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Re: Rumours, Regional Events and expanded System Information

#17
It wouldnt strictly be necessary to implement proper fuzzy logic.

Say the data packet has some internal "quality" modifier, this modifier gets lower every time the data gets retransmitted, or "told" without proper map data transfer.

With lower and lower quality theres an ever increasing chance of soms detail of the data to degrade or change to something false.

Lets say the initial data is
"valuable randomium ore in the north asteroid field of Dethra in the Artash cluster"
With 100% quality.

it gets retransmitted correctly the first time, but its quality gets lowered to 75%

The next time it gets told the data degrades to
"Valuable ore in Dethra in Artash" with quality 50%

Retold again
"Valuable ore in Arthra ((2 systems over from Dethra)) in Artash" 25% quality

Finally it degrades to "valuable ore in Artash" or maybe even "treasure in Artash".


Maybe we could even ditch the quality stat altogether and just have the data change with every "improper" (hearsay) transmission. :think:


Some data correlation tool would be useful too.

Take all the rumours you think adress the same piece of information and compare them with some highlighting function which marks all the rumours which have coinceding statements.

For example if you mouse over "Artash Cluster" in a rumour all the rumours about Artash and systems in Artash get highlighted, when you click only the marked messages remain in your comparison buffer.
Repeat until only reinforcing statements remain.

Maybe even create a new statement out of all those rumours as "guess" to tell others :think:
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Re: Rumours, Regional Events and expanded System Information

#18
Unreliable rumours would be a bad gameplay element. Nobody wants to follow a trail in a computer game only for there to potentially be nothing. The moment players aren't rewarded for their time - or at least experience a rumour related event - the game stops being fun, plain and simple. There's nothing worse than not getting any feedback. Of course reality is full of unreliable rumours, but a computer game is limited in its content so the content must be engaging to the player and it must lead to something, at least, for it to warrant inclusion in the game.

There could be obstacles to rumours. Paying money to shady characters 'in the know'. Allegiances with relevant factions. Even simply destroying ships could lead the player to salvage data/messages of hidden bases, abandoned ships, anomalies, trade information, wormholes, etc.

This compels the player to read the relevant information. Messages could be displayed, for example, with the ability to click on a relevant piece of information that then opens the system/regional map, displaying where the rumour/message/data leads to and setting a marker.

Why is this good? Immersion. Suddenly, the abstract AI world becomes one where the player has access to pieces of data that were seemingly composed by entities that inhabit the universe, with knowledge, goals, allegiances, homes, etc. Suddenly the player is inside the heads of the AI, not just observing from afar.
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Re: Rumours, Regional Events and expanded System Information

#19
asod wrote:it must lead to something
[citation needed]

i personally find nothing more boring in games where rumours are just differently worded "there is a treasure" markers.

some play around extracting information from potentially unreliable sources and a possible failure of that makes more interesting gameplay than a guaranteed "get thing".

interesting gameplay comes out of the possibility to fail, iif i cant fail, and "rumours" are only pointers to "get your stuff here", why implement them at all? just give the loot directly and leave it there.
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Re: Rumours, Regional Events and expanded System Information

#20
The problem would be if the game didn't give you any feedback. I understand that some rumours could lead to negative events, like triggering a couple of hostile drones from a wreckage, or a pirate trap. However, if you're exploring an area expecting something to be there and there isn't, it can become frustrating fast. Players would not be able to fully trust a game mechanic. In this case, I would favour a hint of realism being sacrificed for reliable gameplay. If you accepted missions, but your targets wouldn't be there 25% of the time due to outside events you have no control over, it would surely be more frustrating than immersive?
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Re: Rumours, Regional Events and expanded System Information

#21
asod wrote:If you accepted missions, but your targets wouldn't be there 25% of the time due to outside events you have no control over, it would surely be more frustrating than immersive?
thats already going to be the case in LT, ratio to be determined simply because of the full simulation going on in the background.

and its very unlikely that something in vanilla will change that.

same with actually true rumours, others have the same data and might get the shiny stuff before you.

with imprecise data and some smarts to apply it could actually improve the players chance to be the first one to act on that data because he could search for the data he needs and be the first there.

if rumours are just simple pointers the AI would know them as well, and had many more chances to act upon them before the player could even hear of them.

with incomplete and wrong data around the player could outsmart concurrents, and not just outluck them.
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Re: Rumours, Regional Events and expanded System Information

#22
This is starting to sound a little familiar (well, it is!)....
Flatfingers wrote:What if Trust was one of the characteristics associated with any piece of information that you didn't personally acquire just now through your ship's sensors?

Suppose you buy a piece of information, such as a map of part of the universe that you haven't personally visited. There'd be a number from 0 - 100 attached to that information object that denotes its reliability. 100% would mean there is no chance that information is wrong, while anything less than 30-40% would mean that much of that information might no longer be accurate. Any information you display could be marked, or have an overlay, to show you its Trust score.

This Trust number could be affected by several factors. One factor might be the "officialness" of the person who obtained it or traded it -- a map from a lone pirate would probably have a much lower Truth rating than a map purchased from a member of an Imperial Survey Commission faction. Another factor might be the number of hops between you and the person who originally created the information object. A map that's changed hands five times would have a somewhat lower Trust value than one you got directly from its creator. Yet another factor could be time: the Trust value of all information degrades as time passes.
This model would apply the rule being implicitly suggested in this thread, which is that "fact" and "rumor" should be implemented in LT as endpoints on a spectrum of grays, rather than as two hard-coded categories for simple gameplay.
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Re: Rumours, Regional Events and expanded System Information

#23
Consider that someone may play as a pirate and wants to intercept a convoy. The player might come across this information and be told that the ship is carrying ore and might have one or two escorts. The player decides to act on this information. The player assembles their fleet of 10 ships and heads out to intercept the convoy.

The convoy appears at the proper time, but instead of a fighter escort there are 3 battle-cruisers guarding the hauler. The player pays off the escorts and they depart, leaving the hauler all to the player. The player boards and captures the ship but finds out that it was hauling advanced weapons and blueprints.

Maybe the convoy was destroyed or the hauler took more time than usual getting fuel it needed for the trip. These sort of things could very likely make the convoy late or prevent it from showing up at all.

This is what makes LT so fun. You can affect the environment around the other NPCs and sway things into your favor. It's also why imperfect information needs to be in LT.
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