A plea for FD to focus next on balancing -maintenance- costs for larger ships

[starry]

But combat pilots don't earn that much, because they prefer fighting to trading. Pythons are multi-role ships that should be owned by traders who like fighting, but Vipers are owned by people who like fighting and don't care about trading. Cobras are either used as a bridge to larger trade ships, or by pirates (who also don't like trading, 'duh).

So, the real TTR should be based on what the ships are actually used for, not what they *could* be used for. Not everyone wants to be forced to trade an so trade cr/t/hr ratios should not be used as the only way to balance the ship costs.

Edit:

...why don't you bring up the same calculation with a t9 for python? according to your calculations, i can make they rebuy for the python in a t9 in 20 minutes.

Exactly!

 

[Jordan Cobalt]

I like having reasons to have more than one ship in game. An even scaling in power, earning or otherwise, would remove that need.

Except the way it is now, all it does is force you to trade so you can pay for your damage/insurance losses.

 

[darshu]

sorry for typing, on phone
fair calculation, it is steeper. but if you bring up "a t6 can earn money for a cobra", why don't you bring up the same calculation with a t9 for python? according to your calculations, i can make they rebuy for the python in a t9 in 20 minutes.
DOES.TOTALLY.SCALE.

you can make 10 mil in 20 minutes ? I've never heard of anyone making 50 mil a hour...

 

[Jordan Cobalt]

But combat pilots don't earn that much, because they prefer fighting to trading. Pythons are multi-role ships that should be owned by traders who like fighting, but Vipers are owned by people who like fighting and don't care about trading.

With your line of thinking every ship is a trade ship, except the eagle and viper. Out of 15 ships and 13 are used for some form of trading.

 

[Phier]

Except the way it is now, all it does is force you to trade so you can pay for your damage/insurance losses.

Thats really a content issue more than a ship issue. After cobra, and only if you didn't to rares in a cobra, you are always better off trading.

 

[sorenbro]

I agree that big ship balance should be the next balance pass, but I don't think its the maintenance that's the problem. It's lack of income scaling for big ships.

I hope so too.. Stronger NPCs but much more bounty for there killing.

And maybe a cargo net that can be loaded on a large hard point. That might help make pirating and mining more feasible for larger ships. but has the drawback of losing a large hardpoint weapon

 

[xaisis]

Flying Anaconda, and it is paying itself back just fine.

U are not supposed to die at the same rate as u do in a fighter, if u do that, u better stay in a fighter.

 

[bassman]

You and the above posters are missing the essential point:

It should not take 1-3 HOURS for any one player to recover from the same exact proportional damage when other players can recover from that same proportional damage in literally 5 minutes. That's not even close to balanced. If the big ships were ONLY for trading, your argument would hold water, but we have 3 big ships clearly designed for at least "multipurpose" combat

For someone who has just reached a smaller ship, the rebuy cost in time is not that dissimilar to yours, I do think though that some cost moderation is needed and I've already suggested an exponential cost curve for % damage vs per-unit price e.g first % damage costs say 1/5 th unit cost 99th % costs 5x unit cost and scale between those extremes.

 

[Jordan Cobalt]

I hope so too.. Stronger NPCs but much more bounty for there killing.

And maybe a cargo net that can be loaded on a large hard point. That might help make pirating and mining more feasible for larger ships. but has the drawback of losing a large hardpoint weapon

Good ideas,

Exploration could get more scanners that require larger internal slots. You'd make more money, if you had a large ship to equip them.

 

[xaisis]

I agree that big ship balance should be the next balance pass, but I don't think its the maintenance that's the problem. It's lack of income scaling for big ships.

I agree there, big ships need something to do.

Missions, Explorations and so on.

 

[Loskene]

I just think that the scaling is off, and agree that it needs a balance pass. You should be able to pay for at least your ship's running costs at each stage of your career with your chosen profession. At the moment that's only feasible up to an Asp, and even that pushes it if your profession is a low income one like exploration.
Basically, regardless of what ship you choose to fly, if you want anything big the only way to afford to keep it is to be a trader. What do you do if you want an Anaconda but want to pay to maintain it via bounty hunting or piracy? You can't, there's no alternative to trading that would cover the ridiculous minor damage fees. This is going to pinhole all of the big ships, regardless of their intended role, into being at least part time traders. If you don't submit to this requirement then your career will only cost you money instead of making it.
This problem will snowball if we get a large ship with similarly big running costs that has a (relatively) tiny cargo capacity.
I want to fly a clipper but I don't want to have to do a sudden career change from contract killer to trader once I get it.

 

[[VR] Frank_G]

I agree there, big ships need something to do.

Missions, Explorations and so on.

Hauling ships in trouble back to a space station would be a nice job for big ships... repair-modules fitted to it, providing basic repair services in deep space for a healthy sum of creds... that would be cool and unique to the big guys as they would be the only ships capable of carrying such large equipment and tons of spare parts.

