Neutral npcs are attacking my grids: I don't know about you, but being shot at feels pretty hostile

A_N1ne shared this feedback 20 days ago
Not Enough Votes

Neutral npc drones have been attacking my grids. I've been told by multiple people in the Keen discord that this is an intentional thing, so I'm going to try and make my opinion/point about this as clear as possible (as to not waste any devs' time).


1. I don't care that their signal is neutral when they are warning me about getting too close to them or that I need to move or they will open fire (though this is a bit annoying when they do it to my static grid base, which they have decided is now in their flight path).

2. I don't care that when I ignore these warnings, the drone starts attacking me. (Though maybe an audio queue could accompany their chat warnings, as their chat messages can get lost in a server with an active chat).

3. I DO CARE that after they have opened fire at me (they shot first), their signal stays neutral and doesn't change to hostile or is treated as hostile for turret targeting. (I don't know about you, but being shot at feels pretty hostile)


The drones staying neutral means that my base will not defend itself from attack unless I manually change turret targeting to target neutrals, which feels wrong to have to do (again, them shooting at me is a hostile action, not neutral)

1. If I'm on an active server where there are a lot of neutral signals (or even in single player, in an area with a lot of npc ship trafic), I now have to find the neurtral signal that is closest to me instead of looking for the red one (which in this game has always meant hostile, and our brains have been trained to look for when we hear shooting)

2. Being forced to use target neutrals is a good way to accidentally piss off every other neutral faction around you. (Maybe on the official servers, where pvp is a constant threat, this isn't a problem). But when in single player or on pve server, this is a problem. People leaving their grids on attack neutrals (or forgetting to switch it off attack neutrals) can lead to people accidentally shooting each other or other non-hostile npcs; ie. actually neutral, neutral grids like trade stations.


TLDR: When an npc grid is shooting at me (and they shot first), I expect it to be a hostile signal for the purposes of turret targeting, not neutral (I don't know about you, but being shot at feels pretty hostile). Noticed after the Apex Survival update.

Replies (4)

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https://youtu.be/18Se-ME8D5M?t=13550 example of what I'm talking about

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This has been a really annoying "feature" so far. I've also made a bug report about it, cause let's be honest, getting shot at by neutrals (when they fired first) feels like it should've been a bug. I don't know about you, but being shot at feels pretty hostile.


https://support.keenswh.com/spaceengineers/pc/topic/49501-neutral-npcs-are-attacking-my-grids-i-dont-know-about-you-but-being-shot-at-feels-pretty-hostile

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looks like they moved yours from bug to feedback :/

this being "intended behaviour" is honestly a bad decision and unneccessarily confusing.

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I couldn't agree more about it being unnecessarily confusing, or why anyone would've thought that neutral signals should be hostile (as in their the ones shooting first).


Like don't get me wrong having neutral npc base defend themselves is a good idea, but having it also spawn drones that are also considered neutral signals wasn't. (Or in my case a random npc cargo ship deciding I'm in it's way and shooting me). Having to use target neutrals in a defensive manner is a great way to piss off every other faction on the server (player and npc) or just shoot your own base and salvage. Heck, most pve servers (at least the ones I've played on) disallow target neutrals as a general rule because of this.

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Hi A_N1ne,

Thanks a lot for taking the time to write such a clear and detailed post. We really appreciate the effort you put into outlining your experience and the reasoning behind your feedback.

What you’re describing is indeed intended behavior, not a bug. Because of that, we’ll be moving your report into the Feedback section so the team can track it there alongside other feature and balance suggestions.

Thanks again for helping us improve Space Engineers with thoughtful input!


Kind Regards,

Ludmila Danilchenko

Head of Space Engineers QA Department

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Thanks for taking the time to read it, and moving it to the correct place within the forms.

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Yeah, it may be "by design," but this design is problematic. Grids that are shooting you need to be recognizable as "Hostile" by the HUD signal and, more importantly, by weapons. It's just causing problems. It's cool the NPCs are dynamic and stuff. But once they become hostile to the player, they need to be hostile so weapons will target them.


This ticket here provides a few suggestions on how to handle the scenario. Worded differently, but same issue.

https://support.keenswh.com/spaceengineers/pc/topic/49555-neutral-grids-attack-without-provocation-no-different-from-hostile-grids

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