Overview
This is just a few quick tips ive learned for designing workable ships without resorting to admin models.
Quick Guide
12/26/2016
Just a super quick guide:
First thing is first, always experiment when Building your ships, don’t believe everything you read. even if the general consensus is that solar panels are too heavy, which I read alot, the more I play the more I am finding out that that is completely opposite. Nothing like creating a ship or downloading one just to find out it does 10 M/S or you would need a crew of 5 just to keep it fueled lol. I have seen alot of ghost ships already, so I am making this quick guide to help you get past that stage and make a somewhat useful ship. I am not a master builder but I have learned a few tricks along the way.
There are tons of awesome ships on the workshop, great designs and a lot to learn just from downloading them and playing around with them in single player or the editor. My tip is to check out as many as you can and learn from them, ask the builders questions, read the forums, and just keep an open mind when building your ship and be creative and experiment.
Anyways, I don’t want this to be 100 page manual so on with the tips:
1. Compartmentalize: In the engineering console you can turn off power to whole rooms. This solves a bunch of problems just by compartmentalizing you can power up or down entire engineering sections. For me it’s way easier then messing around in the power groups editor.
A.. Save Fuel: Put all your Generators and fuel tanks in separate rooms away from your powercells and batteries that way you can power down all your generators at once from the engineering console and then your fuel won’t be used.
B. Shields: I put all my large shield generators in one room so you can power them down and save power. I leave some small shields on the bridge so I can adjust them all through the slider. Shields at 20%.
C. Solar Hybrid ship: If you have 1000 solar panels and then 20 large hydrogen generators, you can compartmentalize your whole ship to reflect that. For example you can create two rooms one for instance has enough stuff to run on solar power alone, and another room is designed to run on fuel only. One room might have 4 small shields and one might have 6 large shields, and you can switch those rooms on and off depending on what power you are using.
D. Batteries and Powercells: In some of my builds I have those in separate rooms to just so I can mess around with them. Have you ever powered down your powercells and batteries mid warp? Try it..
2. Stacking Items: Did you know alot of items you can stack on top of each other? I actually avoid doing this with certain items cuz it just doesn’t “Feel right” lol. But it’s possible.
A. Solar panels: You can use these as any other building block. Best thing is they don’t need the sun to operate. Go ahead and stack 100 on top of each other you would get the same power as someone else building a giant solar array. The wings of this ship are all solar panels..
b. Batteries, and small power cells. You can literally stick these almost anywhere i’ve found. Inside walls, Shields, Life Support systems. You can even go vertical, and you can stack four on the same square by rotating them. Very useful for small ships.
C. Generators: You can overlap them to save space. It looks funny to me so I don’t do it, but it’s possible.You can always hide them out of site or out of reach.
3. Doing the math: Get a calculator when you are building your ship. Don’t be afraid of writing down some numbers on some paper and trying to figure out the maths for your ship. Write down room sizes. Do some drawings first. Test things out. Don’t just take someones word on things either, a class 3 engine may be more efficient on a smaller ship but on a bigger ship you may want to consider a class 1 ion engine.. Switch back and forth and test it.
4. Using More then one Bridge: This is something I love doing. It’s always good to have a backup in another room.
5. Item placement: It’s great that you can have your friends help you pilot your ship, but what about all the other times when they at work and your home sick er.. playing ur game? I like placing 1 shield generators on the bridge just so I can change shield percentage. Also I like my rift generator and gravity anchor on the bridge. It’s just easier.
6. Teleporters: Don’t be shy, if you have a big ship it helps alot to be able to beam from one room to another quickly.
7. Layout of the ship: every design decision has it’s own positive and negative. But the most annoying thing about a ship design IMO is getting lost. Try and design a ship that has a good easy layout. It’ll help in a battle, your buddy can’t load ammo if he is lost lol. Also, if you have a room that has a refinery in it that is 3 tiles high, you can save room or space by putting a large fuel tank next to it (also 3 tiles high) or in an adjacent room. Every space you save makes the ship more efficient, faster, lighter, more agile. Try and think outta the box. 🙂
8. Power system design: So you can go with hydrogen, or go with solar, or go with both. I prefer hybrid Solar/Hydrogen in that order, I rely on my solar for most of my power and hydrogen is a great backup if you enter into a battle and need the extra power for your shields or speed. My biggest secret is having enough solar panels to keep my ship charging and I like to have it charge quickly as possible so I use a ton of them. Power Generation should be above drain, if your not sure load up single player and go into your ship stats and see if your ship is charging. If it is your good. If not add more solar panels or dissable some shields for chargine. Batteries can hold a S#!+ Ton of power so a lot of batteries is good. They aren’t that heavy either, so I normally add around 48 on a large ship.
9. Excessive weight: Every pound counts. Do you really “Need” 2 refineries? Can you get by on 1? Can you make this hallway a little shorter? If I add a transporter here can I elminate the walk and use the space for extra solar panels or batteries? What if I build a walkway above the generators that will save room and weight. Just something to think about. Don’t let numbers deter you from creating a masterpiece though it’s your ship you can build a big flying banana if you want. 🙂 Always good to keep weight in mind though if you want to build a working ship.
10. Cargo: It’s a good idead if you put cargo next to each device that needs them. Also compartmentalize so it’s easier to find in cargo teleporter. Its so easy to beam ammo to an ammo loading room or beam fuel into the fuel tank room. I also put a teleporter next to my refinery.
Anyways thats about it for this guide. Hopefully this guide helps you with your builds. If you like my guide check out my ships. I have a good variety but my favorite right now which adhere mostly to this guide is the “Apex Predator VR1”
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Check it out, hope ya like it, and any comments welcome. 🙂