 

[Poplin]

Viper: 22 cargo space x 16,000 cr/ton/hour = 352,000 cr/hour = 23 minutes to earn the insurance rebuy
Cobra: 60 cargo space x 16,000 cr/ton/hour = 960,000 cr/hour = 22 minutes to rebuy the Cobra (and only 9 minutes to rebuy the Viper)

Python: 272 cargo space x 16,000 cr/ton/hour = 4,352,000 cr/hour = 102 minutes to rebuy the Python

That's not good scaling for an ongoing maintenance cost.

Next consider that it's dirt easy and fast to get into a Cobra, and only a handful of hours from there to move into a T6. Most people can _easily_ earn at T6/Asp rates with very little time invested. The T6/Asp can fund their Viper/Cobra rebuys at the following rate

T6: 100 cargo space x 16,000 cr/ton/hour = 1,600,000 cr/hour = 5 minutes to rebuy a Viper, and 13 minutes to rebuy a Cobra.

So _most_ players are going to be able to fully rebuy their Viper/Cobra in 5 to 13 minutes, while Python owners require 102 minutes per rebuy. DOES. NOT. SCALE.

Then taking a look at my Anaconda's rebuy cost.

Anaconda: 436 cargo space x 16,000 cr/ton/hour = 6,976,000 cr/hour = 155 minutes to be my Anaconda at 18 mil.

So even further proves your point about not scaling.

 

[starry]

With your line of thinking every ship is a trade ship, except the eagle and viper. Out of 15 ships and 13 are used for some form of trading.

I think that's a true statement, but the OPs assumption was that *every* ship is a trade ship and that cr/t/hr was therefore a valid metric by which to judge them. I think that approach misses the point, which is that some ships are not used for trade and will not earn as much as if they were. Nobody trying to min/max cr/hr is going to buy a Viper, nobody.

 

[darshu]

Flying Anaconda, and it is paying itself back just fine.

U are not supposed to die at the same rate as u do in a fighter, if u do that, u better stay in a fighter.

It seems like you assume all pvp is 1v1. It clearly isn't and when wings come out it will be even more frequent to be out numbered. I'm not saying that is a bad thing but when you die 3 times in a A rated python setup for pvp it's equal to dying 60 times or more in a viper. That's just 3 times in a open pvp game. That is not going to encourage diversity imo. It is going to make people who don't want to spend 2 days trading for every day of pvp they play fly in vipers. The cost of running big ships hurts the ship diversity in pvp and most people will be running vipers and cobras with some niche players that are willing to punish themselves on a far greater level for any hull damage or deaths that occur.

If they lowered the cost of running to something more reasonable for large ships we would probably see things like type 9 turret boats floating through the battlefield or pirates flying something more respectable like a clipper. That's a more likeable version of the game then 90% of people in ships they earned on the first day or so of playing, not because they cant afford to fly a large ship but because it's much more efficient.

 

[Skuli]

I posted this in the suggestions forum:

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=113105&p=1757723#post1757723

I don't really know that NEVER losing your purchased ship is a good idea, but maybe there's some correlary argument here.

Maybe ships shouldn't actually be destroyed; maybe a player ship, upon destruction, is simply recreated at 1% hull at the station you last visited, and you have to pay the repair costs rather than ship insurance. In the event you can't afford the repair cost, you've still essentially lost the ship (what use is a 1% hull anaconda?) and may have to choose to restart in a sidewinder.

That, alongside paying insurance only on upgraded components as suggested in that thread I linked might go a long way to balancing risk vs. reward and keep larger ships more viable and sustainable from a cost perspective, although that may not actually be a good thing!

 

[flynnmichael81]

I'm of the opposite opinion to the op. I think larger ships need to cost more to run, especially the big trade-only ships. I fly a Python and a Viper, and I really wish there were more reasons for me to jump in the Viper but even after the balance the Python is way too good. I don't want to see it balanced down more in stats but increasing running costs would be a good way to make me fly the viper more!

 

[Putok]

Rebuy costs are fine IMHO, but other operating costs could use some tweaking. Repair costs are really silly.

I think repair costs should be based on the damage repaired in tonage.

In other words, a 1000T ship that suffered 4% damage (40T) would pay the same to repair it as a 100T ship that suffered 40% damage.

Optional cargo insurance would be nice to. Perhaps five players with a certain trade rank the option to purchase an "upgrade" for a few million to allow cargo rebuy on ship destruction.

 

[sorenbro]

Good ideas,

Exploration could get more scanners that require larger internal slots. You'd make more money, if you had a large ship to equip them.

Ya maybe scanners that will better read asteroid field find out what type of metals have.. Or probes and find out what type of gas gas giants are made of. all information that could be very valuable to Miner's.

 

[Belsameth]

I think that's a true statement, but the OPs assumption was that *every* ship is a trade ship and that cr/t/hr was therefore a valid metric by which to judge them. I think that approach misses the point, which is that some ships are not used for trade and will not earn as much as if they were. Nobody trying to min/max cr/hr is going to buy a Viper, nobody.

It is a metric to use. Whichever metric you use tho, combat, trading, exploring or a combination comes down to the same thing.
I can rebuy my Viper with the income of not even an hour bounty hunting at he NAV. My Pyhon on, on the other hand, costs more when I have a mere 20% hull damage.