IIRC Infinity lore has the origin of FTL tied to telecommunications advances. Also I don’t really see why automation needs to be cut at the root. Infinity MMO might even include gameplay that requires advanced automation; judged from all the “features” we came up with on the old forums; everything from semi autonomous colonies to factories to drones.
As a hardcore twitch gamer, my preference is to have no automation or auto-aiming at all in fighter combat. I genuinely believe that gimballed weapons would have lessened the overall experience of playing the ICP. I also think that they lessen the experience of Elite Dangerous, fortunately combat in that game is good enough in other ways to survive that decision.
For larger ships I would not be completely averse to auto-aiming turrets. I’d simply explain these by the presence of NPC gunners.
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I must agree with JB. The game needs as much ingame realism as possible. If you don’t use auto-aim just because it’s not so fun to play… Well it’s just out-of-game reality. But how can you make the auto-aim not possible inside the game reality? How can you make that reality to work in all the universe of that game and not just local decision that is out of context from the whole game?
All i can say that possibility of auto-aim system to be hacked doesn’t seem logic. If that was the reason there would be no computers in war aircrafts today. And yet there are plenty of them ( some of the airplanes would fall down if they wouldn’t be computer guided).
Anyway i hope the ingame reality, where auto-aim is not possible, will be found cause it wouldn’t be fun otherway 
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Auto aim could be balanced very simple. Auto aim should require CPU resource. Small fighter like ships do not have it enough. End of the story. Starting from the big bombers and bigger ships will be possible to have some extra free CPU to have hardpoints to operate in auto aim mode. Autofire should consume even more CPU. More complex behavior of autoturrets should require more CPU.
for example low range guard fighters could have autoaim turrets but in the same time they will not have warp/FTL drive, long range sensors, galaxy map applications, trade applications, and so on.
But then you have to explain why my smartphone today has more computing power than an entire FTL-capable battlefleet - back to square one.
Hacking risk is not entirely stupid, as hacking methods can evolve a long way along other techs. Maybe they stopped using our silicon-based digital computers after some spoilsport found an effective way to scramble them at a distance. Maybe the new computer types they use are open to direct physical manipulation. Or simply really inefficient at most things. Or very specialised, like the aforementioned MEMS.
I’ll note that while military planes are hacking-proof AFAICT, it’s not the case of civilian airplanes. Recently, some security engineers showed that you could hack the airport/airplane liaison used to help the autopilot land the plane, and that you could use it to crash the plane (assuming that the pilots didn’t see that their instruments disagreed with the autopilot, i.e. doing their job). Yes, the stupid plot from Die Hard 2 is actually technically feasible.
Similarly, it’s possible to hack the GPS (and as such autopilot) of a boat if you have an emitter less than a km away, and some people raised serious concerns about military drone security.
If today’s technology is having such glaring security holes even in what should be absolutely secure, with such dangers only increasing with the advance of technique, then it’s not hard to imagine another set of technologies where it’s simply not worth the risk.
But again, hacking risk is only a small part of software risks.
You have the risk of bugs. You have the risk of new bugs from damaged hardware - those high-energy doodads military ships are throwing around (let alone those you get near stars, in warp or with hyperespace) could easily knock parts of your mass memory drives and create new errors. Good thing the human brain is particularly resistant to that.
You have the risk of expert systems making the wrong decision (those can’t adapt like a human mind does), and the risks associated with true-( or empowered stupid-)AI. Don’t see how it could affect something as simple as auto-aim? Listen to the general opinion about nuclear power if you want an idea on how it could drive irrational decisions about forbidding anything that sounds even remotely similar.
A nuclear power-plant on this Galileo probe? There is no way you launch this Chernobyl-waiting-to-happen!
A robot controlling a gun? There is no way you build this Skynet-waiting-to-happen!
With a strong enough anti-AI sentiment, it could even prevent developing such systems in the first place.
This is but a few examples, there are probably many other ways to justify it.
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I think you just stated a lot of good reasons for why we shouldn’t use auto-aim and auto-fire together. Still if we use auto-aim and human push the fire button your mentioned problems are solved. And if auto-aim is damaged, only then pilots would need to manually aim.
