The Game: A 3D isometric SF RPG The Problem: Looking for modules you can buy to enhance your starship The Details: You can buy, pirate, or be gifted different modules that upgrade your starship. The modules can be legal or illegal. They have a price, and power and size requirements, as well as mass. (Other requirements or rules welcome...) --- More Details? I already have basics: Engines - Thrust, turning, sideslipping Armor - Generic HP that protect hull. Must be replaced. Shields - Generic HP that protect hull, but regenerate Tractor Beam - Grab other ships, asteroids. Slow or alter your own course Various Lasers and Missiles --- I''m looking for more exotic module ideas like... Emissions Mask - Hides power emissions Crew Module - Provides life support, at least n required based on size of crew Bridge - Must survive if you want to control the ship Hologram Generator - Can display the image of any ship on screen. Can be used as a decoy, or to fake what your own ship looks like. Smuggler''s Compartment - Addition (but secret) cargo bay storage ... others? -------------------- Just waiting for the mothership...

Heres some more then...

* Ordinary cargo bays

* Transporters/Shuttlebays (or however you plan to allow the player to board other ships.. I think both, transporters being a large and very expensive option, because then u can let the player steal cargo and parts off other ships without using a boarding party)

* Pirate Scanner, this provides a very detailed scan of one ship, allowing the player to see what cargo and parts the target ship is carrying.

* Sickbay (so you can heal your crew after an attack)

* Repair drones, improves repair rate of ship

* Various scanners, jammers and battle computers

* Various shuttles and troop transports (for boarding purposes)

* PowerLink, allows you to drain another ships shields/power sources and augmnent your own with the stolen power

* Recriational Modules, improves crew efficency

* Training Facilities, improves the rate at which your crew gains experience

* Remote datalink, allows you to hack into other ships computers and steal information.

Hehe
I did a game kinda like this, I had a fair few different module types, its a cool idea.
Check it out here:
www.real.com/games/starlines/index.html


http://www.positech.co.uk

Modules as an abstract of what you can put into your ship or
modules as a division of your ship into sections or
modules as bolt-ons, you can add more or less randomly..???

how will space combat look like? Combat when boarding a ship? ..

Planetary diagnostic tools:
1) Atmospheric scanners.
2) Planet mineral extrapolators.

Star diagnostic tools:
1) Heat and spectral analyzers.

Alien language translators.
Databases for planets.

Holding cell for unruly passengers.

Autopilot / navigational systems

Robotic drone to examine exterior ship from all angles.

Disposable probes to fire into planets and stars to gain information.

Mini-probes to attach to other ships to track them.

Keep the modules generic and place upgrades into them, or upgrade them to hold better equipent:

There are different sizes/tech levels of each module type

Science Module I - VII
Weapons array I-X
sensors array I-X
crew compartment I-III
.
.
.

they differ in hitpoints, space usage..... Then you´d have to have generic "storage points" in your ship, or build it modular 2d, like in XCom - Maybe provide different, fixed secions for each ship, on a graphical layout. Then you could fill those to the best possible efficiency. Or make the slots of different sizes and just specify their usage - tech level would be made regardless of size.

I think I´ll better give you an example:

In your typical Voshhh-class Freighter hull space allocation per default is like this (specifiying space usage for each compartment):

Bridge(1), Sensors(1), 2xCrew(3), Engine(5), 6xCargo(8)

This means that you have 11 compartments. Some of them would be restricted to a certain type of content (Engine would have to stay where it is, for instance). Others you could change as you please. So you could convert one of the two crew modules to a weapons module, but only a size 3 weapons module. (Otherwise the whole thing gets very messy and complicated, It might be possible to split up compartments, like one crew(3) into a weapons(1) and a crew(2), but not combining them to house bigger stuff, that would make the whole system pointless and not so interesting).
The bridge would be fixed as well, and the cargo bays would probably be fixed-usage as well (maybe an upgrade that lets you convert cargo space to "all-purpose" space, enabling you to put a huge science lab in....).

Then the upgrades:
Initially all are level 0, the most basic.

Crew upgrades would mean something like:
0 -basic bunks, ugly+dirty, morale penalty, max 20 crew*size
1 -standard bunks, no penalty, max 15*size
2 -well equipped bunks, morale bonus, a personal locker, more than one toilet/shower for all. Max 10*size
3 -officers quarters. Max 5*size
4 -captains quarters. 1*size

and of course, once you have the upgrade you can convert it to a lower level, should it be necessary (at no cost, to encourage players to continually upgrade their ships - the surplus equipment can be stored somewhere)

Cargo Upgrades:
0- Empty space, container or bulk freight only
1- modifications for liquids and gas
2- modifications for hazardous materials
3- mods for high-tech equipment
4- passenger modules
5- luxury cabins

also downgradeable, so with cargo lvl 5 you can haul anything...

Science Modules:
0- basic funcions
4- science drone launcher+storage, different environment lab, high energy research lab...

some of the higher upgrades might need a certain space requirement, so for instance a size2 science lab could only be upgraded to level two.

And then to bring the tech upgrades into context with additional extras:

weapons module:
1- can hold beam weapons up to level 2 or missiles level 1
5- holds up to 4 beam weapons up to lvl 12 and 3 missile launchers level 6

The same system would work for science/sensors/engineering...
You buy the individual gadgets and put them into the section that you want them in.
So, size restrics section upgradeability (tech level) and storage space, and tech level restricts the types of equipment you can put into a section..


Let me know if this helps..

I think if you put cabins in your cargo bay, it should (like Frontier) reduce the available space for normal cargo.

And speaking of Frontier, looked there for ideas? That was a d@mn good game.

I was talking about converting the entire cargo section to passenger space (easier to do the math...)

quote: Original post by cliffski

Hehe
I did a game kinda like this, I had a fair few different module types, its a cool idea.
Check it out here:
www.real.com/games/starlines/index.html

Argh! I just bought Gazillionare Deluxe, when I could have bought a much cooler looking space trader game!

Thx, cliffski, I will check this out. It looks good!



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Just waiting for the mothership...

Thx guys, this was exactly what I was looking for!

quote: Original post by Hase

Keep the modules generic and place upgrades into them, or upgrade them to hold better equipent:

....

This is good, Hase. I am first going to make module upgrades EXTREMELY simplistic: Modules have a cost, space requirement, and power need. Your hull interior and power output are the limiters.

BUT!

Eventually, I am determined to put together a graphical system for "level building" your decks. It will take awhile to do this, and I''ve got a lot of work with just what I have, but it will tie in with boarding operations and some other ideas (maybe RPG SimCrew type stuff, interior ship emergencies / puzzles, and being able to walk around inside)

So your ideas haven''t gone to waste, and I appreciate them!

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Just waiting for the mothership...