Small quality of life improvements / new parts

Cube

Small quality of life improvements / new parts

Lately, since I finished my bounty hunter game and started designing ships again, some things have started bugging me, most are small, some are bigger, but here are some minor things that is have a solution for (possibly).

Minor things

Looking at the minimap, something very small I'd like to see is your ship's "destination". Just in the form of a small green blip or something, nothing major.
Currently, if you switch "auto place doors" off, fire extinguishers also will not get a door, generally, you would want a door on your life savers, i always forget 🙁. An option to toggle this would be nice.

Major things

Let's talk thrusters. If you were to place a thruster now, it shows a "danger zone" in which all other parts (except for other "danger zone" parts) will be denied. I find this irreasonable. In my opinion, this severely limits the things you can do with thrusters, such as large carrier ships and player-made missiles. I would love (but don't expect) to see this change, here it is anyways.
So instead of denying other parts, the thruster would permanently be shut off, until the blocking part is removed or the part it is attached to becomes separate from the blocking part.
The only way to properly detach ships is by using explosive charges, I like to use these not only to separate parts, but also to trigger reactor-missile explosions. The point is: explosive charges are dangerous, they can severely damage your ship or even destroy parts of it while you only meant to get rid of that one little structure piece. My idea is to use a placing mechanic similar to doors, but in between any and all parts. This "decoupler" could also be 'grouped' to easily detach large amounts of parts at once, and would be quite expensive ($150 a/p).
Last part, a piece of code. Specifically, a [MassMax] / [MinMax] attributes. This would work as follows: the [MinMax] attribute would set a minimum max under which a part would be unusable on that ship. This is the same with the [MasMax] attribute, just the other way around. Currently, mass doesn't have much of a use other than affecting speed. This would give players a new reason to watch the ship's mass, as some of their weapons might not function anymore with that fancy new spaghetti-kitchen attached! (just me? ok.)

Please, feel free to comment on and critize these ideas, I want to improve them whenever I can!

Ultranova

Cube we've all had it, you're flying around in your newly-weaponized flying meatball (just me? ok.) And suddenly you accidently hit Q instead of A. Oh noes! now your screen is rotated! No matter how hard you try, you can NOT get it straight again. My proposal: a hotkey on your keyboard to re-orient the camera! Small, yet effective.

Delete key/Tab if you have older versions

Cube Last part, a small FTL Drive. Now, i know that these smaller parts are often called "cheaty" (because they are) but here's the thing; small ships often have no room for a regular-sized FTL Drive, forcing players to constantly sell-and buy their fighterships from system to system. This "Small FTL-Drive" (1x1/2) can be made less cheaty in many ways. Making it more expensive helps ($7000 a/p), only giving it one acces point (fire extinguisher style) would also help. The finished product would still be overpowered however. My way of fixing this: add a max mass of say around 125 to 150 tonnes, and make it service the entire ship, no matter the size. Above this max tonnage, the Drive will become virtually useless, having a garbage range and really encouraging players to invest in the next tier of FTL Drives; the 'normal' one.

Part of the reason for parts that are annoying like that is you have to build around it. It presents a challenge which looks limiting, but if you actually plan ahead, you can still achieve small fighters that have FTL drives. Making a part that's very specific for a specific form of ship is not flexible in any way and is not necessary. It might be frustrating at first, but if you design with it in mind, it's not a problem.

Cube

Ultranova Delete key/Tab if you have older versions

I am aware of this, but i mean a hotkey, just a single key you can press. Delete and tab are on opposite sides of the keyboard, making the combination just that little bit less smooth.

Ultranova Part of the reason for parts that are annoying like that is you have to build around it. It presents a challenge which looks limiting, but if you actually plan ahead, you can still achieve small fighters that have FTL drives. Making a part that's very specific for a specific form of ship is not flexible in any way and is not necessary. It might be frustrating at first, but if you design with it in mind, it's not a problem.

I agree, but i build a lot of very small ships, most are so small that I REALLY can't fit in another 2x2 part without making the design significantly weaker or more expensive. Also part of the reason is that the code required for this (think MassMaxUse=140) could in some occasions be very useful for creating tiers in modding. For example restricting small reactors and ammo factories for use by small ships only.

Ultranova

Cube I am aware of this, but i mean a hotkey, just a single key you can press. Delete and tab are on opposite sides of the keyboard, making the combination just that little bit less smooth.

