i think theres some potential for some great diplomatic features in having civilian ships as well as letting me live my dream of being a pirate. So i came up with a couple of hull types for players to create. I define a civilian ship as a ship not designed for combat much like the colony ship and the exploration ship.  So i came up with a couple of ideas on some more.


Trade vessels: I mean actual trade vessels. When you upgrade your trade companies that allows you to build another trade vessel that you can then send to another empire on a set route through space. it travels through lanes like any other ship meaning that if a hostile fleet got to it they could attack and pillage it. This means that trade routes must be activly blockaded by a fleat instead of an influence sphere (unless siad influence shepre closed borders then the tade vessel owner must find new trade route. Depending on how you outfited your ships they get bonuses in dust production, science production, or luxury resource production.


Diplomatic envoys:  This ship would be viewed as non-hostile by other empires and would serve as a way to balance diplomatic pressure. It would also produce a small amount of influence based on ht eprecentage of diplomatic pressure in your favor. This ship must also benefit the empire its visiting so there can be a substantial dust tax for each envoy in the influence sphere (or systems if using celestial vines) Envoys may also reduce diplomatic treaties between the empires involved.


Mining ships: These ships would act similar to trade vessels but instead of sending them to a trade subsidiary you would be sending them to an unclaimed system (unless you have permission from an empire) to extract a specific resource (titanium,hyperium,red sang, dust water). the ships would harvest .5 or that resource which would be upgradable in time.




I really enjoy the thought of using privatiers to ananomously plunder trade routes, assasinate diplomats, and sabAtoge mining operations. There is a lot of potential here for some fun game play and it offers some ways to get resources and advantages otherwise outside your grasp. A new layer of game play that i think would be cool.