SE5 Poll on Slot Layout, take 2

[Baron Munchausen]

Slots are ok if 'inconvenient' when dealing with many components. The real problem is the difference between ship sets. In the 'form fitting' slot scheme, races that have been given 'slender' ship artwork will have far fewer actual slots to work with in designing their ships. With Starfury you can go buy another ship if you want something different. With SE V you will be stuck with the racial set you have chosen, and screwed if that set has 1/2 the slots of some other player's shipset. Ships needing many small components, like transports, could be impossible to finish properly in some shipsets. We need a standard grid for a game like SE V where fitting weapons to firing points is not necessary.

[Kamog]

The real problem is the difference between ship sets. In the 'form fitting' slot scheme, races that have been given 'slender' ship artwork will have far fewer actual slots to work with in designing their ships.

That's a good point, I'm concerned about that too.

OK, for SEV I'm only going to play races with square blocky ships like the Borg! Yup, the Borg are my favorite race now. Hopefully the Borg dreadnought will be just a huge cube full of slots that takes up the entire ship design window. With the maximized number of components, it will easily beat other races with thin spindly-shaped ships.

[Captain Kwok]

Ships still have a tonnage as dictated by the game and not by the number of slots they have... what BM was saying below was that if slots were based on each ship so some might have an advantage in how you could arrange components...

[narf poit chez BOOM]

The number of slots will most likely be standardized.

[Baron Munchausen]

Captain Kwok said:
Ships still have a tonnage as dictated by the game and not by the number of slots they have... what BM was saying below was that if slots were based on each ship so some might have an advantage in how you could arrange components...

Actually, I was saying that you might not be able to use the full tonnage allowed because of not enough slots. It won't happen early, of course, but ships that use many small components, like transports, could in fact run out of slots.

There are also very real differences between the shipsets in the proportions of armor, outer hull, and inner hull slots. This also will make for arbitrary and unfair ship design restrictions.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Since it's such a bad idea, what makes you think it's in the game?

[Baron Munchausen]

narf poit chez BOOM said:
Since it's such a bad idea, what makes you think it's in the game?

Could it be that the features list in Malfador's site says so? Or could it be the screenshots?

http://www.malfador.com/SE5scr012.htm

And then there is the recent interview already cited.

There are several 'fun' things about designing ships this way, but this is not like Starfury in one respect. You cannot change your shipset. Whatever set you choose at the game setup is what you are stuck with for the whole game.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Baron Munchausen said:

Could it be that the features list in Malfador's site says so? Or could it be the screenshots?

http://www.malfador.com/SE5scr012.htm

And then there is the recent interview already cited.

There are several 'fun' things about designing ships this way, but this is not like Starfury in one respect. You cannot change your shipset. Whatever set you choose at the game setup is what you are stuck with for the whole game.

Ok, that's scary. But it shouldn't be too hard to mod the pics.

[henk brouwer]

Baron Munchausen said:
The real problem is the difference between ship sets. In the 'form fitting' slot scheme, races that have been given 'slender' ship artwork will have far fewer actual slots to work with in designing their ships. With Starfury you can go buy another ship if you want something different. With SE V you will be stuck with the racial set you have chosen, and screwed if that set has 1/2 the slots of some other player's shipset. Ships needing many small components, like transports, could be impossible to finish properly in some shipsets.

That sounds really bad. IMHO the number and placement of slots should be independent from a ship's artwork. It seems very silly that you could get a huge bonus or handicap just because you prefered certain artwork when designing your race. (It would also confuse newbies in terrible ways, and pbw players would be forced to all take the same shipset for a fair game)

That said I really do like the idea of firing arcs and directed damage, but like Munchausen said there should be a standard grid for ships, I know that would probably mess up the current ship design window, since the grid would not fit on the artwork, but the ships for SEV are quite low on polygons and have low res textures anyhow, and these flaws are clearly visible in the shipdesign window. The shipset artwork (though very nicely done) is not designed for showing the ships zoomed in that far.

So my advice would be to change the shipdesign window so it gives a standard grid for each shipsize without the top-down view of the ship. You could replace it with a nice looking texture or some fancy artwork. The ship's artwork could still be displayed somewhere in a corner of the screen at a more apropriate zoom-level, maybe with some nice rotating animation.

(Anyhow thats just my opinion, based on incomplete knowledge and vague assumptions on how the current seV system works, I have not yet voted for this reason)