Starbase Progress Notes: Week 14 (2021)

[ElluFB]

Starbase Progress Notes: Week 14 (2021)
April 5th - 9th

Hello everyone. Here are the progress notes of week 14 of 2021!

Please note that the "Progress Notes" are different from the Starbase Alpha "Patch Notes". Progress Notes are snippets from the development team and what has been worked on during the previous week, and many of the features might not be present in the current or upcoming builds of the Closed Alpha. Some features, especially in the design portion, can be subject to change as the development continues.

Design

Features

• Mining Backpack changes have been tested (two dedicated ore slots added and ability to store ore in normal slots)

User Interface

• Company stations access control design has been worked on
• Ship controls, mining in space and building tutorials have been worked on
• Work on Auction House design for crafting continues
• Station Manager can now be used to control who is able to see your station transponder
• Station Manager can now be used to resign your station
• Player station and lot transponder Settings have been moved from Station Manager to Settings menu

Stations and cities

• Moon City should no longer float above the planet surface

Other

• Solid version of pipes and cables that can transfer resources and data has been worked on

Code

Gameplay

• Tripod weapon rotations have been worked on
• Work on Easy Build Mode continues
• The implementation of Spaceship tutorial has started
• Station building multiplayer has been worked on; work on permissions continues

User Interface

• Crafting UI has been worked on
• Fixes have been made to the mail system; the issue with loading the inbox, when it contained mail with a lot of attachments, has been fixed
• Interface for sharing spaceship access rights to others has been implemented, backend support still needed
• The Station Manager has been worked on

In-game Designers

• Cargo Beams & Cargo Frames are no longer erroneously active in Spaceship Designer
• Automatic thruster naming no longer groups connected triangle thrusters
• Decal painting has been worked on

Art

Animations and Emotes

• New unarmed and rifle prone transitions finished, animations for others weapons to come

Stations and Cities

• Skyscraper entrance module 3 (light and dark) has been updated to Moon city
• Additional art has been added to Work Hub's job hall modules

Other

• Work on polishing Viper armor set textures has continued
• Cliff materials for Moon type 2 and 4 have been worked on
• Large thruster connector has been updated to fit the station grid
• VFX updates for Antigel Rifle and Whiplash weapons have been worked on
• VFX work on Autocannon Tripod has started

Gallery



As always, feel free to ask any questions regarding these progress notes!
And if you haven't yet, go add Starbase to your Steam wishlist!

 

[Kenetor]

NICE!

 

[Mr. Extinct]

Tripod

 

[Senkii]

Cool stuff, nice to see access management get some attention!

 

[Eviltek2099]

What are cities for?
I went to one walked around for about an hour and there really isn't anything there but just pretty buildings.

 

[Torokin]

Once again the added pics are just amazing!

 

[runzik]

Nice up date

 

[MAXD]

Are we gonna be able to add thrusters to the stations?

 

[CalenLoki]

Those prog notes gave me a lot of "what?" moments.

Large thruster connector has been updated to fit the station grid

Thrusters for stations? Or connecting ships with thrusters to stations?

Automatic thruster naming no longer groups connected triangle thrusters

Does it mean we can have multiple groups of triangles that are touching? Or that we just have to group them manually?

Mining Backpack changes have been tested (two dedicated ore slots added and ability to store ore in normal slots)

I though the plan is to slowly phase out backpack meta, not the other way around. Will people be able to just bolt 20 backpacks to their Labourers now? Or just teleport ore between stations with insurance transfer?

 

[KaiFB]

Does it mean we can have multiple groups of triangles that are touching? Or that we just have to group them manually?

I think there was a typo regarding the grouped triangle thrusters. The automatic tool now correctly names all triangle thrusters that are grouped/touching, so they now get the same name. Previously it gave them individual names which made them not work.

 

[Mutleyx]

"

• Station building multiplayer has been worked on; work on permissions continues

"
Woohoo!

 

[Orlover]

"

• Station building multiplayer has been worked on; work on permissions continues

"
Woohoo!

This might bring a couple of our people back.

 

[Naija]

I haven't been following the development of tripods much. I saw some renders from progress notes at some point. But as I understand it, tripods will allow endos on someone else's ship to use ship weapons with mouse control and not be affected by hosting issues from the owner of the ship. Assuming all of that is correct. I'm just wondering if turrets are being abandoned? Could the same method being used to make tripods viable be used to make turrets viable? As in maybe make the turret base or the pilot chair of that turret determine who hosts the turret. So if the turret is empty, then the turret is hosted by the primary host. If a different endo sits in that turret, then the turret is treated like a separate entity (that is still attached to the ship) but is hosted by the endo manning the turret. In my limited understanding of p2p and networking in general this seems possible. How far off am I?

 

[CalenLoki]

I haven't been following the development of tripods much. I saw some renders from progress notes at some point. But as I understand it, tripods will allow endos on someone else's ship to use ship weapons with mouse control and not be affected by hosting issues from the owner of the ship. Assuming all of that is correct. I'm just wondering if turrets are being abandoned? Could the same method being used to make tripods viable be used to make turrets viable? As in maybe make the turret base or the pilot chair of that turret determine who hosts the turret. So if the turret is empty, then the turret is hosted by the primary host. If a different endo sits in that turret, then the turret is treated like a separate entity (that is still attached to the ship) but is hosted by the endo manning the turret. In my limited understanding of p2p and networking in general this seems possible. How far off am I?

That's how current "dev turrets" work. And it's buggy AF spaghetti code. Turret visually lags behind the ship for other people. Small tripods are at least less visible.

You can read more about them here. Note that devs initially said they're scrapping turrets, but after strong community disagreement they're just halting their development for now https://forum.starbasegame.com/threads/gunships.1656/

 

[Naija]

That's how current "dev turrets" work. And it's buggy AF spaghetti code. Turret visually lags behind the ship for other people. Small tripods are at least less visible.

You can read more about them here. Note that devs initially said they're scrapping turrets, but after strong community disagreement they're just halting their development for now https://forum.starbasegame.com/threads/gunships.1656/

Thanks. Thats some much needed context. I can understand tripods as a temporary solution. And I am glad they are not scrapping turrets altogether because tripods as the long term solution is just... bleh. Doesnt make sense lol.