New ship plans

[Kazinsal]

If you mean moving dockable base, I don't think game mechanisms will allow it.

Why not? I mean, the docking part would require the carrier to be at zero speed, but undocking would be simple.

I'd also like to see some kind of powerful gun that does recoil, if possible, so that it may pack a punch, but it pushes the ship a couple dozen M back. Oh, and with like a 10 second refire rate to balance it out.

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Retired, permanently.

[Eppy]

Here's the role I envision for Carriers. We have an unused gun class, right, 6? Well. How's about we turn the Carrier into a Fighter Support Vessel? Two Battleship turrets, four Gunboat turrets, and however many Class Six turrets, which will mount high-speed, medium-range, high-refire weapons - basically an optimized Solaris - and improved Flak. It can mount a pair of whatever Battleship guns it feels like - probably missiles for taking Gunboats, I'd say, Gunboat turrets for the anti-fighter missiles, and the rest for anti-fighter in general. So, in essence, we've optimized the Carrier for righter support - it now can't hope to take on anything bigger than a lone cruiser, but anything smaller than that had better learn to riverdance really, really fast. Keep it classed as a Battleship with the exorbitant Battleship prices and we'll have ourselves a new purpose as a fine support vessel for the current pseudo-Battleships.

Of course, this is all conjecture, and I'm sure somebody will come along in five minutes and tell me how wrong I am, but let's say that this is the direction of thought I think people ought to take in this matter. Think up new things! Instead of worrying about being dockable or spawning fighters, think of how we can repurpose them to help assist smaller ships in a larger tactical situation.

Why? A carrier is, by definition, a support ship. Therefore, it should do some supporting instead of being the ship of the line. Honestly, each house having only one or two Battleships has always been a bit of a shortfalling with me. I mean, in a real navy there's so much room for variation, but here we've got, at most, five classes of capital ship per house/major affiliation. New Dreadnoughts or Light Battleships (and several different models of cruisers, destroyers and gunboats) ought to be built instead of forcing a carrier into the role of Dreadnought (or Disco-Style Battlecruiser, in the case of the Geb).

I'll just move these over from the other thread...

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Quick comment - we thought that Panzer was the Leader, Swift. -Agmen

Which Dreadnought was that?

One of your nine.

[Aoyagi]

Why not? I mean, the docking part would require the carrier to be at zero speed, but undocking would be simple.

Well, the ship would have to change into stationary base for the docking procedure. And I have NO idea how to make that. Dev question.

[kikatsu]

let me just throw out an idea

the assualt frigate in homeworld is a rather nice all around craft, but sluggish and can't defend itself against smaller ships... her weapons are 4 turrets and two plasma cannons


now I figure maybe we can have a ship, a bit bigger than a gunboat... maybe give it 4 cruiser guns, 2 gunboat forward guns and heavy armor but a gunboat shield? the defensive parts have to be worked out, but this kind of ship would basically be for attack...it still would have trouble with fighters, but gunboats and cruisers...should be able to do a number on those

also it should not have enough energy to fire a missle or mortar, but the two gunboat forward cannons would provide nice firesupport

[CCI45-px/Probe149]

Passenger ships. Passenger liners. 'nuff said?

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In a brilliant tactical movement, i charged backwards.

[kikatsu]

@Argonaut

Yes, smaller passenger liners for the OSC...maybe a medical ship
and more medium transports for us freelancers to use...give traders even more choices for ships

[Elsdragon]

Class 6 freighter turrets.

You knew this was coming. They need something, Otherwise they retain underused ness.
Otherwise, a targetable, Via FLhook, Auto aiming comp For the turrets would be fun

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No longer a slave to the man!

[Knucklehead]

I thought this thread was supposed to be for new ship classes...

I like the idea of more support ship types. Right now we have the Heavy Lifter and Repair Ship. (Which I don't think I've ever seen anyone flying, by the way. Or maybe I'm just not there when they are... Anyway...)

A medical ship has been mentioned.

How about some runabouts for Orbital Spa & Cruise? Light passenger vessels designed to ferry small groups to and from the exotic locales OSC is known for. Even if they end up mostly flown by NPC's. Give them agility similar to the VHF's (though not quite as good) with only minimal weaponry. These are built to haul passengers, not to fight.

How about a mine layer? A small ship with 3 mine slots but little other armament. Maybe make a special type of mine that has an extra long fuse time but requires more energy to drop than even a heavy bomber's powerplant can produce. (Idea for the infocard: Each mine must receive a significant infusion of energy in order to maintain the stasis field used to contain the high-energy payload.) Give the ship a small transport powerplant but only 4 class-9 gun slots (maybe even lower). The idea is to get in, unload the mines, and get clear before the fireworks start. Bomber agility to account for the extra large powerplant, of course.

Another support ship I was thinking of would be something like a modern Electronic Warfare craft, like the EA-6B Prowler. Something designed to make it harder for the enemy to attack your ships by either causing interference or taking out their defenses. Of course, the only way we could really accomplish this in Freelancer is by slapping a whole bunch of countermeasure droppers on a fighter and having them fly between the big ships dropping the flares. Imagine a Hawk with Countermeasure Droppers at every joint on its wings, throwing up a curtain of flares to stop those incoming Battleship Missiles or Nova Torpedoes. Granted, we'd probably need a new type of countermeasure for this as well, and it wouldn't do a thing against non-projectiles.

Feel free to pick my suggestions apart. I'm too tired to work out any more details on them right now. (Although if I did add any more details I could probably call it a thesis paper...)

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It's official, I have too few ships now...

[Jordi]

Armored Cargo Ship.

The idea is a Cargo Ship that can fight vs Pirates, at least against 1 GB.
Cargo, not big, 3k, 3.5k max, some decent manovrability, like a heavy GB or a light destroyer

Something to make pirate's life more interesting....

[Cyberanson]

Actually, having carriers being able to "carry" something would be a "new ship" and would add lots of positive RP and combat values to the game, more than the work it will cause to design. So it would be a positive add. I guess it should be the first ship type to be implemented / altered.

It would be really really cool to let like two or three NPC fighters spawn, via a carrier and a FLHook command.:)That would make sense.

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