Assembly Hall

https://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Walking_in_stations

Announced in 2006, implemented in 2011. And since then? Nothing.... I was saving all my space bux to open a bar in low sec but naw, ruin my dreams of being a space bartender more CCP!!

I really think they could make the game more fun by adding some basic features. Maybe outsource its development? to someone with 'walk around and interact with stuff' type MMO devs? I'm not asking for a fully playable rich environment with progression and features and content. How about just some mini games and a place to chill with other players in game? Let me stream my own music through my bar, and set the prices on drugs and alcohol that act like boosters for a short duration. Strippers? yes please.

Like in GTA you can go bowling and play darts, golf, etc etc. Why not have something like that in EVE? slot machines would be sick too. Would it REALLY take sooooo much work that it would hinder your development of actual spaceship mechanics and balancing?

How many clear stements by EVE EPs do you need before you'll accept it's not going to happen?

How many more years of it not happening will it take before you realise?

Yes, it really would take "sooooo much work". Everyone who worked on the WiS engine has either left CCP altogether or is fully committed to working on other projects. The project would essentially have to be rebooted from scratch, which would be a goddamb huge amount of work, for the minimal gain of a few "Oh I guess that's kind of cool" fluff features. CCP have zero resources to spare and zero corporate enthusiasm to find those resources.

Just let it go man. It's a shame, but we don't always get what we want. Focus your faith on attaining something that's likely to actually happen.

Another way to increase the security and make the air tolerable for capsuleers in-station, but outside the AI secured and air-appropriate common capsuleer areas, could be with a suit. These suits were made to allow for capsuleers to enter into the central hub of the station which doesn't have a decontaminated atmosphere, and in addition provide basic security in these areas (post 215 has some ideas about what one could do in this area, but it can be thought of as something like a bigger version of the hub in Dust). This suit wouldn't have any other function than the possibility to be changed for individuality and to make sense from a lore perspective, as you can't actually get hurt in this area, at least if one assumes that it isn’t possible to use a dust clone. But if it is possible to use a dust clone then security wouldn’t have to be this strict, although you could still have these more secure areas.

The freedom of having a clone with a dust implant puts very few restrictions on the possibilities and mission types for wis. Safety in stations would no longer be a significant problem, you could just have a dust type clone which you use outside of your cq, which makes combat more realistic to implement as there wouldn't be issues like possibly permanently losing your character. Using the capsuleer ships to travel places, you could explore structures with a jump clone brought along for that purpose and you could clone jump to a dust soldier on a planet. The jump clones would naturally be your character and be identical to your character, but have a suit for exploring or missions. If you start a game of Legion or Valkyrie separately, you could log in with the same eve character.


Combat in-station is another question, how that should make sense relies on if jumping to a dust clone soldier is possible or not. It also relies on what combat mechanics are possible and if they can be made realistic and interesting.


In one of the earlier wis threads, crafting and industry were asked for also in wis.
It could be tied to implant manufacturing and research perhaps. There could also be research and industry on suit technology used for exploring. The skill tree could be similar to that in Dust but have skills focused more on exploring. Possible modifications could be decryptors, scanners and sensors are things that seem reasonable, in addition to armor and weapons.



For avatar gameplay outside stations, the possibility of jumping to a dust type clone or not, also influences what is possible, and how interaction between eve and legion would work.

Either if it’s possible to jump to a dust clone soldier or not, you could go on explorer or planetside missions. But upon arrival and docking to the structure you want to explore or the orbiting structure that is used for dispatching dust-type soldiers to the planet surface, there would have to be some differences. If you cannot clone jump to a separate dust type clone, that would require that you log in with a separate character to continue with that explorer or dust clone you brought along on your ship, in basically a Legion level taking place either at an explorer structure or on a planet. This means you log off eve and log on to Legion, so your ship vanishes from the site in eve. One could imagine your capsuleer character warps into a safe spot in space in the meantime after setting your Legion character off on the structure or planet, instead of staying docked and vulnerable for attacks. If one assumes that you can jump to a dust-type clone one could imagine that after you have jumped to the dust clone, you can remote control the ship sufficiently to make it warp away to the safe spot and call it back again, if you make it through the exploring or planet mission. If you don’t, then the consciousness jumps back to the capsuleer in the ship at the safe spot.

Another way is if you bring a larger ship that has room for a shuttle in it, you could stay at a distance from the structure you are going to explore, cloak up and release the shuttle which you now control with your explorer jump clone.

Of course this would require mission arcs than span across eve and Legion, one part of the mission in eve, the next in Legion and then in eve again, but it’s an intriguing thought.

