ModDB - Updates and Votes

[ThatPirateGuy]

Only docking, jumpdrives, cloaking devices, real time creation and destruction of player owned bases, player controlled economy for the bases manufacturing (admittedly limited), player ship infocards, 15000 updated and unique infocards and rumors, an extensive and balanced static economy model, many many new ships and good hitboxes, many unique base models, a few unique room models, oh and pimpship. Several of these features were considered impossible to do in Freelancer.

Most of the things above didn't exist in 4.85. We'd rather like to win mod of the year based on the 4.86 development as it stands today not what's happened in the last 12 months.

Do we deserve it? I don't know but I think we've done enough to be worthly of consideration.

The only significant thing about this mod being that it is forced RP at all times on the server

This is a role play server. Don't like it here? Go somewhere else. This mod is used by a whole bunch of servers, some with stricter RP, some with less or none.

Also, thanks to all of those who nominated the mod. Hopefully we'll make the top 100 and go through to the next stage.

Don't get me wrong, I love the hell out of the game. You have no idea how much time i've put into disco. But if im gonna vote for a mod, im gonna vote for something that's been punching out quite a bit of effort to improve itself and deliver some bit of a modified gameplay experience. Side by side, vanilla freelancer, and disco aren't that different. While what you did list sounds good when you type it out, ingame its really not that much of a game changer. Aside from that A-hole base in Dublin. I hate that thing. Still though, don't think im saying the mod sucks. Its fun as all hell. Used to be even more fun when the server was consistently populated.

[Ursurper]

We were going to delete them in 4.87 completely but for backwards compatibility reasons this is not going to happen.

Then you should disconnect some of them from the map by removing jumpholes, if it saves you development time. 4.87 should be released fast to remove a lot of the problems with boredom-causing system layout.

Sure, I did a bunch of FLHook things but this underplays the massive effort the infocard team did (15,000 infocards didn't come from no where), the modellers, the system editing and economy. I'm absolutely certain that without people like Aeternus, Blodo, Mjolnir, Jinx, Xoria and lots of others, 4.86 would have never come out.

Didnt want to to downplay their efforts, I've seen lot of great stuff at least some of them did. But the things that need to revamped the most urgently are the not really helpful or understandable ID infos and not really helpful or interesting bar rumors, for the benefit of helpful and interesting stuff that really motivates player to read more. In order to get more people to contribute to it, you could make the infocard development an open forum thing, not a task-assigned skypechannel thing.

'noob-friendliness' is probably my biggest concern and I don't have great answers for how to achieve this. Suggestions are welcome.

Well, I think changing the default starting equipment without /restart to a better one ( as in possible to do missions easilly) could be a good start, if that's possible.

I'd prefer buffing all weaker ships, so they both make it easier for noobs in the beginning, and keep those ships interesting even when people have more cash at their disposal. Adds variety and more choices to RP your char just like you want, with a ship that looks like you want but isnt total crap (for example I like the x-shuttle and that freighter you get at Newark, but don't fly them because they can't compete). Ship performances should be more equal, and the real upgrades should lie in the gear that you get for them, like shields, armor, scanners. The higher-end equipment can be made more expensive to reflect that.

Other ways to motivate noobs:
-help command that give you more help than just command listings. For example explanations on how the com system works. Same for the rep system, including ninja-IDs. And for how the technerf works. People can be made aware of the availability of the help at appropriate times, preferably in a way that is as "IRP" as possible.
-more bar rumors that give you really valuable information, like trade routes, good ship and gear purchasing locations, wild and motivating rumors about some of the well designed remote locations, making your mouth water into finding them on your own.
-Easy missions in the places where the faction should be strongest. For example easy Outcast ones in Omicron Alpha, easy Order ones in Mu. Right now they spam capships which is very frustrating for noobs. Very difficult missions in places where those factions are involved in a difficult war (but not near enemy faction's cap sytems, obviously).
-Best gear, or at least second best gear, purchasable at well visited locations, for the according high price. For example best LN stuff at West Point and Norfok, best OC gear at alpha. Its also nice to play a mod that makes sense.
-Discourage the use of the word "lolwhut", or gaga-RP by vets who mock people who don't know how to RP or PvP well (yet).
-Encourage voluntary PvP training and RP advice towards noobs by official faction members, possibly with .addcash. Make the official leaders of military and police factions write a short but well written IRP code of conduct for indies and officials alike, giving hints and information on lore and protocol to help RP those factions properly. Place that in a very easy to find location on the forum. Or in an infocard at West Point, for example.

[Savvy ?]

Dang it, can't double vote

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[AeternusDoleo]

'noob-friendliness' is probably my biggest concern and I don't have great answers for how to achieve this. Suggestions are welcome.

Simple. Don't make em start out in Pennsylvania where they undock straight into the fray with a frapping Starfly. Make em start out in a disconnected system similar to Connecticut. A "Welcome to Discovery" area with some explanations about the server. We can make sure to show off some of Disco's eyecandy there, too.

Heck, you could even make something like "around you you see a number of bases belonging to various factions. Please take a moment to inspect each faction (read the station descriptions) and decide which role you want to be. Upon docking with a base you will be disconnected from the server briefly while your character is updated. You will start with a simple light fighter of that faction."
Then have bases like "Liberty Navy - Liberty Police - Liberty Rogues" etc, which docking to one automatically causes a /restart to kick off, transferring you to a starting base for the faction, with a small sum of credits. No more repping required, you get a LF with rep to the faction plus the ID.

Many roleplaying servers I played on before (NWN ones) had such an area where you could basically customize your character prior to entering the game world. Discovery could benefit from something similar. It would require some minor FLHook programming to tie docking to specific bases, to kicking off a /restart action. And additional /restart templates would need to be built, but that isn't too hard to do.

