Hello, new member here and my first post.

I searched the board and found no mention of this aspect common in most 4X games.

No one has yet (as far as I can tell) mentioned the concept of ship design.

I thought it might be interesting to be able to design your ships in a limited way.

Weapons:
- how many, what type and what weapon arch (within some
parameters depending on the ship class being built)

Shields:
- again now many generators, what type of shields, etc.

Armor:
-what kind, how much are you going to add to the hull

Sensors:
-what kind (science, targetting, deep space scanning) and how many
sensor arrays.

With this in mind I thought it would be interesting to add a kind of customization per ship class. For example a Galaxy class designed for science and exploration (lots of sensors but less shields, weapons), or a Galaxy class designed for battle.

Also in keeping with the Star Trek theme certain races have limits on what they can put in the ships. Klingons for example have a limited amount of shields and science sensors they can put on certain classes of ship but more allowances for weapons (perhaps even a minimum requirement!!). The Federations may have a minimum requiirment for the number of shield generators . Such ideas would be in keeping with the Star Trek theme (and the cultures in the game) while allowing for some customization.

Welcome to the forum mgreen.

This has been mentioned but nobody wants it. This is a pure trek game, the only ships will be established canon vessels, (and some new designs to fill in gaps- like old cardassian ships). Making new ships would rob the game of it's trek feel and leave us with just another game.

This game will be extremely moddable, all aspects can be edited and changed. If you want two types of galaxy then that was a breeze in botf so should be easy here.

Mogh,

Thanks for the reply. I thought about that too, too much variation then you do not get canon ships. That is why I thought about limited variation, but then again what would be the point of that right??

Looking forward to the game none the less. I am reinstalling the original BOTF now. Feel like having a game after coming across this site.

Now if one there were a group who are going to remake Star Wars Rebellion......

i think that it would be possible to create a starwars game with botf2, because it is so easy to mod. Things like terraforming and stuff will stay in, but at least you could put in starwars races and ships.

Yes. It would be possible to SW mod BotF2 � and someone probably will. But it wouldn't be the same. SWReb had a completely different look&feel to BotF; different game-play; different motives. A SW mod BotF2 couldn't be the same as SWReb2... I wonder if anyone will take up the challenge? ... Hmmmmm

Better get crackin'! What info do you need to know about my computer to make your explosive mod? I'll do my part to help! (I just *gotta* see this)

Seriously, though, I'm one who thinks the animosity between Trek and SW makes no sense. It's like people who like blue hating those who like cats.... But that's a great way to start a flame war; not what I want. I'm at this forum to help in the creation a *Trek* game, if I can. I'll go somewhere else to discuss a Wars game... I'll not say another word on the subject.

Trek *will* live long... and prosper. Because we Trekies will make sure of it.

What about a StarGate mod?

I'm with gturfrey on this one. Don't personally like any sci-fi but the mighty trek.

how can you not like stargate? maniac. but should someone want a sw mod then let them make it. i think a stargate mod would be a bit difficult as earth only has 3 ship types the go`auld only have four and the asgard only has two as well.

More than the Romulans then...

I did watch sg a lot when it first came out, then I got a job that took up a lot of time and ditched sky. It's now on channel4 but I'm so far out of the loop it doesn't make sense. (Plus the ship technologies appear to be lifted from trek )

you know what i also really liked was the Pretender, i know it isn't scifi but still a very nice serie and cool movies to.

I like Stargate too! For all we know, there are bound to be other Asgard and Go'a'ould ship-types we just haven't seen them.

I'm sure that there are star wars/star gate mods out there, that haven't been mentioned, but I can't find them when I look (I'll keep looking for you guys if you want, though)

I think it would have been nice to have some sort of ship design screen in the game, even if it is like an engineers report on what a future vessel could be capable of.

Early on, when ships were to be desinged, the different shipyards would design a new class of ship, (based on starfleets' specs) Starfleet would then commission the ship class they liked the best (And so give the contract to that particualr shipyard) Of course, later on in trek, all the designing seems to be done at Utopia Planitia. (I suppose this is canon, but I can't remember where I got this from. It makes sense, even if it isn't canon, though)

I would definitely like to have a screen where future (possible) ships could be shown. (But obviously you could only choose the canon ships) this would allow other ships to be included in the game, it's just that they would not be useable.

Hi, first post here

I've always been a more of a fan for the technology of Star Trek rather than the universe itself, I love the Technical Manuals and would really be interested in a level of customisation.

