I've said it before:
Keep the planets in their relative positions (and keep travel times between them the same), but expand space well beyond them. Make the current space merely the centre of the known universe. If you want me to quantify how big it should be, I'd say fifty times the current size minimum. The purpose is the ability to explore the universe, to find new items, to allow different people to have control of parts of space, to have more to space than just fighting pirates, carrying passengers and the like. Maybe have remote space rocks that can be mined by large vessels and small vessels alike.
So what would go into this expanded space?
Mini-asteroids that could be mined. They would have to be found (promotes exploration) and there is a good chance of getting the dreaded NRF. Once a pilot finds a mini-asteroid it is always going to be there, and will give a certain type of resource when mining is successful.
Space mobs, as in the current universe, but with space area (like land area) rights. A space owner can initially claim a space area by completing tasks within an area. This task might be to simply find the area, or even to fly within close proximity of all eight boundary markers (think a 3D cube). Alternatively, maybe the first to a thousand kills in the area or the first person to mine a certain resource within the area.
Abandoned Alien Craft. These could be explored, they may have common resources in their cargo holds. They may also have Alien Technology that is fragmented and needs to be assembled. Such craft and technology would purposely be rare. To assemble such tech, the parts would have to have matching pictograms on them, and it would require four or five parts per device. Such a device could give a speed boost to a vessel, be a special weapon or evasion device, or have a function on the planets (heal tool, super-armour, etc).
And to expand on that even further:
Imagine that a single alien craft has been ripped apart in some accident before the EU timeline.
Now, maybe six months before space is massively expanded and MindArk's VU notes give a vague "space has been expanded and there are items to be found by the intrepid..." I would implement a message on entry and exit of a planet's atmosphere - simply "A breathable atmosphere has been detected" on entry and "there is no breathable atmosphere" on leaving a planet.
What I am proposing is the ability to find a collosal alien craft that has been ripped into five or six parts, each of these parts floating some distance apart (maybe spread out across a quarter of the newly enlarged space) and all being different in terms of layout, design and what they contain. Each part has a significant full SI (maybe three times that of the strongest mothership in game) but has been badly damaged and can be further damaged and so destroyed. So someone can spend alot of ped destroying the vessel (and possibly the contents) or they can try to land on a flat, exposed section of decking. On flying immediately adjacent to such a deck, the "A breathable atmosphere has been detected" message would alert the participant to the ability to get out and explore.
The interior of the ship would be available through a bulk-head door (at which point you'd go from the space server to the internal server for the wrecked craft). This would allow the participant to explore multiple levels.
So what would the intrepid find?
Somewhere in each part of the destroyed ship would be the equivalent of a repair point, however it would be inoperable. Some parts of the ship would have gunner points while one would have a pilot seat, again all inoperable.
There would be dead aliens everywhere. On the floor and slumped over control panels. Each of these aliens would be moveable and could perhaps be concealing a piece of the fragmented alien technology that I mentioned earlier. It could be that the aliens are difficult to move, so while one person lifts someone else has to grab the fragmented technology. These fragments could also be easy to find, in obvious places. Or in a location that is suitable to their use (e.g, a super rifle fragment would be found in an armoury, and super healing tool in a medical bay, etc). Some parts could be stored in safety deposit boxes, with a lot of experimentation needed to get the correct code to unlock it. And others could be hidden in the ship as "easter eggs."
What devices would the fragments create? Well for example:
- A super rifle, with high damage, quick reload, high range.
- A super handgun, similar to the rifle.
- A super healing tool, perhaps giving 400 HP per heal and 45 uses per minute.
- A super mining finder, giving a search radius range of 110 metres on planets.
- A super mining extractor, that can pull 1000 peds worth of ore/enmatter at a time.
- A super drive system for all types of quad-wings, giving maybe a 25% increase in speed.
[*] A tractor beam system, allowing any space vessel to capture any other space vessel.
- A super repair tool blueprint, to eventually be known as a RK-50 Blueprint that allows the construction of the RK-50 repair tool, giving 250 SI repair per click.
- A super mothership gun weapon, giving maybe 50% increase on a standard MS gun turret. There may be multiple of these.
I've emboldened the tractor beam for a reason.
Not included in the notes is the ability to capture any space vessel. If someone used their imagination and was to drag the five pieces of the craft so that they were in very close proximity to each other, the repair points on each would become active, allowing people to repair. I would perhaps only allow this to happen once 80% of alien technology fragments had been found on each section. When all five parts are together and fully repaired, the ship becomes useable. Turrets, warp drive, pilot seat, the lot, with a total SI of maybe five times that of the strongest MS in game.
Now at this point I can see all MS owners recoiling in horror at this suggestion. But fear not. Activation of the warp drive shorts out all of the repair points permanently. The ship, as strong as it is, effectively becomes (L). Once it is shot to pieces it is shot to pieces.
Whoever owns this beast will be able to dominate space, knowing that to be taken down will cost someone a huge amount of peds. They can explore the resources in space (like mineable mini asteroids, another suggestion of mine) in relative safety. Or they could pirate, and disrupt the existing travel routes. Or they could even be a travel provider themselves.
But their domination would be limited.
And once the ship has been destroyed, perhaps metals and equipment will become salvageable and reuseable. But th ship will not be fully repairable/useable again.
**Note that the above was originally posted by me on this forum a few years ago. It may be that subsequent developments will have rendered some of the ideas out of date.**
