EXPL results

[Clan Elder 'Keen]

25k cargo is reasonable, even when that means supplementing my 5k cargo explorer ships.

[Lord Valwyn]

Pete and Russ,

 

Appreciate the feedback on EXPL and also the intended modification to the rules based upon what you are seeing take place. This is exactly the sort of info flow and responsiveness to the players we need. It is appreciated here gentleman..

 

Mark

[Sha'thar of the Gosht Kohr]

It would be nice if we could simply 'hold' the found item by retaining a ship in orbit at the planet or moon, and then send a freighter out. My -larget- freighter currently is 250000 tons, but I see now that 1,000,000 isn't out of the question.

 

Be fun if the item was randomly generated, and then 'kept' at the planet until picked up. If I understand correctly, right now the item sort of magically appears in your cargo bay (if you have enough), after doing the expl/xexpl order and getting the appropriate 'percentage roll'?

 

A 'Million Tons of Cargo' ship would certainly be a 'Spruce Goose' of a ship, sitting about in the hanger until the one time you need it. Although it might be fun to use it in a large planetary bombardment.

 

Or... fill it with catnip...

 

- Sha'thar

[T'Lariss]

 

The problem, as I understand it, is there there is no way to store the information of what was found. A sub-program generates the find and if you have the room to pick it up you get it. the program does not remember what it generated. Otehrwise there would have to be additional files for each planet n the galaxy to be used as a holding area for whatever finds were discovered, aned how many discoveries can a planet hold?? 1....2...5...Each one requiring additional file space. Then you have the nightmare of deciding what to do if after you come along and find the 1,000,000 ton Stellar Anhillator, I show up and find it wih my exploration fleet (15 Stellar explorers with 125,000 cargo hold each) and pick it up while you are waiting for your cargo ship to show up or worse I explore the planet with a pathfinder and find a 10,000 tons of steel (that replaces the Stellar Anhillator in the planetary exploration slot) only to have you show p with your million ton cargo ship and get 10,000 tons of steel (Arrrgh) No Matter what RTG does with this there would be real problems, their solution was not to deal with it. If you have the hold space you get the stuff, if not you fill the hods with as much as youcan carry and the rest is lost

Gary

[Lotix1417]

Not that I'm a big fan of the colony beacons,

 

however,

 

you could tie the find into a pop seg created by a planet beacon. Just add a field in the EXPL order to specify the pop seg for overflow items.

 

And if you pile up a million-ton 5 meter Spinal Cannon, and someone lands troops and conquers the pop seg (before you get a freighter there), then they capture the cannon, but still have to get it off the world before you counter-attack.

 

-Lotix1417

[Hiver]

I think that's a great idea. (( Way to go, my Wasp bretheren!! ))

 

That way, the code wouldn't really need to change much, and we wouldn't be disappointed by missing a great find that's too big to strap up on top of our explorer ships. As for me, I think for the immediate future I'll stick with Russ' 25,000 ton guideline and take my chances on the big stuff.

[Clan Elder 'Keen]

There has to be a risk associated with not being prepared upfront with sufficient cargo capacity, otherwise the most efficient method is to simply let all the discovered items stack up in newly created pop groups, and send around a single collection cargo fleet to carry the loot home. If items are not able to fit into a fleet, at a minimum there should be some chance that they are permanantly lost; abandoned or pilfered or victim to unprotected exposure to the elements.

 

An expanded approach would be to allow players to create a population group themselves, perhaps with specialized installations present, thereby increasing the chances of preserving rare finds for later handling.

[octagon999]

I like the idea that if you don't have the existing cargo space you lose it.

 

Think of it as explorers finding dead sea scrolls. On one mission, you are just wandering around and find some vessels. You open them up, and the oxygen causes the enclosed papyrus to start disintegrating. On your next mission, you are more prepared, so when you find more containers, you place them in special compartments and open them under certain conditions.

 

You will never know what those first documents had to say, but at least these latest ones are preserved.

 

I think that is how it should be. If you want to be sure, make more of an investment in your exploration vessels.

[hobknob]

One of the most endearing things about the EXPL order is that it is NOT tied to a particular pop group or planet. It would make standing explore orders much less useful than they are since you can't edit them. I don't really have a problem with losing stuff that's too bid unless the only things you find are way too big. I also agree with Clan Elder 'Keen that there has to be some risk involved. At the very least you should get alot more in the way of a reserch bump if you actually find something and don't have the space to carry it away.

 

It would be nice to have ground installations that would directly affect exploration results, including the various characters that might be associated with them.

[WKE235]

Hmmm.... Now, lets say I have a fleet of 4 ships, each with 10,000 cargo capacity. Total for the fleet is 40,000. Now, we explore a world and find some wonderous item, say the 25,000 ton Gobstopper Smasher. Question: Can this 25,000 ton item be picked up by the Fleet?

 

MY own thought is the answer would be NO. Since the item is one unit, it has to fit into one ship for carrying. And since each ship is only rated to 10,000 tons cargo, sorry, you lose. Makes sense. You can't split up the item among ships. Say I split the fleet in half. Each now has a 20,000 ton total capacity. Who gets the 25,000 item when we split? Maybe the crews have a LOT of duct tape and they tape the item to one ship? I guess RTG could allow for this if, when the fleet split, anything that doesn't fit is automatically jetisoned into space. Still, I do not think it would work.

 

So IF there is truely something out that, extremely rare, at 1,000,000 tons ... then only a ship with that cargo capacity could carry it.

[T'Aleen Empire]

Well the simple way to handle this is create a fleet, and assign to it a Explorer type ship and then a big cargo ship as well. Plus add some characters to that same fleet as well too to help up the success!

[DWillard]

From Pete's other comments about cargo and the way he has talked about the programming, I would guess that the program looks at the total fleet cargo capacity. Most everything seems to be on a fleet level.

 

But, as WKE pointed out, what happens to a single large item when a fleet is split?

 

Sounds like a good one for Pete/Russ to answer.

[octagon999]

All cargo is handled on a per-fleet basis. While it may not be realistic at times, it is playable, and I hope it doesn't change.

[DWillard]

So what happens when a fleet splits that is carrying a single item that is larger than either new fleet's cargo capacity? Does the item disappear? Does the RN fail? Or will this situation slip through the code and either fleet will be able to haul it????

[ShadowKitsune]

I'm willing to bet that the 'parent' fleet ends up keeping the object even if it exceeds it's cargo capacity, as long as the 'parent' fleet has any capacity.

 

The reason I say this is that the SKIM Order actually allowed ships to scoop more fuel than they could hold. If your Pathfinder had 1837 Fuel and executed a SKIM Order, it would end up with 2037 (out of 2000) Fuel.

 

Pete, has since fixed this bug. Go Pete!

 

So I'm thinking that until someone tries to split a 50,000 ton object between two 25,000 ton capacity fleets, nothing is going to change in the code. Pete's got his hands full chasing down known bugs ... hand checking our turns ... processing our turns ... etc.