Player-Engineers

[GoalieHoff-G08]

(I apologize if this has been discussed already)
Questions to the community:
Would you get into the idea of being able to take the role of an engineer and specialize mods to offer for sale? Maybe have a special system of leveling your ability and also be able to sell pre-engineered modules for people who have the credits but not the time or mats for engineering on their own? Perhaps starting out the players must play that part of "Errand-lackey" for a specific engineer before they get you set up to engineer on your own. I ask this because I was reminiscing about Star Wars: Galaxies last night. My FAVORITE thing about that game was that I lived my entire experience in that game simply designing, building and selling ships and equipment and I LOVED IT!

I know what you're thinking: eventually people get what they want and then don't need player engineers. That's why player engineered mods would NOT be insurable(maybe even just all engineered mods). This does two awesome things:
1. Ensures a consistent need for player engineers
2. Makes players less brash if they have particular mods/ships that are difficult to come by and highly expensive. It would also create a MUCH stronger connection to a ship for a commander knowing that if it were ever destroyed, it possibly may never be the same.

Now, there are logistical concerns about how to receive money and materials for the work and deliver the finished products. I thought maybe payment could use a similar system to commanders picking up missions, then delivering the mats and/or money, and delivery of the finished products could be handled similarly to having modules transferred from station to station. But there are other options as well. This could also create a tangible, in-game need for trade commodities aside from simple hauling missions. For example, in order for a player to put together a specific engineered mod, they would need to acquire X units of semiconductors and X units of Polymers. This, in turn would allow for commanders to run resourcing missions for themselves instead of some nameless contractor purely for money or other in-game currencies, giving those commodity runs a much more personal and real reason. Again, if a player simply wants to pay credits for an end product, they can pay a high-premium credit cost to have all the needed materials delivered to the engineer.

There are many other considerations as well, but I think this would not only expand the depth of the game a thousand fold, it would bring an even deeper level of customization as well as a great economy-boosting mechanic. I know for a fact that I'd commit my commander 100% to this if I could.

So you all know my thoughts, what about yours? Let's make some noise, shall we?

 

[GlitchedVision0101]

I would love something like this, the problem is that the entire system of engineering would need to be reworked to support it and I'm not sure that FDev wants to redo engineering for the third time. I do however think it does need another pass. I'd love to see more customizability in engineering, to make things more interesting. Take each stat that a weapon/module has and give players the ability to customize sliders and adjust their own trade-offs. Are you fine with sacrificing ammo capacity for extra damage? Can you handle a higher heat load for an increased fire rate? Some of these ideas may simply be horible, but they would make for fun expirimentation.

 

[MK Regular]

I would love something like this, the problem is that the entire system of engineering would need to be reworked to support it and I'm not sure that FDev wants to redo engineering for the third time. I do however think it does need another pass. I'd love to see more customizability in engineering, to make things more interesting. Take each stat that a weapon/module has and give players the ability to customize sliders and adjust their own trade-offs. Are you fine with sacrificing ammo capacity for extra damage? Can you handle a higher heat load for an increased fire rate? Some of these ideas may simply be horible, but they would make for fun expirimentation.

This idea certainly has been kicked around before, but I'd like to add a few things to it:

• All of the existing blueprints (at 100% completion) should be achievable with the sliders
  • In the case of certain blueprints without any drawbacks (e.g. Efficient), stat changes could be allowed for the sake of balance
  • In some instances, minor changes to stats or material requirements may be necessary
• There should be 2 general methods to determining the modified values:
  • Set the value(s) you would like to achieve first, then make sacrifices until you can achieve the desired value(s)
  • Make the sacrifice(s) you are willing to make, then use the leeway granted by the sacrifices to make improvements
• Once the final values are set, a grade value (1-5) is determined and the material cost(s) for each grade are determined by the significant stat changes:
  • Each specific stat has a loot table based on the +/- % change
  • The materials are determined by taking the 3 highest ranking materials across all of the loot tables, i.e.
    • If 1 stat is changed significantly more than all of the others, it may be responsible for all 3 materials
    • If 3 stats are changed approximately equally, they may each be responsible for 1 material
• Secondary effects (weapons only) still require the same materials as the current iteration, and must be applied at an engineer's base
  • Non-weapon secondary effects are now baked-in to the slider system
• In order to start the engineering process, the module must be taken to an engineer, where the desired changes can be started
  • The desired changes are converted to a slider blueprint and pinned to the specific module
  • The changes are limited by the maximum grade available to the engineer where the slider blueprint was created
• An option to duplicate a pinned blueprint to a new module could also be added, although I don't think this should be able to duplicate weapon secondary effects