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Player Features and Ideas Discussion

 
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New Exploration Content - Time Travel Anomalies

Author
NekoKitten
Neko Industry 'n' PvE
#1 - 2013-05-03 00:57:45 UTC
Just an idea, I've been running around with for a while ..

-=-=-=-

Time Travel Anomalies (TTA)

Time Travel Anomalies take place in a seperate (limited) part of the new eden universe, before the human colonization. Just a few systems can be visited around the anomalies goal as not all stargates are finished constructing. In these Time Travel Anomalies (TTA from now on) you will encounter the ancient races already known in the eve universe (yan jung etc). These races will consider you neut or hostile, half leaving you alone on your journey, the other half attacking you once they will encounter you. They can change their behaviour from neut to attacker if you do something that they dont like. (like breaking their wrecks open)

You will encounter wrecks and/or structures in space, you have to analyze or hack them, giving you unique broken items. (The more worth these items, the more parts they require you to find) These items are of no use to you in this state, you will have to go through other wrecks (and ships you blow up) to find other bits and pieces. In the end, if you find a number of these items, you have to research or reverse engineer these (requiring the yan jung skill for example), to get a blueprint. These blueprints consist of the usual minerals and/or salvage, or parts from the blown up ships in the TTA.

You can build these blueprints once you have the required bits and pieces, to create a unique mod, rig, ammo or even a ship. (with a meta level of 6 or higher).

These TTA's show the ancient civilizations with their own structures, stations and ships still unknown to humans. You cant dock in these stations as your ship doesnt 'understand' how to connect with the stations computers and exchange information. You will also encounter other factions, who are at war with the ancient races. They will consider you hostile and will attack you on sight.

CONCORD wasnt invented yet in that period of time and the systems all have an unknown rated security. You can encounter other players and there will be no police force available if you decide to fight over certain resources. There wont be any local chat available, your board computer cant decrypt local chat and will only display garbage when it receives messages. (Can be trained to decrypt these once you find the ancient language decryption skill book and learn it. Level 5 can give about 90% correct decryption of all received text. Still the number of pilots and their names in the system remain unknown, or display as random garbage/false readings, system names are random garbage too, unless you train the decryption skill, to display up to 90% correct information.)

TTA can be visited for a limited period of time, depending on how much fuel (heavy water) you take with you. When the fuel runs out, you have a few minutes left and then you will return to the present. You cant run another TTA right away as there is a cooldown period for your engines to be able to re-establish the connection with the past. (6 hours, can be trained with a skill too to reduce this time frame (-1 hour per skill level with a maximum of -5 hours)

To establish a connection with the past you will require a TTA T1 or T2 mod, mid slot, Time Travel Activation skill required, T2 module uses less fuel per cycle, requires TTA skill on lvl 5.

Whatever you do in the past has no effect on the present.

TTA mod blueprints will be seeded on the market.

Skills:
"[Ancient Faction] Technology" (already existing like "Yan Jung Technology" skillbook)
"Time Travel Activation" skillbook (for the use of the TTA module)
"Time Travel Reduce Cooldown" skillbook
"Time Travel Message Decrypting" skillbook
"Reverse Engineering" skillbook (already existing)

Modules required for time travel:
"Time Travel Activation Module" - mid slot, uses fuel, T2 module uses less fuel per cycle.

Unique items:
"[Ancient Faction] [Module Name] Part X out of 6+" for Meta 6+ module, parts go up for higher meta level.
"[Ancient Faction] [Rig Name] Part X out of 6+"
"[Ancient Faction] [Ammo Name] Part X out of 6+"
"[Ancient Faction] [Ship Name] Part X out of 5" for frigate, '10' for cruiser, '15' for battlecruiser, etc

-=-=-=-

So .. what do you think ?

Greetz
Neko
Ruze
Next Stage Initiative
#2 - 2013-05-03 01:08:53 UTC
First, like the idea.

Second, how do you stop it from being instanced? How do you warp out? Can your pod communicate across time?

If you're driven to threaten others with harm or violence because of what they do in game, you can't separate fantasy from reality. That "griefer/thief" is probably more sane than you are. How screwed up is that?

Alx Warlord
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#3 - 2013-05-03 01:16:46 UTC
Time... Some scientists says that Past and Future are things that don't even exists... the Only possible thing to change would be the Flow of time.... you can travel Forward,You can travel faster or slower, You can enter in a time bubble and the universe will look still to you, or you can reach near light speeds entering a black hole and the universe will age to the end of time in front of your eyes in a flash....

