Release 197: New Universe, New Worlds, and New Characters!

I have turned the game off and played something else. I wasn’t in the mood to grind for minimal xp when all I am trying to do is level. Especially when I died and then got placed right where another cuttle could find me. . logged off and played a little space engineers to build something spacy!!

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Re spawning is odd. I totally get moving us far enough back that we are out of harms way. But it often throws us in front of a spitter or cuttle that almost instant kills us.

I am not a programmer, and so do not know how you would over come this, but I have been killed 3 times in a row more than once. And I’m a vet of this game.

Also majorly needed… Please please, let us have a waypoint or face us in the direction of when we were killed. When I spawn in I have absolutely no clue where the meteor was that I was working on.

Also, losing the meteor (abandoned) #$^% sucks after I downed expensive foods and drinks and wear on my weapons when we die. The reward is not balanced for the cost. I will say once my hunter gained enough defense, hunting meteors at the proper level is not much of a problem solo. But should be avoided if you are not defense spec. Gatherers and glass cannons beware. But even now , solo, one silver ore and 1 oort is kinda lame for a reward.

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At least the death penalty is not cumulative. . but I was still not happy about it.

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The game is in an unusual demand cycle with a huge group of people trying to establish themselves and create all new items on a limited selection of planets. Additionally people are exploring more than we normally have seen. So it seems a bit premature to define the resources as too scarce. The balance might be a bit off but we can’t really know for sure due to the different demand nature than we are used to. They might appear so now, but once machines are created and more people have scaled there is a high likelihood that resources will start slowing. Also, in real life if everyone decimated a planet of the resources they wouldn’t just show back instantly.

I would disagree with this. I spent over 2 days just digging out stuff and placing some basic blocks on an Alt (past level 10) and did not really level. In fact it was horribly slow in what I experienced at least. Meanwhile there are people running around leveling multiple times a day. A “builder” should be able to level without it taking a week and shouldn’t be forced to learn to mass craft or hunt or do other things.

Shouldn’t people get copper primarily from the lower tier worlds anyway? It doesn’t feel right to have specialized planets but then expect other tiers to have the same abundance of lower tier resources. Why must you push up the Tier structure to get certain stuff but not have to go back down the Tier structure to get other things?

I had thought the forge was more of an end game item anyway. People have been able to make decent tools without power and things.

It already has the potential to be a huge balance problem and causing super powerful tools. So we really need to be careful how it is used especially in the earlier parts. We’ve already see how easy it is for some to get to level 50 because of some unbalanced issues in the game.

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I agree with Kal-El, perhaps the solution is simple as just give experience only when you place blocks inside a beacon.
Same thing about chiseling, all the cities are surrounded by chiseled terrain and who knows when it will go back to normal.

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Why is an hour unacceptable? If people play smartly for that next hour or team up better or change how they approach things, then it shouldn’t be too big a burden.

Trust me, I don’t love the death penalty especially since there seems to be some code in the game that once you are out of it some cuttle shows up and kills you again. But, overall it is not horrible and many in the community felt death should be penalized. So this gives a balance of something that requires a bit of work to get out of it.

I would be fine if they added a timer that if you quit the game for 24-36 hours and came back into it that the death penalty would be gone. But I think anything less than at least 40 minutes or so of real game work should exist after death.

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A post was merged into an existing topic: Release 197 - Report issues here

What was the patch today?

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Stripping out the NDA message on load.

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Having now played for a while with this model, I dislike the death penalty. I know you want us to feel death is a threat but it feels like your time investment is being taken from you and that’s quite precious to some. I think it’s a fairly sucky way to punish adventurous play. If XP gain across some underloved activities went up it wouldn’t feel as bad on some characters but still… dunno, it feels pretty miserable when you see a long stretch of XP debt ahead of you.

I like the new death penalty considerably more than the previous approach.

It’s annoying enough to make me spend effort to avoid dying, but isn’t soul-crushing when it does occur (unlike before). And I’ve been dying a lot since 1.0.

