Ships Imperial Cutter designs/looks

Confidenze

Confidenze
What went wrong....?

I - more than anyone - am hyped for the release of the 1.5 "Ships" update, and furthermore the Horizons season.
I have for a LONG time been making posts and trying to dig up photos of any new ships for Elite Dangerous and now that everone in the beta have begun posting pictures and videos of the new ships in game I feel sort of disappointed.

The Federal Corvette have lived up to my expectations. In terms of what kind of ship it was rumored to be, and it's role.

But the Cutter... The more I look at it and the more images i look at - the more i get disappointed in advance.
I was sincerely hoping that the cutter would be the pinnacle of imperial designs and a monument to advanced engineering.
But the designs just bother my eye. It seems out of balance and disproportionate.
The Clipper was, and still is, my all time favorite ship in terms of design. If the Clipper have had collapsable wings to make it fit a medium landing pad I would still be flying it.

Am I the only one that has been bothered by the imperial Cutters weird appearance?

The Anaconda has is own unique look (like a submarine if you ask me), and the Corvette looks like it has the cockpit tugged in between all that armor - giving it a rough look - like a battleship should have.
The Cutter just looks like a deform #Boring747 that ate to much and couldn't digest it so it's comming up again.

So all in all, I guess it was just not what I hoped...
When I fly a ship in ED I alway want to F1 and look around.
I'm afraid that when it comes to the Cutter I won't get that urge...

If anyone has any awesome looking Cutter pictures, please link them. I want to fall back in love with my Cutter, but right now its just not happening.)
Please post your thoughs.
 
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newman1702

newman1702
I too was a little disappointed in it's looks - both Clipper and Courier look a lot better when it comes to the Gutamaya lineup, imo. My other hope was that it would be an imperial combat explorer hybrid, capable of performing both of those roles by having a Conda-like jump range (if set up for it, of course). Instead it's a giant trading cow. In that respect, it's looks are appropriate - it looks fat because it is fat with all that cargo capacity. I'm just not convinced that yet another big freighter was what was really needed.

Well, maybe in the future they release an Imperial Explorer and redeem themselves, who knows :)
 
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Confidenze

Confidenze
What I don't understand thou is this:
Why would Frontier implement a ship with the internal compartments to potentially become the biggest trade ship, when we are all anticipating the arrival of the Panther Clipper?
And another thing - I would have loved to see an alternative to the huge hardpoint. Maybe another large and 2 mediums, or just 2 large.
The huge hardpoint just feels like they HAD to do it... Even if it doesn't really fit the ship.
Again - it feels completely out of balance. And with the current weapon loadout it would be a taunt to put huge hardpoints on the engines, because fixed weapons would hit so far apart they would become useless in most situations.
 

Mephane

Mephane
Confidenze said:
Am I the only one that has been bothered by the imperial Cutters weird appearance?
Click to expand...

Speak for yourself. I love the design of the Cutter. :)

Confidenze said:
What I don't understand thou is this:
Why would Frontier implement a ship with the internal compartments to potentially become the biggest trade ship, when we are all anticipating the arrival of the Panther Clipper?
Click to expand...

The Panther Clipper may very well be slower, turn even slower, have less shields, guns etc., but more cargo. A bit like the trade-off between Anaconda and T9.
 

newman1702

newman1702
Of course it's his opinion, who else's would it be? He simply asked if he's the only one disappointed in it's looks, and the answer to that is no, he's not, even if there are more people who like it than those who don't. I personally don't hate it, but I'm also not wowed by it's looks. Clipper and Courier both look a lot better for my tastes.
 
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narheth

narheth
I was burned by the new design of all imperial ships. I was hoping for a refit of what we had in 'Elite II Frontier' (I know I'm not alone there). But over time the Clipper has grown on me a little, perhaps this will too.
 
