In a nutshell: solo access is important, but putting in a mechanic to suck up AND REWARD effort will give the thing more life.
So- the ability to make better rank gear comes to mind. Anyone can just jump their ship around, probably to LYR systems, and pick up whatever gear they want. People can do it now, and they can do it after carriers just as easily.
So, it's not a big deal if you let a carrier make gear (and sell at 100% price), right? If someone puts in the time and effort, they can pimp out their carrier, and people can buy modules there. I'm not saying the carrier owner should get any of the money. This is just a way to generate new modules anywhere, and the money flows the same way that it does when someone buys a module from a station. No discounts, even.
There could be a bunch of ways to unlock stuff:
And the good part is, a basic carrier won't have it, but people don't really NEED it, either. So it provides a long term goal, as it would take a VERY long time to unlock every single module. And perhaps carriers would only have a limited amount they could stock (or unlock?) at any given time? Limited quantity perhaps, driven by how many people use the carrier services?
So- the ability to make better rank gear comes to mind. Anyone can just jump their ship around, probably to LYR systems, and pick up whatever gear they want. People can do it now, and they can do it after carriers just as easily.
So, it's not a big deal if you let a carrier make gear (and sell at 100% price), right? If someone puts in the time and effort, they can pimp out their carrier, and people can buy modules there. I'm not saying the carrier owner should get any of the money. This is just a way to generate new modules anywhere, and the money flows the same way that it does when someone buys a module from a station. No discounts, even.
There could be a bunch of ways to unlock stuff:
- Materials gates. For miner support ship.
- Taking modules of the rank you want to make and having the carrier reverse-engineer them. For combat support ship.
- Time-based research (hours/days for D-rank, days/weeks for A-rank. Multiplied by size.) For exploration support ship.
And the good part is, a basic carrier won't have it, but people don't really NEED it, either. So it provides a long term goal, as it would take a VERY long time to unlock every single module. And perhaps carriers would only have a limited amount they could stock (or unlock?) at any given time? Limited quantity perhaps, driven by how many people use the carrier services?