Drop using the term 'license' and use something like 'Schematic'

😂🤣, bruh, I'm dyin here

ouch, right in my certificates.

Excellent point, but this also opens the question up to 'is this why there are renegades?' Are they resisting the authority? Can I hack my welder to let me build 'restricted' schematics? Could I buy a renegade welder that has no restrictions?

All of this is obviously headcanon questions, but changing terminology simplifies that completely and removes headcanon questions, unless it's actually correct and the CA is some overpowering AI overlord that's restricting your actions.

Better (to me) headcanon is that your space buddy ejected in an escape pod with a basic welder and no schematics. They have all the know-how to build anything but have no schematics to do that, and sadly the CA doesn't know us well enough to give us the schematics for everything and instead is trading them to us bit by bit in exchange for mundane tasks that it needs to be done.

ohhh i get it, so the welders we are carrying around are sort of like licenses in and of themselves, and as we progress with the CA, our welders licence gets updated, stamped with new HR, HL, C. classes for building new blocks.

"ALL HAIL OUR CA AI OVERLORD"

I mean I would argue that opening up interesting lore questions is a good thing, no? In fact, I'm relatively sure that's why they chose the term license for that very reason. Some Satisfactory "you are just another pawn in the FicSit chess board, you are not allowed to do X Y or Z" type thing. Or some Subnautica "you have used resources from the planet which belong to Alterra in order to escape the planet, so you shall now pay a billion dollars as a fine for misused company property". Fun questions = Interesting lore, generally. If they can back it up, at least

All tis is headcanon for all of us until they clarify. I'm only pointing out that by picking that terminology it leans heavily in that direction. it may or may not be intentional, but if it's unintentional and that's not the direction they are going they probably should know.

Frankly even if it was the CA being some AI overlord, then I want to know if I can join the renegades and be able to build what I want when I want. No issues with having to unlock things along the way, but even then I'd enjoy having all these schematics on datapads that could be traded also. "Here let me make a datapad with the schematics for the medium cargo container' sounds more fun than 'sorry I'd teach you how to make a medium cargo container but it would violate my license agreement'

lol become a black market dealer in unlicenced blueprints

I think we just need a different word than "license", license insinuates that permission to obtain and build the items, that it can be revoked, and that there are penalties to doing so outside the scope of the license.

As there is no ability to "manually craft things without a blueprint" (see Green Hell as an example of having to discover blueprints by literately tying rocks to a stick), it's probably more correct groups of items "schematic libraries" and single tools/upgrades "schematics". If SE2 wants to go down the path of letting players discover how to build things in their own, it would still require some kind of crafting "minigame" of putting the required quantities of resources up, and the suit/backpack going "invalid combination" and destroying the materials if the types are incorrect, and returning excess materials if the quantities are wrong.

However I feel that would not be a very interesting game mechanic unless things were discovered in a specific order, can't go putting 6kg of plutonium on the crafting table and make a demon core the second you find uranium.

That said, if we want to stick to lore reasons, then there should be no renegades. Since a license permits making things, then revoking the license should render renegade bases unable to manufacture ammo and fuel. So clearly that's not the word that best fits.

If we want to keep the renegade lore then there needs to be a way to acquire everything without a license (eg black market or piracy) but that also would require some specific kinds of "pirate" production blocks that allow the player to build "everything" ad-hoc, so instead of a 100% resource-to-resource assembly, certain items made on pirate production line, don't produce the same quantities and do not connect to a licensed production machines. Probably the easiest way to make this work is to give "pirate" versions of blocks a different "shape" conveyer tube (eg instead of a "rounded square" that has two doors, it's a "circle-in-a-square" with an dilating aperture. Thus only a difference in texture would be needed. Anything "unlicensed" can't be "built" with licensed tools, so no backpack building pirate production machinery, you have to use a pre-built production machines that self-assembles themselves, bought from renegade/pirate bases.

I'm overthinking it. We don't really know what direction the lore goes. My personal opinion is that schematic/schematic library implies it's data that is loaded into the tools instead of a permission structure.

I just don't like the implications of being restricted not by a lack of space buddy knowledge and discovery, but instead because some AI overlord says I can't. Even if that turns out to be lore, it really changes the underlying feel of what 'Space Engineering' means. My Space Buddy isn't learning anything, isn't discovering new technology through exploration and experimentation, they are only being doled out 'licenses' and my magic backpack and magic welder is really the engineer. I guess that's why this is sticking in my craw a little.

SE1 your space buddy learned by making something and unlocking new things as you went along. If I learned it, I didn't need permission to use that knowledge.

Personally, I'd prefer some level of trial-and-error/experimentation, but as we all know gamers will just look up a wiki/gamefaq/walkthru the second they are done experimenting. Hence some underlying chemistry/physics knowledge would be required to know "yes those things go together".

I'll reference green hell again, The way the game does this is very basic to the point of infuriating, because it tries to be "survival hard". Which is fine when you're using a hand-crafted map and fixed unchanging recipes to make everything. Everything you learned the first time, you can reuse that knowledge the second time.

