Civilian missile transport, and hangars

[Mor]

Off course you can play whatever mix of options that floats your boat, I am just trying to make sure I understand what this feature implies and if it is something of interest for me.

[83athom]

Now, forget cruisers or carrier fleets, scientific advancement allowed us to create the concept of fleet in box. This magic box is like a carrier, but our lawyers were able to classify it civilian for logistic\tax deduction purpose. Thus it suffer no breakdowns and other silly things. You can even overhaul your fleet while in enemy territory... Overall it seem like a pure convince feature.

Remember a few things; 1) They come after Hangars in tech, meaning they may end up being really costly to research in the first place. 2) While similar in cost, they are 50% larger, so instead of 1050 tons to support 1000 tons, it takes 1575. In a purely military ship, that is wasted space that could go to something else. 3) Its only 1 htk. Anything that scratches it will probably blow all the hangars of a massive commercial carrier in a few hits (once armor is gone). Not to even mention shock damage. 4) The design couldn't protect itself. While you could escort it with warships, that completely negates the point of it in the first place.

[Mor]

I think that it can be very interesting if we had PvP and for RP as deep space station (as advertised in the log) but other than that I am going to avoid this.

[bean]

I really want this feature, as I tend to run big fleet games, and my existing repair ships/ARDs are expensive and annoying to deal with.  Some way to repair ships well forward without using shipyards would be very nice.
In conjunction with it, I'd like to see civilian damage control units, because otherwise we're looking at absurd amounts of engineering spaces, and that would be annoying.

[Steve Walmsley]

I really want this feature, as I tend to run big fleet games, and my existing repair ships/ARDs are expensive and annoying to deal with.  Some way to repair ships well forward without using shipyards would be very nice.
In conjunction with it, I'd like to see civilian damage control units, because otherwise we're looking at absurd amounts of engineering spaces, and that would be annoying.

I've added civilian damage control for v7.2. Here is a possible future Commonwealth repair base.

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Portsmouth class Fleet Base (Repair)    110,000 tons     1000 Crew     7298 BP      TCS 2200  TH 0  EM 0
1 km/s     Armour 1-204     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/11/0/0     Damage Control Rating 31     PPV 0
MSP 24041    Max Repair 36 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months    Flight Crew Berths 5   
Hangar Deck Capacity 60000 tons     

Fuel Capacity 4,000,000 Litres    Range N/A

CIWS-160 (1x6)    Range 1000 km     TS: 16000 km/s     ROF 5       Base 50% To Hit
Ryan Techsystems RTN-25 Navigation Sensor (1)     GPS 2520     Range 25.3m km    Resolution 120
EM-11 Passive Detection Sensor (1)     Sensitivity 11     Detect Sig Strength 1000:  11m km

**************************************************************************************

It will probably be matched up with several of these. Both bases can operate in deep space.

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Weymouth class Fleet Base (Maintenance)    85,000 tons     780 Crew     3963 BP      TCS 1700  TH 0  EM 0
1 km/s     Armour 1-172     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 1     PPV 0
MSP 6029    Max Repair 200 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months    Spare Berths 0   
Maintenance Modules: 15 module(s) capable of supporting ships of 3000 tons

Fuel Capacity 6,000,000 Litres    Range N/A
CIWS-160 (1x6)    Range 1000 km     TS: 16000 km/s     ROF 5       Base 50% To Hit

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[iceball3]

Then surely the best option is simply to not use it?

This is a really poor argument for game design.

But by not having this concept in place it forces everyone playing the game to endure the micromanagement that the old system entails, this way both parties get to play the game in the way they wish.

If it is really that significant of a problem... You do know that maintenance as a feature can already be disabled, yes?
Steve already has deep space maintenance facilities for civilians being designed for civilian use, and he's streamlining maintenance anyway, so certainly, it should be less of a pain to keep your ships serviced. However, it's still gonna cost you MSP, and whatever "logistics nightmares" that somehow induces is more a consequence of you overextending too big of a fleet and expecting it to not be costly to maintain, attention-wise and materials-wise.

[bean]

This is a really poor argument for game design.If it is really that significant of a problem... You do know that maintenance as a feature can already be disabled, yes?
Steve already has deep space maintenance facilities for civilians being designed for civilian use, and he's streamlining maintenance anyway, so certainly, it should be less of a pain to keep your ships serviced. However, it's still gonna cost you MSP, and whatever "logistics nightmares" that somehow induces is more a consequence of you overextending too big of a fleet and expecting it to not be costly to maintain, attention-wise and materials-wise.

