Ruby, kinda, but bigger, more capable and all empires included. More a stepping stone for new capital pilots, and a way to bring carriers to high-sec.

Datarunner - carriers use fighters, and I'm talking about this being a smaller version of a carrier. No FB, just the plan old fighters, and fewer of them.

Ruby, kinda, but bigger, more capable and all empires included. More a stepping stone for new capital pilots, and a way to bring carriers to high-sec.

Datarunner - carriers use fighters, and I'm talking about this being a smaller version of a carrier. No FB, just the plan old fighters, and fewer of them.

Us Incursion weenies have been praying for something to carry battleships around highsec for quite a while. Honestly, I support the idea if it actually didn't have logistical capabilities (which are well-covered and don't really need more excuse to proliferate); light fighter bays, no jump drive, and a ship maintenance array big enough to carry a battleship and two cruisers would be my dreamboat.

If you want a ship that can move ships around like carriers (only no jump drive and can use gates) then support this

Check this bad boy out.

Incredibly slow, expensive (which may be moot depending on mini-carrier's price), cumbersome, requiring either multiple characters, a 1-man corp, or praying nobody in your corp steals your stuff, and only possible through a wonky game mechanic.

Sure, it's functional, but it'd be nice to have a dedicated platform.

Drone Interfacing originally allowed up to 10 drones to be deployed. This was changed because of the lag it introduces, all those drones needing to be tracked. Carriers can field a lot because there aren't many of them, compared to the total number of ships active.

Making lots of drones readily available in hisec is a recipe for disaster.

You want a platform with that capacity that's fast, cheap, and agile? Seriously?

Nope. Honestly, an Orca with much smaller cargo bay and no ore hold, a larger ship bay, and no fleet boosting capabilities would be pretty much right on target.
Specific capacity (ship bay instead of general cargo), probably less than a billion isk (around the price of the Orca), faster to warp than the biggest brick in highsec (i.e. Charon) but nowhere near what would be considered "agile."

Ruby, kinda, but bigger, more capable and all empires included. More a stepping stone for new capital pilots, and a way to bring carriers to high-sec.

Datarunner - carriers use fighters, and I'm talking about this being a smaller version of a carrier. No FB, just the plan old fighters, and fewer of them.

there is a reason carriers are banned from empire. its not that hard to get in carrier now ok still need considerable amount of time to fly ir properly. why do you need something between domi and carrier in empire? trouble with lvl 4s cant be it (i hope)

Been thinking about this for a while, why don't they make a light carrier. An in between battleship and capitals fighter platform/ support (think of a larger Logistics) ship that is able to move into High-sec, maxes at 5 or 10 fighters (set to a number that keeps them reasonable for a highsec ship), and doesn't have jump ability (needs gates or titan bridge). Basically the idea would be a carrier about the size and maneuverability of an Orca.

Not a fully fleshed out idea, but hey, see if anyone likes the idea...

Drone Interfacing originally allowed up to 10 drones to be deployed. This was changed because of the lag it introduces, all those drones needing to be tracked. Carriers can field a lot because there aren't many of them, compared to the total number of ships active.

Making lots of drones readily available in hisec is a recipe for disaster.

Drone Boats ARE NOT Light Carriers.

They are Gunships with the ability to launch a small to moderate number of drones.

A True Light Carrier would be able to launch and hold Light Fighters and Light Bombers that are basically the same the normal Carrier Fighters and Bombers except they would be faster and carry smaller payloads.

I think a Light Carrier that employs upto two corvettes and either two light fighters or light bombers or four corvettes or five light fighters or five light bombers is a much better role suited for the Light Carrier.

Corvettes are about twice the size of a fighter are slower than a fighter still smaller than a frigate but have nearly triple the weapons range and destructive power than a fighter has.

The corvette would come in the typical four damage classes along with having Web Stasis and Scrambler emitters fitted to their hulls meant to capture fighters and bombers.