It's not a combination. Using a slash ( / ) means it's separate.

So, visual representation for better understanding:

BEFORE MULTI-PLAYER CREATIVE MODE WAS ADDED:

Use the TAB key to reset rotation.

AFTER MULTI-PLAYER CREATIVE MODE WAS ADDED:

Use the BACKSPACE key to reset rotation.

Ultranova

Cube I agree, but i build a lot of very small ships, most are so small that I REALLY can't fit in another 2x2 part without making the design significantly weaker or more expensive. Also part of the reason is that the code required for this (think MassMaxUse=140) could in some occasions be very useful for creating tiers in modding. For example restricting small reactors and ammo factories for use by small ships only.

I have two viewpoints for this. On one hand, I agree with you that using mass as a way to restrict certain parts could be helpful for things like tiers in modding (like you said), but I also have a disagreement with this. For example, take the Fighter weapons from Kroom's Forge. They have more than just a use on a fighter, because you can make makeshift turrets or similar from a combination of the fighter guns and armour. If you take that away and force parts to only be used on a certain weight (or tier) of ship, you are restricting creativity.

Now obviously, that example is rather specific, but while we're talking about fighters, let me address this another way. Sometime in the future, customisable fighters will be added to the game and from the looks of things, the logistics behind them are going to be different than the terran ships we're used to. For starters, they probably won't have crew running around in them supplying the weapons, thrusters etc by physically taking a battery and plonking it in the part. There's a high probability that fighters will have automatic distribution, which includes storage of power, ammo etc. This will mean that they'll have their own parts.

When I say this, I'm thinking about future proofing. Why would you make parts that are designed for lower tier, lower size ships, when in the future, a different system for the same (or similar) type of ship will be in use? Is it worth the trouble to implement such a feature? In terms of superweapons, perhaps a mass threshold where you must have X amount of mass in order to place the superweapon, it would be useful, but for fighter parts that might not necessarily be needed in the future, I'm not sure.

Cube

Ah, thanks Ultrablast. I'll scrap it off the list. What do you think of the other ideas?

Cube

Ultranova When I say this, I'm thinking about future proofing. Why would you make parts that are designed for lower tier, lower size ships, when in the future, a different system for the same (or similar) type of ship will be in use? Is it worth the trouble to implement such a feature? In terms of superweapons, perhaps a mass threshold where you must have X amount of mass in order to place the superweapon, it would be useful, but for fighter parts that might not necessarily be needed in the future, I'm not sure.

Elethio You're right that adding a single FTL drive to a small ship can be a big problem. But consider, when we get docking
This problem will become an incentive for players to use Motherships that can dock multiple craft and jump them all at once to a new system.

I get both of your points, I have adjusted the main post accordingly to now take the FTL-Drive as an example for MassMax/MinMax.

Ultranova I have two viewpoints for this. On one hand, I agree with you that using mass as a way to restrict certain parts could be helpful for things like tiers in modding (like you said), but I also have a disagreement with this. For example, take the Fighter weapons from Kroom's Forge. They have more than just a use on a fighter, because you can make makeshift turrets or similar from a combination of the fighter guns and armour. If you take that away and force parts to only be used on a certain weight (or tier) of ship, you are restricting creativity.

With restricting parts I don't mean your average weapons per say, more as in restricting small reactors and fighters cockpits for large ships, and restricting superweapons for small ships. I totally agree with you on the fact that forbidding fighter weapons on larger ships will come at a cost of creativity, but this is the mod maker's choice to make.

Elethio

I like your Thruster idea. I expect this will be vital when we get moving parts, Gundam type spaceship/robots might need to fold away thruster/weapons when in different modes - or at least that's how I envision it.

https://trello.com/c/HChZ7np8/80-hinges-sliders

You're right that adding a single FTL drive to a small ship can be a big problem. But consider, when we get docking
This problem will become an incentive for players to use Motherships that can dock multiple craft and jump them all at once to a new system.

https://trello.com/c/tifRV7ic/1-docking

Ultranova

Cube With restricting parts I don't mean your average weapons per say, more as in restricting small reactors and fighters cockpits for large ships, and restricting superweapons for small ships. I totally agree with you on the fact that forbidding fighter weapons on larger ships will come at a cost of creativity, but this is the mod maker's choice to make.

I don't think the example I used was the greatest for the point I was trying to convey. But my other points still stand.