New Ship Guide Discussion

[Darron Wraith]

@[member="Akio Kahoshi"] What you and @[member="Pandeima"] are fighting about so much stems for a need to have detailed ships for fleet battles that don't occur. We aren't catering to something that's not used.


As @[member="Tefka"] says, don't talk about the problems without offering a solution. So if you want the ability for hyper detailed ships with the ranges all maxed and all your guns customizable and stuff why not build a larger fleeting group on this board and actually....fleet battle? As it stands, I personally have a larger ship IC than your faction possess...and I've yet to use it for anything other than to say it's "my ship"

 

[Torjesgo]

It's a great system.

The counter to the worrying "weapon count" is simply that you don't need to put on MAX guns. Just like every ship doesn't have to be the max 2000m when it's designed. There is plenty of flexibility. The goal should not be to TOP OUT all the weaponry. So get together with your fellow tech enthusiasts and point that fact out. That allows for TONS of flexibility.

These are simply the TOP OUT numbers, from what I am gathering. No one is forcing you to use them.
The factory was very draining and I hardly took part in it. I'm glad the Staff has something standardized they can work with now and I encourage players and RPJs to work together still on making ships unique rather than just having them follow to the letter the guidelines. Ships should not be carrying the TOP OUT stats all the time.

That's boring. So I see where you're coming from Akio, but just don't carry the TOP OUT load. I've seen too many ships that are exactly 2000m.

Communicate with the other techies, Staff is simply implementing what the limits are. You should never be right against the limits for every vessel that is abound.

*Note, these are my opinions, I'm not speaking for anyone else here.

 

[Onrai]

@[member="Torjesgo"]

The implication we've received is that all ships have to have those exact numbers. I for one have no reason to make a vessel with max armament right now. Aside from some of my fighters, none of the ships I've proposed significantly push at the boundaries in any way. Well, that, and there's quite a bit of ground between subdivisions that could be covered.

 

[Torjesgo]

@[member="Pandeima"]

If you read the post, it mentions MAXIMUM guns and MAXIMUM hanger capacity. It does not say it must use those exact numbers.
If it is implied otherwise, I would quickly change sides here and agree with the dissenters that it is foolish to have a MUST HAVE set of numbers.

 

[Darron Wraith]

Everyone's also forgetting that anything 1,000M long requires a thread showing development now.

 

[Tefka]

 

[Darron Wraith]

@[member="Torjesgo"], those are the MAX numbers. So it's all good.

 

[Valiens Nantaris]

The irony is of course that if I’d had my way I would have had simply had all the ship’s weaponry graded on a scale of 1-10 like the speed.

(Un)fortunately that didn’t happen.

 

[Torjesgo]

@[member="Tegaea Alcori"]

That was my thought as well.

 

[Valiens Nantaris]

People get worked up into a froth about things so easily. The conservative nature of people generally pushes them to resist change, especially if they believe it may be against their interests.

But I would argue here that these fears are unfounded. This is a template to work with, to use, to simplify and open up the factory to those left behind by the proliferation of arcane SW tech.

However, should you wish for something special there is no reason why you cannot submit something different, after completing a dev thread. If your justification is good, your work is thorough, and you really, really must have that Mk4 stutter firing gun…you can try.

Things which are different from the template are not impossible to approve, but channel your inventiveness into explaining and justifying why you need to be different. Would that not allow both sides to be relatively happy?

 

[Torjesgo]

Everyone is entitled to their fears. This thread is here to allow that discussion. They should not just be tossed to the side because they don't have any direct evidence. The counter point is that there is no direct evidence that this will be better.

The fact of the matter is that rules are created and modified in all aspects of life. Just like government, our board must try out things to see what does and does not work. This is something that staff has created and will test: if it works, hurrah. My guess? There will be changes but I imagine there will remain a template of sorts for RPJs and tech creators to work from.

So while we can argue in both directions, we should let it play out and see what happens. If issues remain, then they can be repaired or modified. But outright hating on something without trying it is incorrect. The purpose here should be to offer suggestions to what can make it better rather than not offering any compromises.

Compromise from both dissenters and supporters.

 

[Valiens Nantaris]

Exactly, there is always a middle way for those who wish to have a bit of both.

