This is aimed at gturfrey, i hope your still about...

Weve been talking baout the diffrent Tech trees and other tings, but really to actua,lly make a rpoper go at the list, we need to know how research and upgrading is going to work.

My prefered way would be like the game Warzone 2100.
In that you research a hull, then the propulsion and then the weapon and from that u build the vechal. i know the dosent work in trek but im on aboutr something similar.

You would research the ship design, say Miranda, which has the basic stats that cover. Impulse, Warp, Weapons Beam, Weapons Torp, Shields and hull.
So lets say the Miranda had stats like I3, W2, WB3, WT2, S3, H2. Then you say the ship can be upgraded by 3 points on each. So as you research say Impulse you can upgrade the ship a little, or wait till more research in other fields is done and brijng her in for an over haull.

The other way is a simple list that says, you need to research a certain bit to get the First miranda, then rsearxh a certain set to get the upgrade and so on. Just like the first BotF was.

The reason i like the first one is because i think it would be easy to program, all you need for a ship file is the starting stats and the max stast, then in the save file, you have the name of the ship, con#mmision date (if thats happening) and the cuurrent stats kinda like the way i stared above I4, W3 ect.

Your the programmer so i need to know what you think, and more importain what way its going

Well ive explanied the eaiest way i can think of, each ship having a line with the stats ect, but you know more baout it than i would.

Oh and now your sigs boigger than most of your posts, and its limited space, so watch out for Half things appearing.

The only issue I have with the first option is pulling ships back to starbase for lots of little upgrades. The botf way is better, your ship gets 1 or 2 overall refits.

I think we all agree ships have to be refit at a shipyard or starbase, that's the top priority!

Well the way i was looking at it was, id starfleet got a new imuplse design, they wouldnt hold it back untill everything else was ready to do a major upgrade, it ships come in for upgrades because their systems are outdated, not because new tech avalible. So if a galaxy comes in and get a level 7 impulse say, a few months later, a diffrent Galaxy would come in but be fitted with the new level 8 drive, because its newer. So you could keep sending your ships back for small upgrades, but it would mean taking them away from whatever their doing, when they can do that fine with what theve got. Plus if u have a ship at base on guard duty, you can keep it Top of the Line.

I completely agree with all that mate.

I guess it's a nice strategy element knowing what amont of new tech constitues enough to warrant a refit. Rather that the decision being made for you.

Guess it all comes down to programming.....

I am kinda in the field of the upgrading not piecemeal but in grouping into class design upgrades. Not automatically every ship everywhere magically being upgraded as the newer technologies are researched but rather after being proven effective as combinations of systems after prototyping new potential classes overtime. Breakthrough package deals bought together cheaper than each one individually done piecemeal and then added one at a time to each ship.

This might mean, as in some other gaming systems, the first ship of each new class is a prototype of the newer collective designed elements and pieces of newer technologies fitted into the newer single prototype ship. This then very expensive single design prototype would have to take a mandatory 'shakedown' cruise to work out all the bugs of the new systems and then figure out which actually works and which need more work.

Once the 'shakedown' cruise is completed then certain technologies are proven and ready to be included into predetermined upgrade packages for the currently fielded designs in the fleet. A package deal that applies to the whole class being upgraded uniformly after the necessary downtime of refitting rather then a little tweak to this ship then a little tweak to that ship. This process not only models the reality of prototyping new starship sytems and technologies but also the larger economics of fleet management. Consistent tested and proven designs implemented in groups for economics of scale and implementation and also lack of micromanagement of the entire fleet one ship at a time.
Call it a new design rollout or upgrade package that each ship recieves after its designated tour of duty and return to Starbase or StarDock. Minor refitts and/or major overhauls; which to do with the increased design costs for rolling out a new class prototype?
Not to mention the nightmarish code tracking and memory allocation class management of each individual ship including their individual piecemeal upgrades. Also depending upon the scale of the larger fleets actual number of ships per class fielded and this could get to be a memory hog really quickly bogging down slower systems without the RAM to cope adequately.


Posting number Three

Awsric Armitage

I think that the way you said it, will complecate stuff, and will NOT add to the gameplay. I even think that your will be heavier for the comp then the earlier idea about this.

Absolutely, I agree the prototype ship should maybe have to be in service for xxx turns before others of the class should be built but the other ideas are perhaps too in depth.

I for one favour 2-4 predetermined upgrades for each class. As soon as the necessary tech level is reached, a ship of said class can put back to starbase or ship yard for the newly researched refit. (basically botf without magic refits )

Yeah, magic refitts as someone said are silly.

Maybe I am going a little deeper off the end but was wanting some more flexability in the design and upgrades to match the technological developments over time. One game you might get this group of techs and upgrade with that package new class upgrade. Then another game with a slightly different set of upgrades included in the class upgrade package. All kinda depends on where your different levels of tech development happen to be at the particular time the choice of the upgrade class happens rather than being locked to predetermined tech levels and upgrade points.