Absolutely love this.

Any chance we can get the same direction right in the cyno out effect? It would be cool to see a capital jump and be able to tell where it went.

Also, is there any relationship between the stargate location in a system and where it's going to? In a few systems I noticed stargates sending you down in the starmap are actually located high in the system map.

An idea about reworking the minimap and making it more clear-cut:
Remove the minimap from the right side of the screen, put it to the middle and make it transparent and unflattened (just like in diablo style but in 3d :D). Similar to the tactical overlay. If the camera turns the minimap turns in the same direction too. With the solar map this could make easier the directional scanning and the constellation/region map could make easier to locate ourselves and our route during traveling between solar systems

In space, all directions are up.

The new jump drive animations could use a little directional overhaul as well. I coordinated a little 'mass jump' on sisi from 6-c to next door, and this is how it went:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywA2cDBG12c

As you can see, it pretty much kills any sense of direction you would have had.

A fleet of capitals jumping to a system should all zoom off in the same direction when they jump out together - that direction should be the destination system.

So as some have seen on SISI we also have stars in the proper locations. The stargates will point you to the actual solarsystem and you will be able to tell how far the jump is from the perspective scaling of the stars. Closer stars are bigger.

That would mean that your ship would have to align before it could jump, please no...
At least if this is implemented it should be possible to align to a star so you know the entire fleet is ready to jump

When you arrive in the destination system, it would be cool to alter the current effect of spawning as cloaked around the cyno to say spawning as already in warp 1 or 2 AU from the cyno. However this does have its disadvantages, especially if you're hotdropping a large fleet, as it will take some time to load the scene.

Hate to throw realism into this, but at a distance of multiple light years the size of the star is irrelevant. You can have super-massive stars much further away than say a nearby white dwarf and they'll still both be pinpricks in the sky.

In this case, size doesn't matter.

Absolutely love this.

Any chance we can get the same direction right in the cyno out effect? It would be cool to see a capital jump and be able to tell where it went.

Also, is there any relationship between the stargate location in a system and where it's going to? In a few systems I noticed stargates sending you down in the starmap are actually located high in the system map.

@Jack Dant, Makenshi Drakonnen and Grarr Dexx: : We have fixed the randomness of the cyno out, but getting them to orient towards their destination is a different ballgame. It is something we want to do though!

In space, all directions are up.

Just have to say it since it's a huge pet bear of mine,,

Moving planets...

Or more importantly (to me) the smaller the satellite the faster the orbit (generally). Planets rotate suns much slower that moons orbit planets. POSs anchored in orbit around moons would move faster still.

Planets orbits measured in years
Moon orbits measured in months
POS orbits measured in days

Or more importantly (to me) the smaller the satellite the faster the orbit (generally). Planets rotate suns much slower that moons orbit planets. POSs anchored in orbit around moons would move faster still.

Planets orbits measured in years
Moon orbits measured in months
POS orbits measured in days

This

[quote=Hykke]
Don't see why cynoing ships have to align first. When you jump at a gate your ship doesn't align to the direction of the jump before it jumps. Cynoing is just another jump mechanism.

Or more importantly (to me) the smaller the satellite the faster the orbit (generally). Planets rotate suns much slower that moons orbit planets. POSs anchored in orbit around moons would move faster still.

Planets orbits measured in years
Moon orbits measured in months
POS orbits measured in days

All i read was "...have to move bookmarks" and then i chose not to like this.

Doesnt improve the game at all its just stupid work that has to be done if u want to have your previously working bookmarks to work again as intended.

This is great. Immersion for the win. Now for your next project can you make it so ships dont rotate to an imaginary plane when not moving? Partly for immersion reasons partly for tactics it has annoyed me for six years now that if you align to an object above you then stop (passive align) your ship will turn itself to the "plane" when there is no force that would make that natural.

So as some have seen on SISI we also have stars in the proper locations. The stargates will point you to the actual solarsystem and you will be able to tell how far the jump is from the perspective scaling of the stars. Closer stars are bigger.

So many good comments from you guys!

@StukaBee: Having the proper stars in the background opens up a lot of possibilities with regards to interaction. We will definitely be investigating ways to get some more interaction with them.