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Mursac

M
When I look at the cutter, my eye starts at the engine nacelles, and trails along the leading edge of the wing. When the wing meets the Fuselage, I expect the arch to reverse and begin curving inward while the ship itself continues to narrow. Instead, the curve reverses, and the ship suddenly gets wider. This combined with the narrow rear section which the wings are attached to makes that fat, disproportionate look. So, I made one change: I moved the wide section back.

This is a tracing of the base cutter model.
Cutter Comparison_0001.jpg

I marked out the front and back of the vessel on another sheet of paper, and flipped it around, and marked the wide section wherever it appeared. I then filled in the rest of the vessel, and got this result. I did need to fiddle with the back end a little to account for the increased mass, but I think it works.
Cutter Comparison_0002.jpg
This pretty much solves the balanced look issue, although the wings could be just a tad wider. There might even be some practical benefits: by shifting the center of mass backwards a bit, and towards the thrusters, the vessel would have become a bit more maneuverable, which is something it desperately needs. Additionally, it wound up losing very little width farther forward where it's shortest, but gained a bit farther back where it's tallest. This would have granted it slightly more internal space (perhaps for a size 8 FSD and/or a better power distributor). To bad it would require almost a complete remodel.
 

Seolenn

Seolenn
I love the rear of the Cutter but the 747-like front is kinda ... meh ... dunno, but could have been better :c
 

Mc80

M
Does anyone think that the wing pylons are a bit tiny in dimensions compared to the rest of the ship ? making them longer might make it look a lot better already.
 

Krezan

Krezan
I would prefer it with a shorter nose (bit more bull dogish), better agility and slighty less cargo space / weight. Would be awesome then. Flies like a whales at the moment.
 
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CTR69

C
The biggest problem IMO, is cockpit in front. For a cruise ship of this size, the bridge must be positioned at the top, like Anaconda or Corvette. And every real-life ship/yacht in existence. This is the size where we're dealing with ships, not planes.

That's why I love Anaconda, it looks the most similar to yachts I adore, like Pershing 115. That's what Cutter needs, the looks of a luxury yacht like Octopus or Eclipse. Not A380 whale looks. But because it's already done, Gutamaya would need to make another model specifically designed like a ship.
 
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Krezan

Krezan
Cutters just a bit too long and heavy for me. What I would like to see is dome sort of gunship for knight rank (as knights did the fighting). Would be good for planatary things as well.
 

Confidenze

Confidenze
CTR69 said:
The biggest problem IMO, is cockpit in front. For a cruise ship of this size, the bridge must be positioned at the top, like Anaconda or Corvette. And every real-life ship/yacht in existence. This is the size where we're dealing with ships, not planes.

That's why I love Anaconda, it looks the most similar to yachts I adore, like Pershing 115. That's what Cutter needs, the looks of a luxury yacht like Octopus or Eclipse. Not A380 whale looks. But because it's already done, Gutamaya would need to make another model specifically designed like a ship.
Click to expand...

This! This exactly!
It makes absolutely no sense to have the captain / commander of a vessel this size positioned in the absolute far end of the ship of this size.

If you look carefully on top of the ship, right behind the 2 x Large hardpoints, there is a small window for passengers. THAT should be the position of the bridge!
It would totally alter the entire appearance of the ship.
And since we are already agreeing that the cutter in its current designs is nothing like a combat ship - why does it have the huge hardpoint, and not 2 more large in stead?
Would much better fit the defensive idea of this ship.
It already has a worse power distributor and stronger shields. I have no idea why the designers put an offensive hardpoint under its nose.

The whole Imperial Cutter ships seems a little like someone coulnd't make up their minds, and therefore tried to get the best of both worlds... Wanted both a luxury freighter and a hard hitting fighter... Ended up with a freak of space-nature...
 

Commander Debic

Commander Debic
I flew one in 1.5 ships beta until I did a clear save It is quite an ungainly creature but has it's own beauty. I think in flight it looks a lot nicer than when landed.






cutter.jpg



Here it was in space
 
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