A lot of people are having a problem swallowing the idea of instant ship transfer between stations. People have spoken about it being immersion breaking and generally unrealistic. While that may be true, there are plenty of similarly unrealistic instant functions already in the game. These have been pointed out in other places but hare are a few: instant crafting such as SRV repair in combat and instant ship services such as refuel/repair/reload/cargo transfer/ect. But I really don't think that "immersion breaking" is the main problem with instant ship transfer.
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Why then is instant ship transfer such a big deal? I think it is a big deal because it is also balance breaking. FD used jump range as one of the primary factors to balance dedicated combat ships. Players can have their super powerful Corvettes or FDLs but it is real pain to take them anywhere. This is why the first engineered module on my personal Corvette was a level 5 FSD range upgrade. Even that only gets me to 18LY. For perspective, that same FSD in a light weight Anaconda will get around 50LY.
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Here is a brief vignette using my Corvette. When I move a long distance for a CG or some other such thing, I lighten the Corvette by selling modules where possible and then reassemble at my destination. This makes the move a dangerous proposition as my Corvette is weaker during the transit but still has a costly rebuy. Moreover, there is a risk that I can't rebuy all of the modules I want at the destination making me weaker during the CG. With instant ship transfer, I will be able to move across the cosmos in a hauler then summon the Corvette. This completely removes the risky and tedious transit.
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My bottom line is that I think there should be some downside besides cost to using instant ship transit. Maybe there could be a small percentage chance that the ship gets destroyed during shipping. IDK honestly. Instant ship transfer will change balance in ED; change isn't necessarily bad. I believe FD know this and are going ahead anyway. I'm curious to see how it all shakes out.
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Why then is instant ship transfer such a big deal? I think it is a big deal because it is also balance breaking. FD used jump range as one of the primary factors to balance dedicated combat ships. Players can have their super powerful Corvettes or FDLs but it is real pain to take them anywhere. This is why the first engineered module on my personal Corvette was a level 5 FSD range upgrade. Even that only gets me to 18LY. For perspective, that same FSD in a light weight Anaconda will get around 50LY.
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Here is a brief vignette using my Corvette. When I move a long distance for a CG or some other such thing, I lighten the Corvette by selling modules where possible and then reassemble at my destination. This makes the move a dangerous proposition as my Corvette is weaker during the transit but still has a costly rebuy. Moreover, there is a risk that I can't rebuy all of the modules I want at the destination making me weaker during the CG. With instant ship transfer, I will be able to move across the cosmos in a hauler then summon the Corvette. This completely removes the risky and tedious transit.
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My bottom line is that I think there should be some downside besides cost to using instant ship transit. Maybe there could be a small percentage chance that the ship gets destroyed during shipping. IDK honestly. Instant ship transfer will change balance in ED; change isn't necessarily bad. I believe FD know this and are going ahead anyway. I'm curious to see how it all shakes out.
