Greetings, CSM people. I have a relatively simple inquiry to you today.
It appears to me, skin’s you create and make available as “Corporate Skins” are not actually that - just ‘regular’ Player-Made skins that are ONLY sold to the corporation you are in, and by looks of things, still permanent to the player that bought and applied it, regardless of if they stay in the corporation or not.
Here are my two concerns with that.
-
If I wish to make a “uniform” for my corp in the way that matters - the physical look of the ships the people in my corporation/alliance flies - I will need to, should I wish to be completely thorough, cook up one skin for each ship the people in the corp could possibly fly, that’s also covered by the SKINr system.
-
Once a player/corp leaves the corp/alliance they can still fly the skin(s) that ‘belong’ to that corp. It being the ‘corp colours’ is just a suggestion right now.
What if we had a dedicated SKINr section for corp uniforms? We have one for structure painting - make one for ships in the corp.
A. They would apply only to your ships if you buy them and are a part of the corp/alliance. If you leave, they become deactivated, re-activated if you re-join the same corp/alliance. If you join another corp/alliance, they have their own you can buy if you wish to.
B. The cost of making them would either be very, very cheap due to their limited use-area, OR they would cost the same as the SKINr production we have now, only that if you make skins for the corp, you make a template, not individual skins, with the possible option to convert them to ‘regular’ skins should you like, prompting the need to make another template. That would allow someone shutting down a corp to ‘salvage’ the invested PLEX into the corp-skin by at least getting a universally usable item before they go.
C. The cost of the skin to the average member could be set to the cost of the materials. Cooking a frigate/cruiser skin in my testing was cheap on the material’s front, roughly 6 million in sequencers etc. IF you want to have a skin for every T1 frigate, Destroyer, Cruiser etc. etc. etc. that could get costly for the average rookie quick, but it’s something to strive for, the ability to fly the colour of the group you are in if you wish to - given the average player don’t mind earning ISK or plex for NES/market-bought skins I see no issue with this.
D. Finally, to make this very worth-while for CCP: Each corp-standard skin you might want to buy could cost 1 PLEX in addition to materials, making the value of selling NES skins, having players pay in PLEX to make skins, and now also having players use corp-limited skins a lucrative prospect, while still being quite affordable to the average player. It would drive up interest in buying PLEX from the store or earn up the ISK to buy it off the market from other players. The materials cost of a Frigate SKIN atm is around 6 million in my area - the average cost of a PLEX in my area is 6 million too. 12 million for a permanent (so long as you are in that corp) skin is highly affordable.
Did the work on bare-minimum costs to give every skin some simple colouring, left here to underscore my point:
Costing 25 PLEX minimum:
4 Corvettes (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar)
+
5 Shuttles (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar/SoCT)
+
27 T1 Frigates (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar/SoCT/TriC/EdenC)
12 Navy Frigates (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar)
33 T2 Frigates (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar/TriC)
7 Faction Frigates (Guri/Sansha/Blood/Angel/Serp/SOE/Mordu)
+
1 T1 Mining Frigate (ORE)
+
2 T2 Mining Frigates (ORE)
+
10 T1 Destroyers (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar/SoCT/TriC)
4 Navy Destroyers (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar)
9 T2 Destroyers (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar/TriC)
3 Faction Destroyers (Guri/Angel/Death)
+
14 T1 Haulers (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar/ORE/EdenC)
10 T2 Haulers (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar/EdenC)
+
3 T1 Mining Barges (ORE)
+
19 T1 Cruisers (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar/TriC/EdenC)
8 Navy Cruisers (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar)
2 T2 Cruisers (TriC)
7 Faction Cruisers (Guri/Sansha/Blood/Angel/Serp/Mordu/SOE)
+
14 Battlecruisers (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar/TriC/SoCT)
8 Navy Battlecruisers (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar)
3 Faction Battlecruisers (Guri/Angel/Death)
+
1 T1 Battleship (TriC)
This cost-bracket cuts between Navy and T2 cruisers, even Faction cruisers cost minimum 25. Odd, but I don’t make the rules.
*Side-note, Triglavian ships lack the ‘secondary’ slot for SKINr paint and all their ships cost a minimum of 25 plex with the sole exception of their Dreadnaught (Minimum 35) for this reason, it seems. Also odd, but I’m not complaining.
Costing 30 PLEX minimum:
3 T2 Mining Barges (ORE)
+
24 T2 Cruisers (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar)
+
14 T1 Battleships (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar/EdenC/SoCT)
8 Navy Battleships (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar)
7 Faction Battleships (Guri/Sansha/Blood/Angel/Serp/SOE)
Costing 35 PLEX minimum:
8 T2 Battlecruisers (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar)
+
2 Industrial Command Ships (ORE)
+
1 T1 Freighter (Caldari) - No ‘details’ slot?
+
1 T1 Dreadnaught (TriC)
Costing 40 PLEX minimum:
8 T2 Battleships (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar)
+
1 T1 Capital Industrial Ship (ORE)
+
5 T1 Freighters (Amarr/Gallente/Minmatar/ORE/EdenC)
1 T2 Freighter (Caldari) - No ‘details’ slot like the T1 version.
+
4 T1 Dreadnaughts (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar)
1 T2 Dreadnaught (Amarr) - No ‘detailing’ slot.
3 Faction Dreadnaughts (Guri/Blood/Serp)
+
12 T1 Carriers (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar)
4 Faction Carriers (Guri/Sansha/Blood/Serp)
Costing 50 PLEX minimum:
3 T2 Freighters (Amarr/Gallente/Minmatar)
+
3 T2 Dreadnaughts (Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar)
Costing 60 PLEX minimum:
4 T1 Titans (Amarr/Caldari/Gallente/Minmatar)
4 Faction Titans (Guri/Blood/Angel/Serp)
327 different ships that can get a player-made skin, totaling 206 at 25 PLEX minimum to make a SKIN, 56 at 30, 12 at 35, 39 at 40, 6 at 50 and 8 titan variants at 60 baseline cost. That’s 9590 PLEX at least to make a skin for each ship and complete a set.