Star bases and dreadnought design upgradeable and editable

[Stile Libero]

It would be great to be able to change the design of the starbases or other ships that are acquired as a reward for the completion of special projects or anomalies

[galadon3]

yea or at least have them automatically upgrade to your empires drives like the civilian ships now do so that they can keep up with the normal fleets.

[ℳɑℵƐɳƮɨɳʊᎦ]

Modders have looked at making starbases editable and it IS possible but there is not enough room on the ship designer for it to work. There is the one central base and then 6 arms that have to be designable if someone puts in a full load of weapons. The game just can't fit that in.

[galadon3]

Originally posted by ℳɑℵƐɳƮɨɳʊᎦ:

Modders have looked at making starbases editable and it IS possible but there is not enough room on the ship designer for it to work. There is the one central base and then 6 arms that have to be designable if someone puts in a full load of weapons. The game just can't fit that in.

could just designing the "rump"-base be do-able, like keeping the automatic addition for the new slots you add but making the slots that are always available designable?
That should work with a single design for each starbase-rank.

[ℳɑℵƐɳƮɨɳʊᎦ]

Originally posted by galadon3:

Originally posted by ℳɑℵƐɳƮɨɳʊᎦ:

Modders have looked at making starbases editable and it IS possible but there is not enough room on the ship designer for it to work. There is the one central base and then 6 arms that have to be designable if someone puts in a full load of weapons. The game just can't fit that in.

could just designing the "rump"-base be do-able, like keeping the automatic addition for the new slots you add but making the slots that are always available designable?
That should work with a single design for each starbase-rank.

Another problem is that an empire will usually have multiple levels of starbases through their empire so how would they know which weapons and such to use? you'd either need a seperate design for each level(which is a lot of "unneccessary" clutter) or have a messy design (like you'd have 2 railguns then two lasers then two railguns..etc.) Another thing is that for most of the starbases where proper designs will be useful(bastions) then the central base and the "guaranteed" weapons will be the minority of the available weapons.

This may also lead to the problem of people demanding that the entire thing be made designable despite it being impossible to fit. It is sometimes better to deny people all of something then tease them with just a part of it.

[Stile Libero]

Originally posted by ℳɑℵƐɳƮɨɳʊᎦ:

Originally posted by galadon3:

could just designing the "rump"-base be do-able, like keeping the automatic addition for the new slots you add but making the slots that are always available designable?
That should work with a single design for each starbase-rank.

Another problem is that an empire will usually have multiple levels of starbases through their empire so how would they know which weapons and such to use? you'd either need a seperate design for each level(which is a lot of "unneccessary" clutter) or have a messy design (like you'd have 2 railguns then two lasers then two railguns..etc.) Another thing is that for most of the starbases where proper designs will be useful(bastions) then the central base and the "guaranteed" weapons will be the minority of the available weapons.

This may also lead to the problem of people demanding that the entire thing be made designable despite it being impossible to fit. It is sometimes better to deny people all of something then tease them with just a part of it.

The point is optimization! If I invest time and resources concentrating them on the engineering of kinetic cannons, increasing their rate of fire and damage, what do I need a stellar base that bases its defensive weapons on lasers? Or, what do I do with armored plasteel ships if I have already implemented dragon scale technology in the meantime? I hate waste!

[Elitewrecker PT]

Starbases have a mix of every weapon type and defenses as you can see, but the armor should have been upgraded to dragonscale.

[ℳɑℵƐɳƮɨɳʊᎦ]

the best compromise I can see is having a normal starbase and then one for use in pulsars that have no shields and less anti-shield weapons.

[Stile Libero]

Originally posted by ℳɑℵƐɳƮɨɳʊᎦ:

the best compromise I can see is having a normal starbase and then one for use in pulsars that have no shields and less anti-shield weapons.

But why settle for a compromise, when instead we could aim for the perfection of an hyper efficient design, supported by a careful research plan?

[ℳɑℵƐɳƮɨɳʊᎦ]

Originally posted by Stile Libero:

Originally posted by ℳɑℵƐɳƮɨɳʊᎦ:

the best compromise I can see is having a normal starbase and then one for use in pulsars that have no shields and less anti-shield weapons.

But why settle for a compromise, when instead we could aim for the perfection of an hyper efficient design, supported by a careful research plan?

Because having a fully designable starbase is impossible with the current game's UI

[Stile Libero]

Originally posted by ℳɑℵƐɳƮɨɳʊᎦ:

Originally posted by Stile Libero:

But why settle for a compromise, when instead we could aim for the perfection of an hyper efficient design, supported by a careful research plan?

Because having a fully designable starbase is impossible with the current game's UI

The developers changed the user interface several times, so they could do it again. there is also more to consider possible alternative solutions. it does not seem to me to be a titanic effort, especially for the paradox team! In my opinion they are absolutely capable of it!

[Deagroth]

There are mods that change the ui quite a bit. And if the designer wasn't in a flyout window, like most of the important things from the top left menues, and was actually full screen you would have -plenty- of room to design anything.

By limiting all those windows it's limiting their usefulness. True, some windows don't need to be full screen, like the research window (unless you have a lot of choices, then a grid would be great), but most of them could benefit from being fullscreeen and/or making use of the space they already have.

[ℳɑℵƐɳƮɨɳʊᎦ]

Perhaps i need to go back and reference i point i made before. Modders have tried to make this work but there is not enough room for this to work. the starbase would require 7 sections for it to be fully designable but the most sections that modders have been able to do is 5 sections. There is also the fact that the game isn't designed for large screen (that's why there is a 1080p UI mod) and that limits how large they can make windows in the game because they have to work with smaller resolution screens as well.

[SpectralShade]

I seriously can't see why it should be impossible to change the UI. It's just lack of desire to do it along with a misunderstood concern of 'it needs to look like this'.

Let's be serious here. If it was impossible, they wouldn't have been able to design the bases in the first place. It's only because they want to limit themselves to a specific UI and do not want to spend effort on creating a proper UI that would allow us to design and refit bases/gifts proper.

I'm also still annoyed that repairing the automated dreadnaught is almost so much useless, simply because you can't install your own drives in it, but need to keep those slowpoke drives.

[Elitewrecker PT]

Originally posted by SpectralShade:

I seriously can't see why it should be impossible to change the UI. It's just lack of desire to do it along with a misunderstood concern of 'it needs to look like this'.

Let's be serious here. If it was impossible, they wouldn't have been able to design the bases in the first place. It's only because they want to limit themselves to a specific UI and do not want to spend effort on creating a proper UI that would allow us to design and refit bases/gifts proper.

I'm also still annoyed that repairing the automated dreadnaught is almost so much useless, simply because you can't install your own drives in it, but need to keep those slowpoke drives.

Just have to remember to go for it AFTER unlocking the last drives :P

[SpectralShade]

Originally posted by Elitewrecker PT:

Originally posted by SpectralShade:

I seriously can't see why it should be impossible to change the UI. It's just lack of desire to do it along with a misunderstood concern of 'it needs to look like this'.

Let's be serious here. If it was impossible, they wouldn't have been able to design the bases in the first place. It's only because they want to limit themselves to a specific UI and do not want to spend effort on creating a proper UI that would allow us to design and refit bases/gifts proper.

I'm also still annoyed that repairing the automated dreadnaught is almost so much useless, simply because you can't install your own drives in it, but need to keep those slowpoke drives.

Just have to remember to go for it AFTER unlocking the last drives :P

the playtrhough I got it in, it had biodrives. I never had something called that.