Ships Small ships' niche in the metagame

[wstephenson]

As the game currently stands, the smaller ships (anything smaller than a Cobra, really) are only a stepping stone to the big ones, which practically outperform them in every regard - combat, trading, realspace speed, jump range, cost of maintenance+fuel/income potential. Players choosing smaller ships are either new, or eccentrics who drive Peugeot 205 Rallyes and Abarth 500s IRL. The only theoretical advantage smaller ships have is that they are scanned for contraband by authorities around stations less frequently, but in practice, a large ship can run into a station at top speed and never be scanned. The Eagle's top manoeuvrability does not make it a viable combat ship against equally good player pilots.

To give the game the diversity that its physical scale deserves, small ships should have a distinct niche in the game's mechanics that makes them attractive for some tasks to players of all levels. Otherwise, why are there so many Elite NPCs burbling around in Sidewinders and Eagles? They can't all have fallen on hard times. Did they have their pilot's license endorsed against flying larger classes for their crimes?

Some ideas:

• Supercruise visibility could be a function of ship mass and velocity as well as a travel time horizon. This would make small ships and slow harder to spot in SC, making them better blockade runners (hello, or rather goodbye, pirate groups!) and also sneakier pirates*.
• Real space visibility could be made larger for larger craft, making smaller ones sneakier in a knife fight.
• Larger craft could be subject to much more aggressive authority interdiction and scanning on arrival, in SC and in station vicinities. Faction/government type dependent?
• Cost of repair and maintenance could be returned to where it was in 1.0, so you have to be playing well to afford the upkeep of big ships; small ships are more forgiving of their owners. The hull integrity degradation rate could be higher for larger craft, as they face more strain from frame-shifting.
• Trade taxes, like the bulk trade levy, could be rebalanced to give small craft a better margin. But run for run, large ships will still make more profit.
• Capital ship and station weaponry should be much more effective against larger craft.
• Increase Supercruise fuel consumption on large ships; make small ships better scouts/faster explorers

* As you've probably guessed, I'm a fan of small ships with loud exhausts, and I'd like to see a reason for FD to add the Mamba, Krait and Gecko to ED.

 

[Hellhawk666]

You raise some interesting ideas.

The value of the small ships is certainly mainly as stepping stones but, as many have proved, the Sidewinder is one tough and versatile little craft. Lack of cargo space is it's big issue. The Adder and Hauler have legs as budget exploration ships when stripped down. The Eagle is pretty much my least favourite ship, what with its tinfoil fuselage, but in that case certainly a very low radar profile would make it a more interesting proposition. It would be amusing if a wing of 4 Eagles was something to be genuinely worried about

 

[ethelred]

It'd be good if unique modules could be added to smaller ships, such as:-

smuggling modules to to haulers/adders for reduced visibility

super boost modules to sideys & Eagles (essentially for a hot hatch) or larger thrusters.

Hopefully with the new or forthcoming missions there will be a stealth requirement which would suit smaller ships too

 

[wstephenson]

The value of the small ships is certainly mainly as stepping stones but, as many have proved, the Sidewinder is one tough and versatile little craft. Lack of cargo space is it's big issue. The Adder and Hauler have legs as budget exploration ships when stripped down. The Eagle is pretty much my least favourite ship, what with its tinfoil fuselage, but in that case certainly a very low radar profile would make it a more interesting proposition. It would be amusing if a wing of 4 Eagles was something to be genuinely worried about

Thanks. As you say, the Sidey is a great craft, but is equalled or exceeded by others. During the Lugh campaign I was role-playing a pirate in a Sidey, shooting out cargo hatches from incoming weapons freighters. It was great fun, but the choice is only for emotional reasons. If anyone wants to join a 'Legion of Kobolds' Sidewinder pirate group, PM me.

 

[Defacto]

I think that it is planned to reduce the scanner visibility for small ships. This makes sense, since they have lower power outputs and so produce less heat.
It's also a great way to make small ships useful as something more than a stepping stone, while still having some incentive to get the larger, more expensive ships.

I also think that the Eagle (and possibly the Sidewinder) should be faster. They're so light and fragile, I don't really see the reason for why they would be so much slower than the Cobra or the Viper.

For mid-level traders like the Type 6, there's not really much reason other than budget to pick them now, but if the medium traders are less visible than the big ones, and also maybe have a larger jump range, I think that they would be useful while there still would be a reason to go for the really large traders.

More complexity, considerations and features in general also helps. The more niches and variations that there are, the easier it will be to give all ship a useful role.