Even several players could go in a fleet to the same place and those same players could log onto a Legion explorer or mission site.

Items you find at the site could be items you receive back in eve.

This could also allow for a different way of collaboration, in a way that you don't log in with a separate dust character or jump to a dust clone but rather another player does who already has a dust character on that planet or maybe only has a dust character. You stay logged into eve and remain docked in the ship, but through a new ui, you offer realtime support of the other player who has the dust character in the structure for exploring or on the planetside surface. With your ship you scan for artifacts and enemies, projecting a real time map over to for them to navigate with. In addition to finding artifacts and combat, the dust soldier can set markers for orbital strikes that appear on your ship's map.

Attacking and damaging of the structure that you are docked to seem reasonable, but should maybe follow the same principles that exist today: concord and sentry guns in high sec and more freely engaging in low and null. Something that would give a great deal of tension is if your ship is attacked by other players, you are forced to leave the support ui you have for the dust player exploring the structure or on the planet and return to the eve ui, in order to deal with those attacking.

Lastly, something not really important but necessary is that in the character creator, height would have to be added.

Another big post for imagining what I hope to see with this concept and for it to achieve. I also want to think about the concept of wis from the basics again.

To not limit the imagination, I want to try a different term than wis and the most fitting one I could find is “Being in places”, as I wanted to find a term that was neutral and didn’t limit in any way. Using this term is to suggest that stations, other space structures, and planet areas and bases are meant to be as open-content places where one to a great extent, can choose one’s own experience. Wis was maybe meant only to be in stations, but stations are only one of many places the ideas could work, so I wanted to take away the barrier between stations, other space structures and planet areas, that’s why I want to call everything just “Being in places”.

The goals are additional ways in which to explore, experience, interact in and imagine new eden, and like otherwise in Eve, choosing your focus and content.

So, I have tried to think how this could be possible and at the same time think about what would be difficult about it.

New Eden as a world in itself has almost no limits. But even being a capsuleer has limits and the technical and practical sides of making eve have limits.

As being a capsuleer, and the technical and practical sides of making Eve are the limits, then the possibilities have to be within these.

Spaceships are obviously the most important and prominent part of the abilities of a capsuleer. After all, the possibilities coming from being a capsuleer is a result of just those. But one thing is what capsuleers can do, another thing is what they can experience. They can almost only experience that which gives them their abilities, the capsule combined with spaceships, the only other places they can be are the quarters. They can travel to places nearly boundlessly, but never experience or directly engage in the places they go, just look at it or interact with it from a distance. The benefits of being a capsuleer are great but sure are there some disadvantages too.

As the sleeper implant was discovered and then the suit technology developed to make capsuleers be able to tolerate air outside the quarters, I can imagine the tumultuous feelings after a long time with life solely being that in the capsule and the quarters.

To meet the worlds on planets are only one bonus, as also other opportunities on these and other places are opened. You may see similarities with Legion’s concept, which is the inspiration:
On planets the opportunity of looking for artifacts, unattainable from space ships, at abandoned sites.
Close combat and experimenting with the different suit tech, to find the best match for their skills.
Opportunities in breaking or claiming new ground on planets for your corp to prosper through.

For npc-corp controlled areas on planets I imagine they have set up hubs. For other planets such things might not exist yet, you are just arriving at a natural planet surface, and have to adapt your equipment accordingly. Security levels would likely be reflected in if a npc corp and concord are present, and how far you go from the hubs.

The same would be with the stations. It is not only planets you could go to, as the sleeper implant and suit allows you to engage in activities going on in stations, as you now can go outside of the quarters. For capsuleers this would mean you could enter the central hub on stations. Additional station-like structures you could enter are citadels, like suggested by someone some posts earlier, and also the barges used with the transfers to the planet surfaces.

Besides stations, you could enter structures at exploration sites. By going inside these structures you can find items unattainable from just spaceships alone, but there would naturally be other hindrances here as well.

Each of these places would offer different possibilities and experiences, but be a part of the same framework. By showing other sides of capsuleers realities, it allows players to have additional experiences in new eden, like other types of challenges, teamwork, interaction and combat.

To have the opportunities of making and imagining your own content, I think it is important that these places are open areas where you can choose to be without having to be in a group or queued for a mission that you have to take part in, in other words not bound to a particular mission or setting. Make it possible to join a location without having to take part in a mission, either if there is a mission going on or not.

