The premise:
it would be cool to be able to fabricate certain cargo and modules and ship pieces and have them able to to taken to a station to be assembled or sold for others to use or to the game's bgs.
How it would be done:
Multiple sub-stations that self-assemble that can be purchased by the player at fairly great expense and deployed by a player ship to any specific location they want, then disassembled and relocated at will. These stations exist only in the owner player's instance when they are at their defined location. They are damageable but not destroyable. They require periodic refueling by the player at rates that vary depending on the type of substation. They have an internal inventory that will cause the station to go into standby mode if full. You can provide permits to players to dock at any given station sharing your instance via comm cmd to the station. Those players can then transfer objects to and from your substation if they match the appropriate input item type or if taking, have the cargo space.
Substations take up multiple "tons" of cargo space and be displayed as multiple units - each unit being a set of self-assembling drone machines that combine to create the substation. If you lose the minimum number of drones needed to create that particular substation you will be unable to deploy it. Different substation types use different drone canisters to self assemble so you can't mix them. You can carry multiple copies or types if you have the space.
Substation - miner : You deploy this substation on a roid that you've determined has the raw materials you want. Once deployed it is married to the specifc roid until relocated. This means the stats of that roid will dictate the output of the substation. There is no limit to how long the substation can mine the roid, but the size of the roid must be large enough for the substation to attach. You can then unlock via blueprints certain items to fabricate directly from the raw material of the roid or just acquire the raw materials. The quality and size of miner substation is tiered in cost when purchasing the substation.
substation - manufacturer: You can deploy this anywhere. It takes refined and raw materials and other manufacturerd items from your other substations or purchased/mined from the game and creates other items for you. This could be simple modules not available in the given system or to sell to the local faction or to make available to other players. The number of simultaneous output items is customizable by the player with tiered costs when purchasing the substation
substation - shipyard: This is a very expensive and large (requires a lot of cargo space on the ship deploying it) substation that you can deploy that allows you to take manufactured objects from your substation or other players substations and after creating all the requisite modules, substructure pieces and other materials, create ships via blueprints you have unlocked and acquired. There are no rank limitations. This would also allow certain variants of ships that are not available for direct purchase by the manufacturer. Once a ship is created and ready, the player can request that it be transferred to a station they are docked at. Any player given a permit to your shipyard can request a ship be transferred to them and then it's theirs. Shipyards can create any ship that has blueprints available however once production begins, you can't change until it's complete or you lose all current input items.. The substation will self-assemble and grow scaffolding to handle any ship size as construction begins, which only occurs once all input items have been provided. During this time (actual building of the ship occurs quickly via automated drones) the substation is vulnerable to attack and you could suffer construction setbacks (this will cause the shipyard to divert much more energy to shields to protect the constructing ship ...and slow the process down significantly, but you will not lose the ship or items)
substation - waystation: Deployable near scoopable stars ....these substations connect to stellar cartography and in-system networks to provide the player an ability to turn in exploration data and refuel if connected to the station. If remote, the player can select the system the waystation is in on the galaxy map to get current stats of trade crime etc data that would normally require the player to be in-system to acquire, including which cmdr's in open or your particular private server have recently been in the system (obviously solo is excluded). Giving waystations a dual purpose for explorers, traders, and espionage. Waystations nare not re-deployable and do not last forever, being required to be deployed near scoopable stars to function, they have a limited lifiespan due to the harsh conditions and will need to be re-deployed periodically. They are however, much smaller than other substations and take up considerably less cargo space.
substation - SuperCruise scrambler: This substation is illegal but is known to be available in certain anarchy systems. Deploying this in busy shipping lanes will pull ships out of supercruise by confusing ship systems into dropping out at it's location instead of the destination automatically. It has a much larger range of effect than typical destinations, allowing it to pull in a lot of ships in a short amount of time. While heavily armored and shielded, it can be destroyed - which will happen fairly quickly once a number of combat ready ships have been pulled in unwantedly... but is an excellent tool for pirates looking to acquire loot fast. Use of the supercruise scrambler is highly illegal and will quickly lead to military responses by local major faction forces if there are any. Escaping it once pulled in can only practically be done by high jumping out as SC is impossible for many millions of meters in all directions.
substation - Capital refueler : This substation is deployable only near neutron stars and white dwarfs. Like the waystation, it has a lifespan and must be periodically replaced. The substation creates capital ship fuel using a highly unstable process to refine this usually unstable jump fuel into a proprietary formula that can be safely transported and stored. The station takes about a day to fill up and will alter orbit around the star once full, to a safe distance to be unloaded. it can do this about 5 times before needing to be replaced. Deploying multiple around stars can allow faster creation of fuel for fleet carriers and can be sold on the black market for significant profit.
players and squadrons can then work together with various substations to create large complex ships, unique variants of ships not available for normal purchase or provide local access to modules/goods not normally available. The larger idea being that fleet carriers and the like would be such huge endeavors that it would be something that encourages group participation to create instead of having to grind credits to purchase it outright. Creating a network of supply and demand and teamwork to build something special that could potentially be lost (no insurance) ... Squadrons could specialize in certain areas and advertise their services to other squads or players and organize trades or help eachother acquire source materials and manufactured objects to create the complex ones needed.
it would be cool to be able to fabricate certain cargo and modules and ship pieces and have them able to to taken to a station to be assembled or sold for others to use or to the game's bgs.