But yes, if for some reason computers work differently then ours then we might find why auto-aim can’t work. For now we just need to find that reason.
Just make them illegal? Perhaps some treaty between the Starfold/Deltan/Centuras forbids their use?
But then you have the problem that only pirates and other criminals use it, giving them an advantage.
There is no head exploding smiley… 
[quote=“Crayfish, post:72, topic:554”]
For larger ships I would not be completely averse to auto-aiming turrets. I’d simply explain these by the presence of NPC gunners.[/quote]
I am completely averse to auto-aiming turrets, period. I’m completely averse to auto-anything in PvP scenarios.
Use the rule of one-gunner-one-target. On any given ship, I can control just one of the turrets or all of them, but I can only point at one location in space at a time. If a battleship ship wants to engage 100 locations with its 100 guns, then it needs 100 player gunners. For that matter, if a frigate has 100 anti-fighter turrets, then it can engage a swarm of 100 player fighters. Epic fights remain available to owners of small ships.
This again relies on the idea that automation just isn’t available. While I’m happy to use the NPC fiction to fill in the blanks here and there, I don’t want any element of PvP to involve any form of automation, regardless of the supporting fiction.
Note that my sending automated drones against your automated turrets is a different scenario, and would be reasonable. But if those same automated turrets can shoot at my player-piloted fighters, then I am again opposed to automated turrets. PvP should be a contest of similar/compatible player skills.
[quote=“Alchemic, post:77, topic:554”]
For now we just need to find that reason.[/quote]
I think there may be traction on that “radiated colony” idea. Humanity had to bail on Earth and ended up on Mars, with its higher radiation levels. That made silicon digital electronics unreliable and also didn’t do the people much good either. So now you’ve got an impetus to get out of there. You want computers that work in elevated radiation and you want to get to a planet that doesn’t have high radiation. There aren’t any such planets in our system, so away we go; FTL drive with simple but durable computers. Heck, those simple and durable computers might be required for a ship under warp. Or a ship that transitions in or out of warp. Or a ship that jumps.
If digital computers are fried by simply being onboard a ship, that would allow them to be continue to be used throughout the galaxy, but only on planets that make them. They can’t be transported.
As an aside, a separate faction went deep into Mars to continue the Earth style of living. They didn’t survive (because they stopped dreaming and lost hope), but anyone returning to Mars would find evidence of their subterranean lifestyle.
Just throwing a thought out there. I have a consideration below after this thought that is the reason I am posting, but I just wanted to throw this out to the sharks and see what happens.
Perhaps the claim could be that auto-turrets exists because of X technology. However, because of Y “X-jamming” technology X tech is easily countered. Because of the easy production of Y tech, it is a standard install on ships. Therefore, X tech isn’t used anymore/only viable on capital ships with enough power/whatever to counter Y tech.
For the arena-style gameplay for I:BS (@INovaeGene ), I can see the arguments against auto-aim and even gimballed weapons, seeing how I:BS is more of an FPS. However, for the actual MMO, should auto-aim be taken more into consideration? Consider a large freighter trading some totally legit goods. Should we expect that ten players besides the pilot manning the turrets to sit in there going back and forth a million times just in case on that million and first time it comes under pirate attack? Even for a combat oriented vessel, manning a turret does not seem like an awful amount of fun unless you are looking for fights (and having a good bit of luck).
For this reason I would consider a CPU-power sort of mechanic mentioned above, maybe needed to counter Y tech. It would prohibit smaller craft from using auto-aim/gimballed weaponry, while allowing larger ships to not be completely useless unless there are multiple players dedicated to turret duty.
As a further argument, consider that just because it says auto-aim does not mean that it is guaranteed to hit the target each shot it fires. This could be tweaked so that an actual player will out-perform the auto-aim/turret, while not making the auto-aim/turret not be a piece of junk.
Another consideration is the use of kinetic weapons. I’m not sure about the speed of said weapons, maybe somebody can clear me up on that ;). But assuming that the projectiles are not moving at a large fraction of c, should the HUD display a lead on the target, or should it be WWII fighter style? If there is a lead, would there be a lead on smaller ships? What technobable would justify this and not auto-aim?
