Manual Ship Design

[rabek_slith]

How difficult is manually designing ships/stations in this game? I've been playing since before the first expansion and never bothered trying it.

Is it pretty easy, or am I likely to totally cripple my empire the first two dozen times I attempt it?

Any basic suggestions?

I feel like designing some spaceships, but games like GalCiv2 and SotS don't do it for me anymore outside of the ship design.

[Deathball]

Well that depends on how good you are, doesn't it? [:D]

As for difficulty, depends on ship class. Military ships are very easy, just slap on some guns and shields and all the other essentials. Civilian ships can be more tricky because giving your construction ships too much range for example will result in mining bases being constructed on the other side of the galaxy.

[CyclopsSlayer]

For me at least the design system is simplistic to use. Deciding what to put on the ships, and how much, now there is the question...
For all the basic design features there are error messages such that you cannot build a military ship without weapons or engines or something. Now is 1 Thruster good enough or do you want 20 of them? That's up to you.

[rabek_slith]

While reading through the components, it says you should have one manufacturer of each type for each construction component. The AI design for a Large Spaceport presently has 12 construction components, but only 4 manufacturers of each type.

Is the game guide incorrect, or is the AI incorrect here? Should I redesign the spaceport with more manufacturers and less construction components?

Edit: So I don't make the thread huge with questions:

Do multiple construction components speed up construction, or does it only allow for building more than one thing at a time? i.e. should I bother with multiple on a construction ship?

[Zygon]

I'm a brand new player to the series and ship designing looked daunting and complicated. After I started messing around with it, I found it to be pretty simple. By that I mean it seems like one of those simple to learn hard to master sort of things. I started with adjusting AI designed vessels and moved on to creating new ones.

I mainly add whatever is required for the role, then build up from there based on what I want the ship to do.

[rabek_slith]

I hate to bump, but it's been a while with no response to the more recent questions I've asked. I'll reiterate them here in hopes of a response:

While reading through the components, it says you should have one manufacturer of each type for each construction component. The AI design for a Large Spaceport presently has 12 construction components, but only 4 manufacturers of each type.

Is the game guide incorrect, or is the AI incorrect here? Should I redesign the spaceport with more manufacturers and less construction components?

Do multiple construction components speed up construction, or does it only allow for building more than one thing at a time? i.e. should I bother with multiple on a construction ship?

[Bingeling]

As far as I remember, someone tested up to 10 construction yards for a single set of manufacturer plants (one weapon, energy, and high-tech). Up to this ratio no difference in construction time was noticed.

This may have been some versions ago, but I figure it is still the same. The AI designs appear to be somewhat on the safe side.

[Osito]

I think this is the thread you're thinking of, Bingeling, in particular, Feelotraveller's post. Seems to be saying that one plant of each type will certainly handle 30+ construction yards.

tm.asp?m=3180183&mpage=1&key=plants?

My understanding is that multiple construction yards allow you to build more than one ship at once. I don't think they speed up construction.

To go back to you're original question, I don't think it's that hard to design ships manually, and it certainly gives you an edge when playing the game. You just need to dive in an try it. You'll make some mistakes at first, but you'll soon learn.

Common mistakes of mine:

- building a constructor with insufficient cargo capacity to build a mining station in one run
- building a ship with a very low thrust speed (I built a coloniser once that couldn't colonise a planet, because it couldn't catch it)
- building a ship with a lower sprint speed than cruise speed
- compromising hyperdrive speed (and range) by adding insufficient reactors
- compromising weapon firing ability by adding insufficient reactors

I play prewarp empires, and the first thing I do is delete all the premade designs and create designs for an explorer, a constructor and a spaceport (actually, I load my own saved designs). I give them all the bare minimum components, then add more as needed. This enables you to get your first spaceport up very quickly, then get an explorer and constructor out early. I then retrofit my spaceport to add further components as and when needed. I add new ship designs as and when needed. I don't allow any private designs to exist at first, because I don't want my private fleet clogging up my spaceport and because I don't want them making ships till they can put a warp drive on them