Howdy everyone, tried doing a search for this, but couldn't seem to find anything that fit the bill. Also, apologies if this is in the wrong subforum, thought this would be the most appropriate.



Anyways, what is everyone's opinion on giving unique classes of ships to the various factions? As it stands, ships are functionally identical amongst every race, the only differences are aesthetics and names. Examples would be Missile Frigates (Medium, -30% Tonnage on missiles, +10% on Beams and Kinetics), Medics (Small, Double the Engineering bonus), Brawlers (Medium, -30% Tonnage on Kinetics, +10% on Beams and Missiles), etc... I think this could help add some more personality to the existing factions, as well as make for more complex custom factions (By choosing which classes of ships to have).



What is everyone else's opinion on the matter?

I Kinda like the idea.



Possibly per faction, Possibly per tech, Possibly per trait and possibly per 'tonnage' module.



Any way to make a players fleet more diverse would be a welcome addition.

I agree, I think the combat is to linear at the moment, in (Very) late game all I do is throw my fleets at the enemy and see who comes out on top, we are pretty much fairly matched..

I agree, diversity is always a great addition

n18991c wrote:
I agree, diversity is always a great addition

As long as we don't get Chaos by diversity, yes!



Yeah, good idea Romeo!

Sounds like a good idea as long as it's properly balanced.

It seems almost like it's a bit too late in development to change such a key feature, don't you think?

I really love the idea, especially since it could create more diversity in the gameplay; for example, Cravers would get ships with less Kinetic weapon tonnage and Sophons less Laser weapon tonnage, and at that point you could even do things like increasing the Tonnage for certain ships in certain races (What Craver player needs defense modules, anyway?). I just don't think it's practical to implement, not now anyway. But maybe for the next big expansion this could definitely be something to try to make happen; I would love to see it implemented.

Fenrakk101 wrote:
It seems almost like it's a bit too late in development to change such a key feature, don't you think?

I really love the idea, especially since it could create more diversity in the gameplay; for example, Cravers would get ships with less Kinetic weapon tonnage and Sophons less Laser weapon tonnage, and at that point you could even do things like increasing the Tonnage for certain ships in certain races (What Craver player needs defense modules, anyway?). I just don't think it's practical to implement, not now anyway. But maybe for the next big expansion this could definitely be something to try to make happen; I would love to see it implemented.

Aye, fair enough. Was just thinking out loud from something I had noticed, always struck me as odd that the peaceful, alien Sophons have the exact same ship doctrines as the warmongering, human Sheredyn. You'd think being the pacifists, they'd be catered more towards the defensive; the survival.



But in the end, you are, of course, correct. With such a huge project coming up (Very excited for the add-on!), asking for even more does seem a touch unfair. Still, hopefully on the next add-on!

One of the expansions will focus on battles so this would probably be the best place to implement that I think.



But to the topic I do think that would be beneficial since one of the goals is to provide diversity to the different factions/races. However I do not think it should be done at once since it would be such a strategy changer. Implement various parts of 'it', the idea of different ships, instead of diving head first and overdoing it.



Granted all that needs doing is changing the benefits each ship class has towards certain modules... just saying.

It kinda reminds me of the Flagships from Twilight Imperium board game where each flagship ship had different abilities based on the race. Human Flagship ,for example, was a huge carrier carrying enormous amount of ground troops (in the board game troops and fighters move with carriers) while in some other races the Flagships counted as wormhole beacon or better planet bombardment etc. So i am all the way in for race specific ships

It would be nice if the ships reflected the strengths of each faction. I'd love if each faction would have another bonus for the ships (but no malus) and the bonus would vary for each ship class within the faction.

So the cravers maybe get a bonus for the ships used early in the game but the Sophons get a bonus at the ships in the late game stage (mind vs. muscles ).

I have thought a lot about this and tried to "mod" a number of different things to increase ship/racial diversity. But, the available hooks for modding are very limited right now. Please take a look at threads I have started in the modding forum, and you will see most of the brainstorm threads peter out with no solution which can be implemented today. If you have some suggestions about what can be done, specifically, please write it up.

davea wrote:
I have thought a lot about this and tried to "mod" a number of different things to increase ship/racial diversity. But, the available hooks for modding are very limited right now. Please take a look at threads I have started in the modding forum, and you will see most of the brainstorm threads peter out with no solution which can be implemented today. If you have some suggestions about what can be done, specifically, please write it up.

Well now, full disclosure, I have an awful habit of biting off more than I can chew with mods (Such as letting a couple units spiral in to two distinct races in Dawn of War), but I will certainly stop in and see what's what in the mod forums here. =)