Space Engineers

[Gared]

I tend do the same with Early Access and/or open beta games. I buy the game, get really excited while I see what it has/is supposed to have, play it a bunch during the first few weeks/months that it's out, then either get bored with the current content level or annoyed with the bugs, and stop playing until much later in the dev cycle. So for my part, no worries man. I still want to see where they manage to take this game, as it is still a lot of fun, but with multiplayer borked right now, and single player kinda redundant after a while, I'm probably done for a few updates at least as well.

And seriously, who changes the primary mass-construction controls at random?

 

[AshburnerX]

So I wanted to try a buggy again and finally figured out how to control it.

Well sorta. So here's my info on doing buggies in Space Engineers.

- You must use suspension wheels or it can't move.
- Set your cockpit controls to wheels. If you still can't move, hit P to make sure the hand brake is off.
- You need an artificial mass in the center of gravity on your ship or several spread out. This keeps the buggy on the ground.
- You need a gravity generator ether on your buggy or in the area you want to drive in.
- It's actually much easier to turn using your mouse and a gyroscope.
/ \
| | - This is the most important bit. Your wheels should be placed like this.
|_|
- With the point facing UP on your ship. This lets the wheels moves correctly when you turn them.

 

[AshburnerX]

New features this week:

- You can control parts via your hotbar now. You want turn on/off your piston? Rotate another part? You can set it up on your hotbar.
- Weapons control works through rotors now.

As the above trailer shows, this means turrets are possible, which means that doing a two man ship seems quite practical now. Still has the lag problem though.

 

[GasBandit]

The full patch notes makes reference of bandwidth fixes, but I suspect this will not address my issues with multiplayer latency/update problems.

 

[PatrThom]

I wonder if rotors wouldn't allow for configurable thrust. Mount some thrusters on rotors to allow you to sacrifice agility for speed, for instance.

--Patrick

 

[GasBandit]

I wonder if rotors wouldn't allow for configurable thrust. Mount some thrusters on rotors to allow you to sacrifice agility for speed, for instance.

--Patrick

As far as I know, they absolutely could. Just gotta be careful that the vectored thrust doesn't ever intersect another block, and also be mindful that if you change ALL a given direction's thrusters away from their original orientation, you'll have a major drift problem in that direction.

But this could definitely be used to switch between two modes of flight - highly maneuverable, and high acceleration. I'm reminded of Macross.

 

[PatrThom]

I'm reminded of Macross.

Or Harriers.

I envisioned it more as something where you might have a 4x4 block of 16 total thrusters pointing backwards for getting from place to place, but once you arrive at your destination the middle two along each edge would rotate 90 degrees to point "out" which would add +2 to lateral in each direction but still leave 8 pointing backwards. This would avoid having a ship that looks like an ear of corn in order to maintain mobility. For a lighter ship, you could even lose the 4 corners entirely if that would save enough weight.

I also wonder if lateral thrusters near the front of the ship could be rotated as well for additional get-me-out-of-here-just-go-ness. Seems like it would make a good strike-and-return raider if other structural challenges could be overcome.

--Patrick

 

[GasBandit]

Or Harriers.

I envisioned it more as something where you might have a 4x4 block of 16 total thrusters pointing backwards for getting from place to place, but once you arrive at your destination the middle two along each edge would rotate 90 degrees to point "out" which would add +2 to lateral in each direction but still leave 8 pointing backwards. This would avoid having a ship that looks like an ear of corn in order to maintain mobility. For a lighter ship, you could even lose the 4 corners entirely if that would save enough weight.

I also wonder if lateral thrusters near the front of the ship could be rotated as well for additional get-me-out-of-here-just-go-ness. Seems like it would make a good strike-and-return raider if other structural challenges could be overcome.

--Patrick

The problem there is you'd have to leave a whole lot of armor open for where the engines would pivot through. The weakest part of any warship is its engines, and usually you try to minimize the holes in the outer hull necessary for the thrusters to thrust out of. Some people even like to recess them for added survivability. That's not something that lends itself to putting them on a rotor.