 

[Lina Ovmar]

I want to apologise that some of you feel that this is restricting your creativity, but I would like to point out that the only thing we are restricting, is the count of guns and fighters. If you believe that these two points are restricting creativity on the story behind the ship and the possibilities that you still have at your finger tips then I strongly advise you to widen your perspective and learn to be creative in other ways.

The counts provided are the maximum you can have. You want to switch it up a bit? Choose your guns more carefully, take care when choosing which fighters/bombers you use.

When its comes to fleeting you will need to think more carefully, if everyone is on a relatively equal playing field then strategy requires more thought and you may find that it expands the story and makes you think outside the box of 'I have X amount of fighters and X amount of guns so therefore this opponent can't win blah blah blah.' This does not in anyway restrict the story behind its development.

You want to have an arms race? Have one. Start your ships off at the lower end, go fight your battle, loose. Develop your ships accordingly and carry on. How many fights did it take for the Jedi to come up with a way to deal with the Dovin Basals on the Coral Skippers?

A lot is the answer. You want an arms race, go and find an IC reason to have one. No more of this OOC metagaming 'they've got this so we need this' development.

This policy is not designed to hinder anyone. Its not designed to make everyone the same. Its designed to give ships a cap in terms of guns and fighters. To make it more understandable for the less tech savvy of us out there (myself included!) and to make it easier for RPJ's (old and new) to stay on the roughly the same page so we don't end up with these precedent's that are way off the mark and give us headaches (because yes, we get them).

 

[Qae Shena]

Considering this is a guide that satisfied every concern most people actually brought to me as an RPJ, I'm going to be actually really helpful here and say thank you to staff for being great and solving the problems of most people on this board. Thanks, guys. Perfect work.

And now I am going to take the template and have my ship ready to go for open, because I am not going to complain about this wonderful boon.

 

[Caulder Dune]

Help, help!

I'm being repressed!

 

[Judas of Vahl]

@[member="Mia Monroe"]
I agree wholeheartedly. Being a major fleeter, I absolutely love these changes. The balancing of all of the armaments and complement in the hangar is outstanding. Now those creating ships will actually have to think about the usefulness, logic, and realism behind their submissions. These new changes are also bound to have a major impact on tech development threads, all of them being positive as quality will need to be increased. Just knowing that fact makes me want to go ahead and start doing some threads to build some tech and actually flesh out the strengths, weaknesses, and capabilities of my vessels.

Now from a fleeter's standpoint: This system based on weapons and hangar capacity will even the playing field. Now all of these jacked-up, unbalanced ships will randomly barge into a fight and be like: "Awww yeahhh n00bs, my stuff is bigger and better, plus I got buttloads of fighters to use with my axial superlaz0r and 7,000 heavy quad turbolasers." Just writing that made me cringe. The balancing of weapons and fighters will make all fleet combat easy to calculate and give the members room to wiggle. For instance:

Fleet A:
Star Destroyer A - 1,500m

• Armament: Heavy Guns
  Turbolasers (700)
• Warhead Launchers (100, Proton Torpedos)

[*]Complement: Heavy Guns

• Fighters (12)

Fleet B:
Command Carrier B - 1,800m

• Armament: Heavy Fighters (Carrier)​​
  Turbolasers (60)
• Flak Cannon Batteries (75)
• Quad Laser Cannon Batteries (100)
• Point Defense Emplacements (125)

[*]Complement: Heavy Fighters (Carrier)

• Fighters (100)
• Bombers (68)
• Gunships (20)
• Dropships (20)
• Ground Assault Vehicles w/ Landing barges (50)

Combat Analysis:
Fleet A: Star Destroyer A

• Strengths:
  Capable ship-to-ship combatant, deadly against larger vessels
• Heavy armament
• Quite possibly boasts a fairly large crew/passenger count
• Smaller size aids in sublight maneuverability and speed

[*]Weaknesses:

• Dwarf-sized complement
• Minimal point-defense and fighter protection
• No tractor beams/gravity wells

Fleet B: Command Carrier B

• Strengths:
  Large complement coupled with sizable ground assault force
• Armament fairly balanced, leaning towards point-defense, highly effective against enemy fighters/bombers/gunships
• Good at keeping enemy vessels at bay with fighters/bombers/gunships

[*]Weaknesses

• Larger size makes it lack in sublight maneuverability & speed
• Basic heavy weaponry, will need support vessels to engage hostile ships without using space complement
• Lack of Ion/specialized weaponry, making specialized missions more difficult

Now just look at that simple to follow and easy to calculate scenarios and options. I think this entire system will just make fleeting a much more intense and rewarding experience when commanders actually have to command! Omg yes, you'll actually have to work to win. Now I'm not saying that you fleeters don't work to win in fleet battles, I'd just love to see some more unconventional tactics to even out these basic strengths and weaknesses.