 

[Arubeto]

As the game currently stands, the smaller ships (anything smaller than a Cobra, really) are only a stepping stone to the big ones, which practically outperform them in every regard - combat, trading, realspace speed, jump range, cost of maintenance+fuel/income potential. Players choosing smaller ships are either new, or eccentrics who drive Peugeot 205 Rallyes and Abarth 500s IRL. The only theoretical advantage smaller ships have is that they are scanned for contraband by authorities around stations less frequently, but in practice, a large ship can run into a station at top speed and never be scanned. The Eagle's top manoeuvrability does not make it a viable combat ship against equally good player pilots.

To give the game the diversity that its physical scale deserves, small ships should have a distinct niche in the game's mechanics that makes them attractive for some tasks to players of all levels. Otherwise, why are there so many Elite NPCs burbling around in Sidewinders and Eagles? They can't all have fallen on hard times. Did they have their pilot's license endorsed against flying larger classes for their crimes?

As much as I agree with you that greater diversity in player flown craft would be fitting for the vast galaxy ED provides, I still can't completely wrap my head around what this would mean. If with some tweaking the Eagle would suddenly stand a chance against for example a Vulture - given both pilots have comparable skill - what would the incentive be to upgrade to larger vessels later in the game? It seems natural that the Vulture has a combat advantage over the the Eagle, that the Type 6 has a trading advantage over the Hauler, that the Asp is a better explorer than the Adder. If this wouldn't be the case, there would be outrage on the forums about the big ships not being viable upgrades anymore.

For me that's not an issue, since - as I stated - I agree with you and value variety over perfectly deterministic ship "progress". But many players on the forum seem to think otherwise, being more concerned about perfect ship loadouts, value for money, optimization etc.

Some ideas:

• Supercruise visibility could be a function of ship mass and velocity as well as a travel time horizon. This would make small ships and slow harder to spot in SC, making them better blockade runners (hello, or rather goodbye, pirate groups!) and also sneakier pirates*.
• Real space visibility could be made larger for larger craft, making smaller ones sneakier in a knife fight.
• Larger craft could be subject to much more aggressive authority interdiction and scanning on arrival, in SC and in station vicinities. Faction/government type dependent?
• Cost of repair and maintenance could be returned to where it was in 1.0, so you have to be playing well to afford the upkeep of big ships; small ships are more forgiving of their owners. The hull integrity degradation rate could be higher for larger craft, as they face more strain from frame-shifting.
• Trade taxes, like the bulk trade levy, could be rebalanced to give small craft a better margin. But run for run, large ships will still make more profit.
• Capital ship and station weaponry should be much more effective against larger craft.
• Increase Supercruise fuel consumption on large ships; make small ships better scouts/faster explorers

* As you've probably guessed, I'm a fan of small ships with loud exhausts, and I'd like to see a reason for FD to add the Mamba, Krait and Gecko to ED.

That's a nice bunch of interesting ideas. The idea of smaller craft being harder to spot is in line with them being scanned not as often as the big ships which has already been implemented but is - as you said - largely irrelevant because it's too easy to avoid being scanned with any ship atm.
The main advantage of more expensive ships (expensive T9 being a better trader than the cheaper T7) could remain unchanged while giving the smaller and cheaper ships some added utility or - and that is the keyword in your post, IMHO - niche advantage. The expensive ships would still perform better for the main activities like trading, combat and exploration than their cheaper brethren, but the small ships could fill special - again - niche roles like smuggling, espionage (if it's implemented some day), VIP transport (once we have passenger missions). I'd like to see that!

 

[Ceekay]

How about racing for the smaller ships? stripped out Sidey's and Eagles with a different range of thruster modules racing in asteroid circuits or a purpose built course.

Adding active/passive stealth to reduce their signature even further allowing them to plant mines or launch torpedoes against capital/large ships.

Better sensor packages and low observability upgrades so they can act as scout/spy ships (could spawn a whole range of missions)

 

[Poseidal]

As much as I agree with you that greater diversity in player flown craft would be fitting for the vast galaxy ED provides, I still can't completely wrap my head around what this would mean. If with some tweaking the Eagle would suddenly stand a chance against for example a Vulture - given both pilots have comparable skill - what would the incentive be to upgrade to larger vessels later in the game? It seems natural that the Vulture has a combat advantage over the the Eagle, that the Type 6 has a trading advantage over the Hauler, that the Asp is a better explorer than the Adder. If this wouldn't be the case, there would be outrage on the forums about the big ships not being viable upgrades anymore.

In theory, the 'larger' (more expensive?) ship could be more forgiving, easier and a bit better, but the smaller one could have an edge which when exploited could be used to great effect by a good pilot. Even if the bigger ship is generally better, having the smaller ship having something it can do better will be more interesting IMO.