But for utility ships that wouldn't be used in a combat capacity, it'd make moving extremely large/massive ships take much less time - such as large drilling rigs. If they could pivot their lateral stabilization engines back to give added forward thrust, it'd help with their acceleration to get up to 104m/s a lot faster than your standard fixed-engine variety.

 

[AshburnerX]

But for utility ships that wouldn't be used in a combat capacity, it'd make moving extremely large/massive ships take much less time - such as large drilling rigs. If they could pivot their lateral stabilization engines back to give added forward thrust, it'd help with their acceleration to get up to 104m/s a lot faster than your standard fixed-engine variety.

I might try this out later. It sounds great for small drilling ships but complete hell for large ones.

 

[GasBandit]

I might try this out later. It sounds great for small drilling ships but complete hell for large ones.

The large ones are the ones that need it worst. It'd be tricky, but doable. In single player, of course.

 

[AshburnerX]

Alright, so I tried the vector thrusters thing... doesn't work. The engines won't detect the current orientation and thus won't fire. I could maybe make them manually do it via the console by setting them to override but that kind of defeats the point. Still, I went to a lot of trouble to make the test bed for this thing so let's take a look at how I solved some of the problems in case they patch it.

This is what one side looks like during construction. What you can't see is that there are no blocks behind the engines to make clearance for the turns. Next to the empty space are blast doors. These give enough clearance so this way you can have a bit of side armor. How you orient the thrusters is difficult to explain, but the idea behind it is not. These are the values I used.

- Lower limit :-90
- Upper Limit: 0
- Then on the control bar you want buttons for increase velocity, lower velocity, and reset velocity.

This means that using the rotors from the tool bar will (at most) make the rotors turn left 90 degrees. So if you make the thrusters facing out 0 degrees, it will turn them towards the back of the ship. It's more complicated than that but really, it just takes a bit of experimentation. Regardless, if you don't put upper/lower limits then you WILL break something.

This is a more complete version of the other side. Notice how the rotor is on the top and not the bottom? This is because in order to use the same lower/upper values, you have to rotate the rotors. You could give each rotor the correct values and put them wherever the hell you want but this was frankly easier.

This is the complete side view.

Complete rear view.

Internals. It's a VERY tight fit. And it has some problems: namely that it's easy to get in via the gaps. Now this could be easily fixed by scaling the entire ship up and installing walls, but on a small scale it's impossible.

So yeah... this doesn't work currently, but in the future it might.

 

[PatrThom]

So yeah... this doesn't work currently, but in the future it might.

Rats.

--Patrick

 

[GasBandit]

What if you rig it so that, in addition to rotating the thrusters, it rotates a merge block on the end of them, which then clicks into place for merging once it's in one of the proper positions?

 

[GasBandit]

Nope, that doesn't work either. The infuriating thing about rotors is they break alignment - blocks that are attached to the rotorized segment no longer perfectly align with blocks on the base segment, and thus things like merge blocks don't work.

I'm thinking for added oomph in acceleration it may just be easier to go back to gravity drive.

 

[AshburnerX]

Did some more testing. Vector Thrusters CAN be made useful, but it takes effort. Let me demonstrate.

Nothing but main thrusters on.

All vector thrusters on. Notice the power usage. That's because they are on full override.

Vectors moved to acceleration mode... I should be going at a decent clip... so why aren't I moving?

Here's the issue: the ship doesn't recognize the vector thrusters as being part of the ship, so when you turn them on via override, it will try to compensate for them with the main thrusters if you have Inertial Dampening on. But if you turn it off, you'll get quite a bit of speed boost from the vectored thrusters. So in order to use vectored thrusters, here's what you need to do.

- Make the usual controls for vectoring them (Increase, decrease, and reset velocity).
- Make group controls for turning on and affecting the speed of all the vectored thrusters.
- Do the same for each individual group.

This means you need two separate hotbars: One to vector and use them for acceleration and one to operate them individually for maneuvering. This means piloting a vector ship is INSANELY complicated and you can't get much finesse out of it. You also can't use the vectors in Inertial Dampening mode because the ship won't use the vectored thrusters for it because it doesn't recognize them as being part of the same ship... which means the original idea for vectored thrusters (for use in large mining ships) is impossible because it can't inertial dampen while drilling, making drilling way more difficult.

