Player Features and Ideas Discussion

(No, it's not what you think. There will be no fondling or otherwise here) :P


Right now, clones -- both medical and jump -- are probably not much more than lines in a database. Beyond using the starbase interface, we can't do much to manipulate them.

There have been cries from some in the Wormhole community to allow swapping of clones in W-space. There is also a notable lack of options with cloning facilities at POSes.

Suppose instead of what we do now, we actually had to carry our clones to different locations? You would place a clone container in your cargohold that contained your clone and whatever blahblah was needed to indicate the clone is safe, etc. You could still pay for transport services, what happens now, but the price could then be significantly increased and a time delay imposed as it would become a convenience feature instead of the only way to do it. So you would still be able to buy a jump clone in Empire and have the selling corp transport that clone to one of their stations in Nullsec. Or you could carry it yourself and save the fees.

In this manner, you would also be able to carry your clones to stations without medical facilities or to stations where you do not have sufficient standings without jumping back and forth between them.

We could then carry our clones into W-space and install them in clone vat bays or anchorable medical facilities, to be used and accessed (swapped) while there. Accessing said medical facility would be like accessing a POCO or PHA now: you have a limited amount of your own, personal space that only holds clone container objects. In a regular station, they would just be stored in a new personal inventory category.

You would be limited by your skills as to how many jump clones you can store in the clone vat, medical facility, or station clone inventory; these would be considered "active". The rest would just be normal cargo, stored in cargo facilities. Edit: They would be Livestock, of course :)

These clones are fully implanted, just like we might jump into. If one falls into the wrong hands, it should be possible to reprocess them and have a chance at obtaining one or more of the implants. It should also be possbile to view the clone container to see what implants the enclosed clone currently has; then perhaps you may decide to ransom the clone back to the owner.

This could be a solution to the question about getting clones into W-space and into POS medical facilities in the first place, which could open the door to other things. And it brings another NPC-provided service into the hands of the players.

In the beginning, to make things easier, perhaps only jump clones should manipulated like this.

(Unfortunately, there probably won't be any opportunities to obtain CCP clones this way) :)

Edit: In case there is any confusion, this suggestion does not include the possibility of clone jumping into Wormhole space, which the majority of the Wormhole Community is 120% against and thus the bit which specifically mentions clone swapping. It also does not suggest the possibility of medical clone spawning into Wormhole space.

Re-read. This has nothing to do with clone jumping into wormholes.

Like I said, it has nothing to do with clone jumping into wormholes. I even specifically mentioned swapping when talking about using the clones. The last line about just starting with jump clones and not also medical clones was to avoid waking up in a W-space system following podding.

Have I mentioned that this has nothing to do with clone jumping into W-space? :P :)

I thought the part about clone swapping was sufficient, but I made it a little more explicit. Thanks.

This type of approach would open some new game-play types.
+1 As long as we only get to swap clones in W-space and not to jump K to W and vice-versa.