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Posted by: xenoscepter
« on: May 19, 2019, 10:30:00 PM »

For what it is worth, I do this in v7.1 by making a "Blank" of the ship I want to make, then using one shipyard to manufacture the "Blank" and letting otyher shipyards build it into the ship it is meant to be by Refitting that "Blank".

It's not what you wanted, but it's something...
Posted by: Jorgen_CAB
« on: April 30, 2019, 11:38:15 AM »


All the Napoleans are freighters that are exactly identical, only difference is the drives, they are exact same size, only difference is power output. It will happily build some of thé much less powered ones, but not the ones close to power and certainly now any more powerful.

Why oh why can I put on much smegtier engines but not close to identical ones? Who knowes? There is no rhyme or reason. I mean, I could get bigger or smaller engines, even different tech, but they are exact same size and technology. Hell, even an argument could be made that large engines would need larger tubes to feed them sorium. But why the close to identical engines?

It would be much better if I could build ship hulls and then fit them with tech that fits into the appropriate hull points that I have designed

This depends on how you see things... from a role playing perspective it might not be so hard to rationalise.

The reason for this technically is that the engine become more expensive and complex as you get new technology and the rest of the ship remain the same from a technological perspective. This means that the engine are not a huge part of the cost and development effort at lower technologies which they are at a higher technology. Thus it is easy to remove lower tech and replace them with more advanced. It is far more complex to replace a high tech engine with an even more complex high tech engine thus it require a change to the yards.

It actually makes sense if you think about it.

You look at the change in cost from one part to another in comparison to the total cost of the ship. In a low tech ship the engine is relatively simple and a lower cost of the the ship and much easier to remove and replace. If you have more advanced engines then the percentage of change in cost and effort is just so much bigger.

This is why you want to think about upgrade possibilities of ships in general. You actually can gain allot of benefit by designing ships that are easier to upgrade, it can save you both time and resources.

You have to look at things a bit more realistic... if you have an engine who is more integrated into the entire ships systems it is harder and more difficult to remove. This is simulated by the fact that the mechanic look at the total cost of removing and adding something based in the total cost of the ship. So... a ship with just one purpose will be more and more expensive to upgrade rather than a ship that can do many things and who can upgrade in many more incremental stages.
Posted by: hostergaard
« on: April 30, 2019, 04:21:22 AM »

No picture attached.

Ahh, is was there but now showing, fixed!
Posted by: Cavgunner
« on: April 29, 2019, 10:52:59 AM »

No picture attached.
Posted by: hostergaard
« on: April 29, 2019, 07:30:23 AM »

I think this picture shows what my issue with the current system is:



All the Napoleans are freighters that are exactly identical, only difference is the drives, they are exact same size, only difference is power output. It will happily build some of thé much less powered ones, but not the ones close to power and certainly now any more powerful.

Why oh why can I put on much smegtier engines but not close to identical ones? Who knowes? There is no rhyme or reason. I mean, I could get bigger or smaller engines, even different tech, but they are exact same size and technology. Hell, even an argument could be made that large engines would need larger tubes to feed them sorium. But why the close to identical engines?

It would be much better if I could build ship hulls and then fit them with tech that fits into the appropriate hull points that I have designed

Posted by: Jorgen_CAB
« on: April 16, 2018, 03:42:08 PM »

I put hangars on my capital ships for that very reason.  I just use size 9 sensors that fit into fighter pods, that I build with fighter factories.  No retool cost.

It means if I have a squadron of 6 capital ships, I will have a flag bridge pod, an EM Pod, 2 Res 1 pods, a thermal pod, and 2 anti-ship pods and possibly an anti small craft active sensor.  It also means that if I lose a ship that carried a sensor, instead of having to retool, I just switch out the sensor pods.

There is an added benefit:  because you can only activate and de-activate active sensors on a ship by ship basis, by having the sensors on pods I can ensure by res 1 sensor is ALWAYS up, but I can switch off my noisy anti-Swarm mommy ship/commerce hunting res 500 sensor.

I am going with LACs as my primary early missile ship in my current game, so I might only build size 50 antimissile  and anti-ship sensors for PDCs for my colonies.  Might be an interesting tactic, find an asteroid that will be within range of the target enemy planet at some point in the orbit, build a sensor and point defense base there, using construction bridges on pre-fabs.

This is exactly what you should do with all those expensive modules. Since Hangars basically make maintenance free for whatever is in them and hangars themselves is very cheap you can get away with extremely advanced ship at nearly no maintenance cost.

There are many interesting things you can do with modular ships if you like to game the mechanics, especially if you also include tractor beams as well.

Aurora are probably a rather open ended game to begin with for a reason and only you as the player decide how you want to play the game and which limits you put on your games. There is no right or wrong way to play the game. I you feel something is a bit gamey you can just decide to not do it, some things are left in for players to explore if they like.
Posted by: Michael Sandy
« on: March 31, 2018, 11:08:54 PM »

I put hangars on my capital ships for that very reason.  I just use size 9 sensors that fit into fighter pods, that I build with fighter factories.  No retool cost.

It means if I have a squadron of 6 capital ships, I will have a flag bridge pod, an EM Pod, 2 Res 1 pods, a thermal pod, and 2 anti-ship pods and possibly an anti small craft active sensor.  It also means that if I lose a ship that carried a sensor, instead of having to retool, I just switch out the sensor pods.