So the entire idea, while cool, is completely useless right now. They need to work on rotors and thrusters before this can be helpful as a design feature.

 

[AshburnerX]

Couldn't sleep. Started a new project.

Using my newly developed talent for rotors, I'm working on a large scale mobile ship that works off of batteries and solar panels (I'm using reactors until I can move the ship into a position that it can get solar energy). The solar panels can fold in and out. They are also armored on the outside with blast doors. The whole process is a bit jerky though, as the outside ends accelerate to a fast enough speed that it kind of jerks when it stops. Still, nothing is getting damaged at any point when I open and close so it's obviously working as intended.

I have a small flight deck on the inside, which I've coated with bullet-proof glass to absorb some of the thruster damage from landing ships. It also has connectors on the bottom (hidden by the bottom solar array when it's closed) so I can hook up ships for charging. In the end I'm hoping to make this 100% solar and battery powered, with the ability to charge other ships, move cargo, refine resources, assemble materials, and protect itself from meteor strikes. It's my largest design to date and I'm being pretty ambitious.

 

[GasBandit]

I don't think BP glass absorbs thruster fire all that well.. About the only thrust "resistant" surface there is is heavy armor, and even that only works vs small ship size thrusters. Large ship small thrusters still cut through large heavy armor like butter.

 

[GasBandit]

Aw hell, it's the space police.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/17625073/SPACE/Space_gif (4).webm[DOUBLEPOST=1406899304,1406899113][/DOUBLEPOST](Previously, on Space Police)

 

[Dave]

That...that gif has sound.

 

[GasBandit]

That...that gif has sound.

That's why it's a link.

 

[AshburnerX]

Mowed lawn. Still couldn't sleep. Time for more insomnia filled building!

So the back interior is finished. It just needs to be armored on the outside and then it'll be done. Then all I have to do is the front.

Half the landing pad is finished. Two anti-personnel turrets to monitor for boarders as their isn't a whole lot I can do about some of the gaps (though that Space Police video gave me some ideas...). Behind that layer of internal walls are several batteries and gyroscopes. I used catwalks for part of the building materials for three reasons:
- They take up less area than interior blocks.
- I believe they also weigh less. Considering the scale of the ship, anything I can do to cut weight is always good.
- They look damn attractive.

I don't think BP glass absorbs thruster fire all that well.. About the only thrust "resistant" surface there is is heavy armor, and even that only works vs small ship size thrusters. Large ship small thrusters still cut through large heavy armor like butter.

I may have to switch the landing pad to heavy armor then. It's mostly designed for small ships but it' definitely possible for a large one to drop in from the top.

Bottom of the ship deck, with connectors leading into the conveyor network, both for cargo transfer and to charge batteries. I'll probably need to put some heavy down here too, if not at least catwalks to cover up the mess.

Bridge, located in the rear behind two layers of internal walls and soon to be at least one of heavy. Two hallways lead in, both locked with two doors and covered with an anti-personnel turret. Chute above leads to my med-bay, which is also covered by an anti-personnel turret. Again, catwalks are used extensively for walls.

 

[GasBandit]

I started building something new in single player creative, too. It's basically going to be an enlarged/improved/Mark 2 version of my previous prototype, and I plan to actually use voidspace between hull layers for added damage resistance. Also going to cut down on how many turrets are on the outside because the first one was a bit ridiculous. I've also enlarged the reactor room so as to completely suspend it off the walls/floor, as the initial previous prototype often had the large reactor come dislodged from everything when kinetic ordinance was used against it, so this should alleviate that. Used the added empty space by filling the corners with 28 batteries. They take 7 minutes to charge off the reactor, and once they do, I can flip them on to double my power output for the hard maneuvers (with 24 large thrusters on it total, it goes into overload on the reactor alone if I am accelerating through a diagonal turn at speed). Also, switched to 3 large cargo containers instead of the tons of small ones.. it really reduces how much the ship can carry, but comes a point you don't want to do inventory management on 80 small containers, and I'm hopeful one of the patches will fix the cargo disparity eventually. Also I'm being smarter about gyro placement to help avoid them becoming dislodged under attack and becoming pinballs that ricochet around inside the inner compartments compounding the damage.

