Old Ship Concept

Hot4Darmat mentioned the Mylene B. from his story “Uncertain Freight” and it started me thinking about how you could represent old worn out ships.

A really simple solution came to me, and I thought I would put the whole concept out here for discussion. (no promises to implement the idea, we will have to see what our schedule looks like).

The basic idea is built around subsystem damage. When your (engine say) takes 50% damage, it stops working and you cannot move. This is part of the standard game. Your autorepair fixes this damage until the engine is back to 100% health.

What we could do is make it so that and old engine can only be fixed to 80% health. The old engine could be much cheaper to purchase, but then it would tend to fail in a fire fight. The engine is just less reliable.

A supporting concept is ship wear. Every few days without repairs the ship engines wear a little bit. This lowers a temporary maximum health. So as you use that old engine, it slowly drops 78%, 77%, 76%. If you go in for service, it jumps back up to 80%. If you don’t go in for service, it finally hits 50% and stops working.

The game already charges a fee to maintain your ship. This discussed feature is a replacement for that simple charge. And opens the potential to purchase used equipment and ships at discounted rates.

What do you think of the idea? Good, but you want more guns instead?

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