10-04-2020, 11:08 AM
I see the appeal. I'm reminded of the cruise drive from Freelancer as well. In that game the tradeoff was it had a short charge time and shut down your weapons. If you wanted a faster option to navigate a star system just so you can get around easier, I wonder if an artificial gate system could work? In other space sims these are just glorified level loads but, I could see use for a large stationary gravity field that just fires ships that pass through it, with either a receiving gate or enough time and space to decelerate. That, or something like Freelancer's trade lanes, which I guess would be the same thing plus shielding for asteroids (not that they matter) and more controlled acceleration and deceleration.
I'm getting off track from your idea, though, which is more of a way to prevent atmosphere dives. The AI should be able to avoid that on their own, I'm not sure coming up with a new feature is the right solution as much as just getting the AI to stop committing suicide is the right path. I bring up the gate idea because it would force the circumstances of travel into something a bit more structured, so the AI just has to worry about traveling a clear path of space-road. Otherwise, just improve AI pathing and figure out why their object avoidance craps the bed sometimes.
I'm getting off track from your idea, though, which is more of a way to prevent atmosphere dives. The AI should be able to avoid that on their own, I'm not sure coming up with a new feature is the right solution as much as just getting the AI to stop committing suicide is the right path. I bring up the gate idea because it would force the circumstances of travel into something a bit more structured, so the AI just has to worry about traveling a clear path of space-road. Otherwise, just improve AI pathing and figure out why their object avoidance craps the bed sometimes.