General Player made Ship variants

[iiMStevo]

I’ve been reading some threads on ships on here and it got me thinking...
Why can’t we build our own ship variants?

I’m speaking here of course for a considerable sum (of Cr) that you can strip out all of the interior, and re-assemble it the way you want it. Essentially like a level of optimisation before you reach that engineering stage.

Let’s take a look at the Cobra Mk3 chassis for example;
Hardpoints: 2x2, 2x1
Utility: 2x0
Core Internal: 4x4, 3x3
Optional Internal: 3x4, 3x2, 2x1 (+1 PAS)

So from a Hull perspective, nothing can change; your Hull chassis, is the Hull chassis.
Hardpoints equally can’t change. The size of the slot, is the size of the slot... but the internals is where I’m talking.

So the bare minimum a ship needs is;
Power Plant,
Power distributor,
Sensors,
Life Support,
Thrusters,
Frame Shift Drive,
Fuel Tank.

In this ship, our internal space total is 45 (+1 PAS) so, you could strip out the PAS and use that 1 module space in your ship for something else. If we’re making a combat ship, let’s stick our life support in that:

1E - Life Support (1/46)

Next we’re going to need some high end thrusters for that manoeuvrability. Let’s stick to class 6 Thrusters.

6E - Thrusters (7/46)

To ensure we have a good pull-through of power, let’s also get a class 6 Power Plant and Power Distributor.

6E - Power Plant (13/46)
6E - Power Distributor (19/46)

Sensors are fairly important in combat, but not so much the range. Others might disagree but I’m going to allocate class 3 sensors here...

3E - Sensors (22/46)

A frame shift drive isn’t that important for a combat ship. Sure you’d reach the system you’re wanting to fight in quicker, but generally you’re not taking combat missions more than 20-40Ly away.

3E - FSD (25/46)

And finally, the other necessity is the fuel tank... Let’s keep the current level 4 fuel tank.

4C - Fuel tank (29/46)

So, for all of our core internals, we’re now optimised for a combat ship. We have sufficient power, we have great manoeuvrability to compensate for ultimately the low damage this fighter will do (while unengineered). It’s looking good... and we still have 17 space left...

7E - Shield Generator (36/46)
This seriously buffs up the Cobra’s survival rate. Especially if stacking on two shield boosters in the two utility slots.

7E - Shield Bank (43/46)
Again, pumping up that Cobra survival rate.

3D - Hull reinforcement (46/46)
Now we’re at the limit, with the last module being there to try and stop the cobra from being one shot while it’s shields are down, albeit this Hull buff won’t be too extreme.

All in all, this is what we’ve got:

2x Medium Hardpoint
2x Small Hardpoint
2x Utility point
——
1E Life Support
6E Thrusters
6E Power Plant
6E Power Distributor
3E Sensors
3E FSD
4C Fuel Tank
——
7E Shield Generator
7E Shield Bank
3D Hull Reinforcement
——
0 Inventory space

All of a sudden, a Cobra Mk3 becomes a viable ship again while utilising the same space the chassis provides. The ship could display as “Cobra Mk3 (Modified)” or “(Custom)” when targeted and scanned so players can check to see what modules are on that ship.

Overall, this will give much greater flexibility to players regarding their play styles, and ship builds. Ultimately you’d still be better off reaching the higher tier chassis’ for the better ships, but even those ships could be better optimised through cannibalisation of internal space and stripping away what isn’t needed, for what is needed.

Here’s an example of another build kitted out for Haulage:
2x Medium
2x Small
2x Utility
——
2E Life Support (2/46)
3E Thrusters (5/46)
6E FSD (11/46)
4E Power Plant (15/46)
3E Power Distributor (18/46)
1E Sensors (19/46)
6C Fuel Tank (25/46)
——
8E Cargo Rack (33/46)
8E Cargo Rack (41/46)
5E Shield Generator (46/46)
——
512 Inventory space

————————

Now, how to keep this balanced...
Simple;
Cost of Chassis * total module space inside chassis = cost of refit (excluding cost of basic parts)

So, to refit the Cobra Mk3 chassis, you would pay approximately 350,000 * 46.
This would cost the player 16.1m Cr for a refit and would increase their insurance price up to 805,000 Cr (instead of around 17,500 Cr).
Then on top of that, the player would need to buy the lowest class of each module available to complete the refit... So the Cobra Mk3 becomes a 20m Cr ship for an entry level one that is customised.

While this isn’t going to be groundbreaking for end-gamers who have 10 fully engineered cutters, it is going to add a new level of play for players that don’t want to just fly the same ships all day, and want to see how their own version cuts it against the rest.

EDIT:
Oh and I’m not saying this should be available instantly to all players either.
I was more thinking along the lines of having to befriend an engineer at one of each of the ship manufacturing companies, and once you’re allied with that engineer, you buy ship schematics from them that allow you to remote refit your ships produced by them.

Schematic price could be 5x the ship price.

Effectively this turns the game from having around 40 ship variants, to having around 4,000 ship variants...

 

[metatheurgist]

Because that would be a balancing nightmare.

 

[Robert Maynard]

The class of module bays seems to relate to a volume (taking cargo racks as the basis for the assumption, i.e. each class is double the capacity of the previous class) - so adding classes together leads to a considerable over-estimate of available volume, e.g. 2x Class 4 = 1x Class 5, not 1x Class 8.

Disregarding hardpoints and utilities, the Cobra MkIII has 4x Class 4 and 3x Class 3 core internal slots and 3x Class 4, 3x Class 2 and 2x Class 1 internal slots (ignoring the planetary assist slot that nothing else fits in).

