u/arekku255 — reddlx

Tensionslop

Something I've noticed recently is that Voyage seems more keen to manufacture tension and conflict than I remembered.

When I started playing, Hollis was actually useful, he did his technobabble for a couple of turns and then the situation was resolved.

But recently, he and other NPCs have started carrying the tension ball, generating tension for the sake of generating tension I guess? For Hollis this manifests as paranoia about everything that could go wrong.

In the case of the receptionist, it manifested as an intent to threaten to call security. Which conflicted with the players intent to incapacitate security.

Player incapacitates security, which does not invalidate the intent so the receptionist then delivers the stale intent. Whatever could be an issue with a stale intent, surely they are not going to double down?

Of course they did, at this point a stale intent is no longer a plausible explanation. No rational agent with self preservation should generate this intent while the building is literally collapsing around them, unless you are trying to maximize tension.

(So anyway I took the blast door and left)

u/arekku255 — 12 days ago

▲ 7 r/Voyage

Roll over unused pool

When the usage pool resets, can we get it rolling over into the new period with a 105% cap?

Instead of:
current_pool←weekly_cap
Can we get?
current_pool←⌊/0 current_pool+1.05 1×weekly_cap

reddit.com

u/arekku255 — 24 days ago

▲ 17 r/Voyage

Short term tension vs long term agency

The AI is excellent at making every individual quest interesting. The problem is what happens after you win.

For example, over the course of the campaign I've:

sabotaged the pirates' fuel lines
trashed their command center
destroyed their listening station
destroyed their smuggling station
destroyed their refueling station

As a player, I expected those victories to add up.

Not necessarily to end the campaign, but at least to change the strategic situation. If you systematically dismantle a pirate organization's infrastructure, I'd expect pirate activity in that region to drop dramatically.

Where do I refuel?
Where do I sell my loot?
Where do I find targets?

Instead, after destroying their refueling station, the next plot hook is investigating a shell company that's secretly supplying them with fuel. From the player's perspective, it seems like every time I remove a capability, the story introduces another reason the same faction can continue operating at full strength.

It feels like the AI is optimizing for immediate tension ("there should always be another threat") at the expense of long-term satisfaction ("my actions permanently changed the world").

It's like the pirates signed a deal with the narrator for exclusive villain rights.

reddit.com

u/arekku255 — 25 days ago

▲ 2 r/Voyage