@Mar Drakar: That is a special dev shield extender to make sure I am not blown up by rats

@Jack Dant, Makenshi Drakonnen and Grarr Dexx: : We have fixed the randomness of the cyno out, but getting them to orient towards their destination is a different ballgame. It is something we want to do though!

@Daedalus Arcova: I will pass on your comments about stargate positions to the appropriate persons. Thanks! We hope to be able to get more landmarks in at some point, but we will need to make do with what we have at the moment for a time.

@Illwill Bill: We would LOVE to make a nice transition effect from one system to another. I will try to get it on our backlog for future realeases.

@hero honda: You will most definitely be able to see the destination star through the gate! Unless the jump is redonkulously long that is.

su much goodness

@Illwill Bill: We would LOVE to make a nice transition effect from one system to another. I will try to get it on our backlog for future realeases.

........

@hero honda: You will most definitely be able to see the destination star through the gate! Unless the jump is redonkulously long that is.

All i read was "...have to move bookmarks" and then i chose not to like this.

Doesnt improve the game at all its just stupid work that has to be done if u want to have your previously working bookmarks to work again as intended.

Why would you need to move your bookmarks? I honestly don't get it. Seriously, I'm struggling to come up with situations where you need to move your bookmarks other than the exceedingly rare case where your bookmark is now inside the structure, causing you to be propelled away from it after warping there.

This is great. Immersion for the win. Now for your next project can you make it so ships dont rotate to an imaginary plane when not moving? Partly for immersion reasons partly for tactics it has annoyed me for six years now that if you align to an object above you then stop (passive align) your ship will turn itself to the "plane" when there is no force that would make that natural.

And this is coming from a member of a PVP corp. I am more than surprised. I won't get into detail where precise bookmarks are needed.

For all those whinging about gates not being on the right "side" of the solar system (i.e. the one nearest the destination), there's some game lore for you here. TL;DR: there are resonance nodes between stellar bodies that the gates have to be installed on, and the nodes are fixed between different systems. So the gates are where they are because that's the only way the system works. "Sides" of the system is irrelevant. Fun with spatial mechanics.

Just have to say it since it's a huge pet bear of mine,,

Moving planets...

In space, all directions are up.

I'd like some answers to these same questions. A fleet of capitals jumping to a system should all zoom off in the same direction when they jump out together - that direction should be the destination system.

I really like the fact that you can see nearby stars now as well. But if I'm flying by gates, and can see the star system in the next constellation that I'm trying to reach to the south, then the gate to that system should be in the south of the system I'm in as well. I shouldn't normally have to warp in the complete opposite direction from a system to reach the gate that takes me to it. So please reposition the constellation and region gates (not the system gates - they 'orbit' planets) so that they are in line between the two stars they connect.

Lastly, things like the EVE Gate, Gununjagap (or whatever it's called), and all those areas of turbulent and impenetrable space should be visible in nearby systems. Since you can add individual stars to the skybox, do you have plans to add these other landmarks as well?

Good work, now keep it up!

but... but... "The enemy's gate is down!"

Seriously, loving this change and asking for an optional HUD-type overlay showing connections between stars in space

Huh? In RL, the star Polaris, the north star, is 200 light years away and still easily visible. (Its an intrinsically bright star, a Cephied variable). The entire eve cluster is only 100 light years across. No jump should be so long as to hide its destination star.

One thought: going from system A to system B that is to the "West" of system A does not necessarily mean that the stargate required to jump to system B should be on the "West" side of system A. This is due to the fact that the star gates were placed in a spot in space that has some sort of 'affinity' with the system you are jumping to, allowing for a jump gate to that system. This, of course, is if I remember some Eve lore I read when I first started looking at Eve (a few years before I actually started playing Eve).

So gate placement was supposed to = best spot to anchor jump gate to go to another system, not closest spot from current system to target system.

Bad idea. It would completely remove the whole "safe spots on the warp vector" thing. You need to think ideas through before you say them. Because first we'll have moving planets(that includes moons, so no more bookmarking POS towers, etc), then moving stargates because that wouldn't make sense either, then we'll have moons revolving around the planets on top of that. I can only imagine what would follow.

