoting yourself really isn't necessary in this case, and detracts from the discussion.

Yeah, essentially. Also using excess of emoticons (or the same one, anyway. You know the post I mean.) or random huge coloured text is pretty far from etiquette.

I understand. You'll have to excuse me for being a little over the top with my posts. I'm not much of a forum guy and I haven't really developed my way of communicating properly on forums. Sorry about guys lol. Thanks for letting me know.

But the emotions will never stop. itll be toned down.

Toned down we can certainly handle.
I think all of us are avid users of the emoticons here
Just not quite in that magnitude, you understand

Anyways, sorry for kind of derailing the thread

I think different types of drones could have different costs associated with them.

In Josh's dev log, it made it seem like you might need a decent number of mining drones to home in on that perfect ore spot so it doesn't make sense to have them be expensive.

On the other hand if you want a type of drone that's more patrol-like and can attack, then I definitely agree with Thymine that the only limiting factor should be cost. Even if the attack drone is still just a pea shooter, it could double as a patrol/warning drone to alert anyone nearby. I think that would also lend itself well to the intel/stealth aspect.

Flatfingers wrote:

Behemoth wrote:I think drones should only be able to do what they're programmed to do. And by that I mean Mine, Kill, Move, Stay, Construct etc. They shouldn't be able to solve problems, but need someone to direct them. ... An AI would shoot the attackers, dodge and maybe even drop some ore to survive with maximal ore left. The AI could want to retire afterwards.

Isn't this a fine example of "you get what you pay for"?

If what you're doing is that important, spring for the extra cost to hire an NPC capable of tactical adaptability.

To put it another way, given two ways of achieving the same result, players will always choose the cheaper way, making coding the other way a waste of time and effort. It doesn't make sense for drones and NPCs to have equivalent levels of capability.

OK. I get the goals and motivations here. But I'm very aware of how that could end up producing make-work that becomes a chore.

I want the interactions with NPCs to be deep and meaningful and complex. But that could be as much of a burden as an advantage.

Let's say you have a system-spanning fleet. You have mining and refining operations (with military support) in various places. You have a central hub with storage and factories. You have supply routes running between them, and trade routes running out to other systems. Across the whole thing, discounting the smallest drones, you might have 500 units working for you.

You're out doing some surveying or exploring or trying to set up a new thing. Whatever. Then:

*Beep* Notification: Miner 45 is unhappy.

OK let's go into the menu dealing with our contract, look at why this dude is griping. Click the "adjust wages" slider, make an offer. Happy? OK good.

Right back to work...

*Beep* Notification: Fighter pilot 25 is unhappy.

Right. Let's open up the menu again. Adjust wages? No, actually, this dude feels he's underused on the trade route because it's boring so he doesn't want more money, he wants a more interesting job. OK let's take him and put him somewhere else, and replace him with... say that guy. OK good.

Now about this...

*Beep* Notification: Transport pilot 3 is unhappy.

OK what NOW? Oh this guy's got the credits he needs to buy his own ship so he's out of here, leaving my transport sitting in a station unmanned. Right, put out a contract for work, she looks OK, let's employ her as a space trucker. OK good.

Now as I was...

*Beep*

At a certain scale, managing NPC employees becomes the whole game. This scale limit hits a lot earlier if you need to employ an NPC to run every gun turret and warehouse and ore shuttle you build.

OK you could reduce every relationship to a "wages in, job satisfaction out" slider and periodically check that window. But then you're lacking the complexity and depth of a game where NPCs actually have goals and motivations outside of "make money and keep the boss happy."

Allowing high-level automation means you can use NPCs in situations where there's an actual call for NPCs, and not to fill the gap of "sit in this system and do nothing until something happens," stacking your list of employees full of ornery or creative types you have to keep managing.

I'm also not a fan of Drones as Golems. We can program a relatively sophisticated AI *now*. You're telling me in the deep future we won't have a mining drone sophisticated enough to say "I sense danger! Better preserve my expensive hull until someone sorts that out"? That's designing a system to be deliberately fragile and maladapted.

@McDuff

I believe the NPC management issue you've pointed out isn't specific to drones. It's something that needs to be tackled game-wide if we are to have that sort of interaction.

Absolutely! I know I probably sound like a stuck record on this, especially after starting the NPCs vs Redshirts thread, but it's one of those design decisions that will have significant knock-on effects.

Everything has advantages and disadvantages and trade offs. Could a game where everyone is an employee be fun to play? Absolutely. But it would be a very different game to one where Drone AI operates up to a high level and NPC AI only kicks in once you have a posh enough gig for them.

And, really, the answers to which kind of system we'll end up with sort-of depend/feed back into other, deeper questions, like the global structure of the economy and the shape of the population.

Are we a teeming, bustling bunch of space-faring meatsacks from a not-quite Type I civilisation, who haven't cracked the scarcity issue yet so who still need to pay for food and water and shelter? Is there a pool of unemployed NPCs from where we draw new pilots and to which they return when we sack them? Are they created Ex Nihilo to pilot our ships when we build them, and returned to the void when we don't?

