f13.net

Ever wondered how many fashion designers/tailors CCP hired to make ambulation characters look exactly right or how much fatter one will look when going weeks without docking?

Find out now (http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm?FEATURE=2156&GAME=14&bhcp=1)

Heh, CCP is like one of those management seminar speakers (I attended one of these seminars recently):  most people code whatever project they have and rely on the results to impress, and the marketing campaign focuses on the product/results; CCP highlights every step of the coding process and try to make mundane things sound like epic undertakings and thought-provoking examples that should be followed.

Oh, we didn't just flush the toilet after taking a dump, we used gloves to do so.  And an economist was there to calculate probable outcomes and provide an analysis of the results.  Not just an economist, either, a PhD economics expert!  The top one we could find in our country!!!!1

Just code it already.  It'll suck.  We all know it.

I still don't understand what ambulation is going to bring to the game.  At any level.  It seems like someone's pet idea that somehow morphed into a major shift in direction for the development of Eve.  If I want to get out of my ship and walk around, I'll turn off Eve and go do something else.


Edit: I forgot about the space hookers.  It will bring that.

I, on the other hand, still don't understand why people complain about ambulation.  It's essentially part of their Vampire project, and they've said in the past that, like the graphics upgrade or mission content enhancements, it is not stealing coding resources from the core game.  So if you don't want to, don't get out of your ship.  Hell, rat solidly for a few months, get into a mothership, and don't even dock!

CCP have always had this whole end-to-end grandiose vision for the game.  I like that.

Ah, I forgot about the vampire project.  So, what you're saying is that it isn't sucking any resources from Eve. 

I don't know - from that interview, it sounds like they're going to some length to incorporate ambulation into Eve. 


So, that's five or more non-technical resources devoted to fluff.  I agree that its nice for CCP to have a grandiose vision, but I'm still in the camp that thinks they should focus on tuning what is in place before introducing something of dubious value to a game about space combat and politics.  Consider this my roundabout way of complaining about the UI without actually complaining about the UI.

True, but I specifically restricted my comment to coding resources.

But, three fashion designers for a space game?  I better look swank when this thing releases.

Well, if the crossover with the Vampire MMO is as great as they say then I hope your character looks good in black.

They say it's not stealing programming resources, and that may be true in the strict sense that no fewer programmers are working on core Eve issues than were before.  But it's certainly taking all of their design focus, and it's become the defining feature of the future direction of the game.  Planetary development, governmental infrastructure (in the sense of making Alliances more capable of functioning like governments), etc., there were a lot of other things they used to talk about as being the future of the game, and slowly they've all been replaced by Ambulation.

It's a big part of why I dropped out of playing.  There's no real gameplay in Ambulation, it's just cosmetics, and although those cosmetics might or might not make the game more approachable and increase the playerbase (because a lot of people just can't deal with a ship as their character), they won't do anything to make *my* game experience more enjoyable.  Hell, they aren't even giving us skinnable ships and displayed Corp/Alliance symbols, which would be equally cosmetic and a hell of a lot easier.  Just...avatars.  That walk around.  Between station services.

Taking your UI and turning it into a 3D environment does not in and of itself make gameplay.  This is why every "3D Web" metaverse concept is DOA.

--Dave

I have to agree with Mahrin here the thing that attracted me to Eve in the first place was the intricacy of the game and somewhat higher IQ of the playerbase (debatable I know), but I think this is just part of a mass dumbing down. Governmental infrastructure and planetary development now that would be much more intriguing.

My problem with Ambulation is that docking is mostly interstitial bits. I want to dock, click some buttons to get all the crap I docked for done then undock and play the game some more. Even if I want to use a lot of station based services like manufacturing or markets then ambulation is still not adding a lot of value to my play time. Stuff that breaks up and slows down the bits I logged in to do is bad in my book. Unless Ambulation in and of itself brings tangible benefits or allows me to do things that aren't possible in any other way, I'd rather keep my docking bay and panel full of buttons thanks.

Didn't they come out with a stat that most folks online were docked 90% of the time or something like that?

I could see why they are interested in making the 'docked' portion of the game more interesting because of that, but they really need to weed out the ones that are AFK.

This has been said time and time again from the beginning: Ambulation will not replace the standard docking interface, merely offer an alternative "with graphical and social perks," and maybe a couple gameplay benefits like the map rooms for Alliances. You can play the game just as you were without ever setting a pixelated foot in a station.

But that would melt your computer when you jump into Jita.

I'm holding my breath waiting for two updates:

Next hardware upgrade for TQ.
Splitting one system across multiple nodes.

Docking is for carebears!  Boycott Stations!

Actually, now that I think about it... I've spent the last few days holed up dangerously inside a AAA station.  It would be awesome to ambulate around and grief some people while I'm stuck there.

