Do you remember back when each race had a T1 mining frigate, and CCP decided to give them new combat-related roles and consolidate their former mining frigate role into a single, far superior mining frigate we’ve come to know and love as the Venture? That was awesome, and I think CCP has the perfect opportunity to do something similar and even more impactful.
I hereby propose that CCP eliminate all racial transports and consolidate them into new or reappropriated InterBus faction transports. There are many ways this could play out, but all of it better. Below I give you an idea of what this could mean:
Instead of four sets of racial skills for transports, there would be only one: InterBus. Naturally this would come with SP reimbursement as the old skills are removed and the new skills introduced. Players with existing racial skills would have those skills automatically replaced by the singular InterBus skills. Existing racial skillbooks would be replaced by their InterBus equivalent.
Instead of four T1 general transports and four T1 agile transports, there would be one of each
The T1 specialized transports sported by Gallente and Minmatar would transfer over directly as InterBus faction ships
Instead of four T1 Freighters and four T2 Jump Freighters, there would be one of each. Alternatively for the T1 freighters, there might be variants differentiated similarly to how the three mining barge series differentiate themselves. Possible variants include: defense, volume, and speed/agility. Something similar could happen to the T2 jump freighters, though I would imagine it would be less beneficial (totally up for discussion, though)
Instead of four T2 Blockade Runners and four T2 Deep Space Transports, there would be one of each.
To complement the T2 BRs/DSTs, a third T2 transport could be introduced: one with a nullified hull for bubble immunity (but no covert cloaking ability). It would have a very tiny hold (probably as small or smaller than the BR) so as to not render nullsec bubble camps useless in relation to inhibiting transportation of goods. In a sense, DSTs have the potential for overcoming bubbles by using MJDs, but given the long cooldowns they aren’t able to do so in rapid successful (unless they were given a MJD cooldown reduction bonus)
Whenever multiple hulls are being consolidated into just one, the new hull will be roughly strictly superior to the original hulls (as was the case when the four racial T1 mining frigates were consolidated into the far superior Venture)
For uniformity, the Bowhead should (at least eventually) roll into the InterBus faction
Regarding jump drive fuel needed: each race uses a different jump drive fuel, so there are a few approaches to handling this. One approach would be to handle it the exact same way Upwell POSes handle fuel blocks: any of the four varieties will work. (Personally I’ve love to see the four isotopes consolidated into a single Atmospheric Isotopes item, but that’s a different conversation).
Now some of you might ask: why bother doing this? There are many reasons:
When it comes to industry and marketing efforts: it is easier to make and sell fewer ships that are usable by a wider range of players.
This would eliminate pricing discrepancies between largely equivalent racial counterparts
Less skill training while increasing the return on investment for training those skills
I don’t think this is going to gain much traction as written.
ORE just came out with the Bowhead, for hauling a bunch of assembled ships at once. That role literally has NOTHING to do with Outer Rings Excavations, since their entire purpose in life has been mining. But somebody decided that if the Orca can carry a few ships, then the Orca’s grandpappy should be able to carry a lot.
However, since we are seeing other NPC factions taking up mantles of responsibility… I suppose we could eventually see some Interbus Faction ships. Just like how you could fly Amarr, or Minmatar, or Blood Raiders for a mix of the two. Well, you could fly an Amarr hauler, or you could spend extra for an Interbus hauler.
In fact, I wouldn’t mind seeing some of the Specialty Bay nonsense getting shuffled over to Interbus. Other than an excuse to preserve the old Iteron line of ships, why do the Gallente have 5 different haulers? Each with a different purpose in life; cargo, ore, minerals, planetary commodities, and… more cargo. While the other races have 2 ships, and all they do is cargo and more cargo.
So yeah… I’d say don’t get rid of the Racial haulers entirely. But retire the vestigial Iterons and the Mammoth (the bullet toting 3rd child of the Minnies). And make some Interbus Faction haulers that can put those Specialty bays to use. Heck, Interbus is a mostly Gallente company anyway, let them have those Iteron hulls.
When CCP created the Venture, it was to fill a gap in the market. Before the venture, you had to train up for a mining barge before you could get into your first specialized mining ship. It didn’t make any sense not to have a T1 mining frigate people could get into from day one.
As for the T2 transports, there’s no gap here apart from the one you’re proposing to create in CCP’s wallet. (i.e. most of my haulers are cross trained to fly different races of T1/T2 cargo ships. Can you imagine the amount of skill points those toons would get back and the money CCP would potentially loose in not having to sell me any skill extractors… Not that I’m spending my money on those anyway but that’s beside the point.)
Always wondered why CCP didn’t go that route. It would have made a lot more sense to offer the speciality haulers under something like the interbus name.
1.) this idea sucks
2.) The 4 empires are not going to give up their Racial status ships fro some other non-entity corp, or are you suggesting all NPC stations in highsec have happen to them what happened to outposts?
3.) More reaction ■■■■ you cant do in highsec…nope combing the isotopes is stupid.
4.) there is a features and idea forum, you posted in the wrong place unless you are attempting to directly lobby the CSM.
5.) please quit posting
Tanking isn’t what I was getting at, but this is a relatively low-level detail that could be fleshed out later; my proposal is more high level in suggesting that transport ships be consolidated under Interbus. There would be SP reimbursement as a result, but given that CCP is making money off of services and vanity (SKINs, resculpts, maybe in the future long-awaited name changes and neural remaps, etc) and whatnot I don’t think this is going to hurt them at any extent worth worrying about.
I neglected to address this in my original post; I do not believe it would be farfetched, lore-wise, to suggest that the empires have struck a deal with InterBus to outsource their shipping concerns, designs, etc to them. I am not suggesting existing ships become limited edition ships like faction fortizars; I am suggesting more along the lines of how they consolidated four mining frigates into a single series requiring a single, uniform set of skills.
I neglected to suggest the existing DSTs could be nullified as an alternative to a third line of T2 transports (for a total of 3 rather than 12 in my proposal). Provided escort and/or utilization of the MWD Warp Cloak Trick, I do feel this would be useful for breaking through bubbles. Nullsec gate camps would need to use points in addition to bubbles in order to catch such a ship, thereby providing a challenge for the camper to catch the transport and a challenge to the transport to escape the camper.
This may be true; I didn’t actually look into how things like shield and armor translated, but the point I’m making is that there is not a single player in existence who would favor the older faction mining frigates over the Venture. The consolidated ships I am proposing would need to be designed in such a way that all but a handful of people would object giving up their existing racial ship for a largely improved transport.
I was actually thinking of posting another suggestion on consolidating certain items such as isotopes; would you be so kind as to message me why you think this would be a bad idea? Talking about it here would detract from this topic.
I actually was looking to get the attention of the CSM directly, but I’ll consider using the other forum going forward.
I’m just trying to make the game better. I appreciate constructive criticism but, otherwise please remember that I and everyone else here are fellow human beings and EVE players deserving of respect.
I can see the point in Interbus making ships like that. It would cut down on costs to the empires. I dont know transports well so I have no clue about tanking them.
They could be modular in the way of swapping cargo holds for shipping certain things. Looking at the Iterions or the Badger, it looks as if they are. An unchanging hull/frame, just swap in another box designed to hold certain items so its not changing the entire ship as with a T3C.
Sorry, but WAHT? You can tank mast, it can cross 250K ehp if you wish so… but I would say mast is the best in fact - due to how easy it is to actually get it for travel fit while being sufficiently tanky. Cloak and mwd is a must, unless you haul trit in hs while in npc corp, add to this some agility mods (low slots!) and any armor tank is out of the question. Leaving only mast and caldari one.
