Idea...! More Utilities, Less Weapons...

[CMDR Cosmic Spacehead]

...On "trader" class vessels.

One thing that pops up occasionally, is the "dead in seconds" comments from trade ships. (I've only died in seconds once, to a torpedo strike. It was hilarious. Lol)

So, what if, trade ships had an disproportionally high amounts of utility slots, but reduced firepower?

I mean, like a T7 having 7 utility slots. And a T9 having 9. Or whatever.

The result is excessively strong shields/defences. But no bite.

Multirole, like the Python, have a more equal number, more or less as is. Good defences, good firepower.

And combat class, have great firepower, but more limited defences. Plus they're faster, and more agile.

Or something.

Would that help? Or just create mega turtle rammers...? Lol

CMDR Cosmic Spacehead

 

[Stealthie]

My only reservation would be that doing so would, effectively, pigeon-hole various ships in specific categories and you might end up in a situation where there was no benefit to trying to fly a "multirole" ship.

I mean, let's say you have no real interest in combat and you were playing as a bit of a "scoundrel" character, flying a Keelback (as all good scoundrels should).
Would there be any point to flying a Keelback rather than a T6 if the T6 could be made much more defensible?

If you weren't careful, you could probably end up with a situation where all the non-combat players were flying T6s, T7s and T9s in preference to anything else.

 

[CMDR Cosmic Spacehead]

Good point.

I was just trying to think how to make traders tougher targets, while not sacrificing their ability to trade Vs Multirole ships.

Back to the drawing board. Lol

CMDR Cosmic Spacehead

 

[Ian Skippy]

...On "trader" class vessels.

One thing that pops up occasionally, is the "dead in seconds" comments from trade ships. (I've only died in seconds once, to a torpedo strike. It was hilarious. Lol)

So, what if, trade ships had an disproportionally high amounts of utility slots, but reduced firepower?

I mean, like a T7 having 7 utility slots. And a T9 having 9. Or whatever.

The result is excessively strong shields/defences. But no bite.

Multirole, like the Python, have a more equal number, more or less as is. Good defences, good firepower.

And combat class, have great firepower, but more limited defences. Plus they're faster, and more agile.

Or something.

Would that help? Or just create mega turtle rammers...? Lol

CMDR Cosmic Spacehead

A t7 already has almost no firepower, reducing it will make it be unable to function as even a mediocre miner. If you want to buff shields, just propose a shield buff. Besides, 'pure tradeships' should be somewhat vulnerable, that is why multiroles exist that offer better defenses at the cost of reduced cargo capacity.

 

[Crank Larson]

I think the ships should be left as they are. Bring new ships in, of course, but no major changes are required to any of the ships in-game as far as I am concerned. They each have their characteristics, and we should accept them for what they are.

 

[GunnerBill]

I don't think there's anything wrong with pigeonholing a small number of ship types as good traders. What's wrong with having a trading "meta"? The PvPer's have had their FDL meta thing going on forever, why can't traders have something their own "apex" trader?

There will always be a role for multi-role.

 

[Ian Skippy]

I don't think there's anything wrong with pigeonholing a small number of ship types as good traders. What's wrong with having a trading "meta"? The PvPer's have had their FDL meta thing going on forever, why can't traders have something their own "apex" trader?

There will always be a role for multi-role.

We do have them already?

 

[Crank Larson]

why can't traders have something their own "apex" trader?

Can't say that I'm ever disappointed when I use my Cutter for trade. A trader that can be battle fitted? Sounds fairly "apex" to me.

 

[coca_fr]

What about allowing utility module to be placed in weapon slot ?

 

[GunnerBill]

Can't say that I'm ever disappointed when I use my Cutter for trade. A trader that can be battle fitted? Sounds fairly "apex" to me.

We do have them already?

I think I've been mis-understood. A trader that cannot carry weapons but is a super-shield tank, reasonably agile etc could be considered an Apex trader but could not be outfitted for battle.

Imagine a Python with more utils instead of weapons, dedicated module slots for shield/SCB whatever and a high carrying cap with reasonable range.

Logically this should already exist.

 

[nexxo]

I think that it is a good idea. In EvE Online (yeah, sorry) cargo ships have almost no fire power, but the more high-grade ones are incredibly resilient tanks. I think that everything should be finely balanced so that there are no easy wins, and every choice has a trade-off.