Hooray for new ship. \o/

[Greasetrap42]

New ships? Fantastic!!!!

Does this mean when the ships get released the forums get another pile of "collecting eng mats too grindy" threads?

No excuse for cmdrs to not unlock engineers, fill up their eng bins, and load up on credits well in advance!

I suppose this means I need to think about returning to human space.

 

[metatheurgist]

Not gonna lie. The engineering loop was the first thing I thought of when I saw it. Sometimes I secretly wish they'll suck so I won't bother (worked for the Mamba).

 

[aRJay]

New ships? Fantastic!!!!

Does this mean when the ships get released the forums get another pile of "collecting eng mats too grindy" threads?

No excuse for cmdrs to not unlock engineers, fill up their eng bins, and load up on credits well in advance!

I suppose this means I need to think about returning to human space.

No need for new threads all the hundreds of old ones are still going or being necroed.

 

[Darrack]

Not gonna lie. The engineering loop was the first thing I thought of when I saw it. Sometimes I secretly wish they'll suck so I won't bother (worked for the Mamba).

Unless they come up with anything silly i have a shed load of engineered stuff on my carrier.

O7

 

[Shurimal]

Well I'll go with NASA's opinion if you don't mind!

I think I figured it out: precursors to Space Shuttle were pure lifting bodies, a lot of research about it was done in the early development stages. Eventually requirements for high crossrange were introduced by the Air Force and pure lifting body design was not able to achieve this due to low lift-to-drag ratios. So large delta wings were added to increase lift and the early lifting body concept was ditched.

That NASA page was probably written by some public relations writer who got confused by the early lifting bodies shuttle prototypes (M2-F1 through 3, HL-10, HL-20) and maybe new lifting body developments (Dream Chaser). This definition of lifting body:

A lifting body is a specially constructed spacecraft that cannot launch under its own power, but needs additional rocket engines for thrust.

is also nonsensical, by that definition Sputnik-1 was a lifting body. A proper definition (lazily copy-pasted from Wikipedia because why reinvent a wheel) would be:

A lifting body is a fixed-wing aircraft or spacecraft configuration in which the body itself produces lift.

But this all is getting abysmally off-topic now; let's get back to new ships in Elite

 

[Commander Biscuit]

It looks great, but I cant unsee that it's just a Python with the rear end of another ship bolted on.

 

[metatheurgist]

Uhh, yeah. That's what makes it a python variant.

 

[Chrystoph]

By Grabthars hammer, what a ship !

When all else fails, lower your expectations...

 

[Mark Zero]

I never thought I'd do this, but I am going to borrow an argument / point from those who criticise those (like me) who want ship interiors ... what new gameplay will it bring? Just being a new ship / variant for the sake of being a new ship / variant, is not going to bring back players or keep them and new players playing the game.

Coming back to this forever later, but I have an answer for you:

With acknowledgement to the fact that Arf is saying that the Python II is going to have some kind of functional difference from other ships in the game (I have no idea what that means yet, so it isn't relevant to this point), what new gameplay will it bring?

None. It's a dashboard and a set of different stats. And that's my point.

People have gone on and on and on about how we haven't had a new ship for five whole years and if Frontier would just release new ships in their spaceship game everyone would come running back because they've finally received new content!

But they haven't, because (omitting an actual fundamental difference in function as teased by Arf) all a new ship is in Elite Dangerous is a cockpit with the same dashboard as every other ship in the game, a loadout of hardpoints and module slots, and a set of base stats. That's it. That's all any ship in the game is. It doesn't bring any new gameplay aside from "how will I use these stats to do what I'm already doing?"

In the same light; ship interiors are not new gameplay either. It's a set of hallways. That's it. It's the same "gameplay" as walking around inside your fleet carrier or walking around a station concourse. It's an internal space with maybe some menus for you to interact with. That's it.

