Frontier: Please show the Imperial Clipper some love in 2019 and give it a buff !
- Thread starter SAB380
- Start date
A few more paint jobs would be a good start: there are still only FOUR packs available regularly in the store, and I count myself blessed to have picked up an irridescent paint when it was temporarily on sale for this ship.
tbh I'm not keen on the Phantom's looks. Now the Krait MkII: That I am interested in trying.
But anytime I get in any other ships, I simply want to be in the Clipper instead.
Flying several thousand kms through rings has really helped me understand its flight characteristics. A lot better. Oh, yeah, did I mention the drifting
o7
Clipper fan here.
Quirky? Yes.
Sleek, agile, fast? Yes.
Fun to drive? Definitely.
Do I miss outposts? Yes.
But for me it's the large "Cobra MkIII" equivalent - a multirole ship.
I'm currently in an armed core-mining rig (what a shock!!
Tweaks? Maybe: I'm on the fence on major changes, but a wee bit more shield strength would be acceptable.
However, even a new paint job would be welcome at this point!! Clippers have had zero Store-love, ever?!
o7
ALL of this. Seriously, a ship kit and more paint jobs are really all the Clipper needs. I want to turn mine into a Baby Whitestar!
So, as noted, some people could make a case. I think the Type 9 is a good example, and if i started a thread on how the type 9 should be buffed, i'm sure i'd get plenty of supporters.
And CM4 irrelevant.... for shame!
It just needs to be a bit bigger, and capable of taking a SLF, and more manouverability, and better shields....
Got a bit of a chuckle here.
You guys do realize those 3d models are usually scale able right ?
https://youtu.be/yjLw7v6D5o4?t=2m50s
It might mess the UV map therefore the texture but its not such a hard thing to do.
Annoying yes, hard nope.
You guys do realize those 3d models are usually scale able right ?
https://youtu.be/yjLw7v6D5o4?t=2m50s
It might mess the UV map therefore the texture but its not such a hard thing to do.
Annoying yes, hard nope.
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Nope. I've got one of each, both G5 maxed for similar roles, and they do different things better. I agree with AA and others, the Clipper is a premium Pirate ship - sleek, agile, enough module slots for all the tools, and fast. My Phantom is almost identically kitted out, but shieldless & low emissions / thermal for silent smuggling, but... no matter what you do, the Phantom maxes out at 591m/s where my Clipper, which has decent shields and is not maxed for speed hits 625m/s. That's enough of a difference right there to give the Clipper its own niche - you're not going to catch me or mass lock me, and I'm always going to look way cooler than you.
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Maybe it's just crazy to think Gutamaya would ever do this, but if they reached out to Core Dynamics and got permission to put at least one of those coffee makers the FDS has into the Clipper, it would go a long ways towards looking over some the deficiencies in their design. Could just be those Imperials assume everyone has a slave to make them coffee though, and I'm just being uncouth.
"The Imperial Clipper is the quintessential Imperial ship. It epitomizes elegance of form while delivering speed and agility. Because of its balance of speed, luxury and strength it is used for transporting valuable items and personnel of importance across the Empire. With the navy ships these can come as standard, and not available for civilian, or export models." — In-Game Description
With this out of the way, taking a look at its internals, both core and optional(yes I can own one and am looking at it both in-game and on wiki):
- 2 Ledium(Size 2) and 2 Large(Size 3) hardpoints seem fairly decent for what it's meant for in this regard. I'd leave them alone imo, the hardpoint placement is good enough a balance to justify such firepower.
- 4 Utility slots are standard for most medium ships, nothing noteworthy here.
- All the core internals seem pretty typical for a ship of this class, but I would suggest downsizing the Power Distributor from size 6 to a size 5. With more room now, we can either ad another size 2 optional internal, or increase the strength of her shields considerably.
Using this factory spec'd Clipper, with the exception of A-rating everything outside of Life Support, the speed is an already fairly impressive 348 m/s(441 m/s boost). While the shields strength is far too weak for their size, something is amiss here - https://s.orbis.zone/1vo0
With this out of the way, taking a look at its internals, both core and optional(yes I can own one and am looking at it both in-game and on wiki):
- 2 Ledium(Size 2) and 2 Large(Size 3) hardpoints seem fairly decent for what it's meant for in this regard. I'd leave them alone imo, the hardpoint placement is good enough a balance to justify such firepower.
- 4 Utility slots are standard for most medium ships, nothing noteworthy here.
- All the core internals seem pretty typical for a ship of this class, but I would suggest downsizing the Power Distributor from size 6 to a size 5. With more room now, we can either ad another size 2 optional internal, or increase the strength of her shields considerably.