This +1

This +1

Oddly, this would be a client side only change. How you see ships oriented is local to you. For example when a cap warps in you may noticeit is not pointed in the flight direction right away. But the pilot of said cap does see it oriented to the flight direction. Your client controls how you see the orientation.

The eve physics model has all ships move as balls in a viscous liquid.

(That said, CCP, maybe the client should initialize a ship to be oriented along its velocity vector?)

CCP could add a check box to make it so ships do not "relax" their orientation back to the ecliptic. Call it "Do not level stationary ships".

They could also add a check box to have ships point in the direction they are accelerating, rather than the direction they are moving.

This is great. Immersion for the win. Now for your next project can you make it so ships dont rotate to an imaginary plane when not moving? Partly for immersion reasons partly for tactics it has annoyed me for six years now that if you align to an object above you then stop (passive align) your ship will turn itself to the "plane" when there is no force that would make that natural.

I don't think this is necessarily as difficult / gamebreaking as some people are making out. I think you'd just need to classify bookmarks into what they're bookmarked "relative to". Currently everything's position is fixed relative to (presumably) the sun. Just allow people to make BM's relative to any celestial or anchorable structure. So a gate BM would be relative to the gate. Safe spots relative to the sun. POS towers relative to the POS etc.

Then as the POS moves around the moon and the moon around the planet etc, your BM moves with it - it's always "POS position +a on the X-axis, +b on the Y-axis, +c on the Z-axis.

There would be the very rare possibility that as a planet orbits it moves periodically on top of someone's safe spot. Would need a mechanism to avoid people warping inside a planet (or not ).

I don't think it's beyond the bounds of lore that our ship computers are capable of dealing with "relative to" BMs. And I would *love* to see proper orbital motion in EVE.

While we're at it, why do we have single "warp-to" spots for celestials? Given the size of a star, it's a bit ridiculous that two people warping to zero land right next to each other doncha think?

In space, all directions are up.

omitted for post length

To repeat a concern: It is currently possible to "warp to zero" to some star gates and either land too far away (e.g. when you are in a pod), landing outside of activation range, or "too close" (e.g. when you are in a freighter), bouncing off the gate if you don't hit "jump" real quick. It would be good to adjust the spheres of the gates to make this less likely. Would also make most of the "WTZ bookmarks" unnecessary :-)

Just an FYI, some Gallente stargates aren't properly aligned to their destination star. I submitted a bug report for this. (ID#: 118728)

Here's a screenshot of the misalignment: Clicky

booya


You know what would be really awesome though? If you could see the 'spiderwebs' of your constellation's stargates (or even the whole region?) projected between the stars like they appear in the map view, rather than just the stars themselves. Also, imagine if those nearby stars in space showed on the HUD, and you could set destination/jump to beacon/etc just by right clicking on them in space (rather than having to F10 or F11 and use the separate map).

Also, is there any relationship between the stargate location in a system and where it's going to? In a few systems I noticed stargates sending you down in the starmap are actually located high in the system map.

I noticed that too. But I also noticed that sighting down the bore of the gate did show it pointed at the correct star. Then the gate fired and I noticed that the gate effect is not lined up with the gate!

It may be a side effect of the limitations of the graphics. There may be poor granularity in the direction the gate effect can be shown in, and the game just picks the closest option.

5. What if a player is afk at a POS? Does he move with the POS? And what if he's orbiting the POS? I hope you're going to be writing the code for this so CCP doesn't have to.

This change is totally worth re-doing all my bookmarks.

Hate to throw realism into this, but at a distance of multiple light years the size of the star is irrelevant. You can have super-massive stars much further away than say a nearby white dwarf and they'll still both be pinpricks in the sky.

In this case, size doesn't matter.

That would involve a great deal of re-coding. I take it you aren't familiar with programming. It may seem easy to you, but that's only because you aren't going to be the one wading through piles upon piles of lines.

Yes, this would be potentially game breaking. It changes the tactics of PvP and certain PvE aspects quite drastically. If all celestial objects in a solar system are constantly changing position, there are many, MANY game mechanics that will have to be redesigned in the ensuing chain reaction.