I suggest you ready something about the Theory of Relativity....

Also... beware of the butterfly effect.
James Amril-Kesh
Viziam
Amarr Empire
#4 - 2013-05-03 02:15:50 UTC
Alx Warlord wrote:
Time... Some scientists says that Past and Future are things that don't even exists... the Only possible thing to change would be the Flow of time.... you can travel Forward,You can travel faster or slower, You can enter in a time bubble and the universe will look still to you, or you can reach near light speeds entering a black hole and the universe will age to the end of time in front of your eyes in a flash....

I suggest you ready something about the Theory of Relativity....

Also... beware of the butterfly effect.

So what?

Enjoying the rain today? ;)

Alx Warlord
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#5 - 2013-05-03 02:32:13 UTC  |  Edited by: Alx Warlord
James Amril-Kesh wrote:
Alx Warlord wrote:
Time... Some scientists says that Past and Future are things that don't even exists... the Only possible thing to change would be the Flow of time.... you can travel Forward,You can travel faster or slower, You can enter in a time bubble and the universe will look still to you, or you can reach near light speeds entering a black hole and the universe will age to the end of time in front of your eyes in a flash....

I suggest you ready something about the Theory of Relativity....

Also... beware of the butterfly effect.

So what?


So, no time travel.

Although part of the Idea is salvageable. Change time travel to some other kind of space far far away and it is ok....
Ruze
Next Stage Initiative
#6 - 2013-05-03 02:37:23 UTC
Alx Warlord wrote:
James Amril-Kesh wrote:
Alx Warlord wrote:
Time... Some scientists says that Past and Future are things that don't even exists... the Only possible thing to change would be the Flow of time.... you can travel Forward,You can travel faster or slower, You can enter in a time bubble and the universe will look still to you, or you can reach near light speeds entering a black hole and the universe will age to the end of time in front of your eyes in a flash....

I suggest you ready something about the Theory of Relativity....

Also... beware of the butterfly effect.

So what?


So, no time travel.

Although part of the Idea is salvageable. Change time travel to some other kind of space far far away and it is ok....


As far as sci fi is concerned, time travel is still something to play with.

I mean, sure, it's only been proven that time travel is impossible. But then again, wormholes and fluid space and laser beams and immortals flying two-mile long ships while incased in fluid pods and ...

If you're driven to threaten others with harm or violence because of what they do in game, you can't separate fantasy from reality. That "griefer/thief" is probably more sane than you are. How screwed up is that?

Nano Sito
#7 - 2013-05-03 02:46:40 UTC
+1 I like it.
Forget about scientific facts, this is freaking game!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Destination SkillQueue
Doomheim
#8 - 2013-05-03 03:14:58 UTC
Didn't read the actual proposal. Just wanted to say, that time travel is almost without exception lame and detrimental to any universe. At best it still creates tons of plot/lore holes, because it's used as a cheap gimmick or a convenient plot device and the full implications are ignored. What I'm saying is, that I don't see any use of time travel being necessary or good for EVE. Maybe the idea proposed isn't total crap, but I'm betting the time travel part of it is either totally unnecessary for the actual gameplay or a lame gimmick with the full reprecussions totally ignored.
ExAstra
Echoes of Silence
#9 - 2013-05-03 04:31:01 UTC
Time travel to before the Human colonization, but it includes the Yan Jung, Takhmal, etc. ruins?

Correct me if I'm wrong, which I very well could be, but weren't they also remnants of the original Terran colonization effort? Similar to the Jove?

Save the drones!

Andrea Griffin
#10 - 2013-05-03 05:14:07 UTC  |  Edited by: Andrea Griffin
Time travel as an aside, the concept of a time-limited wormhole-like system in which to explore isn't a terrible one. The core idea is great. I can imagine the mechanic working something like this:

1. The player discovers this anomaly. It could be considered a very unstable wormhole that needs player assistance to become passable.
2. The player lays down a structure of some kind nearby which must be filled with fuel to operate.
3. The structure stabilizes the anomaly and makes it passable, but only as long as the fuel lasts. Interfering with the anomaly in this way causes it to become unstable, and therefore collapse completely, when the structure runs out of fuel (or is shot).
4. Entering the anomaly is very much like entering a wormhole system, except there is one way in, one way out.
5. The entrance/exit is automatically visible with a timer (similar to POCOs in reinforced mode right now).
6. This gives you an idea of how long you have to do your thing inside of this space. Other players, of course, can follow you in. There may / may not be total mass limitations, but there should be a per-ship mass limitation (or limit by ship class).
7. You do your stuff; combat sites, exploration sites, harvest special materials, etc.
8. If you don't make it out before the timer ends, whelp, you're stuck. Forever. Whelp, sucks to be you!
9. The "system" completely despawns when everyone leaves.