That means that there needs to be unscripted content in these places, which is one thing I think was so good with the Legion concept, you could go around searching for sites and artifacts in your own pace. Or if you didn’t want to do that you didn’t have to. The important thing is that you can choose. Whether you would like to invite a friend to a duel, look at battles from a distance, explore or interact with other capsuleers, through the use of dust clones, you’re free to choose.

Even if I don’t know much about developing, I can understand a lot of work would be needed to make all these areas, but here are some things that I think will help.

These places doesn’t need to big, I don’t see any need to have very large maps or areas. They just need to be large enough to have some room to either explore freely or be interesting maps for fps.

i really want WiS, and i think WiS should be free2play.

Let players walk around stations for free, and create a bunch of gameplay in the stations full of microtransactions and junk.
In a world where f2p microtransactions are pulling in tons of profit, it would be nice to see CCP get some of that. WiS would be a way to unite eveonline with F2P microtransactions and not effect the eve game itself.

This would also serve as a way to convert free players into paid eve players. Connecting free players to rich plexdaddies who might buy them a few months gametime. All sorts of opportunity for profit and fun

Let eve players transport 'walkers' to new stations (would require "walking in ships!!!"... or at least ship cargo holds...)
and because this would be hella fun to blow up and see 50 corpses fly out the side of the hull

just do it already

Well this definitely blew up while I was doing other things.

I'm glad to see there is still support, and I hope that we can get some kind of immersion creation from it that would expand the depth of New Eden for all of us.

What is disappointing is the lack of Dev responses and comments here. Sorry to say but It looks like my EVE online subscription will end when there is an MMO that shows me the original promise of EVE online, that of a space simulator that has all the things depicted in any Sci-Fi movie.

Star Citizen is close but isn't a true MMO. Its the MASIVE part that is its short coming. So it wont be able to effect historical on a scale like events in gamming as what we have experienced in EVE.

Eve has become stagnant. Its Imagination has had its breaks put on, were it can only iterate within its core self. This was not its original promise and vision. It has become a game of disappointments rather than the sandbox that has its Box opened to other parts of the beach. The sand has become dry and the box claustrophobic.

Many of the old time players are syndical of remembering the old promise. They only remember the failure of the over reach by CCP. Aspiring to have great goals is not a bad thing. Each year our computers become more powerful and the tech becomes more capable. Unfortunately fear seams to be the overriding influence to pushing forward and giving the players true reasons to continue to play; which is more... space, and places, even if the space is inside of my ship on a planet or in a station.
With Dust514 and Valkyrie there was a promise that those venues would be part of a whole game yet that promise hasn't been fulfilled again.

Eve was the original promise and even if the technology isn't there to create in one game/platform all the gameplay of the original promise it should be the Hub that connects all of them. EVE should be profoundly affected by what goes on, on the ground in Dust514, and if there are space battles to be won Valkyrie pilots should be a force to contend with.

I do want to see planets defending there space from hostiles space ships by blowing them out of space from the ground. I do want to hire Dust mercs to help me not just blow someone else's ship up but take it from him by boarding it and shooting the pod jockey in the head. I want to have Valkyrie pilots at my disposal to help me disable my enemies capital ships so I can land my boarding party and take his stuff. being it his POS, his planet, or his titan.

I do want to get off my ship and hunt creatures on planets for sport or for gain. I do want to take a planet over and become its lord. I want to build cities and homes that look out onto alien vistas and see my factories billow smoke as they produce the finest ship that will blow up in glorious space wars.

I do want to call my friends and plan our secret meetings to take over the universe. or simply hang out and listen to some music and talk about my new baby girl that was just born, all from my home on a planet or on my capital ship or in my Station.

I think...this dream, the original dream that sparked this in my imagination is all right with all of you too. Lets be encouraging to CCP while we wait. Sooner or later this Dream WILL be fulfilled by someone. It would be great if CCP where to do it.

It will come and ill see you there.

A challenge with wis is finding an emote system that makes the environment visually alive and interesting, and gives the freedom to express and show what you want, also for places where capsuleers can be without suits, which I hope that there will be if there is a wis expansion.

One should not necessarily try to achieve emotes for expressions, as for expression emotes a different system maybe with text can be used that can replace them. Also, action emotes for actions that doesn’t directly influence the gameplay, can be replaced by this system.

The reason I think emotes for expressions, and those actions that doesn't directly influence the gameplay, should be handled by a text system, are that they are so personal that making an emote for them actually hinders interaction. Even if you have many to choose from one can feel forced to use an emote just because it’s the closest one to what you want to show or express, even if it isn’t that close. And even if it is what you are looking for, it doesn’t have subtleties from person to person. Therefore I find it very difficult to interact meaningfully using emotes. Writing your own words allows you to describe precisely what you want to express or what you are doing. Then it’s up to the player or players you are interacting with to imagine.