During the operational life of a ship it would under go many refits or upgrades as technology progresses or to fit in with the mission specs of the ship, the most obvious example would be the Galaxy class, by the time All Good Things, yes I know it's an alternate future, but the ship was radicall different, the addition of a third warp nacelle and some serious firepower not only reflected the advance in technology but also the more military nature of the universe.

The Miranda is another prime example, the same basic hull but several variables, basic hull, roll bars, aditional sensors and rear additions being seen.

In BOTF this was covered by having versions of ships, at the game progressed the ship was upgraded automatically which worked pretty well

In Starfleet Command there were several version of the basic hull, not only for upgrades but also for mission parameters, this can differ from the TV show, for example missle cruisers but it is also not that far from the truth.

When the Nebula class was created there were numerous pods that could be attached to it, I remember two at least, these would be changed dependingg on the mission the ship faced, the Galaxy class also had that capacity but all internally, various parts of the ship were empty when it was designed and constructed and modules could be added or removed when required, this gave the ship great flexibility, a major concern with such a substantual investment.

It could be possible to become bogged down in the detail and this would make the game more of a simulator rather than a empire level strategy game but I think some input would be good

Has anyone had any experience with the imperium galactica series of games, I like the 2nd in the series Imperium Galactica Alliances, in that you researched basic hull designs and could add items as you saw fit, it's the same in Nexus: The Jupiter Incident although on a much grander scale. But I think that these would complicate matters and if everyone had their own ships customised it would slow down the multiplayer connection speed, or so I would imagine, I'm no expert there

To make things easier what about having all the ships designed but include a sort of multitasking capability.

Using the power bar from Star Trek Bridge Commander, a ship produced X amount of energy which would be enough to power the ship, but say I was going into combat, I'd boost power to the weapons, the weapons would then charge more quickly and make the ship more combat effective, you guys probably know what I'm saying and if not, go play the game, it's fun.

Well using this as an idea, a ship has set values for it's class, my federation is a happy one, when at spacedock/starbase, I decrease the weapon capabilities of the ship, lower the power so to speak and use it to boost the sensors and it'll scan things quicker or something, next turn the ship is refitted and it leaves spacedock a nice wee science ship, less of a kick but just what I want for my happy world, like the beginning the TNG, then bang the borg appear, I just manage to win. Next chance I get my ship is back in spacedock to get the weapon systems boosted and make it more of a potent little hellraiser but less of a science ship.

Then as technology progresses, just increase the amount of power available to it, this would allow a certian level of customisation but still keep things managable

I would love for sonething along these lines to be in, but i'm not so sure it could be implemented.

The game is all about management of systems, and conquering (Or making friends with) the rest of the Galaxy.

If every other turn, you had to spend a minute on altering the specs of your ship(s), then you would spend half of the turn on just doing this! Trust me, when you get to turn 3,494, you would give anything to make the game run quicker! (You would also do anything, when you notice just how much time you have spent on the game, and then realise your computer has crashed!) Thank you, you useless peice of (Soon to be upgraded) junk!

If you were faffing around making your ships less powerful, coz you're wiping out the Borg, then there is something wrong with you!

Of course there are people out there, who are this sort of control freak (Hey, my mum is one, when it comes to cleaning the house) There is nothing wrong with this, but I doubt it will in any release of the game.

Fear not, though, for THERE IS SUCH A THING AS MODS. (This is what the game is really about)

You (Or someone you know, that knows more about computer programs than you) can make a mod, to make the game exactly as you want. So don't worry. Even after my ranting, chances are, one day, you will realise your dreams. (If you do, make it downloadable and i'll try it out as well)

Ya I'm for mods but I'm for this being a STAR TREK game...it's birth of the FEDERATION and besides....after star trek...i'm a Babylon 5 guy
-Jega

if ya like bridge commander, go to http://bridgecommander.filefront.com/ its where i go to get all my BC mods, theres all sorts of funny ships there too, how about "StarTrek birth of the Fedex"

I also like B5,Star Wars,Stargate sg1/atlantis and long walks in the country .. i recently took out a Sovereign with 5 X-Wings and sat back and watched a fruitless fight between a Borg tactical cube and the Death Star .. i must say tho that Bridge commander has much superior ship to ship combat than BOTF ... but then thats ALL the games about, oh yes the guys on the Bridge commander mod page have got together to make Bridge commander 2 .. amazingly heh .. if your a ship designer/modder id realy suggestyou go there, the ship lists are amazing

