The lack of Universal Cartographics on Fleet Carrier worries me. I might be wrong but said missing feature makes FC not very useful for exploration unless it's for transporting people with ships not fit for traveling long distances; in what instances would that be useful?
1. combat builds for fighting what in deep space? there's basically no threat from neither npc nor players unless it's an open play expetition.
2. mining? yeah maybe you might find some ludicrus 7 hotspots of LTD overlapping in the middle of nowhere... is that even possible? probably there is a more profitable option close to the bubble. But overall, for mining to make money while out exploring the deep space still useful yeah.
3. trading? sure
Anyway back to lack of UC on the FC. I have a few ideas which might be stupid but i guess this is the best time for brainstorming.
First of all i have a missing piece of info: once you own a FC, say you are in deep space, far away from Colonia and the Bubble, you die while in your ship. What happens? Do you respawn in Colonia, Bubble, the closest human enclave or do you spawn in your FC if nearby?
The above question is relevant to this idea: what if once you own a FC your exploration data is stored on the FC, therefor if you die while in your ship(with your FC nearby) you don't lose your data?
You only lose you data if you FC goes into debt/gets decommissioned/is too far away.
This would sort of compensate for not being able to sell the exploration data while in deep space.
A downsite to this would be: someone that goes back sooner to a normal starport to sell the data of the same systems you have discovered but not yet "signed in your name" will get their name on those systems/planets before you.
Meaning if you stay out for say 1 year and accumulate 1 year worth of data, many players that might have been in the same unexplorerd systems as you and might have already gone back and signed their names on said systems/planets. So it is sort of a double downside: you don't get your name on them(which is one of the coolest thing in exploration) and get less profit from the data(no first discoverer bonus).
If those 2 downsides are not considered enough for the safety of the data maybe also add upkeep cost to store the exploration data on the FC.
Another messy idea i have is: once you own a FC, you are surely in the Bubble at first. You have to chose a spaceport with which you'll make a contract that says you can only sell exploration data to that station while you are in deep space. This would prevent you to use the sale of exploration data to gain reputation in different factions which is quite useful.
I get this is not a big enough downside because probably a FC owner is already over that part of the game so maybe you might add that you profit will be less if you sell from deepspace or that the value of your exploration data depends on the power that said faction holds back in the Bubble which would mean it would be important to have a group of players in the Bubble allied with the explorers players out in deep space that can keep that faction's influence high.
Yet another idea: Once you get rank Elite in Explorer you unlock a "permit" to be able to sell exploration data from the FC.
Other questions i have are:
How many FCs can be "docked" in one system? How many around one planet? Does it depend on size of said planet?
What if a Commander wants to keep the location of his/her FC private for reason of faction conflict or similar? This might be an irrelevant problem because i don't know the game well enough.
If i send my FC by remote command to an unexplored system, does that action claim discovery of the main star by me or do i have to be there myself with the normal ship?
How much Tritium per light year of travel?
Can i charge the frameshift drive of the F.C. with a neutron star?
Can a fellow player bring only 1 ship onto my FC or more?
I'm lacking info for this but it seems that if i have ship packages and certain modules packages on a FC that still doesn't allow for a player to buy a stock ship from a FC and kit it out enough to be useful. If this is the case does it mean you need to have modules ready for transfer in storage from the Bubble or have multiple FCs in the area with different modules packges available?
One bit of feedback on the jump effect for the FC: it was underwhelming mostly sound wise but also visually. The Capital class ships of the Federation and Empire have an imposing sound like a war horn. I get it, they are warships but it really gives the idea of the massive potential they carry. The FC which is not the same but not far from them has a really chill jump aspect in comparison
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Forgive me for the outpour of thoughts and my bad english. If it is even a tiny bit helpful to make the game better i guess it's worth.
