Status

[Haxus]

Steam Workshop integration is going well. Blueprints can now be published, updated, listed, and removed. The two remaining functions will subscribe and unsubscribe to blueprints in the workshop; they should be completed by the end of next week. I’ll post an update as soon as the workshop is ready. 

Some items from the list of annoying bugs were fixed. I’ll give details when the changes are posted. 

There was a ten day interruption in my work schedule. Paula’s boss for the past 33 years died of cancer. We went to the funeral in Daytona Florida. Back home now.

[Vooker525]

Sad to hear that.

On the bright note, would you like to participate in event? We gather up together for a party at Saturday

[Deantwo]

Steam Workshop integration is going well. Blueprints can now be published, updated, listed, and removed. The two remaining functions will subscribe and unsubscribe to blueprints in the workshop; they should be completed by the end of next week. I’ll post an update as soon as the workshop is ready.

Looking forward to see how this will work.

Some items from the list of annoying bugs were fixed. I’ll give details when the changes are posted.

And excited for bug fixes! ^^
For reference, this is the list: (Thread) Currently Most Annoying Issues

[Haxus]

When a blueprint is subscribed, it is downloaded into your game’s library. An entry is created in the appropriate blueprint exchange.

Subscribed blueprints get updated automatically after the architect publishes an update. This will affect spacecraft and buildings that have already been built using that blueprint.

Unsubscribed blueprints are removed from the library and exchange. Spacecraft and buildings using unsubscribed blueprints are destroyed.

When the publisher of a blueprint unpublishes it, the blueprint is removed from visibility in the workshop. Subscriptions to the blueprint persist.

This all accommodates monetizing of workshop blueprints in the future. It’s a bit more work and I do not plan to do it in the first release.

Access to blueprints is simplified. It can now only be full or restricted; view only access was removed. Full access allows unrestricted access to the blueprint in a design studio as well as build permission. Restricted access only permits the blueprint to be built in the game environment.

Restricted access is recommended when publishing blueprints that you plan to monetize in the future.

[GaelicVigil]

Great news on the workshop integration! And more bug fixes is always a good thing. I am so excited for this Steam launch!

And sorry for the loss of a family friend. I think most can relate from events over the last few years.

[Phoenix]

Hello Haxus. Sorry for your loss of a family friend.

Regarding the ability to profit from steam workshop items. I think it is safe to say that I am currently one of the more active users of the designer at the moment. While I do appreciate the thought of being able to turn some sort of profit from the vast amount of time needed to produce a satisfying design within Hazeron. I have to say that I do not think this will be popular as there are many designs needed in game and I do not think many users would find the value in spending money on each design. I would prefer an environment where users shared their designs freely based purely on interest in the game. Regardless, I intend to release my ships and other designs without cost. 

I have some bugs I wanted to report to you.

1. Airports: Airports do not protect against environmental damage from atmosphere or anything else. Spacecraft left on an airport will slowly take damage. I believe this behavior is unintentional based on the message that is sent every time your ship takes damage. 

Edit: The airport may actually in some cases provide protection? I am not sure. The ship stopped taking damage after some time. 


(Leaving a small metal ship outside on a airport pad in corrosive environment for less than 10 min)

2. Medical Stations: Medical stations do not provide any feedback when a player cannot access due to wearing clothes. I thought the medical stations on my ship were broken for a long time until I read the wiki. I believe that the medical station should send the player a message any time there is an issue preventing them from using the system (Player needs to remove clothes, player needs to stock med kits, player needs to stock antidote kits.'

3. Environmental Voids: Environmental voids for biodomes and ground platforms do not remove environmental effects such as snow or murkiness inside a gas giant. This may not be solvable by your engine, but it is confusing to the player that they are both protected but seemingly in the same environment.  

4. Ring Mining: Currently the visual indicator for planetary rings does NOT line up with the actual location where mining beams must be shot. The result of this is that it is sometimes impossible to mine if a player is relying on orders (Ship Orbit Ring A -> Ship Mine From Ring A). Additionally this just looks strange as the mining beam shoots into empty space. 


(Shooting into space) 

5. Designer Preview: Currently doors do not appear at all in the designer preview mode. They are simply gone and therefore cannot be tested. This only seems to apply to buildings. Not ships for some reason. 


(Normal door on factory design. In the closed position)


(You cannot activate the door even with switches)

7. Ship Construction Material / Streamlining: This is not necessarily a bug but currently you cannot change the primary construction material (Steel, Vulcanium, Etc) without going into the designer and publishing a altered design. This will lead to many extra ships being uploaded to the steam workshop as each ship will likely require a low level metal design and higher level designs to stay relevant to the player as they progress. I also hasten to add that most players do not understand the designer enough to make these changes unassisted. 

As for streamlining a ship to fly in atmosphere or water. Currently I do not see any reason not to make every design streamlined for both air and water. This feature of a ship also cannot be changed outside of the designer even via refit. I recommend all ships are simply allowed to enter both air and water by default. 

Recommendation: I recommend that a menu similar to the refit menu appear any time a player builds a ship which gives them the option to choose a primary construction material, allocate hull space, and even select what kind of modules they would like to use. 

