Alpha 8 Experimental Release | HWS 8 Countdown

HWS Announcements
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Hey @everyone!

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Here we go:

https://empyriononline.com/threads/alpha-experimental-8-0-part-i.37392

After months of hard work and taking care of the community feedback this new patch went into the EXP state, which means the public release is a matter of 4-6 weeks maybe…

However I have to let you know some more insights about it you won’t read in the patchnotes or know after 4-6 weeks.

Compatibility

The old universe is not compatible with Alpha 8 anymore.
I have to rebuild every planet and change the universe.
I can’t say yet how the new one will look but in general the goal will be to have less playfields overall because planets are so huge now.
You need for example ~25 minutes to surround a Class 5 planet with a SV in a straight line now.

Basically, I have to check everything from scratch again and make sure it is still working in HWS 8. The biggest task for me now.

Bigger planets

This is one of my biggest fun and fear moment and I really, really hope some of you will dive into the EXP version and test some things out and report back to me.
It isn’t just decorations or “oh, so big, cool”. It is affecting the whole meta, immersion and overall gameplay.

For example what Planet Class is good for PvP? For ECC? For Origin planets? And so on.
I have my ideas but the more input, the better.

Features

Some features you are waiting for are not in the first EXP version yet. Like Alliance OP check, “only BAse building” or different Origin Stargate Missions; but they will come for sure!

So please focus on testing the Repair to blueprint for example since this is one of the biggest feature affecting both PvE and PvP.

Repair to Blueprint (R2BP)

We discussed in Discord quick what impact it will have on HWS Garage ships.
All I can say from my tests is that the LIMITS of the ships are not affected. This means if you have a V-Wing with 10 Homing Rockets and you lose all of them, you can only get 4 of them back with the R2BP feature.
After some discussion we think this is good.
But other things like the blocks, advanced constructors, Stargates, etc. can be repaired back from your template.
We have to discuss / see how this will change the meta or where we need to adjust.
But for now we have NO influence to the ingame R2BP feature! (we had a lot of suggestions like increase the cost, etc.)

Ingame changes vs. HWS

As you already know: if the game makes a big step forward and introduce so many changes it is not only our responsibility but even forced that we reflect it as well in our HWS “universe”. Mainly talking about OCD.

So to make it quick:

We have to reflect Alpha 8 also in regards to the OCD!

This means following items will be wiped from your OCD completely (but you get credits per item as a little exchange and gentle offer)

  • All Emergency Ratios (500 credits per item)
  • All Epic weapons (5k credits per weapon)
  • All Repair Bay (BA) (1 credit per item)
  • All Repair Bay (CV) (1 credit per item)
  • 50% of Canned food (veg + meat: 50 credits per item)
  • 50% of small and large medi packs (50 credits per item)

HWS Features

It will be one of the most stressful weeks ever for me / us and I don’t know yet how much we are able to implement but some teasers:

  • Better HWS chat system
  • Supergates!
  • Lot of new POIs!
  • Big RP push - Reputation Points will be your big victory or worry
  • Automatic Events (Capture the POI for Planet Dominance and Control)
  • HWS Garage changes
  • Orbital Factory
  • Big PDA story + Mission push
  • …

Let’s see :slight_smile:

We are very excited and REALLY hope you can contribute as GOOD as you can!

The more you contribute and help us the more time we have for cool stuff and less iterations we need to find the best HWS universe again!

Because remember: Alpha 8 is basically a new game! The code in the background changed dramatically. We will see if better or worst for PvP performance but so far it is looking very good.

Last but not least: It is just the FIRST version of EXP and Eleon is working on still some new things!
One thing we really try to push is the “Cache Render” system. Only things near you are rendered.
THIS would mean an insane performance boost!! (because everything is loaded currently no matter where)
Stay tuned!

Your HWS Team

P.S.:
Some special notes you might overlooked

  1. MP Player Chat mute :wink:

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  1. Your new and biggest enemy - above or below the terrain

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5 Likes
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I’m hopeful they didn’t go all out on another PvE only patch, since I started it’s only got progressively worse for PvP. But I’ll hold my judgement.

But larger planets YES!
Less planets NO!
We scaled so far down from the glory of HWS v5, and the thrill of hunting different worlds, finding new and interesting factions, and killing them. My main concern (as recent as last night) is if fighting is occurring the entire play field is severely impacted to PowerPoint slide shows and watching porn on a dial up modem frame rates. Now if we massively increase the planet sizes and I want to kill some at random. Let’s say, for arguments sake it’s Ranzeth. Bust out the popcorn and let the slide show begin for everybody on that planet.

I’m surprised they don’t have different biomes on planets other than the minor differences that exist now.

And less polishing Zirax shits please.

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Is there going to be an item to credit conversion for epic weapons that are wiping?

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Wait and pray.

Yeah, sad story. Still for the better sake.
In v5 I’ve heard so often: I can’t find PvP. I can’t find pewpew.
In v7+ I’ve never heard this.

