Potential Ship Re-balance Idea

[PalletTown]

I think the ship system is interesting but lacking in its current state. I get the idea of the module system and having interesting trade-offs between whether one should get an upgrade, weapon, or crew member. However, I think this just creates annoying situations where in order to keep all the crew members you want, you have to be basically defenseless. It also creates weird situations where the Clydesdale is basically the best ship by virtue of have the most module spaces.

My solution is the ships have a separate hard point, upgrade, crew, and module capacity. Weapons would require a free hard point, upgrades would require a free upgrade point, and crew would require free crew space. Modules would be like wild cards and can be used for a ship weapon or an upgrade. Additional crew quarters would use a module point instead of an upgrade point and turrets would require one hard point and one module point.

Example Ship Stats:
Ova'LEK
4 Weapon
3 Upgrade
5 Crew
2 Module

Clydesdale K7
5 Weapon
1 Upgrade
12 Crew
4 Module

I think this would alleviate some the annoyances with the ship system but preserve the idea of trade-offs.

 

[Theron]

As far as I am aware, the current ship system is a Hideous Abomination, a Twisted Mockery of the Sublime and Perfect system originally envisioned. It was thrown together in a month to have something to use to steal the Sidewinder with so we wouldn't be stuck on Zheng Shi for the foreseeable future.

I don't know if the original system is still being worked on, to be implemented when it's ready. If so, work done to refine the current system would be wasted when the new, original system replaces it.

I agree Hardpoints could be their own thing, since you still have to worry about Energy (and Crew, if you're using Turrets).
Do you mean Gadgets (usable 1/combat) and Upgrades (passive bonus)?

Thing is, fine-tuning the system is a bit difficult right now, because there are only 4 fights in the game.
1. The Modified Casstech Z7, which is supposed to be beatable by the default Casstech Z14 without taking Armor damage if you know what you're doing.
2. The fight to get into Zheng Shi (2 Z7s and an EM Turret), which can be skipped, and can be reliably beaten with the stock Aegis MS-XI.
3. The 'difficult' fight vs Dr. Teyaal's MS-XI (which is actually easily shut down with 1 Hardened Systems on the Sidewinder and whatever weapons, I recommend 2 Missile Turrets), and is optional.
4. The new fight in the backer's patches. I don't know the stats are.

That said, the Clydesdale could use a rework. By default, it loses to the Z7. It's also the most expensive buyable ship in the game and you need to use much of it's module space to make it combat-ready. Unless you really need the Crew or Storage, you're much better off going for the MS-XI, or waiting until Zheng Shi and stealing the Sidewinder.