Make cargo shuttles more useful.

[7-of-10]

I love this game, but as soon as I get bigger and better ships, I run into a problem, I can't dock a six-slot warship at stations very well. My idea is to use cargo shuttles for ship to station trading as well as their original purpose. It would probably take special scripts for this action but I know that it is possible. Other than that, awesome game, keep up the good work.

[Sir Charles]

Nice idea, that would end drifting and destroyed stations all over the place ;)

[7-of-10]

Nice idea, that would end drifting and destroyed stations all over the place ;)

It would also help encourage big trading ships.

[Shrooblord]

Haha sweet. Initially when I got some Cargo Shuttles, this is what I thought they were for. When they didn't work as expected, I looked at the documentation and found out they're meant for Stations only. Too bad!

I would love to see this implemented in the game.

 

Incidentally, I am currently making a mod that will auto-dock your ship (any size) to any Station (any size). I'm in the final stages of initial development: testing and bugfixing some issues that have been present for a while but haven't found a resolution yet. It will appear in the Mods subforum... soon^TM.

[Ulrich_Rüstungjäger]

I would suggest trying to add "observation arms" to your ship. I find I can dock my 12 slot carrier to most stations with the "arms"

[Shrooblord]

I concur. Having a carrier with wings and a slim pillar-like design running along its main axis, extremities can help when trying to dock using the vanilla behaviour.

 

But just you wait til my mod comes out. The Auto-Docking functionality is a doozy!

[7-of-10]

Auto-docking would definitely be helpful, but I think that it would be easier for development team to implement the ship to station trading because they already have the script for station to station trading. Also thanks for the tip about the observation wings, I will have to try that.

[Burnthalo]

someone suggested hologram blocks.. it works. extend a long hologram off the front or side of the ship. the added length counts for the distance to dock and since its hologram it doesn't actually impact if you touch the station with it. I have been using it for transferring fighters to stations and for my cargo transfers to storage depots (engineless ship - nothing but a cargo block and crew quarters and a generator)

[7-of-10]

someone suggested hologram blocks.. it works. extend a long hologram off the front or side of the ship. the added length counts for the distance to dock and since its hologram it doesn't actually impact if you touch the station with it. I have been using it for transferring fighters to stations and for my cargo transfers to storage depots (engineless ship - nothing but a cargo block and crew quarters and a generator)

Never thought of that, I'll have to try it.

[Shrooblord]

Good tip about the Hologram Blocks. I should experiment more with the different block types we have!

 

Auto-docking would definitely be helpful, but I think that it would be easier for development team to implement the ship to station trading because they already have the script for station to station trading.

Actually no, they're not tricky changes to make. I'm in the finalising stages of the mod's development as we speak. It should appear on the Mods subforum soonish. And boy! It's satisfying to use, if I may say so myself. ;D

[Burnthalo]

Good tip about the Hologram Blocks. I should experiment more with the different block types we have!

 

Auto-docking would definitely be helpful, but I think that it would be easier for development team to implement the ship to station trading because they already have the script for station to station trading.

Actually no, they're not tricky changes to make. I'm in the finalising stages of the mod's development as we speak. It should appear on the Mods subforum soonish. And boy! It's satisfying to use, if I may say so myself. ;D

 

I can NOT wait for the steam mod support to be ready. I tried to install a few and failed miserably lol. first attempt so go figure. hope its a lot like the mod system in 'Bannished'.

[Shrooblord]

We can all only wish for a cleaner and much easier mod process than that dreadful manual approach we have to go through now.

 

In the meantime, maybe the community can compile modpacks for each other so we have a "clean install drag-and-drop" zip file that "just works". In fact, let me make a thread for that.