I have a suggestion that is feasible and would be a good addition to the game.
Bring back the barge with a complete overhaul of the concept.
Like the old barge, it would be for use as a mobile base, except the new barge actually WOULD be a mobile base. The new barge, upon being earned, would then still have to be made out of a base. Players docking onto the barge would then go onto the base, which would then exist in a system dedicated for bases, called In Base. It would be like Bastille, but for Player Owned Barges, and possibly other special bases. Players launching from these Barge Bases would be launched at the location of the Barge. Players could sell cargo to the barge, and it would go into the base. The base and barge would have the 30,000 cargo capacity of the traditional Barge, along with an additional base supply space of 10,000, increasable by 20,000 per upgrade, usable exclusively for base maintenance supplies, perhaps to be enforced by storing it as a separate item hold.
Items placed in base supplies would be committed to construction or maintenance of the base, and could not be removed from the base. Items placed here in error could be removed by developers, perhaps along with limiting how often this can be done to avoid players making this mistake often.
Whenever the barge pilot logs out, in their place would be a giant Player-Owned base with the same model and size as the barge that was flown, positioned as it was positioned. Players using barges would be prohibited from logging out within a certain range of tradelanes and existing bases, including POB's. If they did, their base would instead be placed X amount of range away from any obstacles of any sort, whether above, below, or aside from.
When destroyed, the barge or base would lose all cargo, modules, and core upgrades, however the player barge-owning player would still have the right to build a new barge out of another base, by requesting it.
Now, barges would truly be mobile bases.
While the barge is being changed, I believe it would also be appropriate to arm it with 16 cruise turrets positioned so that only 4-8 of them at a time can fire at any enemy, with the amount of turrets existing only so that there will be a few turrets close enough together at each angle to actually be able to properly fire at the target. This amount of turrets would not adequately protect the barge against anything at all; it would merely cause targets to need to back a little further away in order to fire at the barge, giving protectors of the barge a chance to actually engage the attackers.
On top of this, I have some additional ideas for upgrades for the barge:
The barge could be upgradeable like a normal base.
The barge's base health would be 2,000,000 (raised up from the current 1,700,000) so that a Capital 4 armor upgrade will give it the same 8,000,000 health as a Core 1 base. Subsequent core upgrades would give the base a non-transferable 6x, 8x, 12x and 16x armor upgrade, giving the ship the same health as the base for each of these levels. Consumption of repair supplies would be multiplied to even out with the multiplying base health.
Supply modules would increase the free cargo space of the barge base by 5,000 per module, along with an additional 35,000 cargo usable only for base supplies, as described above, which would be unmoveable and placed directly on the docked base. The increase to the flying ship's cargo could be achieved at worst by duplicate barge ship types, but I'm sure there are better ways.
Shield Modules would have the same effect as previously, on the logged-out version of the base, however the logged-on version of the base would use ship shields. While logged on, the ship would start with a battleship shield. The shield would use the base's shield fueling materials while its shield is regenerating Construction of, and upgrades to the shield module would upgrade this shield to a Base Shield, with the follow levels and stats:
(Compared to Battleship Shield: 650,000 Capacity / 6,500 Regeneration Rate)
Mk1: 3,000,000 Capacity / 10,000 Regeneration Rate
Mk2: 5,000,000 Capacity / 12,500 Regeneration Rate
Mk3: 8,000,000 Capacity / 15,000 Regeneration Rate
Mk4: 11,000,000 Capacity / 17,500 Regeneration Rate
Mk5: 14,000,000 Capacity / 20,000 Regeneration Rate
Mk6: 17,000,000 Capacity / 22,500 Regeneration Rate
Mk7: 20,000,000 Capacity / 25,000 Regeneration Rate
Mk8: 23,000,000 Capacity / 27,500 Regeneration Rate
Mk9: 26,000,000 Capacity / 30,000 Regeneration Rate
Mk10: 30,000,000 Capacity / 32,500 Regeneration Rate
The upgrades to the shield module would be available only to barge bases, and would take module slots in the base. Use of the base shield, although appearingly impressive, would drain the shield's supplies while protecting the base less than the 97% damage reduction of the normal base shield, so logging out would be preferably during attacks, however this would give players the option of not logging out for these fights.
Defense modules, while a player is flying the barge, would become NPC's whose positions in relation with their original placement are kept, as moving ships that appear as weapons platforms, which stay in their positions relative to the base as the barge moves.
Due to the huge size of the barge making it difficult to protect, each defense module would award twice as many weapons platforms, while weapons platforms granted from the same module would be prohibited from being within 1k range of each other.
In order to prevent players from abusing their now-mobile defense modules, players who have been awarded modules would need to be prohibited from flying it within 5K of player-owned bases without permission from the base owner, with the consequences of doing so to a hostile base, or with the intention of attacking the base or players docking and launching from the base, being very severe.
Additional module types would be made available to the base: Engine Modules, Cruise Modules, and Steering Modules. The barge could have no more than three of each module type. The current barge's speeds of 25 m/s on impulse and 90 m/s on cruise could be adjusted.
Engine modules would give the barge an additional 15 m/s each, up to a maximum of 70 m/s. These upgrades would not increase the cruise speed.
Cruise modules would increase the cruise speed of the barge by 15 m/s each, up to a maximum speed of 135 m/s. Bear in mind that it takes minutes to active cruise mode with a Barge.
Steering Modules would increase the turning speed of the Barge from 1.64 deg/s up to 3.28 / 4.92 / 6.56 deg/s.
(12-04-2018, 07:49 AM)Tenacity Wrote: Barges should only be for partying.
This is what we have @diamond1 's Renzu Liner for.
Edit: Wrong account
(01-15-2018, 08:58 AM)The League Wrote: As long as your questions, comments, or concerns are presented, they will be addressed.
If you believe that you have been wronged by one of our guys, contact us for it to be redressed.
If you are a hot chick, kindly show up to our parties undressed.
(12-04-2018, 08:46 AM)diamond1 Wrote: so TLDR it's a POB with basically the same features except it moves? I'm just trying to imagine what sort of pressure the plugins would have for this.
That is why I suggested placing a duplicate POB in a non-traversable system, similar to Bastille. The actual POB would not move. The barge would move, and players docking on the barge would be moved to the POB, similar to Connecticut or the single-player base command. Upon launching, they would launch from the barge, or be placed on the barge to launch.
The barge would also not be quite as good as a stationary base, due to the fact that it is more vulnerable while logged as a ship, and it wouldn't have as much room for all of the base modules, due to the extra shield modules, speed modules, and defense modules needed to keep such a huge target alive.
At first it might sound OP, as it would be so difficult to kill, until you factor in that when the barge dies, an entire POB dies with it.