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Wide awake in a world that sleeps, enduring thoughts, enduring scenes. The knowledge of what is yet to come.
From a time when all seems lost, from a dead man to a world, without restraint, unafraid and free.

Mostly retired Discovery member. May still visit from time to time.

[AshDent]

Simple. Don't make em start out in Pennsylvania where they undock straight into the fray with a frapping Starfly. Make em start out in a disconnected system similar to Connecticut. A "Welcome to Discovery" area with some explanations about the server. We can make sure to show off some of Disco's eyecandy there, too.

Following on from this AD why not make it a few systems (2-3) where they can learn how to play, this also can help re-use some of the systems that were wanted to be deleted.

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| Faction Information | |Recruitment |

Other Character: Robin Lowe || FP5 Zoner

[Govedo13]

One single system is good enough.

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€œ

Official faction players that are often accused of elitism, never deploy them and have those weird, immersion killing "fair fight/dueling" suicidal hobbies. (yes, i've seen enough of those lolduels, where house military with overwhelming force on the field willingly loses a pilot in a duel. ffs.)

[Fluffypinkbunny]

I would have like to see an influx of more angels. People who can still be their own faction, doing their own thing, but still help out the noobs. I would love to be able to help people learn a few things about freelancer, they might need to know before even getting started.

[James.]

About guards systems, I think there is a way to at least make em invisible, cut all jump holes to that system, but leave jump holes leading out of said system, result? players wont be trapped, and system will be kinda gone from environment.

[Ursurper]

Upon docking with a base you will be disconnected from the server briefly while your character is updated. You will start with a simple light fighter of that faction."
Then have bases like "Liberty Navy - Liberty Police - Liberty Rogues" etc, which docking to one automatically causes a /restart to kick off, transferring you to a starting base for the faction, with a small sum of credits. No more repping required, you get a LF with rep to the faction plus the ID.

Many roleplaying servers I played on before (NWN ones) had such an area where you could basically customize your character prior to entering the game world. Discovery could benefit from something similar. It would require some minor FLHook programming to tie docking to specific bases, to kicking off a /restart action. And additional /restart templates would need to be built, but that isn't too hard to do.

Nice idea. But I think that takes a lot of system-designing and programming, so maybe something to aim for in the longer run. I still think 4.87 should be released really fast so the major problems with system layout get fixed before people leave because of boredom. A lot can already be done by jam-packing Pennsylvania with bar characters that give people a lot of information useful to play the game and find what you're looking for. What can't be explained there can be explained by additional "/help $subject" commands with a little more text.

But in the long run a really small oorp starting system would be a good thing. But it should be simple in design, not eye candy. It could have a starsphere that doesn't look like your in space, but in some kind of oorp limbo. Maybe a totally white one, or one that has the star constellations you see from earth and the milky way. The systems will be a good place for admins and angels to hang out. Maybe admins in the evil lookign ravens claw and red lights, angels, in shiny white ships
Only 3 things should be in the system:
1. Station where you start out with. The barkeeper tells you that talking to bar characters will help you get started. If its possible to transfer that "talk to the barkeeper" message you get at the beginning of the SP campaign into the start of the mod, include that. The barkeep could also explain that if the server has "RP" in the name, you need to role play as a certain character when you talk to people in system or local chat. The bar characters will be people from the 5 houses (any affilitiation), a Miner, a Freelancer. I don't know if its possible to put 7 people +barkeep into a bar without hiding any randomly and always telling you the same thing, but that way it would be best. At least there are some bars that have more than 7 chairs. Those people will tell you about restarts and as what you will restart. For example: "If you type /restart Freelancer, you will become a Freelance spaceship pilot situated in the Coronado system, who seeks his fortune doing odd jobs around Sirius. You will have access to civilian technology, and your reputation will be neutral with most factions. You will be able to fulfill bounty, escort, and scouting contracts, and your reputations will allow you to travel safely through most human-inhabited places." The other texts will be similar, just like "you will start as a citizen of Bretonia, etc". Each of the people can also tell you about one additional aspect of the mod, for example the miner will also mention that you can use /givecash to transfer money to other characters, the liberty guy can mention that you will be able to adjust your reputation enough to join the navy and buy a LN ID if you do missions on West Point. I think there is also the possibility to put talking chars in other rooms. The equipment dealer could tell you about the tech compatibility, the ship dealer how you need to transfer your ID by selecting the cargo hold (I hope that finally gets fixed tho, another issue of noob friendliness). The commodity dealer could tell you about trading and mining strategies and /givecash.

2. navigation buoy that reads "Talk to people on the station for help on the game, before you take the gate to the Sirius sector"

3. one-way alien hypergate that leads to the dead hypergate in Coronado, or Pennsylvania, alernatively. Because some non-english people may be wanting to play the mod as SP and wont be able to understand the /restart stuff.

For a more speedy release, you could write the bar infocards and provisionally put those guys on planet Erie.

That will help the people who are willing to read integrate faster, but there's still the issue if the mod is "beautiful" or not, or high quality or not. For that, you should really fix the issues that all the vets got used to but noobs find terrible.

Like getting stuck in stations, hanging in lanes and gates, mentally challenged overzealous npcs, too many unlawful npcs near lawful bases, losing your ID if you dont select cargo hold in ship purchase, having no ingame explanation or help about the tech nerf or the repninja IDs, getting only capship missions at places most likely for noobs to take missions, copy-pasted bar characters that don't know who or where they are, absence of lore or sense to certain places.

[Hone]

Sum really good ideas in here from practically everyone, so much so that it would take too long to point some out specifically.

This thread should be "Actually helpful, well intentioned, and constructive discussion to improve disco"


Id say a message saying "DONT TAKE IT TOO SERIOUSLY" would help!

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