I did think of a system where you could use something like the playstation move or those controllers for Oculus to record movements and make your own emotes to be used in game, maybe as an addition to the above?

Here is another idea

Making a full expansion with a lot of features and content ready doesn't seem likely, but if it could start somewhere maybe this is a place to start.

The idea is to be able to dock at some exploration structures, stations and planet sites, and have the possibility to team up and go together with maybe up to three others or more, and that the gameplay would be avatar related and involve investigating the structure, or a district or facility at a station or in a city. Either alone or with others there could be several different aspects to this gameplay in order to be successful at the exploring or mission. There are challenges like decrypting, hacking, agility, salvaging, obstacles and combat, requiring a thoughful planning on what skills and items you and your group need to bring. It would be possible but hard to take on all the roles yourself, encouraging to bring someone with you.

One reason why I think this is a good idea is that it adds the experiences of exploring and missioning to a Dust type of game. You can also decide if you want to do it alone or with someone. The difference is that alone you can't succeed at all the objectives set for the mission or obtain all the loot from the exploring, so the rewards would maybe be about 1/4 if it is a mission designed to be appropriate for four people.

Maybe it wouldn't be too costly as some of the backgrounds and characters types could be similar to Legion and so a lot of the work could be used again. There is no need for these areas to be very large either.

It likely isn't possible to make a lot of different missions, so they need some things that make them replayable without making them feel "grindy". So it must make sense to do the missions again, with objectives that are reasonable would come up again, and to play the missions employing different tactics giving different rewards. Explorer missions could be tweaked so that random different challenges await you, so you never know what skills would be perfect. Here are some missions ideas that maybe would make sense to be replayable:

Investigating the less visited areas of a station, the station owner wants your group to find out why there is a power failure in a part of the station, you must go there in the dimly lit corridors and get the power back. It seems someone has tampered with the systems in order to avoid security in the illegal trading of contraband goods. You need the skills to scan for the problem area, repair it and deal with those responsible (or buy their goods). Even if you stop the trade it is likely that this is something that will happen again.

On planets you could have missions in cities, not the whole city but small parts of it. On the outskirts of a city, a mission could be that you have been tasked by a faction or npc corporation to find out if a competing faction or corporation have set up a spy network and if so take it down. With the grand vista of a city in the background, bringing down the network you need speciality in skills like decryption, hacking, scanning and security. Even if you take the network down, it's not unlikely that the faction will try to set it up again. So it makes sense to do the mission again.

To make the tactics different every time, some kind of randomness should be introduced, where is the area of power failure? where are the spy networks placed? and where do the enemies come from? You cannot use the same combat tactics every time when there are enemies coming unexpectedly with changing weapons. In structures for exploring, the challenges could vary from hacking old terminals and getting the power back up to get loot out the cargo doors to be picked up by the npc ship you hired to take you there.

I think it is nice that you would need a strong versatility in your group to complete the missions fully.

Also it wouldn't affect the gameplay in eve at all unless you take part in it, as it would be separate and played indepently from eve, except with perhaps isk, aurum and plex connections. It wouldn't be a sandbox, yet at least, as it unfortunately seems to be restrictions in computer hardware. But it could be ready for it at some time, as this is just the start. It would instead be a small scale multiplayer taking place in the eve setting and be both a collaborative multiplayer and a competitive multiplayer. It would influence eve in the way that if you have a character there, the items and isk you get can be used there.

The way to finance it would maybe be with a subscription like eve, but with a discounted total if you subscribe both to eve and this.

The pvp part is a big difficulty in this idea, but there needs to be areas for this too, not sure how it should or could be implemented though.

Some place for interaction outside of the missions would almost be as important to have, like a central hub and market place before missions, meeting up with your corp and others in your faction, change gear with others, planning missions, journey to places together. Particularly I am hoping for areas for sociality.

To be honest at this point (considering lack of CCP will for WIS in the EvE game client) I would be happy with a seperate game built around the unreal engine or something similar that does WIS stuff easier. gambing, market trading, some fps style exploration/missions, walking around giant stations and maybe even some ships.

As long as tehe the chat channels were linked (like dust) I could spend my time in a cool virtual world while waiting for pings.


However...
I do think this idea https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=467040&find=unread

its doable for the current engine and reasonably easy to do from a resource / dev time perspective.