Allow All Special Ships from Anomalies to Merge with Regular Fleets (submerged cruiser)

[takecarey]

I believe it's time for the team to revisit some old anomalies that reward military ships and their lack of ability to merge with regular fleets.

For instance, the submerged cruiser line. You can't merge this or built ships into it.

Some newer updates add the ability to merge military ship rewards to existing fleets, though. I believe there is a nanite ship that does have the ability to merge—I forget the name of the chain.

Can we perhaps consider this QOL change?

 

[ParanoiaMod]

I have never understood the reason for limits for non-leviathan-sized Ships not being allowed to merge with other ships to form a bigger fleet, yes.

I mean, sure, maybe Ether Drakes should not go prance about with other ships, but anything short of that (and Construction, Science and Army Fleets aside obviously) should be a fair game for Fleet-merging.

 

[NotAYakk]

I think the game should bring in "hero ships" as a core mechanic. We already have a few cases that are almost there; the Offspring ships, and the various "quest reward" ships, and even science ships.

A "Hero ship" becomes a ship that a leader can pilot. In this model, a "hero ship" with a leader can lead a fleet, instead of the leader leading the fleet. (This simplifies how Offspring Ships work as a bonus)

Hero Ships have distinct designs than the ships-of-the-line; they can have different sections and even ship types. Each slot can be locked to a specific component, have a default component but allow customization, or be fully free to be customized.

If a Hero Ship has a default component in a slot, you can always use that component even if you lack the technology for it, and ditto for locked slots; a psionic avatar might have every utility slot locked to psionic shields, or whatever.

You can build Hero ships of each ship size - so a Hero Corvette, a Hero Frigate, a Hero Destroyer, a Hero Cruiser and a Hero Battleship. These may (or may not) have extra features compared to the base ship (like how Offspring versions of the ships have upgrades over the baseline). You'll be limited somehow in how many Hero ships you can have.

The ship designer will have a separate tab for Hero ships, which includes quest reward ships. The quest reward ships currently act as if every slot was "locked"; the game designers can choose to set slots to "default" or "unlocked" so we can retrofit those quest reward ship with upgraded components and keep using them in the end game!

The commander of a fleet will be piloting a hero ship. We can add features to the leaders that impact their hero ship individually, and even permit non-admirals to lead fleets. This means we can have "hot shot pilot" military leaders whose main boost is to their ship, compared to ones that boost the fleet more. Naturally Hero Ships will have an extremely good chance to retreat if their ship is damaged while the fleet hasn't been defeated.

In short, I want to find a submerged cruiser, and upgrade it and have it with me until the end game, piloted by AHAB.

 

[indalecio248]

While you can't merge on of these unique ships to another fleet, you can build a fleet around those unique ships. Find the unique ship/fleet and click 'Add Ship' and voila.

Though it still makes no sense that you can't add these ship to another fleet, this may make them a little more usable.

 

[Calimora]

While you can't merge on of these unique ships to another fleet, you can build a fleet around those unique ships. Find the unique ship/fleet and click 'Add Ship' and voila.

Though it still makes no sense that you can't add these ship to another fleet, this may make them a little more usable.

There are a couple of ships that you cant build fleets arround, the submerged ship that started this thread is one of them. What I really want to be able to do is scrap the quest ships for research insight.

It really gets my goat that the Radical Cult can build a battleship IN A CAVE! five years in, but I wont even see the technology for another 30-100, depending on how much the RNG hate me.

 

[DarkHelmet110985]

I think the game should bring in "hero ships" as a core mechanic. We already have a few cases that are almost there; the Offspring ships, and the various "quest reward" ships, and even science ships.

A "Hero ship" becomes a ship that a leader can pilot. In this model, a "hero ship" with a leader can lead a fleet, instead of the leader leading the fleet. (This simplifies how Offspring Ships work as a bonus)

Hero Ships have distinct designs than the ships-of-the-line; they can have different sections and even ship types. Each slot can be locked to a specific component, have a default component but allow customization, or be fully free to be customized.