8. Grav Packs: Grav packs do not allow a character to fly or hover. This may be intentional, but I think it would be a great upgrade for players who did not choose wings to give them the ability to fly with assistance. Flying is a huge benefit, but I find it silly that ally players end up walking around with huge angel wings in order to utilize the ability. Also Gen 4 avatars cannot even select wings. Please make Grav packs act like glider wings. 




Conclusion

Thank you for all your efforts. Hopefully the launch of Hazeron Starship will send some financial validation your way. Additionally if you would please take a look at the email I sent you, I would appreciate it. 

-Phoenix

[Deantwo]

1. Airports: ...
Edit: The airport may actually in some cases provide protection? I am not sure. The ship stopped taking damage after some time.

According to the notes on the wiki for environmental decay, the ship is only protected by an airport if it has an avatar or officer on the rouster.
See: hazeron.com/wiki/Decay#Spacecraft_Decay

And I don't think an airport ever protects against an actual corrosive atmosphere, but I have never been totally sure about that.

It would actually be really nice if being landed on an airport had some vidual effect on the ship to indicate it is correctly landed and receiving server/protection. Again my first idea is some kind of scaffolding or something, or some glow effect. Or the heathbar could just become blue I guess.

2. Medical Stations: ...

I would suggest removing the whole "have to take off armor and clothing" thing. It is troublesome and confusing. Even more so now as the actual "medical seat" isn't that default tube anymore.

7. Ship Construction Material / Streamlining: ...
As for streamlining a ship to fly in atmosphere or water. Currently I do not see any reason not to make every design streamlined for both air and water. This feature of a ship also cannot be changed outside of the designer even via refit. I recommend all ships are simply allowed to enter both air and water by default. 

Recommendation: I recommend that a menu similar to the refit menu appear any time a player builds a ship which gives them the option to choose a primary construction material, allocate hull space, and even select what kind of modules they would like to use. 

I totally agree on the whole changing modules during construction start. That was part of my annoying issues list too.

I would however say that "streamlining" had always been a little weird. Maybe it would be better if streamlining was also a module? It might add another construction compound, but if no streamlining is selected it could require zero of that module, just so there isn't a "no streamlining" module (see also my request for "null module" selection). The streamlining modules could require some advanced resources, such as the harder metals or io plasma for sealing.

Or the whole streamlining option could be removed and solely depend on the size of the ship. If the ship is too big to spawn on the ground, it won't have atmosphere streamlining. What would allow for float and submersible streamlining I don't know though. I like the idea of the modules better though.

8. Grav Packs: ...

I think Haxus had a slight plan of adding a "jet pack" item someday. I would prefer it being a separate item from the Grav Pack though. Maybe just an item that can be placed in the belt slot, the belt slots have a reasonable size too so it doesn't have to be a tiny item.

[Haxus]

On the topic of updating published designs. While the code is capable of doing this, there is currently no mechanism in the game to do it. The game has never permitted changes to published designs due to the obvious potential for abuse. E.g build a little shuttle then update the design to a battle star.

To fully enable the updating of designs would require some additional work in the game. Simply changing a design in the library could cause a severe disconnect between existing ships and the library. A lot of information stored on a ship is derived from the library design when the ship is built. Numbers and types of system modules and damage accrued are examples. A design change might force existing ships to reset all modules and damage as if they were newly built.

As things are now, an updated design will have to be published as a new design on Steam. The old one could then be safely unpublished from the workshop and anyone using that design would continue to do so.

This leads to a question. Should I do the work to enable updates to an existing blueprint in the Steam Workshop? My gut says no.

[Phoenix]

On the topic of updating published designs. While the code is capable of doing this, there is currently no mechanism in the game to do it. The game has never permitted changes to published designs due to the obvious potential for abuse. E.g build a little shuttle then update the design to a battle star.

To fully enable the updating of designs would require some additional work in the game. Simply changing a design in the library could cause a severe disconnect between existing ships and the library. A lot of information stored on a ship is derived from the library design when the ship is built. Numbers and types of system modules and damage accrued are examples. A design change might force existing ships to reset all modules and damage as if they were newly built.

As things are now, an updated design will have to be published as a new design on Steam. The old one could then be safely unpublished from the workshop and anyone using that design would continue to do so.

This leads to a question. Should I do the work to enable updates to an existing blueprint in the Steam Workshop? My gut says no.

I think if this is the case than it can be dealt with by the designer by simply publishing multiple versions and clearly stating the design requirements as is the case currently. I would personally not advocate you spending more time allowing the steam workshop entries to be updatable. Designers can simply publish new designs when changes are made.

Thanks for your consideration.

[Deantwo]

Yeah, the simplest solution is to just have the savegame import the new version of the Workshop blueprint again with a new ID every time it notices the Workshop blueprint has been updated. This would preserve existing constructions in a save-game without causing weird issues. Simply make the old version not be published in the exchange anymore.

At worst it would mean that if a Workshop blueprint is updated a lot, it might create a lot of old versions of a blueprint in the savegame. So maybe some garbage collecting of old versions of Workshop blueprints when they aren't used anymore.

It would also mean that unsubscribing from a Workshop blueprint wouldn't damage anything in the savegame, but it would unpublish some blueprints on the savegame's exchange. If garbage collector then sees that the unpublished Workshop blueprint isn't used in the savegame, it can delete it.