[Megathread] Star Citizen

[Val the Moofia Boss]

there is a mention by a CiG emplyee there

That was then unendorsed by the company.

but it does look like that you wont completely lose a ship even without insuranc

There is no official word from CIG I can find that suggests this.

I honestly do not see them doing this. It would be stupid for them to go through with it.

CIG was pretty clear on the insurance system from the beginning. "Insurance: 3/6 months" is billed as on of the core features you see when buying a ship or a pledge. You can't miss it. Everyone who bought a pledge saw the words "3/6 month insurance" and immediately realized that there must have been some sort of ship loss system. Anyone who bought the pledge/ship did so knowing that there would be such a system implemented.




In the past, CIG has assuaged fears about the insurance system by saying that "don't worry, the ingame UEC cost to renew insurance will be pretty cheap".

IMO, the real problem is that we have never been given hard numbers as to what "cheap" actually means. Is it, say, 10% the ingame price of the ship? IIRC, the ingame price of a Mustang Alpha is 250,000 UEC, so would a 3 month insurance cost 25,000 UEC? If so, then literally anyone could pay off their insurance after twenty to thirty minutes of easy missions.

The problem with trying to estimate numbers right now is that we are in alpha, and the numbers and game systems are in flux. In 3.7, you could have easily accumulated 25,000 UEC using your mustang by doing simple skimmer missions, but that was back when the AI pirates that spawned in were of no threat to you. Now, it is very difficult (and probably impractical) to do a skimmer mission in a single seater ship, as the AI pirates will tear you to shreds, which means you'd have to do cargo deliveries. The core gameplay loop of Star Citizen hasn't been nailed down. The current gameplay loop and numbers are almost certainly not going to be representative of the loop when the game launches with the insurance system implemented.

I think the playerbase will be fine with insurance, so long as that system isn't insurmountable. Ie, you don't have to grind a lot to pay off the insurance.

[Proskill]

so if its 3 months insuracen it already over for me because i nought the game in april 2019 and i destroyed my mustang just recently and got it back

[Val the Moofia Boss]

so if its 3 months insuracen it already over for me because i nought the game in april 2019 and i destroyed my mustang just recently and got it back

No! Again, the insurance period does not start until the game actually launches. We are in alpha 3.9 right now.

- - - Updated - - -

There is no insurance/permanent ship loss system implemented ingame.

[Lothaeryn]

The problem with trying to estimate numbers right now is that we are in alpha, and the numbers and game systems are in flux. In 3.7, you could have easily accumulated 25,000 UEC using your mustang by doing simple skimmer missions, but that was back when the AI pirates that spawned in were of no threat to you. Now, it is very difficult (and probably impractical) to do a skimmer mission in a single seater ship, as the AI pirates will tear you to shreds, which means you'd have to do cargo deliveries. The core gameplay loop of Star Citizen hasn't been nailed down. The current gameplay loop and numbers are almost certainly not going to be representative of the loop when the game launches with the insurance system implemented.

I've finally been able to upgrade my computer to run this game after pledging 2 years ago, and I'm having trouble with the combat, I'm glad to know its not just me in regards to getting nuked in half a second.

That said, I only have a Mustang atm, any recommendation on how to practice combat? Or what ship you'd recommend for Merc/Bounty Hunting?

[kenn9530]

I've finally been able to upgrade my computer to run this game after pledging 2 years ago, and I'm having trouble with the combat, I'm glad to know its not just me in regards to getting nuked in half a second.

That said, I only have a Mustang atm, any recommendation on how to practice combat? Or what ship you'd recommend for Merc/Bounty Hunting?

can try the arena commander module to practice combat, aiming for a cutlass or freelancer would be one to start for doing anything combat related or just ask around and see if ppl are needing crew that way you can get money safely on someone elses ship.

[Lothaeryn]

can try the arena commander module to practice combat, aiming for a cutlass or freelancer would be one to start for doing anything combat related or just ask around and see if ppl are needing crew that way you can get money safely on someone elses ship.

So not a snowballs chance in hell with a mustang? Or would it be viable with some upgrades.

Surprised to hear that a Cutlass or Freelancer are the baseline assurances considering their intended purpose.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I've finally been able to upgrade my computer to run this game after pledging 2 years ago, and I'm having trouble with the combat, I'm glad to know its not just me in regards to getting nuked in half a second.

