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I agree about the boring AI comment. I have little enough successful experience at modding the AI to qualify me as unqualified. Any help? I can slice out stuff like techs that aren't included, but I haven't gotten the hang of the design/construction files yet.
Don't get hung up on this part of it. Make the mod, do the components, tech tree stuff. Get it to where we can use it for multi player first. We can go back later and tweak the ai to work within the framework.
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(like solar panels but doesn't need a star, if possible)
Not possible without a code change.
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I'd reduce the supplies storage given by engines. Right now they store as much as a supply storage but are half the size. Not right.
True, but this is going to severly limit the range of ships, especially in the early going. Not that this is a bad thing, if we are going for ultra-realism. Ships would have to stay very close to home unless they are in large fleets with support vessels. I might even go as far as saying reduce the amount a supply component stores, and make solar cells more expensive to research and build. Eliminate emergency resupply and quantum reactors entirely maybe?
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Various types of armor. Big, cheap but less effective (by weight) but easy to fix, normal, small ablative that is tough but a PAIN to repair, etc.
No way currently to make components harder or easier to repair. But decreasing their size does make them take
longer to repair, because repair rate is by number of components.
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speaking of repair, need to put some careful thought into repair bays and such. I'm assuming no shields, so there's going to be a fair amount of hull damage going on.
Kind of like the engineering section in Hadrians mod and bandyed about for a Trek based mod. Not a bad idea. I think repair bays should be smaller and cheaper, but repair fewer components.
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deflector shields. Make an armor-piercing gun- like the current Shard Cannons- but say it's made of a very magnetic .........though this one is a bit high-tech.
I'll say. 
This whole paragraph got away from me. Doesn't fit with the whole idea of the mod IMHO.
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damage reducing components. A shield that has.....
Uh...see above.
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different types of minewarheads. Engine killers
sorry, component specific mines are another good idea that can't be done currently
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, small but cheap chemical explosives, etc.
This is a nice idea, for variety if nothing else.
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I'd say no tractor or repulsor beams, nor smart bombs that kill facilities. Plague bombs.. maybe. No MCs obviously.
Beams, I agree. But Smart Bombs? Uh, anybody remember the Gulf War? I know Sadam does.
Plauge Bombs, definetly doable. No MC's? You mean Master Computers? I'd say most definetly not obvious to me. I can see automated systems controlling ship functions. Remember, what we are going for here is not to limit ourselves to what we can do right now. (We can't even sustain a permanent occupation of the moon right now.) We are just looking to eliminate the techs that aren't
feasible with today's science. Smart Bombs and Master Computers are certainly feasible. The principle is understandable, even though we don't have the technology to do it on that scale yet.
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to add a little variety to the research tree, how about researching warheads seperately from missile types? You could have multiple types of missile, each with an option for a specific warhead (which would be a different component)
I like this. Advances in missle tech would give increases in range and speed, but not change damage. Advances in warheads would increase damage, but not speed or range.
Great idea. Each new mssle component wouild simply have two research requirements. Very easy to implement.
Geoschmo
[This message has been edited by geoschmo (edited 18 July 2001).]