There is an added benefit:  because you can only activate and de-activate active sensors on a ship by ship basis, by having the sensors on pods I can ensure by res 1 sensor is ALWAYS up, but I can switch off my noisy anti-Swarm mommy ship/commerce hunting res 500 sensor.

I am going with LACs as my primary early missile ship in my current game, so I might only build size 50 antimissile  and anti-ship sensors for PDCs for my colonies.  Might be an interesting tactic, find an asteroid that will be within range of the target enemy planet at some point in the orbit, build a sensor and point defense base there, using construction bridges on pre-fabs.
Posted by: alex_brunius
« on: March 29, 2018, 02:50:24 AM »

So another aspect of making the ship design more modular and designing ship hulls which you can later add components on (a bit like you can fit different missiles in the same launcher) is that it could allow you to also temporarily refit the ship for a specific mision profile.

Say you have a big carrier with a huge hangar space. You need a ship with a huge sensor array to go check something stat, you don't have time, or maybe resources to build a new ship, but you just so happen to have a very large sensor laying around. So you stuff it in the hangar space, maybe with some extra generators and hook it all up. Presto! You got yourself a temporary listening ship. It far less efficient as purpose built ship in terms of sensor strengt to hull strengt as you are kinda have to make it fit into a space it was not made for. But hey, you got something that works in a pinch.

This would allow for more tactical options, interesting retrofitted pirate ship or other people and organisations engaging using haphazard ships as need be. Or just spyops where you can disguise your ships, like stuffing a hangar in a transporter or whatever to surprise your enemies.

What prevents you from designing a "ship" that is 100% sensor using the one you have laying around and building it very quickly since all components are completed + just stuff it into the hangar in current Aurora?

You can probably use a small DD shipyard for this or something, so should be quick to retool..

This would probably take less then 20% of the time and resources needed to rebuild a new Carrier which includes the large sensor integrated.
Posted by: hostergaard
« on: March 27, 2018, 09:22:48 AM »

So another aspect of making the ship design more modular and designing ship hulls which you can later add components on (a bit like you can fit different missiles in the same launcher) is that it could allow you to also temporarily refit the ship for a specific mision profile.

Say you have a big carrier with a huge hangar space. You need a ship with a huge sensor array to go check something stat, you don't have time, or maybe resources to build a new ship, but you just so happen to have a very large sensor laying around. So you stuff it in the hangar space, maybe with some extra generators and hook it all up. Presto! You got yourself a temporary listening ship. It far less efficient as purpose built ship in terms of sensor strengt to hull strengt as you are kinda have to make it fit into a space it was not made for. But hey, you got something that works in a pinch.

This would allow for more tactical options, interesting retrofitted pirate ship or other people and organisations engaging using haphazard ships as need be. Or just spyops where you can disguise your ships, like stuffing a hangar in a transporter or whatever to surprise your enemies.
Posted by: TheDeadlyShoe
« on: February 03, 2018, 02:46:32 AM »

IIRC Steve's talked about a system where slipways and slip size are convertible.  I thought it was in Newtonian Aurora but i couldn't find the post.
Posted by: QuakeIV
« on: February 02, 2018, 12:29:52 PM »

That could potentially be really fun.
Posted by: TMaekler
« on: February 02, 2018, 03:59:11 AM »

Interesting concept and idea. Let me throw in my 2 cents... or a little more  :)

How about changing the system of "shipyards" into a two component system:
a) slipways (assembly lines)
b) construction areas

Every shipyard can have one or more slipways, even of different sizes (2x15.000t; 1x20.000t; 1x30.000t). Additionally to this every shipyard can have multiple construction areas where the individual components of the ships are constructed and then given to the respective assembly line (slipway) where it is assembled into the ship.

By this the slipways become independent of what ship can be constructed in it (only the size of the slipway limits the biggest type which could be assembled/refit/scrapped/repaired there). The necessary components for the ship will be constructed in the separate construction areas. And if new technology is researched only new construction areas need to be build for the shipyard to be able to assemble new ship designs (and no longer is there need for a complete refit).
If you want to speed up the construction of new ships multiple assembly areas of one type can be created in one shipyard which then would be used for parallel assembly.
Posted by: TheDeadlyShoe
« on: February 02, 2018, 03:03:39 AM »

I recommend not abusing it even though you can. Aurora isn't sturdy enough for that.
Posted by: QuakeIV
« on: February 02, 2018, 01:41:11 AM »

You could possibly balance it by making people pay a lot in minerals to build a modular hull slot (IE a 200 ton sensor slot) in order to make specialized ship designs potentially much more affordable but less flexible in the long term.

e:  You could imagine the slots being comparable in cost to the systems themselves, so more or less you pay double cost but potentially get long term gains if that ship survives to be retrofitted multiple times.
Posted by: Drgong
« on: February 01, 2018, 06:25:39 PM »

My problem with placeholder hulls to get an advantage in the current system is that taking it to the logical conclusion eliminates retooling entirely.
Retool to the most expensive thing you can build, usually fitting only (hardened?) sensors/fire controls, and you should be able to use it for any practical design forever.

But in game that concept breaks rather quickly in practice as you will end up needing something else.