Have you ever run a really big fleet?  One that's supposed to be able to do what the US did during WWII, and operate out of forward bases basically indefinitely?  I have, and in the current version, it's borderline impossible, and requires a level of micromanagement that's above and beyond even what normal Aurora needs.  The changes made in 7.2 will make it much easier.  Not 'your fleet can skip about with gay abandon, ignoring logistical constraints entirely' easier.  You still need fuel and munitions.  But you won't have to haul a bunch of different minerals to whatever planet you've decided to set up as your base.  And you won't run into the situations where there's no convenient planet, so you're just out of luck.  You won't have to waste military yard capacity on colliers and supply ships, and then make absurd and complicated vessels to help get around the maintenance rules.  (Most of my colliers in my current big fleet game are barges with nothing but magazines aboard.  There's nothing to go wrong, and the tugs are civilian.)
And you definitely won't be faced with the problem of having no way to repair your battleship if it gets damaged without either setting up a colony and towing a big shipyard forward, building an absurdly large PDC you'll abandon just after it gets finished, or sending it all the way home.
Steve, please hurry.  I'm itching to get started on my best empire yet.

[Iranon]

I'm a little wary of these changes.

Civilian carriers have some limitations, but the ability to shove all proper military craft into a mobile hangar and avoiding maintenance forever will have a huge effect on long-running games.
Civilian damage control units and maintenance storage: What about purpose-built damage sinks (mostly low-powered engines, those cost practically nothing) that can be repaired a few dozen times over?

Most attempts to break the system resulted in interesting things that may or may not be worth the limitations compared to a respectable approach... which is fantastic.
I'm afraid these might hand out gamebreaking concepts like candy, and players would have to actively hold back to get the richness and complexity we have now.

[Steve Walmsley]

I'm a little wary of these changes.

Civilian carriers have some limitations, but the ability to shove all proper military craft into a mobile hangar and avoiding maintenance forever will have a huge effect on long-running games.
Civilian damage control units and maintenance storage: What about purpose-built damage sinks (mostly low-powered engines, those cost practically nothing) that can be repaired a few dozen times over?

Most attempts to break the system resulted in interesting things that may or may not be worth the limitations compared to a respectable approach... which is fantastic.
I'm afraid these might hand out gamebreaking concepts like candy, and players would have to actively hold back to get the richness and complexity we have now.

You are still affected by maintenance requirements while in a civilian hangar.

The concern about purpose-built damage sinks is valid, but you can already do that with massively armoured freighters. It depends to what extent you want to use what are plainly exploits in a single-player game.

[bean]

I'm a little wary of these changes.

We've seen a lot of new stuff over the past 5 years, and none of it has caused the sort of problem you refer to.  (Or this sort of controversy, IIRC.)  I haven't looked forward to a new version this much since 6.0.  (Well, maybe 6.43, but that was because the bug was holding up my game.)

Civilian damage control units and maintenance storage: What about purpose-built damage sinks (mostly low-powered engines, those cost practically nothing) that can be repaired a few dozen times over?

This can be done today, with engineering spaces.  The reason is that it's sort of pointless, and most civilian components have low HTK.  Or, if that's not enough, make civil damcon explosive. 

Most attempts to break the system resulted in interesting things that may or may not be worth the limitations compared to a respectable approach... which is fantastic.
I'm afraid these might hand out gamebreaking concepts like candy, and players would have to actively hold back to get the richness and complexity we have now.

And then Steve fixes the problem and we get 7.3 rather quickly. 
Honestly, the biggest exploit I see likely to come out of this has to do with long-range missiles.  It's possible to soak up enemy missile fire by moving ships out of hangars, waiting until the enemy has fired off missiles at them, then putting them back in the hangar.  Repeat as needed.  Previously, it was difficult to apply against anything other than antimissile platforms because of the size of hangar required for a ship which could draw fire near the limits of range.  You could build a civilian carrier which could do this, but it's a fairly big headache, and it's probably cheaper to just build a few more PD cruisers.

[Steve Walmsley]

You are still affected by maintenance requirements while in a civilian hangar.

I just realised I never got around to adding commercial hangars to the Change Log for v7.2, Added now.

[Iranon]

You can already build civilian damage sinks, but the ability to repair themselves will be greatly enhanced.