LOL Thats a funny ship! I've actually never played bridge commander but i've always wanted too. I'm curious, what makes it better (granted the one in botf was pretty bad) but what mad it superior specifically? maybe we could adapt a few of those things to botf2? and i'll try to pick up bridge commander.
-Jega

just the alround quality, the ships are realisticaly textured, the phasers, photons, quantums and plasma/disruptor blasts are just like on tv, you can target systems like take out they're warp drive impulse or weapons, you can aim for the bridge or power core, one mod actualy lets you eject the warp core before you go bang, example im in a romulan warbird, i decloak and attack a galaxy class, i dont want it running so i target its warp necells and open fire, the galaxy class has all round shielding and like in the searies its in sectors, front,rear, port, starboard, dorsal and ventral.. if i took it by suprise i would attack fron the rear blasting the rear shielding to kingdom come, but then i have to wait for my forward phasers to recharge and torps to reload so i pummel it a bit more with my plasmas then rotate my weapon arcs as does the galaxy class, both ships end up in a dogfight situation turning to bear weapons, keeping weak or down shields away from enemy fire, so to finish this a bit quick i increase power to weapons, i can only do this for so long untill my battery and reserve power is depleated, as luck has it the galaxy class tries to increase distance turning its back to me, big mistake i open fire full frontal ripping into its port necell, the necell explodes ripping away its mounting and drifts off into space.. it's rear shield is totaly gone as bursts of disruptor fire rip into it's main body reducing impulse power to 25%, rear torps are down and the warp reactor has taken 50% damage, the ships hull is now at 70% and sensors are undamaged, now i could aim for the weapons but that would take time, or the warp reactor but that would be to quick, so i decide to take out its sensor's, the galaxy class ship turns to keep its weak side to me and opens fire, a quad spread of photons tear intomy front shielding knocking it to 30% and its phasers breach my shielding knocking out my starboard disrupter, now im in a bit of trouble, my forward shield is down and my weapons are damaged, but time is on my side so i decide to cloak and repair, trouble is if i cloak my shields drop totaly so i boost the power to my impulse engines and since the galaxy class is crippled to 25% impulse i easily outrun it and cloak, now cloaked i stalk back and decide.. what the hell and sneak up behind the galaxy, figuring since my front shield was nearly down and if i decloak im vulnerable for a few seconds i may as well go for a death or glory strike i target the reactor and give my tactical officer the command to destroy it then decloak, brifly the galaxy gets a free shot at me reducing my structural integrity by 10%, but my phasers, disruptors and torps tear into its hull and destroys the warp core, as the core breaches the galaxy class is ripped apart by explosions its saucer section drifting off as the remaining hull gives a few final blasts and seperates into peaces ... thats pretty much what combat is like, i also like to toy with my victims, if i incapacitate them i like to lock my tractors onto them and pull them into dangerous places like an asteroid belt or a planets gravity well, only drawback is that nobody can surrender

You evil bastard!
MUAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
I like the cut of your jib michae1ange1o!!

I hate you michae1ange1o!

Bridge Commander won't work on my computer, the stats are waaay too low

Now I want the game even more and it's all your fault!

...

It would be nice if all these ideas could be incorporated into the tactical part of the game, but I doubt many of these ideas will (Or even can be) incorporated.

I know jigalypuff is working on improving the graphical side of the battles, but there is only so much that can be done. The current system means that if you wanted bits to get broken off of ships, you would need extra models for the broken off sections. (Which would mean you would need several models for every ship, instead of just the one)

Someone did have an idea about using 'invisible' graphics on the ships, so that when a section of the ship gets blown off, it would simply disappear, instead of a section physically floating off into space. He hasn't mentioned whether he got anywhere with it though.

I think the beam weapons could have a more TV look than they did in BOTF as well - thanks to the same person's ideas. You're gonna have to send jigaly a PM - he'll be able to explain what ideas he has, and how far he's got.

The rest of us will just have to post ideas, and wait for the release.

just asking as thinking of playing starfleet command 3 online, do any of you guys play this and does it still have a good following, cause the game is fairly old now

Even SFC3 doesn't work on my computer!

God I hate this hunk of junk...oh, great, now it's making a strange noise!

dont worry its probably just the hamsters, they may be hungry.