How it would be done:
Multiple sub-stations that self-assemble that can be purchased by the player at fairly great expense and deployed by a player ship to any specific location they want, then disassembled and relocated at will. These stations exist only in the owner player's instance when they are at their defined location. They are damageable but not destroyable. They require periodic refueling by the player at rates that vary depending on the type of substation. They have an internal inventory that will cause the station to go into standby mode if full. You can provide permits to players to dock at any given station sharing your instance via comm cmd to the station. Those players can then transfer objects to and from your substation if they match the appropriate input item type or if taking, have the cargo space.
Substations take up multiple "tons" of cargo space and be displayed as multiple units - each unit being a set of self-assembling drone machines that combine to create the substation. If you lose the minimum number of drones needed to create that particular substation you will be unable to deploy it. Different substation types use different drone canisters to self assemble so you can't mix them. You can carry multiple copies or types if you have the space.
Substation - miner : You deploy this substation on a roid that you've determined has the raw materials you want. Once deployed it is married to the specifc roid until relocated. This means the stats of that roid will dictate the output of the substation. There is no limit to how long the substation can mine the roid, but the size of the roid must be large enough for the substation to attach. You can then unlock via blueprints certain items to fabricate directly from the raw material of the roid or just acquire the raw materials. The quality and size of miner substation is tiered in cost when purchasing the substation.
substation - manufacturer: You can deploy this anywhere. It takes refined and raw materials and other manufacturerd items from your other substations or purchased/mined from the game and creates other items for you. This could be simple modules not available in the given system or to sell to the local faction or to make available to other players. The number of simultaneous output items is customizable by the player with tiered costs when purchasing the substation
substation - shipyard: This is a very expensive and large (requires a lot of cargo space on the ship deploying it) substation that you can deploy that allows you to take manufactured objects from your substation or other players substations and after creating all the requisite modules, substructure pieces and other materials, create ships via blueprints you have unlocked and acquired. There are no rank limitations. This would also allow certain variants of ships that are not available for direct purchase by the manufacturer. Once a ship is created and ready, the player can request that it be transferred to a station they are docked at. Any player given a permit to your shipyard can request a ship be transferred to them and then it's theirs. Shipyards can create any ship that has blueprints available however once production begins, you can't change until it's complete or you lose all current input items.. The substation will self-assemble and grow scaffolding to handle any ship size as construction begins, which only occurs once all input items have been provided. During this time (actual building of the ship occurs quickly via automated drones) the substation is vulnerable to attack and you could suffer construction setbacks (this will cause the shipyard to divert much more energy to shields to protect the constructing ship ...and slow the process down significantly, but you will not lose the ship or items)
substation - waystation: Deployable near scoopable stars ....these substations connect to stellar cartography and in-system networks to provide the player an ability to turn in exploration data and refuel if connected to the station. If remote, the player can select the system the waystation is in on the galaxy map to get current stats of trade crime etc data that would normally require the player to be in-system to acquire, including which cmdr's in open or your particular private server have recently been in the system (obviously solo is excluded). Giving waystations a dual purpose for explorers, traders, and espionage. Waystations nare not re-deployable and do not last forever, being required to be deployed near scoopable stars to function, they have a limited lifiespan due to the harsh conditions and will need to be re-deployed periodically. They are however, much smaller than other substations and take up considerably less cargo space.
substation - SuperCruise scrambler: This substation is illegal but is known to be available in certain anarchy systems. Deploying this in busy shipping lanes will pull ships out of supercruise by confusing ship systems into dropping out at it's location instead of the destination automatically. It has a much larger range of effect than typical destinations, allowing it to pull in a lot of ships in a short amount of time. While heavily armored and shielded, it can be destroyed - which will happen fairly quickly once a number of combat ready ships have been pulled in unwantedly... but is an excellent tool for pirates looking to acquire loot fast. Use of the supercruise scrambler is highly illegal and will quickly lead to military responses by local major faction forces if there are any. Escaping it once pulled in can only practically be done by high jumping out as SC is impossible for many millions of meters in all directions.
substation - Capital refueler : This substation is deployable only near neutron stars and white dwarfs. Like the waystation, it has a lifespan and must be periodically replaced. The substation creates capital ship fuel using a highly unstable process to refine this usually unstable jump fuel into a proprietary formula that can be safely transported and stored. The station takes about a day to fill up and will alter orbit around the star once full, to a safe distance to be unloaded. it can do this about 5 times before needing to be replaced. Deploying multiple around stars can allow faster creation of fuel for fleet carriers and can be sold on the black market for significant profit.
players and squadrons can then work together with various substations to create large complex ships, unique variants of ships not available for normal purchase or provide local access to modules/goods not normally available. The larger idea being that fleet carriers and the like would be such huge endeavors that it would be something that encourages group participation to create instead of having to grind credits to purchase it outright. Creating a network of supply and demand and teamwork to build something special that could potentially be lost (no insurance) ... Squadrons could specialize in certain areas and advertise their services to other squads or players and organize trades or help eachother acquire source materials and manufactured objects to create the complex ones needed.