1. Warp disruption bubbles will no longer be viable on warp vectors because the vectors will be constantly changing. That will have to be rectified. Bubbles are a crucial part of nullsec PvP in many circumstances.

2. The distance to an anomaly upon entering through a stargate will never be predictable ever again. Some planets have a 30-40AU radius in their orbit around the sun. Some are even larger than that.

3. The element of surprise when a stealth bomber enters a system and tries to dscan an area normally close to the stargate loses said element because the anomaly is now 25AU away, and he couldn't find out until he jumped into the system.

4. CCP would have to figure out orbit paths for literally hundreds of thousands of celestial objects that take different amounts of time to revolve because it wouldn't "make sense" to people like you if they all had the same exact orbit duration.

5. What if a player is afk at a POS? Does he move with the POS? And what if he's orbiting the POS? I hope you're going to be writing the code for this so CCP doesn't have to.

6. Warping to different areas around a celestial would completely eliminate any risk factor whatsoever in bouncing planets for the already agile ships like Cynabals. There are other effects, but that was the most prominent one in my mind.

Fact is, CCP is already making a lot of coding changes, gameplay changes, aesthetic changes, etc. Why load their plate with more crap that just makes PvP harder for those of us who actually run ops and PvP? You should PvP more. It teaches you how the game should and should not be changed.

Yes, it would be, but you should have no need to. Only the graphical orientation of the gate is changing, not it's position in space.

If this happens to you we apologize for the inconvenience, and you may need to move the bookmark....

TLDR; All of your arguments are straw men. Please come back with valid issues that cannot be easily resolved or are not an issue (and in fact are even better for gameplay (e.g. #2 and #3)).

Only drastic changes if you don't think of reasonable solutions. Sure, you can make any change "game breaking" if you refuse to try and think around the box, or perhaps modify the idea to not be so drastic (e.g. see below). Sure, re-coding sucks, but they're doing some of this anyways and, if they have time, some of this would be pretty neat and add new dynamics.

#1: Depends on the rotation speed. If an object takes months to rotate around the sun then this has minimal impact to your bubbles, just "update" them every now and then. How fast do you think these celestial bodies and stargates will move through space? It's all configurable by CCP so as to not cause to cause this issue.

#2,3: Why should it be predictable? Predictable events are boring, especially when they should be moving around.

#4: So? Again not difficult (as someone who has written an admittedly rudimentary solarium in OpenGL with varying orbits for planets and moons).

#5: See #1, but can also ASSuME that if he is inside the POS shield his ship is keeping a relative speed with the POS. Outside the shield...well, that depends. Maybe set relative speed based on the closest celestial?

#6: And this is an issue...why? I believe the "random warp-to" spot would be relative to your starting location. So a fleet in the same spot warping to 30 km to the same celestial would land together, but someone on the other side of the solar system warping to that same celestial at 30 km would not land with that fleet, but on the other side of the planet + 30km.

So...because CCP is already working on projects we can't think of more cool ideas for future projects, even if some of them are trivial (not saying the above changes are trivial)? Perhaps you should PvP more yourself rather than getting all teary eyed that your target now has more options and variability. Things change, adapt or die. Oh, and HTFU. :)

1. Creates too much tedious work for players, even if it would only be updated, say, once a month. Many deep safe spots would either have to be changed or cause people grief when they realize the planets magically switched positions yesterday(how does THAT make sense) but far too late because they've already been dscanned and probed. Why do you think bubbles are anchorable? So we can move them all over the place constantly?

You think planetary orbits are "magical". Maybe you should go play a fantasy MMO instead of a sci-fi one?

Planets orbit very slowly. Very, very, slowly. Jupiter is 5AU from the Sun (next door in EVE terms), and completes an orbit every 12 years. A planet that is, in EVE, outside scan range from the sun (14 AU) would have a period of 50 years. So all your arguments regarding deep safes and scan range are invalid unless you expect to play eve for a few decades without updating your bookmarks.

Where it gets interesting is in the inner planets and moons.

CCP Mannapi wants to tell you about some cool changes to stargate alignment and space-navigation which some of you have already noticed on Singularity, our main test server. Check out the blog right here, and let us know if you have feedback or questions for us.