You wanna know what was an actual expansion of gameplay content? The Thargoid War. A massive, dynamic system of updated and new gameplay loops that changed the way we engage and interact with Thargoids and with hundreds of systems in the bubble. New enemy ships with new behavior, new missions to do, new on-foot content, new assets, new structures, new new new. And if I'm to believe forums and comment sections everyone hated it.

Powerplay 2.0 will also be an update/expansion of gameplay content. And I imagine there will be a whole lot of "this isn't what I want" aimed at that too.

 

[tolm]

Coming back to this forever later, but I have an answer for you:

With acknowledgement to the fact that Arf is saying that the Python II is going to have some kind of functional difference from other ships in the game (I have no idea what that means yet, so it isn't relevant to this point), what new gameplay will it bring?

None. It's a dashboard and a set of different stats. And that's my point.

People have gone on and on and on about how we haven't had a new ship for five whole years and if Frontier would just release new ships in their spaceship game everyone would come running back because they've finally received new content!

But they haven't, because (omitting an actual fundamental difference in function as teased by Arf) all a new ship is in Elite Dangerous is a cockpit with the same dashboard as every other ship in the game, a loadout of hardpoints and module slots, and a set of base stats. That's it. That's all any ship in the game is. It doesn't bring any new gameplay aside from "how will I use these stats to do what I'm already doing?"

In the same light; ship interiors are not new gameplay either. It's a set of hallways. That's it. It's the same "gameplay" as walking around inside your fleet carrier or walking around a station concourse. It's an internal space with maybe some menus for you to interact with. That's it.

You wanna know what was an actual expansion of gameplay content? The Thargoid War. A massive, dynamic system of updated and new gameplay loops that changed the way we engage and interact with Thargoids and with hundreds of systems in the bubble. New enemy ships with new behavior, new missions to do, new on-foot content, new assets, new structures, new new new. And if I'm to believe forums and comment sections everyone hated it.

Powerplay 2.0 will also be an update/expansion of gameplay content. And I imagine there will be a whole lot of "this isn't what I want" aimed at that too.

I didn’t hate the Thargoid war … until they moved the goalposts enough times that I was no longer able to do the parts of it I enjoyed.

I’m hoping the new ships will open up some options for re-engaging - along with whatever the most recent CG is going to eventually result in.

 

[BDelacroix]

I didn't hate the thargoid war. A great many people don't.
I stopped when it became a game for xeno dermotologists.

 

[metatheurgist]

I didn't hate, but it became such an arcane exercise in weird things to do I just lost interest.

 

[St0rmFury]

Yeah, I don't hate the thargoid war either. Took part in it for a couple of months. Gibbed a lot of cyclopes, liberated HIP 23716 (Wakata forever!), but I ran out of juice.

I also engaged in the later thargoid content like titan sampling, kidnapped humans rescue, spires and found them pretty interesting as well but also ran out of juice.

If this was FDev's intention to convey a sense of hopelessness when fighting against an alien race that do not know the meaning of surrender, it's working for me haha.

Anyway, I'll be squashing a different species of bugs in a few days. Join me in Helldivers 2, for Super Earth!!! <gulps liber-tea>

 

[Jmanis]

I didn't hate the thargoid war. A great many people don't.
I stopped when it became a game for xeno dermotologists.

Fwiw... i love tissue sampling in general. I don't like tissue sampling in the context of what it means for the Thargoid war.

It's just such an "Elite" thing to go "oh, you enjoy this? Guess you want to do it a hundred times over then!".

Repetition works for things like kill tallies, bulk trading etc where "making the number go up" is the focus[1]. But things like salvage, tissue sampling etc, the focus is on the activity... tissue sampling would be better as an adjunct-to the main efforts which has a worthwhile, materiel effect, but maybe (an individual) only needs to do it once a cycle or something.

[1] not to say multiple times is necessarily a bad thing, but the numbers need to be realistic... it's the old issue of CGs being filled by majority with a single type of the five requested goods, instead of a fair distribution of all goods.