If a Hero Ship has a default component in a slot, you can always use that component even if you lack the technology for it, and ditto for locked slots; a psionic avatar might have every utility slot locked to psionic shields, or whatever.

You can build Hero ships of each ship size - so a Hero Corvette, a Hero Frigate, a Hero Destroyer, a Hero Cruiser and a Hero Battleship. These may (or may not) have extra features compared to the base ship (like how Offspring versions of the ships have upgrades over the baseline). You'll be limited somehow in how many Hero ships you can have.

The ship designer will have a separate tab for Hero ships, which includes quest reward ships. The quest reward ships currently act as if every slot was "locked"; the game designers can choose to set slots to "default" or "unlocked" so we can retrofit those quest reward ship with upgraded components and keep using them in the end game!

The commander of a fleet will be piloting a hero ship. We can add features to the leaders that impact their hero ship individually, and even permit non-admirals to lead fleets. This means we can have "hot shot pilot" military leaders whose main boost is to their ship, compared to ones that boost the fleet more. Naturally Hero Ships will have an extremely good chance to retreat if their ship is damaged while the fleet hasn't been defeated.

In short, I want to find a submerged cruiser, and upgrade it and have it with me until the end game, piloted by AHAB.

Hero ships technically already exist with Skrand and his ship the First Talon. You can take his ship and add ships to his Fleet to make a pretty godly fleet. I typically have a 2 Titan(First Talon is one), 20 Battleship, 12 Cruiser, 10 Destroyer and 20 Corvette fleet. Manage to get Commanding Presence for another 80 Command limit and add 5 Battleships, 5 Cruisers and 10 Destroyers. Automated Dreadnaught is another Hero ship albeit without the Leader to go with it. I try to pair Warform with it as a symbolic gesture since the lone Corvette Warform spawns with is inadequate and I typically have the same Fleet composition. Seems to work well for me.

As for Submerged Cruiser and what not… eh I’d prefer those be removed or have their events yield a huge boost to getting Ship Techs if you happen to find it early, like the Cult quest that could yield early Battleship Tech(which makes having it fire be worth the early game pain it typically provides me). 1 Cruiser isn’t going to alter things like Skrand or Automated Dreadnaught would but I suppose if you get the Cruiser early and I mean early, it can be useful to clear Space Fauna. Outside of that… I prefer Tech progress.

 

[Aid7en]

In fact, you just need to give the opportunity to upgrade the hero ships. You may have found a ship whose technology you don't understand well, but what prevents you from strengthening its armor or attaching additional weapons?
You can use the quest to explore the possibility of upgrading hero ships.

 

[indalecio248]

In fact, you just need to give the opportunity to upgrade the hero ships. You may have found a ship whose technology you don't understand well, but what prevents you from strengthening its armor or attaching additional weapons?

Or why not dissemble the ship to get new permanent research options?

EDIT: At the very least, allow this to be done with Empires that have the Scavengers or Refurbishment Division civics.

 

[NotAYakk]

In fact, you just need to give the opportunity to upgrade the hero ships. You may have found a ship whose technology you don't understand well, but what prevents you from strengthening its armor or attaching additional weapons?
You can use the quest to explore the possibility of upgrading hero ships.

The video game Alpha Centauri had a mechanism where if you had a unit you lacked the tech for, you could retrofit it by replacing stuff.

You couldn't pick stuff you didn't have the tech for, but you could keep it where it is and reproduce it even. So if you had a unit with a +8 attack/1 defence, you could put the best armor (say 2) you had on it. If you also found a 1 attack/4 defence unit, that could be given your best gun. But you couldn't combine the two.

For hero ships that is sort of what I'd like; but no ability to reproduce. Just retrofit. New drives, reactors, replace armor, etc.

Then ensure the hero ships have something fun and unique about them.