Regardless of your scouting skills it was for the better sake of the server. While HWS 6 was really terrible tiny it is now more or less “fine” in terms of open playfields at the same time. The CPU can’t handle many of them well. And a non-stop 100% CPU causing slide shows or missing ships for sure.

Even if the CPU wouldn’t care, it comes down to either exploring or fighting. Catering both is almost impossible because BOTH, PvE and PvP guys telling BOTH:
PvP: Can’t find guys to kill
PvE: All planets “look” the same. Not interesting

Taking into account I have to convert, basically build ALL planets from scratch now, it’s totally impossible to create 100 unique, outstanding, mind blowing planets for your adventure ego.

BUT I try…

6 Likes
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For now 1 credit. Maybe @Jascha can make different credit convertions in the code and we can convert Epics higher.

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On another positive note I saw they are implementing diseases.

I’ll give 5000 gold ingots to the unlucky fellow to give Ranzeth space AIDS.

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Outsch, sounds like a hell of work for Rex and Jascha ! :stuck_out_tongue:

I would love to get some PVP high end stuff, at the moment we are too much GG oriented.
Personal wish (as always) : Stronger planetary bases ! At the moment stealth is my only defence… boring !

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Sounds good can’t wait.

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Epics sell between 2k and 10k so please invest in better conversions if you’re taking all my babies away.

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I like the idea that we have to work for epics again :wink::smile:

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Speak for yourself, I worked for mine. Lol

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I got hundreds of epics in OCD.

Just in case I need one. And I worked very hard for most of them.

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Looks good Rex, very interesting I will be back in 8.0 for sure :slight_smile:

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It looks as though it will be an interesting time. Fun too.

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No more red wall, no damn green wall!

@RexXxuS I think we should have a heavy drone presence, especially the bombers. I would like to have them carry tactical planet busters for payload. Drop one bomb and play field is completely obliterated.

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Yeah, some goodies here and there.

Also surface wipe is back again!!! No deco reset anymore, trees inside POIs!
Only PDA checkpoints can’t be used still but I will find a workaround about that.

Drones + surface wipe… dunno if this got changed. Otherwise you see massive Drones at 0 0 0 again.
We have to test…

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https://goo.gl/images/q7eNxD

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I love the idea of larger planets, but not less planets. I like exploring and hitting POIs in PvE. I love warping all around HWS space and exploring. I sometimes wish there were more quests that would lead us to hidden warps with new planets to find that are not on the map.

As for PvP, since golden globle will be so much larger it will be much harder to use that as the focus of PvP. Instead, would it be possible to implement some PvP events with RP as rewards? It would be nice to have a few days focused on PvP in space for big CV battles, and some days for PvP on planets for SV and/or HV battles. You could even control the days that SVs and HVs are allowed so only one type could be allowed at once. for example, day 1 is HV only on planet, day 2 is SV only on planet, day 3 is CV in space, and day 4 is SV and HV on planet. this also has the benefit of if people warp away before they are killed, they ‘forfeit’ and the person that remains behind still gets some type of reward.

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I have to contradict as i like spontanous, random PVP like it is currently.

PDA missions and POI i like as well, but as PVE. While concentrating on a mission i dont need bored PVP kids in my back :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

To bring back cool CV combat i have a suggestion : Why not make a space playfield with gold asteroids only reachable through a supergate ? So players can not just warp away when attacked like it is now but have to stand and fight.

Just as Dratcha i would love to have bases on PVP planets with cool HV fights, but for this bases have to be much stronger or will still fall in 2 minutes when the large alliances attack. If this is not implemented end game will be just like now : teaser dogfights, maybe SV assault on poor miners. I have the ressources to bring even the triple towers of the big alliances down, but not without big losses and large efforts. And i will only invest into these efforts when i can keep what i have taken.

You should also be more restrictive with the size/block limit. 12 minutes till i lose my size 7,49 SV is way too long. I can do everything i want in 12 minutes with my OP vessel. Be harsh, mean and ugly : 30 seconds is enough to warn exploiters and strip them of forbidden vessels.

The peacekeeper zones can be dropped as they are pointless for other stuff but the PVE planets in these zones to live on.
Origin Planets and later the reward planets are good enough, especially as now Eden has no longer advantages over the origin planets.
The two planets Ray and… hmm forgotten the other :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye: can also be deleted considering the very few people going there.

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I dont see any need for ECC planet(only story), couple of space stations linked by gates is fine and more performance friendly. I feel awkward every time when see landscape seed/cache mismatch on ECC now. Space are more flexible.
Starters better to be small, to make a crowded feeling, so people have urge to leave it. Too big planet also will lead to resource scarcity, which is bad for newbies, which dont have a ship. Now at starters you can have a profit surpassing anything, but non-stop gold mining, not really a good thing.
Also giving so much resources on start i see as mistake, no joy of first steps in the world.
Maybe even only one starter, and choose your “type” later, maybe even through quest, if its possible. Cool point is to meet many people and make new friends. I remember something like this earlier, when only factions had “origin”.

2 Likes