Taking the volume of each module bay to be 2^Class units, this would lead to a total of 152 volume units (4x 16 + 3x 8 = 88 units for core internal and 3x 16 + 3x 4 + 2x 2 = 64 for optional modules) available. Being able to fit a module bigger than the largest extant class would also assume that the volume was contiguous and able to be freely subdivided.

 

[iiMStevo]

From a lore perspecitve, I thought of this because the current ship manufacturers are looking to make quick sales. The idea behind this could be that Lakon spaceways for example need to come up with an new idea that is cost effective for them, to increase sales. Ship optimisations accomplishes that.
As the player you'd work on increasing reputation with them before they allow you to get on-board with their ship customisations... you then purchase a ship schematic from them, work on it, and name your ship schematic (basically your module usage). Over time, FDev can then have a system which essentially identifies the best schematic (or most used schematic), and the first CMDR that made that schematic and named it (appropriately) could have their version of the ship put into production by that ship manufacturer as a variant.
So like my example in the first post, I could call my combat one "Interceptor" and then if it was configured the most in a month and it was released by Faulcon DeLacy, then it'd be the Cobra Mk3 "Interceptor"... where it would come with the pre-installed slot modifications.

The class of module bays seems to relate to a volume (taking cargo racks as the basis for the assumption, i.e. each class is double the capacity of the previous class) - so adding classes together leads to a considerable over-estimate of available volume, e.g. 2x Class 4 = 1x Class 5, not 1x Class 8.

Disregarding hardpoints and utilities, the Cobra MkIII has 4x Class 4 and 3x Class 3 core internal slots and 3x Class 4, 3x Class 2 and 2x Class 1 internal slots (ignoring the planetary assist slot that nothing else fits in).

Taking the volume of each module bay to be 2^Class units, this would lead to a total of 152 volume units (4x 16 + 3x 8 = 88 units for core internal and 3x 16 + 3x 4 + 2x 2 = 64 for optional modules) available. Being able to fit a module bigger than the largest extant class would also assume that the volume was contiguous and able to be freely subdivided.

Fair assessment, but the underlying point is that we use the internal space of the ship to better fit the modules we need for a more optimal usage of the ship. For example, removing planetary approach suites if you don't need them in a certain ship.

I do feel that limiting this by volume significantly reduces the ability to customise the ship and therefore potentially doesn't justify its cost in the first place, and the cost would be the main reason to do this. Since everyone on here always complains about how there's nothing to spend credits on, while simultaneously complaining they don't earn enough credits. The other main bonus to this option is;
A) So you aren't limited to less than a handful of ships at the end (if that).
B) So there's actually more than 40 variants of ship out there.

Because that would be a balancing nightmare.

I guess its a good thing you're not in charge of balancing then, isn't it? lol
I mean what's harder for FDev to do, code this new system which allows for existing ship modifications creating upwards of 4000 ship variant possibilities in their game... or creating 4000 ship variants themselves as new models and objects, and coming up with 4000 unique names for them?

 

[Cdr Voorheez]

Good thread

 

[Robert Maynard]

Fair assessment, but the underlying point is that we use the internal space of the ship to better fit the modules we need for a more optimal usage of the ship. For example, removing planetary approach suites if you don't need them in a certain ship.

The "slot" (that isn't really a slot) for the PAS was added to all ships for owners of Horizons when it launched, a bit like the 2x Class 1 slots for small ships, 1x Class 1 slot for medium and large ships, that were added to ships when the ADC and SCA were introduced.

I do feel that limiting this by volume significantly reduces the ability to customise the ship and therefore potentially doesn't justify its cost in the first place, and the cost would be the main reason to do this.

It's necessarily limited by volume - otherwise it would not fit inside the ship. The proposal also assumes that any size of core module would fit in the slots integrated into the ship's hull structure - while that might work for smaller modules, I don't expect it would for larger than current maximum sized modules - and the remaining volume in the slot, in the case of a smaller module being fitted, very likely couldn't just be added to the pool of remaining volume.

 

[iiMStevo]

The "slot" (that isn't really a slot) for the PAS was added to all ships for owners of Horizons when it launched, a bit like the 2x Class 1 slots for small ships, 1x Class 1 slot for medium and large ships, that were added to ships when the ADC and SCA were introduced.

It's necessarily limited by volume - otherwise it would not fit inside the ship. The proposal also assumes that any size of core module would fit in the slots integrated into the ship's hull structure - while that might work for smaller modules, I don't expect it would for larger than current maximum sized modules - and the remaining volume in the slot, in the case of a smaller module being fitted, very likely couldn't just be added to the pool of remaining volume.

But equally, that would operate under the assumption that inside the shell of the chassis, it is definitively compartmentalised that does not allow for anything outside of that compartmentalisation to exist. For example, a 6A Powerplant has the volume of 64 units... Is that an 4x4x4 unit cube? or is it 8x2x4 cuboid? We don't know how anything fits in the interior. What if there's an excessive amount of hallways in the interiors that wastes valuable space? From a schematic perspective, I'm talking about having it strip away everything, and Tetris it all back in utilising as much of the space as possible to increase performanaces...
...otherwise you're left with at least 75% of the ships in-game serving no purpose to players other than being stepping stones to get to the next ship (and you don't buy all of the stepping stones).

 

[CMDR Deano The Imperial]

Just thinking off the top of my head here but wouldn't the weight of cargo in 2x8E cargo racks need a much larger FSD than a 3A FSD to jump anywhere.
Seems to me like a balancing nightmare.

 

[Gauntlet]

(and you don't buy all of the stepping stones).

I have, and I still have them all