When you think about it, this is really no diferent than the FW complexes or deadspace missions where you need to activate a gate in order to enter. This simply takes you into a completely different system entirely, with the risk of getting stuck if you don't pay attention. It isn't really instanced any more than a mission is instanced; anyone could enter and come after you.

In low / null, or in highsec if you're at war, people that don't like you could shoot your anomaly stabilization structure to trap you inside...

...but stop with 1% structure remaining. They send in an envoy and politely offer to let you out for a nominal fee. : >

I imagine that it would only be fair to broadcast a warning inside the Anomaly system when the stabilizer is under attack, and at 75%, 50%, 25%, 5% overall EHP left.

I also imagine that rewards found in system would increase the longer the Anomaly remains open - which would also mean the closer it is to closing. This in itself makes for an interesting choice. Do you keep the Anomaly open for only 15 minutes to minimize the chance of someone else scanning it down and coming after you, or do you max out the amount of time you have in there, which maximizes your potential reward, but greatly increases your risk from other players?

In a way, this is a lot like I had hoped what wormholes would have been when they are released. Entering one of these systems should be unpredictable. You really have no idea what is on the other side. Colonization is completely impractical, as once the conduit between the Anomaly Space and K-Space is broken, well, that's it. You're stuck.

Obviously, CONCORD would have no jurisdiction in these new areas that capsuleers are messing with.

Time travel or not, this could be an interesting mechanic. It has the potential for solo, small gang, PvE, and PvP content, all in one.

I believe that Eve does not currently have the ability to spawn systems on command; the set of systems is static and known. I have no idea how much development effort it would take to develop dynamically created and destroyed systems. An alternative would be to create, say, 200 such systems in a static way, but have a system that would "reset" all of the content when everyone leaves.

Dynamically created systems, by the way, could tie very well into the concept of allowing players to construct jump gates.

So here's more content that could be added into the mix.

A group of players discovers an Anomaly with enough oomph to allow several freighters worth of building materials through. They enter into this new unexplored land. Maybe it has a few planets with some moons, maybe not, whatever. In any case, this is a new virgin system. They can drop their materials and start building a star gate.

What if building a star gate requires special, built materials? Drop a POS, mine gas / artifacts / minerals / etc. inside of this system. It may take a while, but that's okay - you've been trapped there, and your only way out is a meat jump at this point. During the several-day long process, your towers are attacked by waves of increasingly more powerful NPCs - battleships, carriers, etc., enough of them to pose a serious threat to a POS with manned guns and a small support fleet. (Again, something else I had hoped would come with wormholes, but never materialized). After all, you're invading into their territory.

Eventualy, assuming your POS survives to create the necessary pieces of the jump gate or however the gates will be built, your gate goes online, connects to whatever system, and you now have built yourself a new piece of the Eve universe. Congratulations.

That second story - finding empty space, surviving a strong NPC attack, attaching said space to Eve - would require a lot of work on CCP's part development-wise, but it sure would be cool. The only part missing is a way to get other players in there to act as an obstacle.

Perhaps the gate has a long process to online, acquire its destination, etc., but it put out enough signals or warps space enough to create standard wormholes. So this allows W-space to connect to this virgin system.

Need resupplies? Time to navigate through wormholes. Enemy alliance figures out what you're up to? They'll pay good money to an entrance to your new system.

So the system gradually moves from Anomaly, to W-Space with inactive gate, to a new null-sec system with a gate.

There's a lot of ways you can massage this idea and come up with cool stuff.
Andrea Griffin
#11 - 2013-05-03 05:21:40 UTC
Also, I should drink strong beer and read the F&I forums more often. This brain storming is fun as hell.
Tarn Kugisa
Kugisa Dynamics
#12 - 2013-05-03 09:03:03 UTC
read my sig

Be polite. Be efficient. Have a plan to troll everyone you meet - KuroVolt