Phocas
Amarr
Viziam
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Posted - 2009.11.06 08:41:00 -
[1]
This is a great idea.
I like the idea of making it not too powerful. I also like the idea of making it absurdly powerful/epic. I think there's a way to resolve the two.
Remember ASCN, the 0.0 alliance that built tons of outposts in a time when no one had really built any? Some people in this game just love to build. And build and build and build. There's not much for them to build anymore except...more outposts? Others, like CVA, have done a remarkable job trying to build a real empire.
This ship could start out smaller than a titan, but could scale up to a project of that size. It could be a real "source of pride"; you put all your building effort into it.
Suppose the mothership starts out kind of weak. But you can keep adding onto it in a formulaic way. Each time you make it better and better (increasing the stats/size), it becomes increasingly difficult - in terms of resources - to operate. However, it also becomes more efficient and very powerful defensively, maybe even offensively.
By far the most important part is that the enhancements and extra pieces would follow some simple formulaic rules/modular system so that CCP wouldn't have to make all kinds of new content. That's the only way to keep it realistic; keep it procedural, keep it modular. Otherwise they'd talk themselves out of doing it.
Imagine an alliance as dedicated to building as CVA/ASCN just working on this. There'd only be one or two alliances that would take their mothership to this level. You certainly wouldn't have to, and most people would not. But there'd be that odd group of players who would, and their mothership would far outclass anything in the game in terms of size/power. It would also take years and years of gameplay effort to make it reach that epic size and a huge alliance of builders/"carebears" to keep it operating.
Here's something cool to think about:
Suppose that alliance someday collapses and the massive mothership is just abandoned in space. You, the lone traveler, are out scanning a random system. You see an indication that there is something 10x the size of a titan in the system. Is it a bug in the game? Or is it that famous abandoned mothership, unique in the game's history, that you've seen so many screenshots of?
You find it, and since walking in stations has been released, you take a look around. It's a lot like a normal station, but eerily empty. Hundreds of ships, but no people.
It doesn't look like those screenshots either. Parts of it look skeletal - just scaffolding, where earlier travelers had salvaged a piece of it.
Like so many others before, you activate your "Salvager III" on the mothership, taking a piece home for profit or just as a memento. Someday, salvagers like you will have dismantled the entire ship, its majesty lost to history.
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