 

[jgm]

It's a shame (and I have to admit a bit of a surprise) that FD didn't think this through. I think that the easiest way that FD could salvage something exciting from the current mess is to have different effectiveness of different classes of weapon against different classes of shield, hull, module and hardpoint.

For example, small weapons would be accurate but not so powerful: fine against smaller ships but when taking on larger ships not very useful to take down shields or hull, but handy to take out hardpoints. Large weapons would be the opposite: too slow to track small ships effectively (although if they hit they would do serious damage) or to accurately hit any ship's modules or hardpoints, but good for taking down shields and hull.

This would give a reason to create a wing with mixed ships: the larger ships to make targets vulnerable and the smaller ships to take out hardpoints, power plant or whatever. The combination of large and small ship would be better than two large or two small ships in terms of overall effectiveness.

 

[wstephenson]

As much as I agree with you that greater diversity in player flown craft would be fitting for the vast galaxy ED provides, I still can't completely wrap my head around what this would mean. If with some tweaking the Eagle would suddenly stand a chance against for example a Vulture - given both pilots have comparable skill - what would the incentive be to upgrade to larger vessels later in the game?

I think you did get your head around it towards the bottom of my post. The keyword is niche; mice thrive even though they can't outfight a cat; a squadron of torpedo-armed Eagles against an undefended capital ship or Anaconda should be able to cause it serious damage.

It's a shame (and I have to admit a bit of a surprise) that FD didn't think this through. I think that the easiest way that FD could salvage something exciting from the current mess is to have different effectiveness of different classes of weapon against different classes of shield, hull, module and hardpoint.

For example, small weapons would be accurate but not so powerful: fine against smaller ships but when taking on larger ships not very useful to take down shields or hull, but handy to take out hardpoints. Large weapons would be the opposite: too slow to track small ships effectively (although if they hit they would do serious damage) or to accurately hit any ship's modules or hardpoints, but good for taking down shields and hull.

This would give a reason to create a wing with mixed ships: the larger ships to make targets vulnerable and the smaller ships to take out hardpoints, power plant or whatever. The combination of large and small ship would be better than two large or two small ships in terms of overall effectiveness.

That's an excellent idea! We have the existing "small weapons are penalized versus larger hull classes" rule, but IMO that just makes larger ships betterer. If a small weapon was needed for precision work - say opening cargo hatches, or disabling FSD prior to boarding, we'd see less emphasis on maximising alpha strike DPS across the board for all ships.

 

[Morlock5K]

I do like the idea of ship specific missions. Like going to system X and then scanning planet Y in a sidewinder without getting scanned and returning with the data, you could even be lent a specific build sidey to do the mission that has some special scanner that allows you to scan space stations or similar. There could also be massive repercussions if you just leg it with the ship and separate alternative missions where you steal this specific ship for your power!

 

[Reaver 2.0]

I do like the idea of ship specific missions. Like going to system X and then scanning planet Y in a sidewinder without getting scanned and returning with the data, you could even be lent a specific build sidey to do the mission that has some special scanner that allows you to scan space stations or similar. There could also be massive repercussions if you just leg it with the ship and separate alternative missions where you steal this specific ship for your power!

Reaver 2.0 approves this message. +rep

 

[Morlock5K]

Reaver 2.0 approves this message. +rep

Thank you. I think there is so much more they could do with missions, I can't wait for 1.3, "Let the Powers Play!"

 

[Petiu]

It'd be good if unique modules could be added to smaller ships, such as:-

smuggling modules to to haulers/adders for reduced visibility

super boost modules to sideys & Eagles (essentially for a hot hatch) or larger thrusters.

Hopefully with the new or forthcoming missions there will be a stealth requirement which would suit smaller ships too

I think it would be interesting to have a heat transformer (stealth) internal slot module that would favour smaller ships. It would reduce your heat level by a flat amount (an insignificant amount for larger ships but quite significant for smaller ships) and it would also increase power regeneration by a small amount (again insignificant for larger ships). You can activate it to provide reduced heat signature for a few minutes but it will go on cooldown eventually so you cannot use it all the time. It won't reduce you to zero heat but its effect lasts longer than the heat sink so it is better for scouting and smuggling.

 

[puca]

The adder is the best explorer ship for scanning. I agree with your larger point, though. Hopefully power play will add things for smaller ships to do.

 

[Brieus]

It really seems bassackwards to me that you can get a really huge jump range on the larger ships much easier than you can on the small ships.

 

[Fendalton]

It really seems bassackwards to me that you can get a really huge jump range on the larger ships much easier than you can on the small ships.

Why is that? Larger ship = larger space for internals, and a heavier mass for more accurate (assumingly) jumps.