If a ship is dirt-cheap for its size, engineering bays will only add a few MSPs. For this kind of ship, Maintenance Storage Bays can get 10 times the density and they're cheap.
Low-power engines aren't that sturdy for their size, but they're sturdy for their cost. Which is what counts when tonnage is no object - heck, we can throw in a habitat and build it in the multiple megaton range for less than a midsized warship.
Now give us efficient MSP storage and access to decent damage control... I see a problem.

Making civil damage control explosive sounds very strange - and if the sacrificial components are cheap bulk, nothing else is likely to be hit much. If it's explosive enough to be relevant here, it's going to be useless for any legitimate use.

[bean]

You can already build civilian damage sinks, but the ability to repair themselves will be greatly enhanced.

Wait.  That's what you're worried about?  I'd say that the ability to build damage sinks is greatly enhanced by the fact that it's much easier to repair armor now.

If a ship is dirt-cheap for its size, engineering bays will only add a few MSPs. For this kind of ship, Maintenance Storage Bays can get 10 times the density and they're cheap.
Low-power engines aren't that sturdy for their size, but they're sturdy for their cost. Which is what counts when tonnage is no object - heck, we can throw in a habitat and build it in the multiple megaton range for less than a midsized warship.
Now give us efficient MSP storage and access to decent damage control... I see a problem.

I don't.  How are you planning to use this thing?  Leaving aside any questions about the AI's targeting routines, you can't build a multimegaton habitat for "less than a midsize warship" and have it be able to keep up with the fleet.  It will either be nearly stationary or very expensive.  Add in that even civilian engines have a non-trivial chance of exploding.  This doesn't look so good now.
Also, it's a single-player game.  If you want to use exploits, that's your problem.  This kind of stuff is rarely broken enough to become a problem.  The only example I can think of where it was is the confetti missile thing, and that was ages ago.

Making civil damage control explosive sounds very strange - and if the sacrificial components are cheap bulk, nothing else is likely to be hit much. If it's explosive enough to be relevant here, it's going to be useless for any legitimate use.

That makes no sense.  Its legitimate use involves sitting in deep space as part of what is essentially an ARD, and fixing up damaged warships.  There's no possibility of damage there, so it can be as explosive as we like, and it won't be a problem in 'legitimate use'.  Unless the ARD is being shot at, of course, but if that happens, something has already gone horribly wrong.

What is your problem with this, anyway?  I'm honestly baffled with your reaction to it.  The hangar maintenance thing made sense, but you're grasping at straws now.  If you really don't like it that much, just keep playing 7.1.

[Iranon]

Armour isn't actually a very good damage sink, too expensive per HTK and harder to repair (even if it becomes easier).
But the things I stated were meant more as examples, probably not worth picking apart details of damage sinks here, sorry I went too deeply into specifics.

I'd greatly welcome natural ways of building auxiliaries that are less of a logistics burden, I've often jumped through hoops to do so (e.g. tractors & pods, excessive maintenance life intending to keep it in deep space until scrapping).
the new options are dangerous as they allow us to circumvent fundamental restrictions on warships. At the same time, maybe not open-ended enough (auxiliary carriers, but no armed merchant cruisers).

My problem is that I fear the game may become less of an honest challenge, that players will have to consciously hold back to have an engaging experience. I'll have some fun playing with the new options, but from what I've read so far I'm inclined to believe that the new options will reduce the overall depth of the game. Maybe considerably.

[bean]

I'd greatly welcome natural ways of building auxiliaries that are less of a logistics burden, I've often jumped through hoops to do so (e.g. tractors & pods, excessive maintenance life intending to keep it in deep space until scrapping).
the new options are dangerous as they allow us to circumvent fundamental restrictions on warships. At the same time, maybe not open-ended enough (auxiliary carriers, but no armed merchant cruisers).

What fundamental restrictions are we circumventing?  Maintenance modules are no cheaper, just a bit easier to use.  Commercial magazines and maintenance bays are long overdue.  Commercial hangars don't maintain things, and building a big enough ship to fly warships around is going to be expensive.  Building enough ships to fly all your warships around will be prohibitively expensive.  Don't believe me?  Try it.  We have the specs of all of the components.  I'm going to do an example when I get a bit of time.

My problem is that I fear the game may become less of an honest challenge, that players will have to consciously hold back to have an engaging experience. I'll have some fun playing with the new options, but from what I've read so far I'm inclined to believe that the new options will reduce the overall depth of the game. Maybe considerably.

I have no clue where this is coming from.  At all.  If anything, I expect that making logistics a bit easier to do will mean more people will take advantage of it.