Science & Industry

Please keep in mind that this post is slightly vague due to my own ignorance, but I have some issues with current freighter design. Anyone's welcome to contribute to this.

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Looking at the freighters, you have a progression between the four ships from "big and slow" to "small and fast". When I say slow I mean both slow alignment and slow subwarp speed. When I say big I mean most cargo space.

Issue) Too little differentiation between freighters.

Freighters are similar to each other in every aspect. They're all within 20% of each other's cost, so there's no real cost savings to taking a particular freighter.

They all carry within 15% of each other's cargo. The result is that there will be few times when you need to take a second trip and even fewer times when you need to take two or more extra trips by choosing one over the other.

While the Fenrir and the Charon are most different, being at opposite ends of the designed spectrum, there doesn't seem to be a reason for the other two freighters to be in the game.

Here are some ideas for how to change the other two freighters to make them more unique:

(Some of these are mutually exclusive. That's fine; it's just brainstorming.)

*Separate fast alignment and fast subwarp speed. This will separate the best freighter for saving at-keyboard pilot time and the best freighter for autopiloting. If the fenrir was spinny (fast align) but slow (subwarp speed) you'd use that one when you were moving stuff to your pos or whatever, and you'd change the design of one of the middle freighters to have good subwarp speed for autopiloting but it doesn't spin as fast. Now three freighters would have a purpose instead of two.

*Give one of the freighters more cargo room. The Charon's full load of tritanium is about 450m value right now. Why not double (or triple) its cargo space? People will still use the autopilot freighters for their speed, since the normal limitation is cargo value. The Charon's specialization in this case would change its function enough to make it extremely useful for hauling minerals.

*Make one of the freighter's a half-freighter. Half EHP, same speed, half cargo. HALF COST. This would allow noobs to get into freighters faster.

*Make one of the freighters a sturdy freighter. Double cost, half cargo space, double EHP.

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I acknowledge that there would be legacy issues with any change in present design.

Right now it just seems that we really only have 2 freighters, which is sad for me because I love the look of the space-beetle (Providence). It seems actually that the Fenrir is the clear winner and the rest of the freighters are kinda useless.

Anyone agree/disagree? Any other ideas in how to differentiate the freighters?

Charon - largest Cargohold, least agility.

Fenrir - smallest Cargohold, fastest velocity and greatest agility.

Providence - 2nd most agile, 2nd highest EHP.

Obelisk - greatest EHP.



It's your choice.

Could we increase the size of carriers?

Then you'd have to change wormholes.

I think the OP has a point, the freighters are indeed very similar... But I am not sure that changing the existing ships is the best way forward. With the industrials it wasn't too big a deal since those ships are cheap. However, freighters are significant investments and having your freighter completely changed on you will sting for some.

That being said, overall diversity is good. Not sure freighters are, or should be, a priority for CCP.

I'd like to see a mid level freighter line that sacrifices some of the m3 capacity but increses the speed/agility of the full size. The current offering for transporting goods has a glaring hole in the middle(yes I know their is a Jump Freighter but its 5-6x the cost of its larger counterpart)

I once had to do regular runs from near Rens to Jita. The volume was about 200k and I had to do the round trip every day at least once. I MUCH preferred the Providence. Niche case but still ...

It looks much better :)

@Topic: Why is there a need to differentiate freighters? I really don't see that. They are there to transport bigger amounts. That's what they do. Why the hell should there be a difference. Half Cargo at half price? Why? To help Noobs getting faster into them? 2 weeks later they will recognise that the space is not enough and have to buy the bigger one anyway.

I don't see any necessity to change anything on Industrials and Freighters. Everything is fine and is working.

Edit:
Small volume and cheap --> T1 Industrial
Small Volume and expensive --> T2 Blockade Runner
Medium Volume --> Orca (it travels as well very fast with same / more EHP like a freighter!)
Large Volume --> Freighter

For Lowsec and Nullsec use accordingly Jumpfreighter or T2 Industrial

Don't see where there is need to fit something in between of above options where we would need a new freighter (class).

Edit2: Before you suggest one option bear in mind, this is not "My little Pony", but EVE

Now, you are just drunk.

Pretty sure you should have used a Fenrir for that.