[Video] Star Citizen AMA - Server blades lots of new info!

[Chip Hazzard]

I do like the idea of carrying several along. It's also a thing where medium computers have 3 (?) blade slots right now, as least as shown in certain missions. So a DUR may have 6 slots available beyond stock configuration. OR it will come with a few blades probably with C grade software that support its intended function.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to seeing how it all pans out. I would think that you would have to switch the computer(s) off to be able to open them up and insert the new Blades. But being able to add in various different types, along with different grades of software would be awesome.

The NPC is still tied to a player account being the ship captain the NPC is servicing on. While the player who Agent Smithed into the NPC might not have a crimestat applied to their actions the captain of the ship the NPC was on will in fact be impacted. The other thing is that these NPC's are going to be crew members on multicrew ships and so the captain is going to have more incentive on what actions they are willing to take given the resources involved. Loosing ships and all of the gear and NPC's on a ship will have a large costs and one I imagine most players will shy away from until the game economy stagnates. So its not immortality for all, it still requires players with their char on those ships. Can a single player on an Idris have 20 NPC's that are then agent smithed. Its speculatively possible. From an outside perspective would fighting this Idris be any different if it had players in their char or controlling NPC's? I currently do not see it being any different. Controlling an NPC has no crimestat impact on you but neither does the heroic actions or reputation performed by the NPC you control have any impact on your chars rep. You want to get those high level bounty missions you still have to go out with your char and grind the rep. Jumping on your friends Idris as an Agent Smith is not going to help you progress forward with that. And your friend best trust you as shooting your gun at the police force is not going to make him any friends.

So I ask you. How does Agent Smith break with death of a spaceman?

The second part is from a game perspective how impactful is having your current char die? True you have to go back to the char creation screen and roll a new look, you could also possibly loose some or all of your rep. But otherwise all of your ships and cash will still be yours and you are still free to go out and do anything you like. From a game play perspective has minimal impact on your ability to play and it was already mentioned that rolling a new char wouldn't be a total wipe of rep/crimestat as they don't want players to abuse it. I know they want to give some weight to death but currently the only weight is bragging rights about the age of your char and its accomplishments. Both are not impacted by the use or not of Agent Smith.

Completely get where you are coming from, but if you had an op planned in one system, part of the fun should be getting to the op! People getting waylaid on the way... some running out of fuel, some taken down by pirates... not just being able to 'jump' into an NPC on the org Idris. I think it should be difficult to run. Fighting it from the outside, I totally agree with you... it probably wouldn't change much (ie. I would still die! haha). But I think it kinda breaks the immersion of the game.

They keep going on about how your decisions impact your character, but I think this makes a bit of a mockery of it.
Being able to agent smith into NPC crews means that you can have your own character as a perfectly law abiding citizen, being able to trade and travel anywhere in the 'verse, BUT you are able to jump into your mates pirate Cutlass Black, take over there NPC crew member and go off pirating without any repercussions. You can blow up, steal or whatever without the worry about your character getting any kind of crimestat, or losing anything. When the bounty hunters finally catch up with your friends ship and take you down, you can jump back to your real character and not worry about not being able to dock etc.

I am all for NPC crews, and am looking forward to hiring my own co-pilot to join me. And being able to 'jump' into NPCs on other peoples ships isn't going to stop me from playing one bit, it just my opinion on whole thing

 

[atpbx]

There's also a discussion in the forum about land claims, base construction, and the role of the Pioneer for those who still own one. There is hope! lol.

I am almost *almost* on the verge of unmelting my Pioneer concept after what Chris has said.

If it can do more than chuck out the shitty outposts and will actually become a proper construction facility then I will do it.

 

[Bambooza]

which could be an agent smithed NPC unless let me quote myself


what prevents a player to hop into NPC and be the captain trillion kilometres away?


because its a perfect tool (if unlimited) for griefers who don't want their main char to die. Or make him deal with the reputation hit. Or go to prison. or ...


Well it could become a major annoyance if you have to stay around in the hospital for a couple of hours (like in prison)

This is obviously very speculative from my side

Another issue i see with (unlimited) agent smithing is that you don't need to make meaningful logistics. You just login and hop onto a ship where currently the action is.

To bring a ship online requires a player, when the player logs out the NPC's will attempt to log out in any available bed. If no bed is available it was mentioned that they might attempt to pilot the ship to the nearest port to log out but the end result is a ship without a player onboard will despawn and I do not see an Agent Smith being counted as a player on the ship so the ship will simply despawn with out one. It does get intresting to think if an Agent Smith will be allowed to jump into one of the single seater fighters brought along on the carrier or be able to join the boots on the ground action, or will simply be limited to activities on the multiplayer ship.

Completely get where you are coming from, but if you had an op planned in one system, part of the fun should be getting to the op! People getting waylaid on the way... some running out of fuel, some taken down by pirates... not just being able to 'jump' into an NPC on the org Idris. I think it should be difficult to run. Fighting it from the outside, I totally agree with you... it probably wouldn't change much (ie. I would still die! haha). But I think it kinda breaks the immersion of the game.

They keep going on about how your decisions impact your character, but I think this makes a bit of a mockery of it.
Being able to agent smith into NPC crews means that you can have your own character as a perfectly law abiding citizen, being able to trade and travel anywhere in the 'verse, BUT you are able to jump into your mates pirate Cutlass Black, take over there NPC crew member and go off pirating without any repercussions. You can blow up, steal or whatever without the worry about your character getting any kind of crimestat, or losing anything. When the bounty hunters finally catch up with your friends ship and take you down, you can jump back to your real character and not worry about not being able to dock etc.