Are we a sparser population like Spacers in Asimov's universe? Lone, genetically altered, long-lived biological creations treading the distance between the stars in a web of artificial robotic helpmeets?

And to think about it another-nother way - possibly a way that's more important than any flights of imagination - what's a realistic limit for number of unique Strong-AI NPCs per system and will it cause problems to have every space truck and storage depot be considering the meaning of its role in the universe if it's never going to be doing anything other than sitting there chewing up alloys and spitting out food processors? Should we be devoting CPU time to letting units that *do* have freedom to operate consider their goals, rather than working it out for units who I'm only going to want to stop exploring them?

i understand your ethusiasm for NPC and how they will ultimately function, but this is again a disscusion of the practicality of drones in a combat sense. i love the idea of drones in a form of construction and production, but to control them on a battlefield seems redundant when you have the capability to control one of your own purchased ship without needing to deal with a contract of any time of unique AI interaction. if you watched the older dev blogs or even played the prototype, a system like that with interaction between our own ships will probably be in the final game.

in the idea of controling mining operations, they would still be youre own ships, you would simply be telling a ship to go here, mine here, go home and drop it off, and have some sort of market dump where you just pour the ore into and NPCs just purchase. boom, MONEY

now im getting off topic haha.

For drones to have a purpose, crew must have a purpose, else there is no point to making the distinction between the two. So what drawbacks do crews bring to the table that makes you want to automate the ships? And what benefits are their to crew that makes you want to have crewed ships?


Random stuff from the top of my head..

- AI level. If one were to put piloting skill on a scale from 1-10, drones should be a 1-3. After all, the human crewed ships undoubtedly have an AI of their own, in addition to a brain capable of thinking. Best of both worlds.

- Size. Crew takes space. Drones can be smaller, and hence cheaper.

- Self repair. Half of the point of a crew is to maintain the ship in good working order, and repair damage. Drone repair capability would thus be much lower, and would need a dedicated service craft.

- Disposability. While you wouldn't want to sacrifice drones(disposable drones are called missiles), it remains a viable option if a great enough opportunity arose. Though to truly get this across would require a morale system for crew, or at least require you hire them. I know I never had an issue throwing away fighters in Homeworld.

McDuff wrote:I'm also not a fan of Drones as Golems. We can program a relatively sophisticated AI *now*. You're telling me in the deep future we won't have a mining drone sophisticated enough to say "I sense danger! Better preserve my expensive hull until someone sorts that out"? That's designing a system to be deliberately fragile and maladapted.

Yes, it's entirely unrealistic. Probably in the future we'll use AI for everything, because they're way better than us in every respect. This is just a way to make employing NPCs worthwhile, by having a drawback to drones

For drones to have a purpose, crew must have a purpose, else there is no point to making the distinction between the two. So what drawbacks do crews bring to the table that makes you want to automate the ships? And what benefits are their to crew that makes you want to have crewed ships?

Sorry, there will be no crew.

• Piloting capabilities should be around the same
• Would work, unless we go the "Everyone is an AI" route
• Biological creatures are really bad at repairing stuff (EDIT: Especially in SPAAACE). Better use nanobots.
• This. Exactly.

Behemoth wrote: Yes, it's entirely unrealistic. Probably in the future we'll use AI for everything, because they're way better than us in every respect. This is just a way to make employing NPCs worthwhile, by having a drawback to drones

You don't need a drawback to drones to encourage NPC use. You just need to say "all ships must have a pilot."

Meanwhile I'm going to assume I'm totally in a minority in suggesting that Sim HR (In Space!) is maybe a thing not everyone wants to play.

McDuff wrote:

Behemoth wrote: Yes, it's entirely unrealistic. Probably in the future we'll use AI for everything, because they're way better than us in every respect. This is just a way to make employing NPCs worthwhile, by having a drawback to drones

You don't need a drawback to drones to encourage NPC use. You just need to say "all ships must have a pilot."

Meanwhile I'm going to assume I'm totally in a minority in suggesting that Sim HR (In Space!) is maybe a thing not everyone wants to play.

Then there would be no drones at all, and that wouldn't be nice for all those who want drones. It's a way to have drones and not be able to use them for everything, because drones are not replacing NPCs.

What about a system, that automatically keeps you supplied with workers, and tries to keep them happy? Or just hire a Human (really?) Resources manager. NPC wouldn't mind the micromanagement, but maybe even think its job as fulfilling, and you could keep doing what you want.

Behemoth wrote: Then there would be no drones at all, and that wouldn't be nice for all those who want drones.

Yes there will. Drones will be something you build in a production module that work on their own AI. Ships will be something construction drones construct that need an NPC to pilot.

It's a way to have drones and not be able to use them for everything, because drones are not replacing NPCs.

Even in my preferred system, Drone AI wouldn't replace NPC AI for everything.

What about a system, that automatically keeps you supplied with workers, and tries to keep them happy? Or just hire a Human (really?) Resources manager. NPC wouldn't mind the micromanagement, but maybe even think its job as fulfilling, and you could keep doing what you want.

I guess I'm of the opinion that if you're going to implement a complex mechanic in order to then immediately automate it away, maybe you could just not implement it?