I've only got the interior done, haven't even started on the outer armor yet.

 

[AshburnerX]

I started building something new in single player creative, too. It's basically going to be an enlarged/improved/Mark 2 version of my previous prototype, and I plan to actually use voidspace between hull layers for added damage resistance.

I suggested this a while back and I'm glad you're trying it out. Just make sure you have plenty of connection points. You might also try putting easy to destroy junk in there.

I've only got the interior done, haven't even started on the outer armor yet.

The only reason I have any outside armor on at all is because I started with an 10x10x? heavy armor skeleton. I knew I wanted the panels to swing open on rotors, so I built the frame so I could get each of them working individually before I did anything else. I also knew that whatever I mounted the rotors to would need to be sturdy or it could break and fuck up everything with the panels.

I'm not planning on doing too many gat turrets on this. An Lus na gréine Corcra (The Purple Sunflower) is designed to be a support ship, not a war ship. It's got enough to repel boarders and to keep some meteors/rockets of it's back, but it's solar, which means fragile. It shouldn't be able to take on a warship.

 

[GasBandit]

I've also enlarged the processing capabilities of my ship to 6 refineries and 3 assemblers.

Basically, it'll still mostly be a mobile base/staging point. I plan to use it to tow a miner to an asteroid... get out and mine, dump the materials in for processing, hook back up and tow the miner back into deep space, all with overwhelming firepower to repel anyone in the area of the asteroid while I'm there. But while I'm offline, it definitely has to be deep space... there is no defense against a smart hijacker for an unmanned, stationary ship right now. All they have to do is snipe off the external turrets, fly in, and weld their own cockpit onto the outside of the ship. That's something that really needs to be addressed. Off the top of my head, I'd say the best way to do it is to make the player unable to build a cockpit or merge block on any grid that already has a cockpit that he doesn't own/have access to. That way, you force boarding parties to actually go in and hack a cockpit, putting internal defenses to use. Right now they go totally to waste because pirate SOP is to simply weld on a merge block or cockpit, fly/tow it out into deep space, and grind the whole thing en masse at their leisure.

 

[CrimsonSoul]

How many players in multiplayer and how big are the maps?

 

[GasBandit]

How many players in multiplayer and how big are the maps?

Both of those aspects are configurable, but the more of each, the meatier a server you will need. I've seen a lot of servers with 300km x 300km x 300km maps and 20+max players which really couldn't handle that load.

You can open up your own personal map to your friends while you play, I've never seen it set higher than 4 players though. Also if your machine is not superbeefy and you don't have a fat upload pipe, people connecting to you will lag badly.

 

[CrimsonSoul]

Awesome, thanks for the info!

 

[PatrThom]

it doesn't recognize them as being part of the same ship... which means the original idea for vectored thrusters (for use in large mining ships) is impossible because it can't inertial dampen while drilling, making drilling way more difficult. So the entire idea, while cool, is completely useless right now. They need to work on rotors and thrusters before this can be helpful as a design feature.

I get the impression this mainly shows that the game is being made by software engineers, not aerospace engineers. But it should shake out over time as more engineer-y people give feedback to the design team.

--Patrick

 

[CrimsonSoul]

Is it worth picking up or no? I'm seriously considering it

 

[PatrThom]

It already sounds like I would've gotten my money's worth out of it by now. Trouble is, I don't have the money. Or the time.

--Patrick

 

[GasBandit]

Is it worth picking up or no? I'm seriously considering it

I recommend holding off until they fix the netcode for multiplayer. Believe you me, I'll be here trumpeting that when it happens. As it is now, multiplayer is a horrible buggy mess where you will frequently lose everything to glitches.

 

[AshburnerX]

Slowly armoring the cockpit section.

 

[CrimsonSoul]

@Ravenpoe and @Officer_Charon check your gift inventories

 

[Ravenpoe]

@Ravenpoe and @Officer_Charon check your gift inventories

Whelp, there goes my free time.

 

[Officer_Charon]

O_O Cheers for that!!