Wormholedrives and stardrives

[Klauss]

I would like to suggest a further feature of SE4.

Wormholedrives
To differentiate between in-system ships and ships which can drive from system to system by passing the wellknown wormholes, I suggest to introduce 2 different types of engines -

one type (type 1) is the engine we know, ion-engine to quantum engine. This type of engine I call Wormhole-drive". Wormhole-Drives should cost in about 2 to 3 times as they cost now.

The other type (type 2) is for insystem ships only. Its another tech branch which is called "In-system-drives". This tech branch should be cheaper than the "wormhole -drive-tech-branch" (wow). Also the engines should not cost so much resource points. But they are not capable of "jumping" between the systems.

It should not possible to "mix" the two different types of engines. Eiter a ship has
type 1 or type 2 engines.

Why a differentiation? because this gives a wholly new view on ship construction. you have to decide to build expensive but mobile intersystem ships or cheaper ships for protection of your sun system.

"Star-drive"
A stardrive is wholly different from the wormholedrive. Mostly everyknow has recognized that the galaxy segment where the systems are placed is composed of squares. This could lead to another type of interstellar drive which I call "star-drive
component". A "star-drive" is capable of travelling a number of segment squares per
turn equal to the power of his star-drive. For example if he has a "star-drive 2"
device onboard, he can travel 2 squares per turn in hyperspace on the galactic map
without using the wormholes. A ship can only have one stardrive component onboard. A "star-drive" should be a seperate techbranch. (a very expensive of course not available before mid-game or available just for some special races)

Why making a "star-drive" possible? Because it enables new strategies to defeat an
enemy.
Secondly it makes it easy to convert "conventional" SF-settings like Star Wars or Star Trek scenario sets which uses Hyperspace or warp engines to SE4.

Fighter engines:
It should be possible to equip fighters with traditional engines like SE3 - no
in-system travelling. These engines should be cheaper, or the in-system engines more expensive (whatever suits better)It should also be possible to equip fighters with the capability to travel through wormholes (expensive engines of course) or to equip them with a "mini-stardrive".(high tech level)

what do you think about this?
klaus

[General Hawkwing]

Intra-solar system ships verse galaxy spanning ships is an interesting idea. However, I wonder about the long-term value of ships that are restricted to one solar system. As your borders expand, how much defense is required for the home system. How much cheaper would it have to be to make it worth it? Remember that the cheaper cost is offset by the additional expense of researching to separate lines of engines.

[Iron Giant]

Its an interesting idea, but I do like fighters the way they are now: powerful but limited. I think allowing fighters to jump would take away from the game, imho.

[Klauss]

General Hawkings:
As your borders expand, how much defense is required for the home system.

Good point. Of course everybody has to decide for hisself if a in-system ship/freighter has any value in a later game.

I mean: yes. (especially if point 3 is true)
Because
1. you can update older ship designs
2. you can mothball the system defense ships for emergency use
3. I hope MM will introduce a tractor beam technology which allows to transport such in-system ships and space stations trough warpgates.

Iron Giant
Maybe you played not much with fighters untill now. As they are presented now, they are somewhat underrated. But in the full Version they will be much more powerful, I think.

In SE3 it was only possible to use them from carriers, so I see its an advance if you give fighters a further function like travelling trough systems. (as it is in SE4) But we should not forget that they was also very useful in SE3 as short range fighters.

New (old) SE4 variants like short range fighters (without moving in system) or intersystem fighters (with possibility to warp) give a player more possibilities and ways to design his game strategy. (which is one of the basics of a good 4x game)
If everybody would be satisfied with the already existent the SE series would have been stopped by SE1.

klaus

[Baron Munchausen]

"Intra-system" and "Inter-system" ships are a good idea, but the way you suggest implementing it is slightly out of focus. The difference between these two types of ships is the ability to use warp-points. I don't think that ENGINES are involved in using warp points. What would work better, I think, is to change the use of warppoints to require a special "warp activator" component in the ship that allows it to pass through. Without it, the warp point is just empty space like any other sector. This component could be reasonably large to make it relatively costly in supplies/weapons capacity for a ship to have warp-point capability. This would also explain why fighters cannot warp. They are too small to carry the component (the tech would have a 'minimum' size).

This does immediately bring up the idea of ships which can carry/tow other ships through warp points. Maybe you could let a fleet with at least ONE warp-activator pass through a warp point, leaving the interesting possibility of ships getting stranded if their "warp helpers" get bLasted. Or maybe we could have some sort of genuine towing rig added to the components in the game. I'd like to see this regardless of whether the use of warp points is changed.

The next step in excitement is controllable warp points - i.e. "Jump Gates"! I hope those get implemented for the final release. Properly used, they would let you accomplish many things with smaller numbers of ships than you would otherwise need.

[jars_u]

I like a lot of Klauss engine ideas. But, the cost issue is the big thing if you have to spend the time researching so many different tech trees what you save in actual resources off sets that. However, I do think it does add another strategic aspect to the game forcing players to pick their techs more carefully. I think fighters should always been short range/in system travel only but I think the in game engines (i.e. your worm hole drives) and in system engines already cover this base. But, the stardrive is an interesting idea if you have ships that can bypass wormholes totally and jump across more then one system at a time then in would be really stupid to leave your home systems un-defended no matter how large your borders/empire is.

[Dweeb]

This reminds me of the "System Ships"/ "Warp Ships" idea from Metagaming's WarpWar. That game also featured "Warplines" connecting systems. For ship design, a "Warp Generator" cost more than some "System Ships" did altogether, and "Warp Ships" could be outfitted with "Systemship Racks" for transport. Warpwar is a great game with an elegant and logical design. I have actually played it in the past year.