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[quote=“Arkenbrien, post:80, topic:554”]
Should we expect that ten players besides the pilot manning the turrets to sit in there going back and forth a million times just in case on that million and first time it comes under pirate attack?[/quote]
That question, and myriad like it, is answered by understanding two simple rules.
One player can operate any or all of a ship’s weapons
One player can designate only one target at any given time
Actually, this specific question can be answered by observing that a freighter that makes a run a million times without seeing a pirate but once won’t bother putting weapons on his ship. They are a pointless expense.
From there, think about what you would do if you were on a freighter and saw pirates either frequently or infrequently, many or few, strong or weak, and those two rules above applied to you and anyone else on the freighter.
The short form is that when you encounter multiple enemies, you tend to want multiple friends. It doesn’t matter if the enemies are in one ship or multiple, nor if your friends are in one ship or multiple. The gear everyone controls clearly plays a role, but so does the number of players. In a multiplayer game, that’s the way it should be.
[quote=“Arkenbrien, post:80, topic:554”]
Even for a combat oriented vessel, manning a turret does not seem like an awful amount of fun unless you are looking for fights (and having a good bit of luck).[/quote]
The only time players will be dedicated gunners (controlling some number of the ship’s weapons) is when it is known that the ship is going to be in a fight. They are known as combat ships. That’s what they’re for. They are trotted out when there’s going to be a fight. If a game is designed such that players have to rely on luck to find interesting gameplay, then the game has other problems.
I believe that the only reason for Infinity not having automation would be based on the fact that implementing it takes time and effort. It sure is easier to leave it out completely and come up with some mumble on why it’s not possible using fiction…
Actually, it’s entirely possible that auto-aim could be implemented using features that are required for a game engine to be useful and either a few lines of code or a few drag-and-drops in a UE4-style blueprint. Coming up with mumble, meanwhile, can be surprisingly difficult.
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Thing is that you don’t even need to come up with mumble to add or exclude a feature, and this is turning into a mumble thread
Given the option to actually code something or think for an excuse why not to code something, depending on what type of a person you are, it’s entirely possible that some would choose to mumble.
And suppose those same player-piloted fighters go up against your automated drones, what happens then? Are the drones just going to ignore them?
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I prefer realism, getting away from realism seems to dumb down games for easier game play learning. At the same time can make replay value shorter or less rewarding. Realism should be the aim.
I wounder if they could have more then one mode for combat. That way they could check out what version works best.
I understand that we are talking about gameplay and personal perefences here, but the whole notion that you would not use a computer to do the aiming instead of you is just plain stupid. Even today, computers are way better at this sort of stuff, and we are usually not aiming at anything more than 2-3 km away. I’d leave the twitch combat for small fighters only. Since we are in space, the fighter itself is practically a turret. Above that it just makes no sense at all.
I don’t really think there is an explanation that can fit “no aiming” and “spaceships” into one feasible idea. Your average navigation computer’s orbital calculations are way more complex than leading a target a few km away. I find it really weird how much you guys cling to the twitch shooter idea. Am I the only one who thinks we can have complex and really enjoyable combat that does not (necessarily) revolve around aiming at the enemy?
(And yes, this is obviously my subjective, personal preference talking regarding gameplay.^-^)
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Hmm… so calculating your orbital trajectory is more complex than calculating the angle relative to your orbital trajectory to fire a projectile to get an orbital (or suborbital, or escape) trajectory that intersects the orbital (or suborbital, or escape) trajectory of your target?
Something seems off about that… but I agree there’s not enough of a difference between the two operations to be able to compute one but not the other.
Technically if you and your target are in orbit around the same body you can ignore all calculations relative to x. You just need your targets vector and the muzzle velocity of your gun. Easy as cake(for a computer) at the point. I think if you will ever be dogfighting in a fighter you and your target will always be in the same relative orbit be it stable, elliptical, or an escape trajectory. If your target is moving slow enough to aim at it and not zipping away you’re fine.
For example, you don’t calculate earths orbit around the sun if you wanted to run past me and shoot a bullet at me. You just calculate the angle and fire.
That being said having a specially equppied “sniper” fighter sized craft with oversized railguns could be funny and interesting…at that point you could sit in another orbit and take pot shots at ships doing other things
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