Question: Favourite Ship Type

[OrionM42]

Interesting Questions ... and somewhat Tricky Ones, too; since many of us don't really know much about many of the ships that are already available (un-lockable) in the game. Still, it's too tempting not to lobby on behalf of some favorites.

Originally Posted by ibol

So, who wants a "crafting" ship ?

I expect most of us would appreciate a Crafting-themed ship. The longer I've played, the more I have come to enjoy the crafting element in this game; and the more I've come to realize just how important crafting can be to a successful strategy. In fact, it recently dawned on me that Crafting is to Approaching Infinity, about the same as Research is to most 4X games. If each case, if you concentrate on that one aspect, and are good at it, you can mostly stay ahead of the curve, traced by the competing races/empires. As PvK suggested, it may the most important single strategic element in the game. So, we would all want it in a special ship; but it will need to be fine-tuned (handicapped), so as not to be over-powering.

Originally Posted by ibol

Can anyone think of a good "theme" for a playable ship, that does not already exist?

I've indicated previously how much I value speed in a ship. I would really like to see a true frigate (or battlecruiser) type ship in this game -- a ship concepted on the idea that it can outrun anything it can't outfight . In the age of sail, frigates were relatively powerful ships that could easily dispatch Brigs, sloops, etc. They could not stand up to the largest ships (Ships of the Line, or Men of War), but those they could outrun. In the 20th century BCs were supposed to be analogous. They had pretensions to being capital ships (think: HMS Hood), but could not really stand up to battleships, because they were seriously lacking in armor, which was sacrificed to give them the speed advantage. In Approaching Infinity, you could limit their armor to only what was included in the starting ship (the basic hull strength) with no ability (or very little) to add any armor. They would still have shields, but if they lost them in a battle, they would pretty much be dead ducks. Again, they would be fast ships (call them Swift-frigates, or the like) that could outrun anything they could not outfight.

One last thought: should there be a Dreadnaught ship class in AI? ... or is the Cruiser perhaps a close analogy? Such a ship would need to be very difficult to get -- maybe only late in the game. For balance, you could create a few really powerful opponents, say the kind that show up in some combat quests (so-and-so ship is terrorizing Sector 50 -- go and neutralize (eliminate) it), so not everyone would be forced to face such behemoths.

Sure like the fact that you keep exploring ideas for new content in this game!

[PvK]

One way to not overpower a crafting ship would be to give it an ability or two that is crafting-related, but not as good as an expert crewman with the same ability, and not stacking with it. So it would help if you hadn't fully specialized and trained up a set of crafting officers, but it wouldn't make you even better than you can now possibly get with crafting.