Any game needs to have a tier system, where the Eagle and Hauler fall into a lower tier say to the Python and Asp. If the game was designed in such a way that an Eagle could be outfitted and compete in end-game content (or lack thereof) then what would the purpose be for other ships? There would need to be a line drawn somewhere, as I would not expect a fully A class Eagle (do we have a name for this yet?) to be able to wreck say a Python, it just wouldn't make sense.

 

[wstephenson]

Any game needs to have a tier system, where the Eagle and Hauler fall into a lower tier say to the Python and Asp. If the game was designed in such a way that an Eagle could be outfitted and compete in end-game content (or lack thereof) then what would the purpose be for other ships? There would need to be a line drawn somewhere, as I would not expect a fully A class Eagle (do we have a name for this yet?) to be able to wreck say a Python, it just wouldn't make sense.

Iron Ass Eagle.

That's not what we're asking for though - as you say, that would be ridiculous.

Rather than a purely linear tiering system to progress through, I'd rather that small ships had specialised niches where they were useful to everyone.

 

[Mephane]

Why is that? Larger ship = larger space for internals, and a heavier mass for more accurate (assumingly) jumps.

Any game needs to have a tier system, where the Eagle and Hauler fall into a lower tier say to the Python and Asp. If the game was designed in such a way that an Eagle could be outfitted and compete in end-game content (or lack thereof) then what would the purpose be for other ships? There would need to be a line drawn somewhere, as I would not expect a fully A class Eagle (do we have a name for this yet?) to be able to wreck say a Python, it just wouldn't make sense.

1. No, not every game needs a tier system.
2. If a game has a tier system, that could also occur within each playstyle, not by swapping them out for another. Let me explain with an analogy:

Imagine an RPG where levelling up means you have to change from a warrior into a mage because a mage is a better, more powerful, higher tier class. Wouldn't that be fun? No, that would be a rubbish game. If you want to play a warrior, your warrior will level up and the attacks get more powerful, you gain extra abilities that allow you to do things you could not before, etc. Yet you will be a warrior, and play the warrior playstyle, from level 1 to level 20.

In ED, the ships ARE our classes. The professions "bounty hunting", "trading" etc. are the equivalent to the "tank", "dps", "support" etc. roles in RPGs. If someone wants to fly an Eagle, they should very well be able to do so. In fact, the module system is basically ripe for this.

What if the smaller ships scaled much better with higher rating equipment? At the moment, for no reason that I am aware of, the Eagle's top speed and boost speed scales worse with thruster rating than most other ships, expecially bigger ones (An A-rated Asp or Vulture is faster despite their base speed being listed *lower* than that of an Eagle!).

What if, instead of the A3 thrusters costing only 500,000 and giving an Eagle a mediocre boost speed of 360 - what if the scaling of power and price in the lower sizes is much bigger, so that A3 thrusters end up costing 10 million, and bring the Eagle to a boost speed of 450? Similar things could apply for the other components.

This would also tie in to what another recent thread correctly critisizes - that the game overemphasizes getting a bigger ship over upgrading your existing ship. It should be a regularly viable (i.e. not some niche where a handful of people manage to take down Elite Anacondas in their Eagle - there will always be people doing what is impossible for the vast majority, no game should be balanced around such exceptions) path of progression to take any of the smaller ships and pour your earnings into it to bring it on par with what currently are effectively endgame ships (e.g. Vulture, Python, Clipper, Anaconda). That doesn't mean a Hauler needs to get 400 tons cargo capacity in the end, but it could, for example, become a very good rares trader with excellent jump range and decent normal flight speed, an Eagle would't become a gunboat like the Python, but be a agile and fast ships that can do hit&run attacks and fly circles around big ships, and due to its speed also negate common "fly backwards" maneuvres that currently entirely negate an Eagle's agility.

Edit: Addendum. I would also consider removing the damage penalties of smaller weapon sizes vs bigger hulls entirely.

 

[Arubeto]

Why is that? Larger ship = larger space for internals, and a heavier mass for more accurate (assumingly) jumps.

Any game needs to have a tier system, where the Eagle and Hauler fall into a lower tier say to the Python and Asp. If the game was designed in such a way that an Eagle could be outfitted and compete in end-game content (or lack thereof) then what would the purpose be for other ships? There would need to be a line drawn somewhere, as I would not expect a fully A class Eagle (do we have a name for this yet?) to be able to wreck say a Python, it just wouldn't make sense.

I am strongly against this linear "tier" system, too. It makes switching ships deterministic and boring. This whole thread is more or less dedicated to the cause of not establishing such a tier system with pre-defined path!

The ideas various commanders have proposed to improve the value of small ships are very intriguing and would make for some very interesting niche roles for smaller ships, even when compared to larger and more expensive ships.