That said, I only have a Mustang atm, any recommendation on how to practice combat? Or what ship you'd recommend for Merc/Bounty Hunting?

So not a snowballs chance in hell with a mustang? Or would it be viable with some upgrades.

Surprised to hear that a Cutlass or Freelancer are the baseline assurances considering their intended purpose.

It's hard to say whether or not the current difficulty of fighting in small ships is supposed to be intended.

Previously, skimmer missions were pathetically easy peesy because the only AI ships that would spawn in would be Bucanners and Cutlasses. Both had small aggro ranges and you could easy run away from them and get to your skimmer. Even if they were shooting at you, you could easily dodge using thrusters. Even if their shots did hit, they'd have to be hitting you for several seconds to down your shields. Buccaneer AI was infamous for spinning around in space helplessly.

When patch 3.8 dropped, the AI changed. Now the ships have large aggro radius and will pursue you for a long while. They now have really good accuracy and will hit you even if you are dodging, and will rapidly tear through your shields in a couple seconds. Buccaneer's no longer spin around helplessly in space. If you're in a small ship like a mustang going against another small ship, like the buccaneer, you're roughly even and have about a 50-50 chance of killing them before they kill you. Add in the other other ships that spawn in during the skimmer mission, and it is highly unlikely you will be able to complete the mission with all those ships bearing down on you.

If you want a greater than a 50-50 chance to taking on another small ship, you'll want to upgrade to a bigger ship, like the Freelancer or the Cutlass. More shields, more armor, more firepower. The trade off of using a larger ship, ofcourse, is that it is more expensive, is slower, and requires more people to fully utilize. There isn't really a point in using a Freelancer or Cutlass for combat over your small ship unless you can get someone on turret duty.

You can upgrade your Mustang's shield generator and weaponry, but it's still going to be in the small ship tier of general powerlevel. You're certainly not supposed to try taking on a Constellation in a Mustang and never have been. At the top end of the small, single seater ship tier is the Hornet, which is a threat to medium sized ships and things like the Constellation, but that's its limit.

What I did, as a 315p owner, is I used my 315p for cargo hauling. Made some money on the side grouping up with other players and raiding bunkers. I then used my money to buy the best equipment I could equipment on my 315p. It gives me an edge up on other small ships, but it's not going to make me as good as a Hornet (nor should you expect to reach Hornet level). It gives me a better chance against medium sized ships like the Cutlass, but again, it's kind of a bad idea to try fighting them in the first place.

[kenn9530]

So not a snowballs chance in hell with a mustang? Or would it be viable with some upgrades.

Surprised to hear that a Cutlass or Freelancer are the baseline assurances considering their intended purpose.

you can rent ships ingame so if you manage to earn some money you could rent something that could make you more but its 1 day rentals so need to earn at least the basic to rent another, i dont like small ships so i stick with the larger ones and have no issues as small ships shields generally dont last long especially since there are usually several cutlasses or freelancers attacking you.

Best bet would be try to jump on a crew of a carrack or something large or earn over 40k and rent a prospector and mine.

[Majestic12]

im pretty sure there was a mention somewhere if you paid real money for the ship you would never lose it, you just have to make sure its insured ingame to be able to use it again even without LTI



any ship you paid real money for you should never lose but if you buy a ship ingame and it gets blown up without insurance then you would lose it then.

A CIG employee did say this. It completely contradicts the whole insurance system and LTI as opposed to x months on purchased ships. The random CIG employee was responding to a concierge ticket.

Long story short: Their statement is highly controversial, and shouldn't be thrown about as any fact. I honestly think the CIG employee didn't know what they were talking about and it completely blew up from there.

[1001]

CIG was pretty clear on the insurance system from the beginning. "Insurance: 3/6 months" is billed as on of the core features you see when buying a ship or a pledge. You can't miss it. Everyone who bought a pledge saw the words "3/6 month insurance" and immediately realized that there must have been some sort of ship loss system. Anyone who bought the pledge/ship did so knowing that there would be such a system implemented.

That was when the game was a different beast, the PVP slider was a thing - enabling people to avoid the part of the game where losses would be far more likely. Now that the game is free-for-all the stakes are considerably higher.

It just doesn't make any sense to remove people's real-world purchases because of some naff in-game insurance system.

