A few things I thought of; just gonna list 'em here for perusal at one's leisure.
Link to Standalone Thread Here ====> http://aurora2.pentarch.org/index.php?topic=12598.0 - A Jump Cooldown w/ Shock Mechanic Tweak: Have Jump Shock be tied to max Jump Tonnage as a function of Increments per 5HS, with 5 seconds minimum. Then multiply it by the number of ships jumped; 1.25x per ship for Squadron, 1.5x for Standard with the rates doubled for Commercial Drives. When under the effects of Jump Shock, ships cannot perform another jump, but a ship not suffering from jump shock
CAN jump ships that are. Jump Shock would
NOT be cumulative when this happens, simply being reset to either the new value or the old value, whichever is longer.
- Transit Drive: A type of Jump Drive that runs on fuel, allows instant transit between points within a system. I had the idea that it would use special fuel, and have it's own special fuel tanks to hold them with the base capacity being 1 Unit of Jump Fuel per HS. Each jump would require one unit of this "Jump Fuel" and larger Fuel Tanks would give more Jump Fuel per HS, but at the trade-off of being more expensive. Each Transit Drive could have at least one unit of Jump Fuel capacity built in, although larger drives might have more and REALLY small (like, Fighter-scale) would have none. These drives could also transit Jump Points, both stabilized and non-stabilized, but would only transit the ship mounting them in addition to giving higher amounts of Jump Shock than if an actual Jump Drive was used. If implemented with the above changes to Jump Drives, it would give double the amount if Military, but Triple if the Transit Drive was Commercial. Like regular Jump Drives, these would be tied to engine type.
--- Designing a Transit Drive would involve the following:
1. Choosing a Jump Drive Efficiency, tied to the existing Tech, but with a 2x modifier applied.
2. Choosing a Jump Drive Size.
3. Choosing a Jump Fuel Capacity, new tech with the values "0" and "1" available from the start. Adds 1HS per unit of capacity. (Optional)
A variant of the Active Sensor that is smaller and more powerful than a regular version. Has a cooldown between uses and is
significantly more visible than a regular Active Sensor of equal strength. Fluff wise the unit uses capacitors to "charge up" power and then releases it all at once to detect targets. Some ideas for implementation include:
1. A separate module that allows mounted sensors to be pulsed, with an order to go with it. This would make all mounted Active Sensors "pulse".
2. Having them be their own sensor "type" selected from the same drop down as Missile FCS and tied to the "Turn Active Sensors On", but with a "ping" between them to represent the cooldown.
3. Same as #2, but tied to it's own order like #1. This would allow only the "Pulse" Sensors to be fired, while allowing the active ones to remain on or off.
--- Coding #1 would likely involve a new part type added along with new flags to check for it and possibly even new techs as well. Coding #2 might prove the easiest as it uses most of the existing framework, but just needs to be tied to the increments for the "ping". Coding #3 would require a new order set, much like #1, and could potentially generate a faux-missile centered on the ship doing the "pulse" that would generate the relative Active Sensor effect as well as the related EM spikes.
Currently, to qualify as Commercial an engine must take up at least 1,250 Tons(25HS) and possess a Power Modifier of 50% or less. Under this suggestion the minimum size of engine would be tied to the power modifier. For every 10% less than 50, the HS requirement for an engine to be considered Commercial would be 5HS less. So, under this proposal we would have:
1,250 Tons(25HS) = 50% or less for Commercial Rating.
1,000 Tons(20HS) = 40% or less for Commercial Rating.
750 Tons(15HS) = 30% or less for Commercial Rating.
500 Tons(10HS) = 20% or less for Commercial Rating.
250 Tons(5HS) = 10% or less for Commercial Rating.