----------------------------------------------

ps; just a little image of what ya missin, i got bored and set the promethius against a galaxy class, promethius won unsurprisingly i destroyed the saucer section then disabled the stardrive section then commenced to use low power phasers to carve it up, resistance was futile...


oh yeah the promethius has multi vector assault mode as does the galaxy class, i just didnt use it

I'd buy a hamster powered computer! I'd probably start immediately yelling at it for being too slow (I just bought and Athlon 64 chip and i'm still yelling at it for being too slow) but it'd be fun too say "yep...hamsters power my comp!"
-Jega

Why for do you torture me? (Well it's not like I wouldn't if I was the one with SFC3)

I assume you meant that the Galaxy classes' Saucer section comes off from the star drive section - it sounds quite evil really, if the Galaxy class has a multi vector assault mode, and it's never been used properly in TNG. Ah well, Roddenberry wanted to save the children I suppose...

...

Hamster power rules! You don't need electricity, just a bag of fruit and seeds! Now that's a real portable pc!

I'm thinking about getting a new computer now (Since this one is six years old - and my hamster is getting a bit on the ancient side!) Do you guys have any recommendations for a new PC?

oh it wasnt sfc3 it's bridge commander, the galaxy class does have multi vecter assault mode, they used to call it emergency saucer seperation, it was even used in combat once too, saucer and battle bridge..
Oh hamster pc's (pet computers) arnt all that bad, the laptops can get messy tho... you may wanna try a petnium 4, people may rave about athalons because they run faster but if it starts getting rocky they trip up a hell of a lot more, i originaly built my machine with an athalon and 3 weeks later i ripped its guts out and replaced the motherboard processor and ram, if your a student tho you may want to get the athalon, i think tiny are doing a pretty interesting one for under 400 quid with a 15inch tft monitor

Sorry, my mistake about the games. I was reading two posts at the same time - not a good thing to do if you want to be coherent - and correct!

I knew about the Emergency Saucer Separation of the Galaxy Class - but it wasn't intended to be used as a Multi-Vector Assault Mode, as the Prometheus is able to do. The Emergency Saucer Separation of the Galaxy was intended to get the Civilians and non-essential personnel away from any really intense or dangerous situations. this is also why the class was equipped with a secondary Bridge, the Battle Bridge.

The Stardrive Section of a Galaxy class is supposed to be more combat able, without the Saucer section. Personally, I don't see how this was possible, since the main Bridge, Phaser arrays, Sensor Suites, Shuttlebay and Impulse engines are situated on the Saucer section. The Secondary Deflector grid is also found on the Saucer section.

From the Schematics that I have seen, other than a single phaser bank, and the Torpedo launchers, the Stardrive section actually has very few weapons - not much good if it was designed for battle!

The original Enterprise had the Saucer Separation ability as well, it's just it did not have the ability to reconnect, once the sections had been taken apart. (It was also never done in the series, because they couldn't afford the special effects, but Roddenberry had planned it all along.)

...

I don't need a new monitor or anything, it's just the base unit that i'm gonna replace. I've seen a nice one in Comet for 260 quid, but I can't remember the specs (But I know they're better than this thing!)

If you want to know, my computer is an AMD K6-2 400Mhz PC, and had 32MB of Ram with an amazing 4GB HD!

I've upgraded the RAM to 160MB (So Microsoft Word works) And I had a 20GB HD upgrade with it as well.

It has an upgraded the Graphics Card as well, but I haven't actually got a clue what it is - the people in PC World were doing some promotion thing at the time, and my mum just thought it sounded good and went with it - she didn't even know what a graphics card was! 8O

It's been a great computer while it lasted. I've only had to phone the engineers at PC World to fix it 11 times in the six years that i've had it!

First there were (Multiple) problems with the CD-Rom, then the Mother Board went, the Battery has failed 7 times, (And isn't even working at the moment - the clock says it is 5:15pm April 4th, 2003!) then the Hard drive crashed completely, so it's been upgraded to 40GB (I can't even use scan disk or defragment the disk now - my computer freezes if I try!

It's been worth it though - BOTF survives!

lol we are in the same boat im looking to buy a new computer soon, looks like im gonna go for a kitted sager 9860, best lappy around.

My current pc is pissing me off with its slowness, takes ages to get avi playing. And i do a lot of video editing so its a real pain.

oh my 8O ... im loath to buy any new hardwear because i have a funny feeling a new processor may come out soon, pitty i never knew ya in november id have got a new pc and SENT you my old base unit Matress, unfortunately i have been sitting around living off my savings and traveling all over britain for the past two months ... bummer ... and its gonna take me another 2 months to save to buy a new one