Suggestion: Make players able to build turrets and modules. (Perhaps AI ships?)

[Rykmentti]

So I decided to try Avorion again after a break and came upon this idea.

 

I really like to design ships in this game and while designing, it would be really nice if we could plan and design turrets and modules on the ships themselves as well as the hull.

 

I also like the idea of looting destroyed enemies for good weapons and modules and slapping turrets onto my (player) ship. But I would REALLY like the idea of mass producing AI ships that would fight by my side and that it would not be such a chore to crew and arm them.

 

For example I have a frigate and I would like it to have 8 chainguns and 4 plasma cannons. I have enough volume for 5 modules. This requires me to have 5 uncommon modules or 3+ rare modules or 2+ exceptional, exotic or legendary modules for the turret slots. Also for it to be effective warship it needs atleast uncommon or rare quality chainguns and plasma cannons. To do this in the game takes WAAAAAY too much effort at the moment, especially if you're planning on mass producing these ships.

 

Im aware there is technically way of doing this in the current game but it's a HUGE pain in the ass to do it. Im ofcourse talking about research stations and turret factories.

 

With research stations, making modules and turrets means that you have to have 5 items of the same quality and type and "mix" them to upgrade a module/turret to the next tier. This method requires you to to kill ships, salvage them and buy modules from shops and merchants in order to get them. Drop rate ofcourse, is complete random. Which means, this way of obtaining turrets and modules will lead to frustration.

 

"Easier" way is to search for turret factories for the properties you want on your weapons and just simply get resources for the turrets you need. This way is MUCH better than the research method and I've done it in couple games I've played. BUT you have to hope that the system you are searching actually have these factories and pray to the gods that they actually have resources to produce them, otherwise you have to provide them as well.

 

At worst, you will spend hours jumping from green blimp to green blimp and when you finally find the factories you are looking for, they are all scattered as far away from each other as they can possible be, some of factories are hostile and after that you notice that some of them are out of ingredients.  Which means you have to bring resources to them to produce the products you need!

 

As you can probably read, this is quite frustrating and time consuming way of making weapons and modules with certainty. Not to mention if you're doing this while moving towards the galactic centre you would have to do it again and again when you advance tiers.

 

So these are my suggestions on how to improve or change the system to make it more user friendly and fun.

 

1. Make turrets and turret modules work like blueprints.

 

If you have one item, you could duplicate it and put as many of that one turret or turret module onto the ship. I don't know if it would be too powerful but we could try limiting blueprint type production to uncommon (green) or rare (blue) quality turrets and modules to not have Exceptional, Exotic and Legendary qualities lose their meaning.

 

2. Make the current system easier to use.

 

If we were able to build turrets without the chore of searching factories for turret resources and hauling them to the turret factory, give us a choice of buying the required resources remotely but it takes time for them to arrive at the turret factory. Something like 30 minutes or an hour? Perhaps have the time it takes to arrive based quality and quantity of the weapons? And maybe you could get the resources yourself from some far away warehouse or something similar to a quest?

 

Don't know about the modules thought... How about module factories which produce modules similar way to the turret factories? But limiting them to uncommon or rare qualities as well? Again, to not have Exceptional, Exotic and Legendary qualities to lose their meaning

 

3. Now this one is would be a huge change and would probably require a lot of work. But would be in my opinion the best option.

 

Make players able to build predesigned ship which you designed before in creative mode. You could build these ships from a shipyard with a blueprint (which is made from the design you made in creative), where you could add modules and turrets to the blueprint design up to a uncommon or rare quality.

 

The type of weapons and modules that would be available would be based on the sector rank,(or quality or whatever parameter the game uses to measure the quality and rank of the sector and the items sold in shops) their reputation with you and/or the turret factories that the faction has OR choose from weapons and modules you have in your inventory. Perhaps you could even sell these blueprints to a faction to add your own variety to the their ship pool?

 

After you have built these ships from the shipyard, they would fully staffed and combat ready (with associated costs). The difference from the regular built ships would be that you could not modify them after they're built (you could pilot them thought)

 

Also being able to see your ship built from left side to the right side, block by block would be pretty awesome as well.

 

So if anyone has any thoughts, good or bad points about this feel free to post and discuss it.

[Giltone]

With the latest update to the game (Fighters update) We might eventually get the the blueprint of the Weapon, Sacrifice it and allow the assembly block to build it. So it's definitely got my vote, I'd much rather get one really good turret, and then spend a few hours afk to replicate it a few times (depending on your Production speed, and the amount of effort the ore-type/rarity combination put the cost at.