It’s also particularly nice to not have to constantly worry about what is in your inventory, and what you might be doing for the next few hours before heading back home and storing your loot. I feel a lot more free to spontaneously switch what I’m doing

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At least this approach does not punish you as harshly for repeated deaths as before.

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(yes I’m a dev, but not involved in death penalty discussions, so not biased I hope). I’ve been playing the game as a “new player” since a few days ago, and not really been bothered by the death penalty other than being annoyed at myself for not being careful enough (like trying to solo a lvl 3 meteorite…). Definitely like not having to worry about tools degrading due to death, that would have been annoying…

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My issue with the penalty is I think the game is already punishin’ enough with all the resource requirements an’ grinding. I play it to try and relax, I think there’s a bit too much seriousness in it.

i don’t know, when I took a death penalty I was level 19 so it was large, but i just kept doing normal mining and crafting and stuff and within a short time i had made up for it with feats and normal xp.

Also, you can save your reward coffers until you die, then use them all at once. That xp counts towards the penalty, and can neutralize it pretty easily.

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the penality is a better way of the standard “xp loss” so yes, you level a bit slower afterwards … but you still level, don’t lose any progress and keep your tools as they are (before death was a real pain in the … you know what I mean ^^). I love it as it is. May be there could be a little lesser percentage of XP drain, but the system is nice and good as it is, especially because it doesn’t stack :slight_smile:

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If you label yourself as a casual player or just trying to relax in game, I think then the more reason you shouldn’t be looking at those exp. You could literally do everything right from the start but you just have to settle in being mediocre.

If you want to wield gems right away, build the next castle in the city, etc., then you’re probably asking more for a casual player because there are non-casual players who could go the extra mile who should also be rewarded for doing so.

I die from time to time but I don’t really mind the death penalty (to an extent I don’t even notice it). I just kept on doing my thing. The rewards for higher tiered skills are just an upgrade version of what you could do now. I currently settle for Iron Hammers, I can solo level 2 meteor and not level 3, our guild house is mostly basic trunk and woods and If we get into decorative tier, then it will get an upgrade to reflect its progression. Hold off first into that sweet curly chiseled blocks and settle for basic cube blocks for now, they are for master builders. :slight_smile:

Probably just enjoy the game as it is in your current progression and play the way it is meant to be, progressing. Now, if you’re permanently on Death Penalty status, then you’re probably doing something wrong and might want to beef up your survival strategy ^^

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It’s actually designed to give people choice to either upgrade tools tier or forge what they have on early stages of the game (so, forge copper and iron or upgrade to silver or titanium etc.).
However it looks like people get to high tier tools faster than they get enough skills ingredients and power coils for forge.

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I always thought it was obvious from testing that for any new players it would generally be a case of leveling up first with normal tools to be able to reach a point that you can then get the necessary skills and resources to be able to forge effectively. The idea that people would choose to start forging tools from stone rather than progressing through the metal ones seemed a bit optimistic. As soon as I get enough cubits (spent all mine on plots so far) I’m going to create an alt to concentrate on exploring the higher tier planets. I rather foolishly spent too many on the crafting skills which I’ve now found out half of them won’t be of any real use until I can reach certain resources.

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To your previous reply, i have to agree that it may be premature to drastically alter surface resources. Someone suggested that the regen counter should be independent of player activity which i quite liked. But also as you pointed out we have just unleashed veterans on a fresh universe, all trying to get back to where we were all coiled up and 50+ in just over a week - i dont think this is indicative of normal gameplay and does give a skewed view of resource availability. The biggest reason why I’m pro-regen independent of player activity is the whole “chiseled world” thing we’re seeing. Down side is you could conceivably be trapped underground by regen if it’s player independent.

On the death penalty - i think the fact that it doesn’t stack negates all claims relating to “I died x times i a row”. If you’re gonna die, doing it all in a row is the best way to minimize penalty. Because of this, meteor lives make sense. They do however put solo’ing meteors on a way higher level - and also significantly motivate teamplay when hunting meteors (technically meteorites :wink: )

Lastly to omni the forge has the impure boon compounds and boon boost paste iirc which you can get uncoiled for up to 300 boon per turn, but then you get quirks and defects and i feel that may be for the better

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