EVE General Discussion

This is a bit left-field, but I had an idea the other day about changing the ship fitting system, and I think this would work well.

Do away with high, medium and low slots, rig slots, and launcher and turret hardpoints. Each ship will have a fitting space, defined by cubic metres. There would be a calibration requirement to fitting modules, much like there is with rigs. The current capacitor and powergrid system would remain.

After all, a ship is a platform, shouldn't I be able to fit what I want to it, so long as I have the skill to fit it and use it, the power supply and capacity to run it, and the space to fit it.

Each module would have it's own volume, so in a ship with only a small fitting space you can fit fewer large modules. Small blasters will have a smaller volume than T2 large blasters. Rigs will have very large space requirements and calibration cost. Larger volume modules also add more to the mass of your ship, increasing signature radius and reducing velocity and AB/MWD/warp capacitor costs.

There will be 2 new skills, module fitting, for each level of fitted module, and calibration fitting, so you can fit a more calibration-hungry (ie T2) module per level. There would be a different calibration fitting skill per tech level.

The idea is maximum fitting flexibility, but still constrained by the player skill level, and the size of fitting space, powergrid and cap of the ship.

This would mean that if I wanted to fit another railgun at the expense of a couple of armour hardeners then I could, which is how I think spaceships should work.

I guess some people would try to fit ships with only defence or only offence for use in fleets, so the calibration and power requirements of offensive and defensive modules would be set up to discourage this, but to be honest i would be curious to see how PvP would change. There's no point having a ship that's 100% defence because it could be safely ignored, and ships that are 100% offense are very fragile. A ship that's 90% defence and 10% smartbomb would be a worry, but it would also be very slow.

Anyway, that's my loonie idea. What do you all think?

**EDIT** This idea is logical but seems to be getting some resistance. For CCP to implement it wound not mean scrapping the current system, they could instead introduce it as 'Tech 4' ships, and give every current module an extra variable, the calibration cost, that only comes into effect when used on a Tech 4 ship.

So you lack imagination, good for you! Now go bother mommy, grown-ups are talking here.

Rather than outright rejecting the idea, and failing to be witty at the same time, why don't you either
a) Join the discussion and say WHY it might be a bad idea, or
b) keep your opinion to yourself :P

I get the impression that people replying to my idea without taking the trouble to critique it either
a) do not understand it, or
b) they are afraid of change.

I'm not saying it's the world's best idea but it IS worthy of discussion if it fixes a few fundamental flaws in the gameplay mechanic in one hit.

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I dont think we need another Tim McGraw album. but thanks anyways.

Yeah the idea a ship is a big hole, you throw things into and everything works real well. Maybe you should send it to CCP, almost sounds like space barbies.

Launcher and Turret points wouldn't make sense for being able to fit another armor hardener. Think of the physical location on a ship, where you would put either. Nope.

Might make more sense to have categories of internal and external mounting.
1EXTERNAL; Guns, turrets, probe launcher. Stuff that is released from ship. this is more limited then category two, they should not be merged even tho they are similar. mostly because a cloak in a high slot pisses me off, same with the drone range mod (why, just why)
2SOMETHING: Webs, bubbles, transport for shield and energy, cloak, armor and shield repair. Requires access to the outside of your ship but doesn't require special mounting like a gun that rotates or a launcher that reloads would since, well yea
3INTERNAL: Sebo, Hardeners, Gyro, Rigs. Subsystems. Doesn't need access to the outside of your ship.

Yet we must ask, why? What would we gain, What that is currently broken by the current system will be fixed?

Any species or race capable of space-flight would seek the most efficient technology to suit their needs. Realistically, there would be no racial differentiation between ships, only skill-based differences. The races in EvE have different skill biases, which is enough to separate their play-styles from each other, so why is their also ship differentiation? All it does is limit player choice.

Why should I not be able to fit a vindicator with 8 launcher turrets instead of 8 railguns, if I have the skills to use launchers?

That's why there's a calibration cost to each rank of module. Ultimately the gameplay should remain consistent, but it will give us more flexibility to suit our own individual play-style.

bad idea for several reasons,

a) CCP would have an even harder time balancing modules for gameplay, if not an impossible task.
b) less ship variety, since without slot differences only a few hulls would be required to supply the 'platform' to build on, the rest would just be different looking skins.
c) large ships would have so many guns, that they would alpha anything that got near, and everyone would only use those fits further reducing variety.
d) incorrect poasting, this thread needs to be moved to the F&I forum.
e) probably more reasons, but that is enough.