First off, I'm super stoked these are designed as personal carriers - absolutely what I hoped for but genuinely did not expect. That said, I find the hangar slot layout a little curious. Before I explain why, allow me to point out some past observations from Frontier:
So you can probably guess where I'm going with this...Why does the carrier have eight (8) large hangars? The corollary to that question is why so few small and medium. Among all of the large ships most late-game players will not have more than three they use regularly (and it has become normal to see these 'three' be the same ship outfitted different ways!). Between the slew of slots the end-game large ships have and the general lack of diversity, eight large hangar bays seems...impractical?
I don't want to complain - there will be plenty of that (from me and the fine forum folks) as time goes on - so again, it's more an observation than a complaint. Every commander has their own fleet variation so I know I'm not necessarily 'the norm'. In my case, my 'fleet' that I would tote around if I could (and very soon will!) consists mostly of medium ships, a DBX (like a trusty pocketknife that ship is), and my three large ships of which I only use one regularly.
SO...discuss!
- Traditionally, Frontier has said that large ships are meant to be stronger than medium and smaller ships. Put another way, the 'balance' of the ships in Elite is fairly linear across class size. From a credit cost perspective, there are a few outliers (the chieftain, FDL, Krait Mk. II, Python) but generally this holds up to be true.
- Frontier has entertained the community suggestion of small ships having gameplay designed specifically for them to make them relevant beyond 'fun to fly on occasion'. That credits are the primary resource for the game to expand and/or acquire anything (before engineering it) doesn't help the plight of small ships as they simply do not compete when it comes to credit gains.
- Recently, we've seen more medium ships released that directly compete with large ships in terms of efficiency and effectiveness in multiple arenas. Except for certain 'quantity beats quality' professions (trading in bulk, bulk passengers) most means of credit gain can be done nearly as efficient (or even better, such as in mining) by medium craft than large.
So you can probably guess where I'm going with this...Why does the carrier have eight (8) large hangars? The corollary to that question is why so few small and medium. Among all of the large ships most late-game players will not have more than three they use regularly (and it has become normal to see these 'three' be the same ship outfitted different ways!). Between the slew of slots the end-game large ships have and the general lack of diversity, eight large hangar bays seems...impractical?
I don't want to complain - there will be plenty of that (from me and the fine forum folks) as time goes on - so again, it's more an observation than a complaint. Every commander has their own fleet variation so I know I'm not necessarily 'the norm'. In my case, my 'fleet' that I would tote around if I could (and very soon will!) consists mostly of medium ships, a DBX (like a trusty pocketknife that ship is), and my three large ships of which I only use one regularly.
SO...discuss!
- Does the pad layout seem reasonable given the current state of the game when it comes to the available ship lines?
- Do you think Frontier is planning on releasing more large ships such that the class is as fleshed out as medium?
- Do you think this implies Frontier is moving away from attempts to 'justify' late-game usage of small/medium ships, instead relegating them to just 'the progression' for newer players?
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