As an example of how people don't like these things, in Elite people grind their way to a large ship, perhaps a few days or a week's worth of playing. They get their new ship, take it out, get interdicted and destroyed, they spent all their funds on the ship and cannot afford the insurance stipend and therefore lose their ship, essentially starting from scratch in the beginner ship. The amount of people that quit the game at this point is surprising. And that is for stuff bought wholly in game. If it was a real world purchase they had lost there would be absolute hell over it. Imagine the media running with it

IMO the whole insurance scheme is complete baloney. People have been suckered into thinking there is some value behind it yet CIG cannot even determine what that value is. Like so many of Chris's ideas, it's sounds good on paper but will be totally shit in practice.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

IMO the whole insurance scheme is complete baloney. People have been suckered into thinking there is some value behind it yet CIG cannot even determine what that value is. Like so many of Chris's ideas, it's sounds good on paper but will be totally shit in practice.

I think the real problem is that CIG knows that this a big point of ambiguity, and rather than coming out and clarifying once and for all what's actually going on, they are just sitting back and letting people go "well, maybe it won't be too bad?". If they know their choice is going to cause bad headlines, why wait until the launch of the game to drop the bad news? That will only sabotage the crucial live release launch.

[cuafpr]

personally I think ship insurance will not make it into retail (if it goes retail), 2 many countries outside of the US have strong consumer protection laws even for digital goods and I see losing a ship that was bought with real-world money for good as going badly. Esp if it was due to a DC, crash or some other outside influence.

It's also going to be a turn off to a lot of people, personally I'd never play game / buy a ship if a single mishap causes it to be gone for good less i spend more money on insurance, I deal with that enough IRL i don't want it in a game.

Also, is it forced PVP now? Skimmed the last few pages and seemed so?

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Also, is it forced PVP now? Skimmed the last few pages and seemed so?

Non consensual PvP, yes.

As of right now, there are armistice around stations and cities where you can't shoot your weapons. However, outside of those armistice zones, everything is free game.

If you catch a newbie flying in their Aurora for the first time having wandered outside the armistice zone, you can blow them up.

There is a crime system in game right now, where if you have a high enough criminal rating certain places may refuse to do business with you (for example, Hurston won't open their hangars for you to land), and bounties will be placed on you. However, there isn't much of an incentive not to be a dick and blow up newbies in their Auroras (besides not being sussed out by the server), as there are no lasting consequences ingame yet. Your criminal record is wiped clean when you are blown up, and given how permanent character death (another system they haven't talked about in years) and the insurance system haven't been implemented yet, there are no real consequences.

Next patch will bring prison gameplay, where if you die or are captured as a criminal, you spawn in prison and either have to work for the duration of your sentence, or try to escape, but if you die or are caught in your escape, your sentence is extended.

The plan is for armistice zones to eventually be removed altogether once there are long lasting consequences to dissuade people from being dicks willy nilly.

[kenn9530]

A CIG employee did say this. It completely contradicts the whole insurance system and LTI as opposed to x months on purchased ships. The random CIG employee was responding to a concierge ticket.

Long story short: Their statement is highly controversial, and shouldn't be thrown about as any fact. I honestly think the CIG employee didn't know what they were talking about and it completely blew up from there.

i never said i was 100% on it but we wont know for a while yet but insurance shouldnt really be an issue, there could be a way to just always pay it when its due either a monthly or yearly cost and it updates as soon as you login.

probably best option would be is have the option to always reclaim your ship regardless of insurance but it may costs far more when its uninsured to get a new one, your generally always going to have a spare ship that can safely make money or doesnt cost too much but you can make money without a ship so there are plenty options.

Also, is it forced PVP now? Skimmed the last few pages and seemed so?

there is a law system inplace so anything thats bad will give you criminal status and a prison system should be coming next patch, to be a successful pirate/PvP in SC you wont really be able to do in a 1 person ship or solo so that would mostly just be the griefing side of PvP, real pirates will do what is most profitable in larger ships with many crew.

[cuafpr]

Non consensual PvP, yes.

As of right now, there are armistice around stations and cities where you can't shoot your weapons. However, outside of those armistice zones, everything is free game.

If you catch a newbie flying in their Aurora for the first time having wandered outside the armistice zone, you can blow them up.

There is a crime system in game right now, where if you have a high enough criminal rating certain places may refuse to do business with you (for example, Hurston won't open their hangars for you to land), and bounties will be placed on you. However, there isn't much of an incentive not to be a dick and blow up newbies in their Auroras (besides not being sussed out by the server), as there are no lasting consequences ingame yet. Your criminal record is wiped clean when you are blown up, and given how permanent character death (another system they haven't talked about in years) and the insurance system haven't been implemented yet, there are no real consequences.