Using this factory spec'd Clipper, with the exception of A-rating everything outside of Life Support, the speed is an already fairly impressive 348 m/s(441 m/s boost). While the shields strength is far too weak for their size, something is amiss here - https://s.orbis.zone/1vo0
Stick a bi-weave in there and have a look at recharge/ recover figures.
Speaking of a chuckle and I'm gonna sound like a snarky here (sorry) but as a hobbyist 3D Artist for 20+ years, I found that to be the most hilarious comment on ship scale ever. It's definately meme worthy.
If you just scale a model without doing some serious redesigns, (regardless of doing it on all axes or not), a lot of other objects will NOT match anything else — this should be obvious common sense.
The video you linked to, just shows the absolute basics of a 3D program with no context to any design decision. Some design notes of mine would be;
• Rescaling the cart bucket will result in a much thicker metal in certain areas.
• If he rescaled the cart handle, it will be disproportionate to a human hand.
• The wheels are just about the only that can be rescaled without consequence...unless the wheel or wheel axle is supposed to represent some kind of standard modular system.
• Rescaling the cart bucket will result in a much thicker metal in certain areas.
• If he rescaled the cart handle, it will be disproportionate to a human hand.
• The wheels are just about the only that can be rescaled without consequence...unless the wheel or wheel axle is supposed to represent some kind of standard modular system.
Try rescaling a car model without redesigning anything and see how well a normally scaled human will fit in the chairs, or how much space is left to the roof.
In Elite Dangerous context: A class 3 hardpoint, that is 15% smaller is no longer a class 3 hardpoint. A cargo hatch that is 15% smaller can no longer get an SRV through it.
And that's without mentioning additional interior designs beyond the bridge, if that ever shows up.
It's okay to do that kind of rescaling in boardgame style Real-Time Strategy games, where a battlecruiser is only the size of 10 footsoldiers — but in a simulation game where components fit visually across ships, no.
So yes, it is easy to just arbitrarily rescale a ship model if you completely ignore any kind of design decisions, as well as ignore any other models that the ship might interact with.
I am still waiting for my asp scout buff, which has been promised but not delivered. That being said though I think the clipper is an awesome ship and great fun to fly.
I don't see any of these big changes ever happening to the Clipper. Would I like it to be tweaked a bit? Not as much as I'd like a new medium Imperial ship. That's far more likely to happen someday than the Clipper being reworked into a medium ship with more internals or larger internals than when it was a large ship. I certainly don't want it's FSD increased a class, it's fine sharing the Class 5 FSD along with the Asp, Diamondback, Python, Krait. Makes less work to do when engineering because you can just swap that module around between them. I would go so far as to say if we ever do get a medium sized Imperial ship I'd want it to have the same Class 5 FSD. I'd want most things to remain the same probably. The hard point placement could be a bit different I guess, but it won't matter to me one bit. Really the only thing I don't love about the Clipper is it not being medium size, just that it's slightly too wide for the medium pads is it's one big flaw, otherwise it's my ideal ship. It's got great agility, decent jump range, with a big scoop and that small tank you fill up at a star in like 3 seconds, and it looks awesome. I've taken my Clipper out on the DW2 expedition, so I'm gonna be in it for a good while.
It's a great ship, you can do lots with it, I personally love the thing. And the one thing I would change about it, will never happen. There's not much point in pushing for such a buff to it, just cross your fingers on a medium Imperial ship coming out someday, it's a million percent more likely to happen than a change to the Clipper's size. I don't think there's even a precedence for a ship moving up or down a pad size to begin with.
It's a great ship, you can do lots with it, I personally love the thing. And the one thing I would change about it, will never happen. There's not much point in pushing for such a buff to it, just cross your fingers on a medium Imperial ship coming out someday, it's a million percent more likely to happen than a change to the Clipper's size. I don't think there's even a precedence for a ship moving up or down a pad size to begin with.
I think the clipper is too cheap, I never understood why a large luxurious ship was so cheap. It's only a few million more than its counterpart the type 7. I also don't understand why it required military rank when it's not a combat ship which even Sandro Sammarco said it wasn't.
If I was fdev and making changes I'd remove the rank restriction and increase the price by at least 10 million cr.
I've been on the buff the clipper bandwagon in the past, but I fell off I realized I just wanted it to be something its not. The Clipper was meant as a safer and sexier alternative to the Type 7 for traders.
I think most that want it buffed either want it to be a better combat ship or a better explorer.
I'll keep waiting for my medium imperial combat ship with central lg and med hardpoints which the chieftain happens to deliver on for now just in a ugly package.
Happens in EVERY ship thread.