Dear CCP,

I file this petition because the same character has been sitting on the mailbox, rendering it inaccessible, ever since we conquered this station.

Please remove him
Kind regards,
Вьетнам

Concept Art
(http://i99.photobucket.com/albums/l288/katal1st/EVE/IMG_0135.jpg)
(http://i99.photobucket.com/albums/l288/katal1st/EVE/IMG_0139.jpg)
(http://i99.photobucket.com/albums/l288/katal1st/EVE/IMG_0138.jpg)

"We can take EVE anywhere"

But should you?

I think its a great idea and don't really see why there are so much complaints about it. Yes Eve still has other flaws which need to be addressed, but show me a game that doesn't! There is always going to be something in Eve that someone will say, "well that needs to be fixed". So do they just keep chasing the same issues and never go forward with development?

I think it will open up the game more to people, and could possibly help with diplomacy if you can walk into stations and talk to people. It may also attract more players to the game that otherwise don't see the attraction. From the artwork, I think it looks very promising. I know I would have welcomed it from out time holed up in FAT, thats for sure.

Diplomacy wouldn't be helped much by ambulation, what are you going to do, send a diplomat into deep red space, avoid getting shot just to dock and say hi? Wouldn't mailing or convoing them be easier? Also, harder for scouts to know who all you are talking to?

It adds to the RP elements of the game. Gameplay, not really. This is some lead's pet project that he just really wants to do, and it's getting done instead of actual gameplay improvements, like completely overhauling the back end to handle the fleet battles the gameplay has dictated the players gravitate to.

If it takes nothing away from EVE, fine. But I have a sneaking suspicion that it's leeching resources, or at least freezing what the rest of the team can attack.

They're not going to get lag-free fleet battles any time soon, and the major determinant of that is not the server code, but the fact that you have a geometric progression of calculations and data as numbers increase.  To over-simplify, if ten per side means 100 arbitrary units of calculation, fifty per side means 2,500 such units of calculation and the current battles of 400 per side mean 160,000 units of calculation.  And this ignores the likelihood that the algorithms almost certainly don't scale even that well.

Far better to find other stuff for people to do (not that I am saying that this will be it, outside of Providence :lol:) than simply building a new highways for people to immediately clog up with extra cars.  Get rid of lag in current fleet battles and I, personally, will simply dual-box another Rokh.

Diplomacy isn't restricted to reds, it could possibly help strengthen relations with neutral corps etc. by getting to know more people, wandering and chatting etc. It may not, but expanding social aspect will have some effect, who knows.


Well this is true also, but again its not as black and white as that either. What happens when you make it possible for two 300 strong fleets to do battle in one system? Next time, they become two 400 man fleets... then 500... then people start whining about not being able to fight because of lag. On xbox live or PS3 you would be lucky to get 20 people in the one game at a time without lag, so I think CCP need a bit of slack on this one.

If you guys want to play dress up with your dollies while we play space ships, that's fine with me.

 :why_so_serious:

Well I personally think a lot of people want to see the interface and usability improved before anything, it's on the CSMs next list I wonder where CCP will see it on their priority scale.

CCP said that they had a team working on this several devblogs ago (just before the CMS kicked off, I think).

The dev who is in charge of the UI thinks it sucks too, I wonder what they'll come up with.
Last I heard, they didn't want a wow/war customizable UI because it would increase the gap between noobs and experienced players (never mind the odd 60mil skillpoints :).

Maybe they don't want to fix everything too fast and be out of a job
A concise list of possible changes here in the PDF link  http://myeve.eve-online.com/ingameboard.asp?a=topic&threadID=856936&page=1#5  , its being pushed by the CSM at the moment.

If they said that, they have it completely backwards.  Auctioneer, Deadly Boss Mods, Gatherer, Healerbot... most WoW mods are designed specifically to make encounters and the game EASIER so that even the most clueless noob can handle the most difficult fights.

Even what's available for EVE (EFT and EVEMON) make it so the 5-year expert who knows how to properly fit a nano-HAC and skill up his alts right, and the newbie who has no clue, both of them can have properly-fit ships and strong characters with a minimum of effort.

They got it completely backwards.

If, IF ? :grin:

Since it's one of those things you've read somewhere and just assumed its true, I figured I'd see if I could dig something up

from some live dev blog transcript:

It has been in some dev blog before that quote but I couldn't find it.

Its not immediately obvious to me why older players are advantaged with custom UI's?

(and btw 1st post, hello everyone  :awesome_for_real:)

My irritation with ambulation is it looks increasingly like a second consecutive zero content update for people in 0.0/alliances. And unlike FW this one isn't even attempting to address the newbie progression or any other problem or gap within EVE.

Ambulation is the best example ever of CCP's inability to prioritise shit that matters over shit that sounds fun for developers.

How is it not going to affect 0.0/alliances?  Is ambulation an empire-only feature?