In a game that uses procedural generation and dynamic event generation, leads naturally to the idea that different planets have different environments/materials/gravity/atmosphere and certain materials can not be made or manufactured in specific environments. Maybe you need a "clean room" for certain materials (eg high end electronics), maybe you need a radiation hardened room when dealing with unstable materials like large reactor rooms and radioactive material storage units. Maybe certain things explode if the ship gets bumped around without an ALS(Automatic Landing System.)

Like I'm all for "discover by doing", but I feel that should be an alternate means to discover the material/schematics earlier, and not supplant how it currently works. One way to ensure the materials remain the same so people don't just go to a wiki and discover every everything in an hour, is to require that experimentation step to not fail. Chemical formula balance in a real world thing, so it makes sense to just randomly determine a quantity it wants and the player has to figure out what quantities of the input make that.

Eg to "make water"

Molar mass of the hydrogen atoms =2g/mol

Molar mass of oxygen =16g/mol

So to get the value the system would "want" would have to be either 1kg Hydrogen and 8kg Oxygen = 9kg of liquid water (36g/mol) in a 1.0 atmosphere. Or if you want "ice", look up "phases of ice" if you want to know this is not always the case. For the intent in the game we're just assuming "Ice I"

So whatever goes into the experiment, has to be the same ratio, but the experiment randomly picks a quantity to succeed, you can't just make 1kg at a time until it flips a flag, you have to make "at least X kg in one try"

Same for any other thing you want to learn how to make without getting the "license".

Anyway that's just a way to open the door to "renegade" options. I'm not sure if that's in scope for this game.

You guys still beating this horse? Why do you think the license is revokable. The license could be either enabled in the welder, or a smart card on the characters suit. How would be CA remotely revoke a license from the renegades. Feels like you guys are talking as if the welder communicates with a CA wirelessly across the universe.

License = Politics

Schematic = Trade

Because words mean things.

License means having permission to participate in an activity. We know IRL people will ignore it, hence a renegade. People drive without a license, people drive without their vehicle plates. That all comes with a risk of authorities treating you like a car thief. You can apply that to weapons IRL as well.

If it's a schematic, blueprint, plans, etc, all these indicate that that no permission was needed, rather it was a commercial exchange (even if that exchange was 0$) Nothing else in the game matters or cares. But the terminology implies something true of the game world that the game lore suggests but doesn't let the player participate in.

It won't hurt the game to use a more accurate word, but if they are using "license" then why do renegades exist.

And yes, the CA can/should be able to remotely revoke a license, since clearly it can deny YOU no matter where you are.

And to add to that, the CA does already actively deny your ability to modify/add blocks to remote structures you don't own saying essentially that I do not have permission to modify this base. This means that the CA does communicate to your welder and can shut it off when you do something it doesn't allow.

I'm no psychologist, but reading these replies feels like you folks are in fact more against the lore rather than the term license.

Kisai: "license insinuates that permission to obtain and build the items", "License means having permission to participate in an activity"

Josh: "License = Politics"

Wilhelm: "I just don't like the implications of being restricted not by a lack of space buddy knowledge and discovery, but instead because some AI overlord says I can't"

As I said, from the campaign/story/scenario, whatever you want to call it, we are part of an expedition, we belong to a faction, whether that faction is infact a government/corporation/state, we belong to an organization. That organization gives us jobs to do, and in turn unlocks tech (licenses).

You don't like it? There's this thing called classic survival, you don't belong to anything, you're a random dude in his underwear in a space suit, and there's no progression because there's no central authority.

But as long as you are playing the story/scenario, there is a central authority, and it grants you licenses to build things as you "progress". Deal with it, or open a new ticket asking for "politics" and "authority" to be removed from the story line.

I'm also not sure if we're just thinking two different ways, or a lack of creative thinking, but we already have the tech to do this today. The welder gets "licenses" to permit it to build things, and it checks grid ownership before allowing you to weld. None of those things require this mystical "remote access" you guys are on about. The renegades were once good guys, unlock their licenses and then f***ed off. Show me one place in this game currently where something can be "revoked" from you, remotely. Think of it as a smart card linked to your biometrics or something. Besides that, it's not just the welder, the holographic build system is in fact what prevents you from building things, I think you can weld anything that's placed.

Someone said schematic is something you can trade. Yes, it is, and we can't trade them, so why use that term. It's also too close to "blueprint" IMHO so it's not that great either. The licenses allows you to build/print the modules, a blueprint is a large collection of those together forming something. The "license" unlocks the schematic, hence: progression.

FYI reading my own post it sounds a bit harsh with the "You don't like it" and "Deal with it" clauses. It wasn't meant to come out that way, it was way more light hearted in my head as I wrote it ;) Apologies if so, I can't seem to edit it.

Free my welder! Join the renegade alliance!

(excellent points)

Side point, if it's controlled by the CA, then how are there renegades at all? Clearly the CA should revoke their licenses and they'd be stuck with rubbing sticks together to make space fire.

Or they have an alternate way to build things, and how do I tap into that? :)