Firstly let me apologise should there already be a thread for this (which there should be since you all are terribly active here! ), but I seached the forum and came up empty, so here goes.



I have an issue, or rather a question, concerning the current retrofit option/function in ES. I find that when one of my fleets has been damaged in battle and is in the process of "healing" and I am able to upgrade it because I've just completed researching a new technology then the retrofit is expensive (this part I understand) but the retrofit does not autmatically bring the "health stats" of the individual ships back up (this I don't get).



Considering that a retrofit involves a ship undergoing work and parts being exchanged etc. then should the ships not at the same time be repaired (i.e. repairs being an automatic part of a retrofit)? Otherwise my newly retrofitted ship could immediately be destroyed in battle because it is still severely damaged!



I would suggest therefore, if it hasn't been already, that a repair option be added to the menu panel and that a ship which is undergoing a retrofit is automatically repaired as well. Fair?

Well it is the same in Civ5. You can upgrade a unit but it is still damaged. Here in ES you could see it like this: Retrofit is for upgrading the modules or "hardware". Then there should be something like regaining full Hitpoints, or as I suggest refilling the manpower. So you can upgrade or get back your full HPs. For both there should be a button. And if this is done there will be a third button to get an upgraded and fully recovered fleet.

I agree; it makes sense that retrofitting repairs the ship as well as outfits it. Or at least give a repair option and maybe a repair and retrofit option in the fleet tab.

Seems like it could be abused by making a really cheap change to the design.

lmaoboat wrote:
Seems like it could be abused by making a really cheap change to the design.

Perhaps then have it so that the amount of health regained by the ship depends on the amount of retrofitting being done?

I can see where it can be abused, only slightly offset by the fact that retrofitting removes all the movement for that round. I like things the way they are, repairs took time, major ones at least, and these a huge, expensive, and precise instruments of war. But if keeping your ships in order is a problem, then a good way to keep a field fleet in order is threefold and one that is a bit of gaming the system:



Spare the room to put in repair modules on all of them. Yes it takes up space, but for a long reaching fleet it'll be more than worth the firepower you had to remove.



If they don't have to be out, don't let them be out. You can take your ships back to a planet and put them in reserve and they'll heal faster (and cost less to upkeep). You can also just put them in friendly territory, I believe that increases the heal rate, but not as much as reserving them.



The third is the most effective, always carry spares. When a fleet of ships takes an immense amount of damage, ferry the damaged ships out and have a reserve fleet ready to pull ships from. Take those ships from the reserve and stick them back with the main fleet and then put those damaged vessels in reserve for them to repair (and when the fleet gets damaged again, those will probably be ready to rotate out).



The last is using the battle card of Nano-bots. You can usually get away with using that in the long and medium phase and that makes a huge difference. I've kept a fleet alive longer than it should have through that (which was a good thing, because those pirates wanted my planet bad).





So, with a repair and rotation system we keep a sense of realism and avoid abuse of repair. I mean, at that point if a nation is rich they can just keep repairing their vessels and win out by attrition and that seems a bit unfair (unless they were in their own system). Hey that's an alternative, right? A repair button only for home sectors and it cost a fair amount of dust.

Perhaps an option to repair ships for dust in friendly systems, no repairs on retrofit and can't retrofit and repair on same turn. Might lock retrofit and repair function when the system is being blockaded as well. Think that would limit abuse... though it would still clearly favor the defender.

moved to game design proposals

ShadowWolf wrote:
So, with a repair and rotation system we keep a sense of realism and avoid abuse of repair. I mean, at that point if a nation is rich they can just keep repairing their vessels and win out by attrition and that seems a bit unfair (unless they were in their own system). Hey that's an alternative, right? A repair button only for home sectors and it cost a fair amount of dust.

I agree ShadowWolf, a simple repair for dust option would invite abuse by richer factions. However, while your suggestion to place severe restrictions on repairs (such as only being able to do it in a home system and then only when paying large sums for the repairs) sounds good to me, it does not resolve the underlying issue that, for example, a ship with red health stats and which would most likely be destroyed in another battle unless it has time to regenerate can nevertheless be retrofitted (which is also expensive) without any of its health regenerating.... :eek:



So how about a retrofit automatically restoring at least a little bit of health of the damaged and now retrofitted ship? Perhaps bringing the health stats back up to yellow?