I am not certain what others have written, asked, pleaded for or begged for earlier on this board or elsewhere in regards to space combat and star ships and how it is portrayed in The Old Republic. But as a long time avid supporter and long-time player of the classical Star Wars star fighter games (X-Wing, TIE fighter, X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter, X-Wing Alliance and their assorted add-ons as well as the Jump to Lightspeed add-on to SWG) I'd at least thought I'd pitch in my 0.02 €. I doubt anyone important enough will take notice of my humble note, but one can always hope.
As far as I've understood the space combat in The Old Republic was thrown into the game with the sort of thought that 'We need at least some type of star ship combat at release, it's Star Wars after all'. Now don' get me wrong, for release it was sort of an amusing little side game, and I still from time to time run a few space missions whenever I feel as if I don't have anything better to do. But I do hope that the programmers and producers at BioWare at least have begun thinking about evolving this (IMHO) vital part of the game that clearly is lacking much in the sense of variety and development.
Now most of these ideas I'm going to list here have most likely already been thought of, discarded or is just simply enough unfeasible, but just maybe there might be a nugget or two in the muddled thing I call a brain that has not been thought of.
1. Pimp your star ship I
The ability to change furniture, holograms and add various trophies to the interior of your star ship. Think of the personal room of Ace Azzamen in X-Wing alliance where you added all kinds of trophies and debris after important missions. But with the added possibility to move them around to various locations, for instance that you might add up to five different things into one room of your star ship, but there is 20 different locations in which they may be placed.
Would add a tremendous amount of personality to the players star ships.
2. Pimp your star ship II
Changing the exterior colour of your star ship as well as the patterns in which it is painted. The possibility to name your star ship, while you would see a gazillion 'Millennium Falcon' and 'Ebon Hawk' not to mention sillier names such as 'Fartblaster' I think overall it would add a lot to the players thinking of their star ship as actually theirs. Of course it would be welcome if you could change the name (for a fee of credits) so you wouldn't be stuck with a spelling error or sneezing mishap while typing.
3. Changing your star ship
It's a sad fact that some ships are butt ugly *cough* BT-7 Thunderclap *cough* while others are insanely cool …..X-70B Phantom.... drool.... and being stuck with an annoyingly ugly ship on your favourite class can be quite distressing. If there was a possibility to buy a new star ship (or even craft one) this would immensely help with the relief of the bothering image of your appallingly looking ship. Each character would still though only be able to have a single ship.
4. New Star Ships
This ties in a bit with point nr. 3, changing your star ship, while I highly doubt this is even close to even reaching a list a priorities, it would be greatly appreciated if there were a greater variety of player star ships to select from, particularly so if a free-flight space game were to be included in some distant future.
5. Star ship combat
While the rail shooter is somewhat amusing every now and then, it is getting a bit stale and a free-flight game would be greatly appreciated. Now I'm not asking for a full space-combat simulator like a Star Wars variant of 'Jayne's Apache Longbow' where you need four hands and two keyboards to fly the damned thing, much less take into combat. But a nice, fun free-flight space-flight game with asteroids, pirates, space stations and whatnot to explore the star systems in the best spirit that Star Wars can give, both in beauty as well as pure fun and excitement.
6. Star ship components
Now most players in MMO's will want the best of everything on board their ships to ensure that they can always beat up worse equipped players and showing off their e-peen. But I hope and suggest that another approach should and will be taken in this instance. Give the ships two finite values with one being a hard value and the second one variable, but dependent upon how much you spend (not credits). Now I don't know if any other computer games out there has utilized any such system of balance, I only know of a pen & paper one but it works.
The hard value on every ship would be 'Volume', every ship has a finite value of, for arguments sake, 100 cubic meters (or whatever measurement suits you).
The second value would be 'Energy'. Energy is generated from a ships reactor ( a component) which depending upon how much energy it is generating takes up more volume.
Every other component on the ship, such as blaster cannons, hyper-drive, sub-light drive etc. costs both energy and volume (with the exception of armour which only uses volume).
This give the players the possibility to tailor their ship after their own preferred style of play, as well as ensuring that not all players would strive to have the best of every component since better components would cost more in terms of volume and energy. So you'll end up with some player ships that are fast and nimble, but lack staying power. While at the same time some other player's ship will be slow and cumbersome but packs a heavy punch and can take a beating.
In regards to hard point (component slots) on the star ships I suggest expanding them a bit, I'd say three hard points for blaster cannons, two turrets and one forward mounted, one for sub-light drive, one for hyper-drive, one for sensors, one for armour, one for shields. Then add a small number (e.g. three) optional hard points.
These optional hard points is for adding various amounts of components such as EW-pod, sensor bafflers, missile launchers, cargo bay etc. but no cloaking devices (remember the words of Captain Needa: “No ship that small has a cloaking device” ) this would ensure that no ship can carry all or even most of the optional components and that players will have to decide what they want to have (of course changing optional components ought to cost credits to ensure that players simply just will not switch them around all the time to suit a specific need).
Components ought also be damageable and become inoperative during space-combat, then either a player or a companion would have to repair it for it to function properly again. If repaired by a player you could even turn it into a mini-game like hacking and bypass was in Mass Effect 2. Would increase the stress quite a bit on a player if losing your sub-light drive in the middle of combat or when flying through an asteroid belt (or better yet, both at the same time ) and you'll have to run a mini-game to repair the component. Fires should also be possible to break out from damage, and even having hull breaches.
7. Group Space-combat I
Being able to group inside a ship and every player taking control of a particular function of a ship. One being pilot and operating the forward blaster cannon as well as any possible missile pods, two gunners each in turret on opposite sides of the ship, and one that performs damage control (arguably the most import, though possibly a boring assignment).
8. Group Space-combat II
Grouping up with each player in their own ship and running 'boss-fights' against big capital ships and space stations that pour out star fighters (adds).
9. Space missions
There should be (at least) two types of missions in a free-flight game. One type is given out by Imperial/Republic command and involves a lot of typical Search and Destroy type missions or reconnaissance of enemy facilities.
The second type would be class specific missions, for instance a smuggler should get missions to pick up and drop off cargo at specific locations in different star systems (with opposition of course).
I would also like to see some sort of public-quests in a free-flight game, the sort of public quests that Warhammer Online introduced.
10. Space combat PvP.
A tough one. Best I can come up with would be huge specific factional battle-zones where players can go in and duke it out, each side may have a maximum of 10/20/40/60 ships (yes ships, not players) in a zone. Each battle-zone would have an objective e.g. destroy the opposing sides dreadnought, when it is fulfilled the battle-zone is reset and begins anew. XP and valour (or a new value for space-combat, maybe Renown?) would be given for destroying opponents and achieving objectives.
11. Friendly Fire.
Ought to exist, so players would have to perform IFF. Friendly fire incurs penalties on (renown?) gained.
12. Sensors
A component that would have range and a value for how accurate it is. A sensor with a good accuracy would identify how durable a ship is, if it has weak points, maybe even top speed and life-forms (i.e. how many players is aboard the opposing ship if in PvP). This accuracy could then the be lowered by EW and other counter-measures.
13. New Craft – Ship Wright
Using scavenging and Underworld Metals. Can craft components and maybe even new star ships. Also have it easier to repair damaged components. Damaged components would need spare parts to be repaired, which Ship Wrights would craft.
Alright that's it, I've exhausted my brain for now.