Keep at it, Staff team. You guys are cooler than the other side of the pillow!

 

[Alli Vern]

I get what your are doing, it is a nice idea to make it easy to just click accept but I feel that this is just an attempt to artificially balance things. I mean with this sort of control over what a ship is, there is no point in making a ship. I can see what your trying to do. I think that this is just far too extreme and really dulls what it is to make a ship. I think that this is far too much simplication. I think it kills creativity that is there . I know its hard and no fun to judge/approve/deny factions But I don't think this is the way to do it. I think this just kills ship development. I have nothing to work for because its just another Heavy carrier or balanced command ship or something. I think this is not a step in the right direction.

I get why you would want this but I don't think this is a good direction for the factory. Yes it makes things more fair but when has life or war ever been fair? I think that if you put this in place you are killing creativity and ship design on this site. Also why would I make a development thread to build something so cookie cutter? As a rper of a company, I would be ashamed to have any thing so like everyone else. I could see these as suggestions or reccomendations. Where idealy your ship is around this but lets say I want to cut down a fighters lasers and it's warp drive and put a bit more power towards its sublight speed.

Well I can't do that in this new world because it has to have 4 lasers and 2 torpedo launcers. I think it takes away the fun of the factory. I also think that the factory doesn't have to have immediate attention. I am fine waiting a week for my thing to be approved, as long as you pay attention to post order and don't prioritize any above others unless they are those easy ones where really nothing needs to be done. I think if we put less pressure on the judges and keep up how the factory current works for ships its great. However if I have misread this and this is indeed just suggestions and not the rules on what a ship can or must have on it then I think it is fine.

 

[Tefka]

As you are the first point out, Alli Wren, this guide is not yet an enforced ruling.

It is my intent, however, to make it so. The SWRP Staff Team & I are currently guaging how we think the community feels about this move.

 

[Tefka]

It wouldn't hurt to use the enter key every once in a while, either.

 

[Torjesgo]

@[member="Alli Wren"]

It's only cookie cutter if everyone must max their ship out.
Again, as I've said, don't max the weaponry out. The goal should not always be to make a super ship: look at star destroyers, THE ship of the line for the Empire and it had a tremendous weakness against fighter craft. And every ship in the Empire wasn't 2000m long.

I think you're all over exaggerating the restrictions that are in place. If you look at the numbers, there is tons of flexibility to move between the classes. They're pointing out the MAXIMUMS for each category. There is nothing stopping you from trading firepower for more speed if that is what you want. They're simply creating the BOX that you have to stay within.

Look at navy development between the two world wars. There were treaties in place to limit number of battleships and tonnage. They STILL made a wide variety of ships. These really don't appear to be that restrictive of MAXIMUMS that the board has to deal with. On that, however, I am not the kind of person looking to create the USS Super Ship that can annihilate everything. From my fleeting days, the Strike Cruiser and the Dreadnought were my go to vessels. Mere fractions of the size of star destroyers and from the sizes of ships I've seen going through the Factory as "standard vessels", even smaller in proportions!

Why don't we give this a shot and if your creativity is really that crushed, I'm sure the rule will be revised. But some of you are making it sound like Staff is suddenly playing complete big brother here and limiting you to using certain things. All they've done is create the acceptable parameters. It gives everyone an idea now of what they can and cannot do, and keeps from anything outrageous from being approved as a warship.

As to the comment (I don't remember who said it) about people just going to non-ships to have an "arms race", all you'll do is invite a similar rule. This is a reaction to what is obviously an issue for the forum and wouldn't be an issue if everyone could play nice with their factory submissions and not try to push for too much.