Suggestion: Device Rack

[Revolver]

What will the probability of the expansion rack being damaged by disruption cannons? Will there be an increased chance the expansion rack could get damaged because of it's physical nature? If the rack is damaged, will there be a chance on or both of the installed devices could be damaged, or could the expansion rack provide a bit of extra shielding for devices installed in it?

[the_holy_thom]

You can scratch the enhancer off the list, at least until more appear. laser collimators arent too good later on

also the cargo hold isnt required for the freighter. Its nice for a bit of cash, but not essential.

[Betelgeuse]

so is the patcher arm. The frieghter can easily carry around the couple extra barrels needed for manual repairing. It isn't like you would have lost a battle if you didn't have the patcher arm.

[the_holy_thom]

Just seen Revolver's post. Id like to see a fairly high chance of a chain reaction occuring - a "slot splitter" would pretty much have to be physical, so if it got damaged, the devices shoved into it are likely to be damaged to, partly due to their proximity.

Gannon - good point, Id forgotten about that. I always install one anyway, due to the massive number of slots. Useful for speed, and in some cases, does save your life. It means you can forget about your armour, as its probably healing well. Thats when you find out it got turned off from a power surge...

[palmiche]

What will the probability of the expansion rack being damaged by disruption cannons? Will there be an increased chance the expansion rack could get damaged because of it's physical nature?

1 - As I stated before, if the rack is mounted on the fuselage with screws a good soot may rip it away, of course, under the same rules for damaging any other part of the ship.
2 - About the physical nature of the damage I don't think the void of the space means any harm to the rack. The variety of shapes in the ships responds to the low friction of space and it shouldn't do any damaga to the rack as the laws of aerodynamics do not apply.
3 - Of course. If the rack is blown away you must not expect your devices to keep attached to the fuselage by themselves.

That is what I think about it, at least trying to be as realistic as possible.

[Revolver]

per physical damage, I was not referring to aerodynamics, but the physical nature of the hook-up to the ship's computer and power supply, would the splitter have a greater chance of being damaged since the connectors and power supply might not be intended to the excessive drain.

[palmiche]

... but the physical nature of the hook-up to the ship's computer and power supply, would the splitter have a greater chance of being damaged since the connectors and power supply might not be intended to the excessive drain.

Today's computers have connectors like USB and FireWire, ready to feed any kind of devices with energy and data and they perform very well. A device rack must have some negative effects over the ship to compensate for the benefits but I think it must be related to the efficiency of the devices mounted in the rack; mounting devices outside improves de efficiency of some (patch spiders) and degrades that of others (try to install a reactor in the top of the fuselage and you'll see )

[Revolver]

Hit your USB and FireWire ports with X-Ray lasers and ion particle cannons then let me know how well they fare.

[palmiche]

Hit your USB and FireWire ports with X-Ray lasers and ion particle cannons then let me know how well they fare.

As well as any of the ship-size 1GW Hyperions we have nowadays

[Revolver]

pffffffft, don't take all the fun out of being devil's advocate.

[palmiche]

pffffffft, don't take all the fun out of being devil's advocate.

LOL

[sysgod]

Giving the playership more deviceslots is not a game improvement! Think about it, how would you feel about starting a new game with 25,000 credits? This device was suggested some time ago when we still only had the sapphire, and instead new playerships were introduced.

Non sequitur.

A deviceslot upgrade is just as valid as any other - enemies get harder as the game progresses, so one must either buy new ships or upgrade the old ship to match.

Considering your ship, with a single exotic weapon bought/stolen/liberated from humanity's fringe elements, is only just barely capable of besting a single Iocrym vessel, chances are you're going to get your innards handed to you the second you step through the gate. Realistically, the next system past Heretic has probably been thoroughly cleansed, so you're going to need to survive in your dinky little ship for a while longer before coming across the next friendly.


Thoughts:
The penalty for external ship expansions of this sort should be higher vulnerability to weapons fire for both the expansion and mounted devices: 1) the increased surface area would add 5% to the shield energy consumption, or take 5% more damage; 2) if the shields are down, devices installed in the expansion would take an extra 5% damage; 3) the expansion itself would not be made of the same stuff as your armour, so it would take one or two hits before it and everything installed in it goes poof (or at least falls off and must be salvaged and repaired).

Also, if the player is going to be customising his device slots, they should be separated into internal mounts (for CPUs, etc) and external mounts, with the externals further divided into hardpoints (weapons, cargo hold, other power intensive devices) and softpoints (solar array, ICX and maybe other very light weapons with low power use and no recoil).

Cargo expansions would consume a hardpoint (and maybe supply an internal slot; plus have the same vulnerabilities described above). A science pod would consume one softpoint and provide one or two internal slots, or a hardpoint and two to four internals.

Extenal mountpoint expansions could come in two versions: civilian "roof racks" that consume one hardpoint and provides three external softpoints for non/light weapons, and a reinforced gun rack (military) that consumes two and provides three or four hardpoints.

With appropriate, probably yet to be invented, devices this would allow the player more freedom to customise his gameplay style.

[palmiche]

Non sequitur....

I agree, the point is improving the gameplay.