[Rykmentti]

Yeah, being able to "build" turrets out of ores and credits would be a huge thing for me. No more going around turret factories and gathering materials for the turrets you need.

[Shrooblord]

I love the ideas you propose for being able to build ships (although possibly not limit it to only Creative), save the Blueprints and sell them to other Factions so they, too, can build your design of ships. That would be epic and give you more agency in this vast, vast Galaxy. Imagine going to another arm in the Galaxy and seeing one of your designs flying around. You'll know that that guy must've come from somewhere near your home, which is a super cool thought.

 

Maybe Pirates steal your designs and use 'em for their nefarious purposes. (Maybe maybe, if they do this too much, your rep with other Factions goes down for allegedly conspiring with Pirate scumbags - or at least for providing something that the Pirates obviously like so much, they use it all the time now, thus you having inadvertently empowered the enemy).

 

Your rep could go up as a shipwright, and Factions from other corners of the Galaxy could start off knowing you and even liking you a little for your craftsmanship, or the opposite, because their ideas on good ship design is way different and you're "ruining the market" with your "art". :P

 

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I don't so much agree with the notion that you then couldn't change these ships, however. They're your ships. You should be able to do with them what you want: maybe you create a template design that you want to mass-produce, with the express purpose of giving each one a custom and unique finish, but want the main structure to be the same for each. You'd limit this kind of creativity with that approach.

 

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This is a highly intriguing concept and I've written it down on my list of Mod ideas... I'll look into how feasible it would be making something like this happen without being the actual programmer of the game. ;)

[Rykmentti]

I love the ideas you propose for being able to build ships (although possibly not limit it to only Creative), save the Blueprints and sell them to other Factions so they, too, can build your design of ships. That would be epic and give you more agency in this vast, vast Galaxy. Imagine going to another arm in the Galaxy and seeing one of your designs flying around. You'll know that that guy must've come from somewhere near your home, which is a super cool thought.

 

Maybe Pirates steal your designs and use 'em for their nefarious purposes. (Maybe maybe, if they do this too much, your rep with other Factions goes down for allegedly conspiring with Pirate scumbags - or at least for providing something that the Pirates obviously like so much, they use it all the time now, thus you having inadvertently empowered the enemy).

 

Your rep could go up as a shipwright, and Factions from other corners of the Galaxy could start off knowing you and even liking you a little for your craftsmanship, or the opposite, because their ideas on good ship design is way different and you're "ruining the market" with your "art". :P

 

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I don't so much agree with the notion that you then couldn't change these ships, however. They're your ships. You should be able to do with them what you want: maybe you create a template design that you want to mass-produce, with the express purpose of giving each one a custom and unique finish, but want the main structure to be the same for each. You'd limit this kind of creativity with that approach.

 

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This is a highly intriguing concept and I've written it down on my list of Mod ideas... I'll look into how feasible it would be making something like this happen without being the actual programmer of the game. ;)

 

A month old post but lets hope you're still reading

 

Yeah, the main thing about this was the automation. I want to be able to build the ships from shipyard fully staffed and combat ready, the idea about not being able to modify them after, was the idea that they're factory made, not customizable (because turrets and modules are made at the factory and fitted into the hull) and the crew you are hiring is trained for that one particular ship.

 

This way when you design a ship you can make the ships hull "curves" fit the role of the said weapons or the ships role in battle.

 

For example torpedo tubes and turret mounts at the tubes which could be in front. Plasma and Rail cannons at the top of the ship and chain guns at the sides as close point defense weapons.

 

You could change the blueprint and template but once they're built, you would either had to scrap the ships or sell them to faction (which again gives factions more variety to the ships) and after that, just build your new modified ships. Or better yet, bring them to a shipyard to be retrofitted?

 

But being able to modify them on the fly, whenever you want wouldn't be a bad idea either. But I think it would bring a bit of immersion if you would have to retrofit the ships at the shipyard or repair dock instead of magically adding turrets or modules and repairing ships in space on the spot.

 

Again this is an early access game at the moment so it is totally fine. But perhaps in the future.

 

I think I thought to myself when I made this post that what if there were two categories of ships that you could build.

 

One is the player ship, this ship is totally customizable and you can edit and do stuff to it whenever you want.

 

Second is the factory built ship (AI ship) This ship is build at factory (Shipyard) through a template or a blueprint. templates and blueprints could be changed but the ship when it's built could not modified except at the shipyard or repair dock.