Ambulation is content free for everyone, including those in 0.0. I don't mean that it is any more content-free for 0.0 than empire (though I suppose 0.0 does have far fewer stations), only that by the time ambulation arrives we'll have had over a year and despite plenty of navel gazing around POS and soveriegnty warfare, no apparent development in the 0.0 game.



I take all this back if the ambulation patch comes along with a meaningful update to internet spaceships. (Hah!)

Older players aren't. In fact UIs narrow the gap.

The real reason CCP don't go this route is because they see UIs as boring things to develop.

They want to be working on pie-in-the-sky new systems, not fixing the plumbing.



To be fair, this is probably a big part of why EVE doesn't play like WoW.

Ambulation could be loads of fun for 0.0 if they put in wing commander/tie fighter esque controllable turrets inside the station.  No locking, no autofire, aim and fire bitches.  It's always been absolutely retarded that you can get camped inside of a station anyways, it's a SPACE STATION, why the hell wouldn't it have guns?

Servers for ambulation and the space outside are completely separate. So this is impossible.

I was going to ask about that earlier would that help decrease lag cause docoked pilots will be on a seperate node?

So you "undock" into a gun that you have to aim and fire, you can exit it at any time and "redock" into ambulation.

As quickly as you threw out "impossible", I really fucking hope that you don't have a job that requires any thoughts more complex than remembering to ask if your client would like fries with their order.

Oooh, ouch. You got me. But aim and fire? "Wing Commander in EVE"? Give me the name of your dealer. Besides FPS combat being a poor game mechanic in an MMO, wouldn't the society of 24,000 AD have come up with something more efficient than a machine gun nest for taking out dreadnaughts the size of small cities?

Unfortunately, you hit the nail on the head with the other. I'm working at Dairy Queen during the school year, with engineering internships lined up for the summer.

It'd be a permanately mounted turret on the station that may or may not be destructable and would ignore player skills, aim and fire is the only mechanic that would make it fun. In case you havn't noticed yet, control-click f1f2f3f4f5f6f7f8 wait for boom is boring as fuck, the fps mechanics are already there in the form of smartbombs.  A linear smartbomb with a ~1km radius and 250km range would work just fine.

Sure. Except that sphere-sphere collisions are far, far quicker to calculate than sphere-cylinder collisions. You could do ray-sphere intersection for a hitscan weapon, which would suck since you'd need - literally - pinpoint accuracy. Or you could use a moving sphere, which instead would have travel time and be just as heavy as throwing out another ship/drone/whatever onto the battlefield in terms of collision detection, so the refire rate would probably blow nuts.


Sounds like it should. And if so, that'll be awesome for Jita and other market systems.

I agree with everything said here. Ambulation is total useless fluff. It makes it easier to move box sales, but they'll still have the AoC problem of not being able to retain, though of course for a different reason. The game play is what keeps people away, and adding avatars doesn't change that....

... unless they make this becomes an FPS or at least Mass Effect-like twitch ground combat. THEN you have something.

And it would be rather fitting to have an NGEing of Eve chase everyone back to SWG  :drill:

Nah, almost everything you do in Jita (chat, market, assets etc) is on a separate server already, so I think it is just bad design that means that docked pilots lag space.  The things that hurt the local node are stuff that involve altering or creating objects in the actual space of the station, like actually making a purchase or sale, moving assets around, (historically) copying bookmarks etc.  If these can be done in the ambulation environment, then they will still have an impact, since those object must stlll be made to exist in the "real" game world.  If not, then ambulating players will neither impact nor improve the situation.



I think Drugstore should have stood his ground, here.  The servers are completely different.  The systems are completely different.  You could no sooner put a point-and-click gun into the station, ambulation or no ambulation, than you could on your merlin.  The game is not designed to be Wing Commander any more than (to follow Darniaq) SWG was designed to be Counterstrike.  And saying "hey it's not a problem with the different servers, you undock into it" is not an argument when Drugstore calls you on saying "Ambulation could be loads of fun for 0.0 if they put in wing commander/tie fighter esque controllable turrets inside the station."  Make up your mind: you started by saying "here is an effect of ambulation on the wider game" then fell back to "hey it's nothing to do with ambulation really you dumbass."

You were well out of order with the "would you like fries with that" insult when he was right in every part of his statement, and you had to do a 180 in order to not look dumb.  And you didn't even get his beautifully executed reverse burn.

Point-and-shoot is impossible anyway, with any sort of lag, unless you have some nice, hackable, front-side collision detection.  I'd rather have the current paradigm and no haxxors.  You might as well say "hey Eve would be great if I could use ambulation to control my space empire like in Sins of a Solar Empire and cilck to build stuff from the galaxy map room!"  Wrong game.

 :popcorn:

I don't think this was anywhere near :popcorn:-worthy.