Small ships, what ever happened to them?

[Stanlayhay]

If you were to look at all the amazing ships out on the StarMade "catalog" you would probably find a giant ship with tons of turrets and docks etc, but what ever happened to small, lightweight ships? Some people may say "Why have a small ship when you can have a huge ship that can defend itself without you?" Well to be honest I think its all about YOU being in control. Small ships may not be as defensive or "cool" but how many people are going to join a server and start out with a 100k mass ship?

I'm not telling people to stop makes these amazing big massers that are truely art themselves. I am just saying lets not maintain a focus on them. Let all post ships of all sizes and equal greatness. Ships that could be used in hangers on a planet not using a planet as a single hanger. I must say some of the neatest looking ships like for instance (I'm sorry I don't have the exact name or who made it) the BB_Escape pod from Halo (I think it was). Anyways my point is lets get some variety in our great game that some can afford and some can't on a multiplayer server, lets get masterful ships of both smal,l medium, and large size. So go out there make a ship, put it in the catalog for all to look at, download, change and do it with VARIETY!

 

[Nootau]

Ships go into the catalog not because they are good, not are combat gods. They go there because they look nice. Most ships in the catalog suck stat and combat wise, does this surprise you? Why would anyone upload ships that function rather than ships that look nice?

 

[Yhgi117]

I like the smaller ships and enjoy challenging myself to make the most effective but cool-looking ones as possible. Here are some. Not that great, but they\'re here anyway:

[NOTE: the links lead to albums]

A Personal Fighter/Bomber/Light Corvette: http://sta.sh/2r4cjxztzm8 [NOTE: This was only half done by me]





A Light Frigate/Heavy Corvette (Two turret docking units): http://sta.sh/2mqtkjrsyvs





A Zingin\' Single Docking-Unit Fighter: http://sta.sh/223cxxyxw0lm





A Fancy-Schmancy Space Torpedo: http://sta.sh/2hspw32ofsa





A Mining Vessel (Room for the single unit fighter): http://sta.sh/2lod32zpbu0





And a Three Block High Fighter/Bomber based off Twinchicky\'s: http://sta.sh/211uvfy4jicp (Also known as the Munin Fighter/Bomber. It\'s horridly effective)

 

[Gasboy]

Corvette.



Heavy Corvette.



The Corvette is 48m long, 15m high, and 9m wide. Her heavier sister is 55m long, 17m high, and 10m wide. They can both take on multiple pirates, and pirate stations are doable if you don\'t fly right up into range of all their amcs.

 

[Freight]

I like the IRL sub looking designs, I feel like that bridge would be the favorite target for any opponent.



I usually build small ships because 1. I don\'t like building big ships after I built a 1:1 of a Venator class Star Destroyer. 2. Building them on most servers I like with increased hull health(negating imports from SP) is dangerous, people always backstabbing or just being dicks. It\'s nice to have a Corvette or frigate to just bolt out of trouble if it comes knocking.



Another type of ship I came up with is a modular ship, I have a ship of only 110 mass and people are really impressed, they like the design and the idea. Have Modular ships make the versatility of the ship much larger and the RP factor with it is just as fun. Also, designing ships for unconventional warfare on this ie. Mine Layers, Bombers, blockade runners, and now with Personal weapons; Marine carriers, troop carriers.



It\'s all about thinking outside of the box with small ships, how can I cause as much damage or annoyance to their ship to have them think twice about engaging me again.

 

[Cybertooth]

I call it a ray fighter, because of the very vauge similarity to the shape of a stingray.

 

[Feace Shlorfk]

They all went to me in the form of 1001 pirate scouts... HELP ME

 

[MisterVec]

I\'m moving on to larger hulls as part of my \"full-sized fleet\" project, but I\'ve done several small ship designs that might be worth a look. The smaller ones are listed on this comment, and another ship, a 112-meter long frigate design has a download link a few posts later.


http://star-made.org/comment/39610#comment-39610

 

[Gasboy]

The conning tower contains a cockpit up top, and the power core below, and yeah I think it would be a prime target.

However, I am thinking of adding armored plates to the front of the ship and conning tower for more protection. I contructed these ships with price in mind, I figured you can have loads of fun without breaking the bank.

Your modular ship idea is a good one, and the ships I have built follow a similar pattern: The engine is one solid block, the power sources are power cubes, and the weapons are also solid chunks.

If and when they allow it so that you can save individual modules and ship hulls (as in, hulls without systems or cores), your idea would be usable. I hope that they do this, it would make ship construction easier and a lot more fun.

 

[Gasboy]

There are quite a few \"fan\" ships out there that both look good and pack a realistic punch.

Me, I prefer building sleek, simple designs with enough shielding, power, engine and guns to be able to kill pirates, and do some light pvp.

 

[Gasboy]

But the one thing that keeps me from trying them out is the exposed component design in your smaller ships.

There\'s nothing more horrible than hearing *bang*bang*bang* and then seeing your weapon power drop by half because a pirate just sawed through it. XD

 

[jarlrmai]

small ships vanished with infinite resources and catalogs

Not sure what\'s going to happen when the balance patches hit, I guess people wont start again now they have a super star destoryer.

 

[MisterVec]

Try them out. They\'re pretty rugged. I promise they aren\'t just for looks. They are designed to take damage to their drive sections and still generate enough trust and power to do what they need to. The gunship has secondary power generators in its main hull and the fighter can handle itself against other fighters just fine. The Omnidrone is crap and shouldn\'t be used in a fight or at all really.

 

[Mason]

I have built two corvettes, one colony ship, a small science frigate (okay, its classed as a dreadnought according to FURB), a few assorted bombers and fighters, a frigate, two escape pods, and a bunch of experimental scout ships.

 

[MisterVec]

Congratulations! You won at Starmade!

 

[Bangelon]

I am of a simular view as Vec, there is nothing wrong with exposing components so long as there are backup or enough shields to keep them safe.

 

[Gasboy]

But I don\'t feel comfortable in small ships that have engines or power or shields exposed. There\'s no way they can take much damage once the shields drop. And since each block represents a higher percentage of stuff than on bigger ships, once the blocks start exploding, each one is painful.

Don\'t get me wrong, they look cool. It\'s just not my design philosophy.

 

[Mason]

Half of the Leviathan is a hangar and living quarters, the other 3/4 is mechanics and weapons. Yes my ship is 1 1/4 a ship, STFU. I havent even finished prototyping it and its already incredibly powerful, not to mention with ample interior. BrickBreaker was a brick, of awesome. Leviathan is exactly that, a ship eating monster of doom and awesome.

 

[MisterVec]

Your victory speach is terrible. We already know you have a giant flying space brick. Plus, it has nothing to do with this thread about small ships. It seems you only mentioned it to brag, anyway.

So, I guess you win twice!

 

[Gasboy]

But this thread was about small ships. XD