I am all for NPC crews, and am looking forward to hiring my own co-pilot to join me. And being able to 'jump' into NPCs on other peoples ships isn't going to stop me from playing one bit, it just my opinion on whole thing

Bringing the fleet to the op will still require lots of coordination and people involved. All of the ships in the fleet will still need to be flown there by players, supplies purchased and protected. In no way would it change the logistical angle. In fact as a player I could just join the crew on an Idris with my char and sit in a turret the whole time and participate as much as if I logged on hours latter and agent smithed into an NPC that was sitting in the turret the past few hours. (of course and NPC will not just sit in a turret for hours they will have their own schedules and needs for food, water, sleep and breaks to play some games)

So yes you would be able to jump on your friends Cutlass Black and be a pirate for an afternoon and then that evening go back to being a law abiding citizen doing your normal trade runs. But you can see how those hours spent being an Agent didn't improve your chars rep in the galaxy so you are still a lowly apprentice with in the trade commission instead of putting time into advancing their trust to run the more profitable missions. I hope they put in more character development to help bring more reason to play your character and keep it alive as right now there really is not much. In many ways Agent Smith is like loading up Star Marine or Theaters of War. Its fun to play and some might never do anything else but at the end of the match it doesn't increase your wealth or reputation in the verse. The same goes for Agent Smith. It allows those who want to try other aspects of the game to do so but it comes at the cost of not progressing your own char.

 

[Chip Hazzard]

Bringing the fleet to the op will still require lots of coordination and people involved. All of the ships in the fleet will still need to be flown there by players, supplies purchased and protected. In no way would it change the logistical angle. In fact as a player I could just join the crew on an Idris with my char and sit in a turret the whole time and participate as much as if I logged on hours latter and agent smithed into an NPC that was sitting in the turret the past few hours. (of course and NPC will not just sit in a turret for hours they will have their own schedules and needs for food, water, sleep and breaks to play some games)

So yes you would be able to jump on your friends Cutlass Black and be a pirate for an afternoon and then that evening go back to being a law abiding citizen doing your normal trade runs. But you can see how those hours spent being an Agent didn't improve your chars rep in the galaxy so you are still a lowly apprentice with in the trade commission instead of putting time into advancing their trust to run the more profitable missions. I hope they put in more character development to help bring more reason to play your character and keep it alive as right now there really is not much. In many ways Agent Smith is like loading up Star Marine or Theaters of War. Its fun to play and some might never do anything else but at the end of the match it doesn't increase your wealth or reputation in the verse. The same goes for Agent Smith. It allows those who want to try other aspects of the game to do so but it comes at the cost of not progressing your own char.

I think its the part of being able to jump into NPCs with no repercussions applied to you that I am a bit against, but like you say, you won't be progressing your own character (unless you get to keep any UEC from the NPC that you were 'occupying'... don't know how or what that deal is!). I think that we can go back an forth on this all day ('tis good to debate stuff!), but they are going to do what they plan and I just hope they make it work for the best.
But like you have put above, I just hope they make it so that it is more worthwhile to actually go and join crews instead of Smithing into them

 

[Sky Captain]

This is a big topic. Can orgs build entire bases? If so, founding good territory and creating a forward base of operations is going to be a massive part of the game!

Here's to the Pioneer being worthwhile after all.

I've been wondering if Chris might want to one-up his old mentor, Richard Garriott, on player-created bases. It will be interesting to see what the team pulls off on this.

Org built bases really would be transformational for game play in so many ways (construction, defense, supply ... it would enable so many other game play aspects).

 

[Michael]

To bring a ship online requires a player, when the player logs out the NPC's will attempt to log out in any available bed. If no bed is available it was mentioned that they might attempt to pilot the ship to the nearest port to log out but the end result is a ship without a player onboard will despawn and I do not see an Agent Smith being counted as a player on the ship so the ship will simply despawn with out one. It does get intresting to think if an Agent Smith will be allowed to jump into one of the single seater fighters brought along on the carrier or be able to join the boots on the ground action, or will simply be limited to activities on the multiplayer ship.

I guess this is the part of the discussion where we need a lot more clarification from CIG how they're intended design is.

I guess we agree that agent smithing needs
- restrictions and limitation on what the Player can do with the NPC
- a ruleset for criminal and griefing actions

 

[ColdDog]

Its not like Agent Smith is increasing the number of personal located in a given area be it NPC's or Players, while it is possible the Player might be more skilled in the turret then the NPC its not a given.

Well, lets say someone hacks your computer and sends porn all over the world, you are in affect agent Smith, you are a conduit for another's actions. My truck has a sticker "My other computer is your computer"... so say you want to sway a battle in your favor... simply agent smith in, kill the pilot and everyone in the hammerhead. As you can see this is problematic, from someone who had someone else sneak on to his ship and shoot him in the head while he was flying.

 

[Bambooza]

Well, lets say someone hacks your computer and sends porn all over the world, you are in affect agent Smith, you are a conduit for another's actions. My truck has a sticker "My other computer is your computer"... so say you want to sway a battle in your favor... simply agent smith in, kill the pilot and everyone in the hammerhead. As you can see this is problematic, from someone who had someone else sneak on to his ship and shoot him in the head while he was flying.

What amazing gameplay possibilities.

 

[ColdDog]

What amazing gameplay possibilities.

By that statement... @Montoya should be the most paranoid person in the verse... someone smith in and kill him... kill him again and again and again :)

 

[Ayeteeone]

By that statement... @Montoya should be the most paranoid person in the verse... someone smith in and kill him... kill him again and again and again :)

That got ugly fast.

 

[Talonsbane]

I'm too tired to think clearly & I've had a lot going on so far this month, so 99.9% of this thread is going right over my head & in its place are mental images of servers using some sort of bladed items to open alcoholic beverages for patrons. Cheers!