if you dont think your going to have a huge range of options what about displaying them along the lines a a futuristic style of Head Up Display

Would be difficult as the primary view will be third person, to the rear of the ship. Ala Starwing

Hmmm, blockage of ideas here lol, I'm gonna have to ponder this one ...

Ok heres one, in the realm of Sci-Fi, how could I implement a capture the flag type objective (Quickmatch Gametype).

For the CTF framework, how about some kind of tech-stealing? Have a prototype "energy recombination unit" suspended in a "stasis field" so that its energies are properly regulated, and then you fly your ship through the field, latch onto the device with a brightly colored tractor beam, and tow it back to your "research bay". The stasis field and research bay would look conspicuously like hula hoops with a colored field in the center, and the tractor beam would be brightly lit in your team's color (because it has to be high-energy, don't you know).

You've got clearly, visible goalposts and a bright designation of the flag carrier. What more could you want?

Hmmm sounds cool ... thats given me another idea though for something, in one of the neutral sectors deep in the multi-verse, there could be an abandoned ship that belonged to an ancient advanced race, and once a ship docks with it (one at a time) the ship is then charged with an energy that extends the ships power once only. So its kind of like a shield powerup, enables you to go twice as fast, weapons twice as powerful ... but power core would discharge slightly more quickly than normal.

It would be far enough away from anything strategic to not be a huge problem for balance, but once a powered ship gets there 2 or 3 on 1 might be a problem depending on the skills of the player.

This vessel could be tractored out of the system by a minimum of 3 ships, as it would be quite large, so it would take teamwork to move and to keep control of.

To move it through gates you would have to have three ships tractoring it, and then go to full speed and release so that the momentum carries the ship through the gate.

Obviously it can be destroyed but it would take some fire to do so.

This might get lots of players around it, and its a good thing to fight over, would cause quite a number of battles!

Any feedback?

That sounds like a neat feature for a free-form multiplayer universe, but you'll start to run into the problem of reverse entropy. However you set up the universe, when players start to win fights, they impose order on it, and you'll eventually reach a point where all the "charge-up ships" are near spawn points so they're unassailable, and so that gameplay feature will stagnate. You'll have to have them explode (or accrue damage through fighting) on a semi-regular basis, so that there will be a good turn-over of bonus powers. Obviously, the boost ship will have to respawn (perhaps at a random location) periodically to keep the feature around.

I advise you to make it pretty rare, so that it's an unexpected addition to the fight. Otherwise, it'll be like buffing units in StarCraft--people will incorporate finding lost technology into ther strategy. It's like having a financial plan that includes a winning lottery ticket--it makes an honest plan inadequate, and cheapens the strategy of the thing.

Well, only higher ranked ships will be able to reach it, go anywhere near the home sectors to spawn rape (as spawn points will be random in the sectors, most often away from enemies, which will usually be at a corner depending on where the action is. So anyone spawning seeing a fast moving higher powered ship moving towards them will be able to face the outer edge of their sector and use the gates to warp to the next zone.

Plenty of other places to hide though, nebulas obviously mask sensors, but at the same time fire from a certain energy weapon also ignites parts of nebulas, so it would rip practically any ship apart lol. Then again their are asteroids, a higher powered ship would find it difficult to navigate if the rocks are close together whereas a smaller and slower ship would find it easy as they are slower and more manuvourable.

Besides the boosted ships woould probably only be able to reach any home bases of any sector quickly enough to probably only be twice stronger instead of three times stronger, as the effects wear off with time.

And I was indeed thinking of letting it spawn randomly in a given number of sectors deep within the multi-verse.

I hope to bring a mix of action and strategy to the game, with the ranking and buying of components to bring longetivity to it.

So it would appeal to both the strategic and those seeking arcade action, depending on how they want to play.

Remember there will be two modes of multiplayer, the freeform multi-verse mode, and the Quickmatch mode, which is for arcade mostly, just shoot and kill with a few objective type missions, but not multiple at any given time like the multi-verse.

To allow for balanced play between newbies and veterans with there own ships why not allow players to sign up for missions at spacestation. Where they are employed by the local authority to carry out patrol/convoy/escort tasks for example, where they fly a local authority vessel. This way they could gain points while still being able to take part in the world without being completely outclassed by veteran players with larger vessels. Players could use their acrued points to purchase/upgrade their own vessel just like veteran players without being at a disadvantage.

Quote:Original post by doorstop
To allow for balanced play between newbies and veterans with there own ships why not allow players to sign up for missions at spacestation. Where they are employed by the local authority to carry out patrol/convoy/escort tasks for example, where they fly a local authority vessel. This way they could gain points while still being able to take part in the world without being completely outclassed by veteran players with larger vessels. Players could use their acrued points to purchase/upgrade their own vessel just like veteran players without being at a disadvantage.

Entrances to systems will be based on rank, so certain sectors only certain types of ranks may enter.

I don't want this to be another freelancer lol