"dropboxes"

collapsible containers which have very low storage needs when inactive,
but can be dropped and store comparatively big amounts of wares in that state

for example for small mining ships, stuff a 'box into your hold, place it where you want to mine and fill it up with an amount of wares you could never fit into your ship
and when you are done you engage your tractor beam/grapplers and pull the box to the market.

maybe this could even be the general purpose external cargo container implementation?

Communication / navigation buoys.

Small droppable devices which inform passing ships about specific things.

warning buoys which share data about anomalies in the surroundings.

Navigation buoys which denote a safe path through a dangerous area.

Advertisement buoys which give you data about the position and stocks of a nearby market.

Etc.

All kinds of information that the dropper would want to be publically known

I get the feeling that Limit Theory will be an information-rich game. There'll be many kinds of data coming at us, and large amounts of each kind.

So some way to organize that information would be nice to have. Since I suspect Josh will be thinking of information as "messages," I can think of some ways I might want to manage those messages:

• 1. Define Urgency as a tag for any message
• 2. Define the Source of every message:
  • character A on their own
  • character B on behalf of a faction
  • character C on behalf of a ship
  • character D on behalf of a fleet
  • character E on behalf of a colony
• 3. Define broad Category types for messages, e.g.:
  • Economic (contract fulfillment, price of X falls below Y, project completed/blocked, colony established on planet X, etc.)
  • Discovery (scanned new star system, achieved research breakthrough, detected sensor readings in a particular band, etc.)
  • Combat (under attack, ship/fleet integrity below preset level X, victory, defeated and retreating to system X)
  • Location (arrived at destination X, blocked from traveling to destination X)
• 4. Define a display priority for each message based on its Source, Category and Urgency
• 5. Allow messages to be saved depending on their Source and Category

I'd like it if messages could be encoded in ways like these, and if I could create rules that fire for each incoming message that define how to display it (immediately in flashing red text no matter what, as a green indicator in the corner of the screen when I'm not in combat, etc.) and how to preserve it.

Weapons that deal continuous damage and weapons with damage-over-time (DOT) effects.

I've seen a lot of weapons that fire rounds and bolts, but I want to see something that does damage as long as the beam is in contact. Kind of like how the mass transfer beams continuously mine asteroids as long as there's ore in the asteroids. DOT rounds are just what they sound like. Maybe make them "acid rounds" or nanobot missiles.

That reminds me: The ability to scavenge wrecks of ships for materials and/or mine destroyed ships with the transfer beam.

viewtopic.php?f=5&t=1808&hilit=hud

Starbuck wrote:viewtopic.php?f=5&t=1808&hilit=hud

Yes, I want that too, Starbuck. I'm not sure if Cornflakes would consider it a small thing but as you can see even Josh likes the idea. Not sure if it's going to happen now but it would be an awesome addition to the game.

Starbuck wrote:viewtopic.php?f=5&t=1808&hilit=hud

Make Tombs the computer and I'll double my investment in the game.

Ways to easily mark and remember points and areas.
Preferrably with a way to make notes on that marks

For cases of "something interesting there" and to remember why it was interesting.

maybe with a nice searchable database to organise those marks.

...hmmm... maybe with a more or less automatic "tagging" system.
Want to remember the resources you scanned in that area just add a resource tag to the marked location.
The tag then includes a precise mineral type and amount, that you can search for that mineral and its amount in the database. (Searching for that should work in general in the map too, but the conscious notes should be separate from the general map)

Idea 1:

A log book with customizable tabs that allow the sorting of information. Information could range from player written goals, owned ships which could be sorted using filters, income per system and zone, and anything else dealing with sorting and categorizing large amounts of data. (Maybe this could be one window that allows the creation of a spreadsheet or a text document. The spreadsheet could take chunks of game data (such as all ships in a given zone) and sort them by type).

Selecting an item on the spreadsheet would pull up a window showing the ship, its stats, and current orders.

Idea 2:

Import function for ship logos in png format. Location and size of logo would have to be defined on a per ship bases but this could become part of the ship editor.

Combat assist software/system

A piece of equipment that improves the flying/fighting abilities of the ship its mounted in.
For NPC's.


For the player it would supply suggestions on which target to engage, which weapons to use and also suggests flight maneuvers.
(Basically giving a "what would a very good AI pilot do" view for the player).


Idea as i write this:
May have other support software kits for other purposes.
Mining kits, salvaging kits etc...

hotkeys, on everything

assignable by doing a modified click on any clickable thing (ctrl+click eg)

Beeing able to build planetary colonies on Gas Giants, Plasma Planets,
cold Worlds like Titan or hot Worlds like Venus in a variety of hostile
environments -> also a greater variety of surfaces and atmospheres.

notami wrote:Beeing able to build planetary colonies on Gas Giants,

They'd probably have to be space stations because of killer gravity and storms, but maybe mining gas giants? I think small, secret bases would be more likely on these planets. Also, mining gas giants. Come on, they've got to be some of the most awesome resource deposits ever. Once stripped, then I think you can start settling. Maybe.

Plasma Planets,

Because our shields will definitely be able to survive entering the atmosphere. Let alone the entire settlement's. You want to try build colonies on the surface of miniature stars.

cold Worlds like Titan or hot Worlds like Venus in a variety of hostile

I can see these working. We don't ever officially leave our ships, so it's really a matter of working rocky and icy textures into the generator. Maybe have it sap shields or require a certain amount of hull integrity to land or take off from those planets. Entering battles with your shields low at the start of deployment because of the location sounds interesting.

environments -> also a greater variety of surfaces and atmospheres.

Well, they are procedurally generated, so we will definitely see more.

notami wrote: environments -> also a greater variety of surfaces and atmospheres.

which game relevant surfaces or atmospheres?

the only change would be texture changes and at max some arbitary limitations for colony placement

@Jazehiah

If you would like to care to be "scientifically correct" by todays standards,
LT would have to be a totally different game, maybe more like kerbal space program.
To picture a future vessel that is capable of interstellar travel with the same ease
you drive your car to a nearby supermarket as a spaceship of our present +improved rocket
engines + antimatter or fusion reactor resembles the 19th century naive idea of a balloon
with propellers as a futuristic concept of a jet airplane from today.

LT is about fun/gameplay + pseudo science with a remaining rest of plausibility;
however small this rest might be.
Whats seems to be realistic and what not in this context is actually a matter
of each ones personal taste.
Speaking for myself,I could read a book from Stanislaw Lem and watch some old
Rocky Jones Movie from the 1950ies and enjoy both.

Pseudoscience and Plausibility

About Gravity:
".....killer gravity and storms"
To bring a capital Ship with the weight of several hundredthousands tons or
more and the aerodynamics of a giant brickstone to a controlled Landing on a
Planet like(to make things easier), say Mars, you would certainly need a
technology that beside some other small extras, can handle artificial
(anti)gravitation.
You cant do this only with reactive propulsion/"Rockets", chemical, ion, plasma
no matter what.

About high Pressure, Storms, Radiation, ionized Atmospheres:
"Because our shields will definitely be able to survive entering the atmosphere. Let alone
the entire settlement's. You want to try build colonies on the surface of miniature stars"
Energyshields, as well as nanomachines that "heal" damaged armor and
structure in no time are fictional.So, there is always some psdeudoscientific
explanation aviable what these fictional technologies can do and what not.
It has beeing stated here before by the developer himself, that stars couldnt
be reached, otherwise your Suggestion of exploring the Corona and the surface
of a sun could be quite interesting.