Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Yes, I mean that's what really drives the nail into my brain here... EvE is the MMO that gets hotkeys right, I wouldn't be surprised if they had the most hotkeys out of any game in existence (bar those insane flight simulator games)...

That's what makes this issue all the more glaring in my opinion... Of all the unnecessary hotkeys in the game (Character Creation: Pick Portrait 1... REALLY?) they skip out on one of the most important for drone users.

C'mon!

You're probably right, but is that justification enough to make the drone weapon system a chore to use?

I want to give EvE's developers more credit than this. Surely they won't allow their players to suffer because of the botters?

Think about it, either way the botters will be "devaluing" the average EvE player's experience. Does it matter if it's via UI inconvenience or isk inflation?

Both are bad, and to say the former is a better evil than the latter leaves us at the same place, in my view.

Perhaps we can have the drone hotkey and ban botters as well? This doesn't seem like such a tall order, in the context of other triple A online games.

…which is not a button, but a context-sensitive option that only works if it actually has a context. I.e. it doesn't work the way, say, firing your guns do.

We don't have a “research blueprint” or “train skill” or (to keep it within the realm of combat actions) “load ammo” hotkey or shortcut for much the same reason: because without context, it's just a nonsensical and meaningless command.

Actually, it has everything to do with what we're discussing since that's part of how you establish context for your contextual command. The problem is that now you have to come up with a way to assign those groups to a hot-key, making that binding ship-specific and load-out-specfic, making those bindings part of the ship fitting, and do it all without having to dig through tons of menus; without having to sort through redundant and irrelevant entries; without having everything break as you move drones around; in short, without making it so complicated that no-one bothers.

…which means you're still making the same mistake of assuming that it is simple because you're not considering what it has to do. Again, that just decides the context of a yet-to-be-issued command — you still have to do the binding and not have it (or the user) break between ship swaps and fitting changes.

What you're asking for requires a complete rework of how drones operate. This is not a trivial task. It is complicated, and it is not simple, no matter how much it may seem like it (which, as mentioned, is more a result of not considering the possible use cases to be handled).

What.
EVE has a long and well-established history of being very bad when it comes to shortcuts, and the UI revamp that happened a few years ago only made it slightly bearable. The main problem is that its underlying structure was never really designed with keyboard shortcuts in mind (hence the myriad of context-dependent rclick menus), and as a result, it is woefully lacking in keyboard controls. Hell, some games out there offer as much control just for team communication as EVE does for the entire game.

No. What you do is:

1. Establish a context (pre-defined group, shift-selected group, or single drone).
2. Select a context (rclick)
3. Select a command (launch).

Without those first two steps, the last one doesn't exist and can't happen. Try rclicking in empty space and launch your drones from there. This is why there is no button for it: because if you want to “launch drones” the game will want to know which ones. If you try to fire guns, for comparison, the command is a simple “fire gun in slot 1” — the context is pre-defined, static, and strictly limited. Grouping guns just slots more guns into “slot 1”, and the command is still “fire gun in slot 1”.

· The fact that, on its own, it will have no context.
· The fact that, to make it work, we have to add two steps to the list above: 4. bind context/command pair to key; 5. press key.
· The fact that these context will vary with every ship, with every drone-loadout, and even dynamically change within a load-out (since you can move drones around and since contexts can be larger than the command allows for).
· The fact that, as a result, the bindings need to be ship and fitting-specific. Arguably, this could work much like how HUD button layouts are handled.
· The fact that, in spite of this uniqueness, you're very likely to want to be able to copy bindings between ships.

…and that's just for the functionality itself, not for the UI to do the binding, which could be a mess in and of itself. The deeper problem is that context→command→action functionality is so deeply rooted (and not just with drones) that it needs a complete rework to be of any value — half-assing it is just a waste of time. If you do it for one context-command pair, it really should allow for all use cases (e.g. not just launch group, but recall group, group attack, group idle etc). At that point, we run into the next fun problem, which is that we run out of button spaces on the HUD (because, again, the game was never designed with keyboard control as a main focus).

…and that's why you think it's simple, when in reality, it isn't, and why the whole “it must be simple” attitude is a rather bad one.

...no, no it shouldn't. It's not a proposition. Please backseat moderate properly if you're going to do it at all.

Alright, assuming everything you said is true, how were they able to program "Return to Drone Bay"? It would seem, imho, to be an equally difficult task, yet they succeeded... Returning to Drone bay seems to involve all of the same logisics as Launch Drones... Even more so!

Not to mention, why increase anti-drone aggression before this is fixed, as others are mentioning as well? I really do not agree with a developmental decision along the lines of "buff npc ai first" then "fix ui afterwards"...

It seems very illogical...

Are you looking for an answer more meaningful than "poor game design"?

Seriously though, launch drone key isn't even needed. Every time the ship comes out of warp, drones should launch and begin to orbit the ship. Same way as guns fold in and out of the hull before and after warp. When loading a ship with drones, there should be a default group that gets launched, and afterwards whichever group you had out last will be the one that gets automatically re-launched. Similarly, there should be an option that whenever you initiate warp, drones return and dock automatically, or you could set the option to warp without waiting for drones, or both (with a hotkey). Etc., etc.

That's how it should work in a game in 2013. Current system is so 1999 it's not even funny. And we (drone users) have been asking for a comprehensive review of drones since...oh...2008? 2007? When was Trinity?

The return to bay hotkey operates under the same principle as return and orbit/engage target: the context required is defined as all currently controlled drones in space.

Just as a quick recap, the new AI makes it so that NPCs randomly switch targets to your drones rather than yourself, and blast them to dust in a few seconds. That is why you need to be able to pull them in and out very quickly and effectively. ;)
Not to mention there's massive lag on all drone commands.

Automatic drone docking would be nice though.. hate leaving those expensive drones behind.

Never going to happen. Something about increasing server load by forcing every person travelling to auto-launch drones only to be scooped within seconds as you jump/warp.