Next patch will bring prison gameplay, where if you die or are captured as a criminal, you spawn in prison and either have to work for the duration of your sentence, or try to escape, but if you die or are caught in your escape, your sentence is extended.

The plan is for armistice zones to eventually be removed altogether once there are long lasting consequences to dissuade people from being dicks willy nilly.

wow... that sucks and kills me desire to play the game....

[Val the Moofia Boss]

bruh/bruhette copy your account to the PTU and update it, this patch is pretty f*cking dope. i only have a starter package, but playing the Carrack showed me the progression for a gamer like myself at release; do mercenary missions, bounty missions, story missions and get currency then buy a Carrack (with a Pisces and Rover?), a Cyclone, and a Yellow Jacket Dragonfly in-game.

on the PTU i logged on, bought a Yellow Jacket and an CYC and put them in the Carrack then bought an 85x and put that in it too and went out to do some bunker missions. i would park about 2-4 clicks out in a valley so as not to get fired upon by the turrets then go to the ship's armory, stock up on firearms and get on my Yellow Jacket and head out to the bunker. they have put gimbled scatter-guns on them now (or maybe it's just the Yellow Jacket that has them), but they shred the turrets. then i went inside and did the missions. it was a very satisfying gameloop even though the current FPS AI is not fully done yet. once the AI is more formidable it will be even more satisfying.

the ship feels pretty good to me, though it feels sparse in some sections but jam packed in others just right in others. it is definitely a home away from home. the engineer aboard the ship is going to have a blast once that gameplay comes online. as well as the drone operators. i think they should do another pass before full game release on it and add more stuff in some rooms that feel barren like the repair shop and give functionality to the panels in the Cartography room. but like i said check it out for yourself while you can on the PTU, the devs also give you like 15 million in credits so buying small ships/arms should not be a problem.

I wasn't able to spend a lot of time trying out the Carrack on PTU due to the constant 30king, but today I got to sit down and spend a few hours crewing it with other people, and had a lot of fun. There were six of us. We loaded up the Carrack with cyclones and landed a few km away from a Hurston bunker and approached by cyclone. Raided the bunker. Used the Pisces to pick people up and bring them back to the ship quickly. Rescued a couple 890's and did several claim jumper missions.

I think the Carrack will be more fun once engineering gameplay is implemented, and when there is content available that can sufficiently threaten a Carrack, due to the overtuned shield scaling (as of the moment, once you start reaching Constellation tier, no AI can really hurt you. Players can't even kill each other in Hammerheads).

The Carrack doesn't quite feel like the Millenium Falcon/Serenity "home away from home". So far, it has nice content functionality with the garage to hold vehicles and the small landing bay for small ships, but there isn't actually much there to make feel attached to the ship. When you walk down to the mess hall, you can't sit in the chairs at the table. You can't go into the game room and play pool. All crewmembers except the captain share the same bed room, with military style bunkbeds. Not very homely or inviting like how everyone in Serenity lived in their own room. Etc. I guess lighting and materials also play a big part; Serenity felt a lot like a "house", with that dining room with the wooden table and kitchen cabinets and warm lighting, etc. It has potential for sure, though.

On a similar note, I'm a little annoyed by CIG's "implement a model or art asset of something, don't program it till later" mentality. They've implemented bars, but you can't actually order anything at the bar. They've implemented restaurants, but you can't walk up to the restaurant and eat something. They implemented arcades, but you can't walk up to the arcade and play a minigame, not even a game as simple as slots. It's just a 2D texture. They have pool tables on ships, but you can't play pool. Etc.

[Zeta333]

wow... that sucks and kills me desire to play the game....

works fine in eve, im sure if this game ever releases it will work fine as well. Youl survive.

[cuafpr]

works fine in eve, im sure if this game ever releases it will work fine as well. Youl survive.

it's also one of the reasons I don't play eve... or any other game that is pvp only with pve only option

[Zeta333]

it's also one of the reasons I don't play eve... or any other game that is pvp only with pve only option

I played for 7 years and avoided pvp the entire time and managed to play in the top 1%. You just have to use your brain.

[Aliven]

works fine in eve, im sure if this game ever releases it will work fine as well. Youl survive.

Yep, lets see that Star Citizen population of 20k players. Im sure they would love it.