 

[metatheurgist]

Anyway, I'll be squashing a different species of bugs in a few days. Join me in Helldivers 2, for Super Earth!!! <gulps liber-tea>

I'll be launching my pod when I get around to upgrading the PC. Just can't be bothered atm.

 

[Rat Catcher]

People have gone on and on and on about how we haven't had a new ship for five whole years and if Frontier would just release new ships in their spaceship game everyone would come running back because they've finally received new content!

But they haven't, because (omitting an actual fundamental difference in function as teased by Arf) all a new ship is in Elite Dangerous is a cockpit with the same dashboard as every other ship in the game, a loadout of hardpoints and module slots, and a set of base stats. That's it. That's all any ship in the game is. It doesn't bring any new gameplay aside from "how will I use these stats to do what I'm already doing?"

Gamers (as a generality) appear to always want something more than that which they have in any particular game - even here there was some excitement about "Elite Feet" until they appeared in Odyssey, then it transpired that, for some, therse were not the feet they wanted...

The cry for more ships has been common, or interiors for all ships, and, I'd guess, the very same "not what I meant" will be uttered whatever appears...

I tend to agree with a comment elsewhere - Odyssey has had nothing but scraps thrown at it, and it was a full-price expansioon, so:
"I'm outraged at no new suits, it's been nearly 3 years and not a single new suit!!! I don't want any stinking new ships in my first person on foot in space shooter!"

(Tongue thoroughly in cheek, BTW )

 

[Ashnak]

With acknowledgement to the fact that Arf is saying that the Python II is going to have some kind of functional difference from other ships in the game

It will be the Fed's reply to the Imperial Clipper: a medium ship that requires a large pad.

Kraits, Cobra and Sidey certainly are shaped like lifting bodies, but they might not be perfect due to other factors like stability and drag.

For drag, you'll need some SciFi handwavium (air shields?). For stability, some massive computational power should be sufficient (see canard configuration).

 

[Shurimal]

For drag, you'll need some SciFi handwavium (air shields?).

Enough thrust covereth a multitude of aerodynamic sins. Our ships obviously have massive thrust, so aerodynamics only become a real problem when you're forced to glide, and Space Shuttle demonstrates that your spaceship doesn't need to be that good of a glider to make a safe landing.

For stability, some massive computational power should be sufficient (see canard configuration).

Nah, an Arduino would be plenty. We had FBW in 1970-s (F-16), you don't need that much raw computing power. Redundancy, low latency and real-time OS are more important.

 

[Greasetrap42]

I am excited for new ships but will be disappointed if the new ship variants are designed specifically for the Thargoid war.

Even if they can be used elsewhere, but it doesn't make much sense. Specialty ships designed for obvious singular purpose and not much value elsewhere except for novelty purpose.

 

[AEBRAM]

The news about new ships coming out is pretty awesome. The Python mk2 looks pretty cool.

I am secretly hoping and would love to buy an Alliance (Large) class ship e.g. a super-sized Chieftan with the Alliance signature superior maneuverability in their other ships. My imagination can run wild on ship specs.

The Imperial Panther would be nice. I thought they sort of broke the Imperial Clipper with its hardpoint placement. Maybe they can shift those wing hardpoints closer to centerline? The Clipper is a great ship and the nuances with the wing hardpoints was a disappointment by putting its class 3 hardpoint in the worse convergence location.

I would love to see the Crusader get some adjustments on its speed and maneuverability and maybe get a replace the top c2 hardpoint and center c1 with a 2nd c3 Large hardpoint. Something to bring the ship into some better glory days.

I also would love to more options for a medium class ship with a Huge hardpoint than the FDL or Mamba. The FDL and Mambas are great medium class shield tank-y ships, so maybe a hull armor beast with Huge hardpoint.

Either way. I am excited about the new ships and would like to know more on their release dates.