I don't see how allowing players to use ships they make in supermelee would work unless your opponent had to agree to let you use it.  Isn't everyone's "supermelee mod ship" going to just be the highest values on all aspects of the ship, with a weapon that one shots anything it touches, and a device that cloaks, sets off a repel, and destroys the enemy ship no matter where it is on the map?

Yes, think tank, it is just a matter of how it is done.  These ships can be upgraded, in a limited way.  In a single, thematic way.  A "whole ship upgrade" that makes that ship "more of what it already is".  Thinking of it in those terms, it works.  Thinking of it in terms of many other games, which either have far more complex ship designs or that do not have functional ship combat, and upgrading all or most of the individual systems won't work.

A weapon upgrade, for example, might actually be the "thematic upgrade" that works for a given ship.  But it really needs to be thought of in terms of a "ship upgrade" and not "system upgrades".

And what works best, by far, because of the BPV system is a "Commander's Option" like upgrade that lets you spend the minimal points you might have left over for it.  Like I described in the post I linked too.  That really is the last piece of the BPV system puzzle and having that 1 possible "left over points" upgrade available adds a lot more to the thought process that it appears at first glance.

1+1=Chess.  The BPV system really is a miracle of game design.  All it basically is, is "ships cost points".  That's pretty much it.  You can literally spend the rest of your lives trying to fully figure it out, and find the "best solution".  Good luck with that:-)

1+1=Chess

Either that (with asset streaming), or it would be opt-in where you would have to agree on a common mod pack or something (like Warcraft 3).

But there is no way that this game is going to see a ton of sustained online play, nothing like this will happen.

Not with just 1v1 dueling, that is a "temporary side game while you are into the full game" that you forget exists as soon as you are done with the full game.  And there is nothing wrong with that all, it's a design decision I might make myself in what I thought were the right circumstances.  Unfortunately:-(

I miss Space Hockey so much.  Too me, it's like FPS games are to other people... my favorite "fast game I can play for 15 minutes and be done with".

Maybe someday there will be an expansion...

Capture The Flag

Base Defense

Space Hockey

1v1 Dueling Zone

1v1v1 FFA

2v2v2 FFA

2v2 Dueling Zone

4x4 Squadron Zone

This is a "minimal full suite", in my mind, to make a serious attempt at building an online audience.  This is a lot more popular than I think most give it credit for.  Still today... gamers don't miss what they don't know.  They don't know this.

"If you build it, they will come..."

For super-melee purposes, I think everybody here is underestimating the importance of multi-ship combat. Once/if 3v3 (5v5, whatever) is released I expect it to become the primary play mode. 

It's good fun to blow up your friend in a 1v1. It's far more satisfying to play with 4 buddies and wipe the floor with those 5 noobs from Chester street.

That said, I think it is well worth investigating modifications to the basic melee system that will benefit larger multiplay. And alternate weapon options (or different pilots, or different load-outs) are a step in that direction.

It doesn't need pilots or upgrades for multiplayer zones.  The supermelee point system would work great for that just as it does for 1v1.

The issue I see is that there is no reason for them to do all of this when nobody is expecting it except for maybe a small group of former Subspace players.  So if it is going to happen, it is going to happen as a separate DLC so they actually get paid for having made it.

I disagree. StarDock is not first and foremost trying to create a game that closely mimics and appeals to the 1000 players of the original SC2. They keen on getting a big market of very young all the way to older-than-us, and I expect the plan is to have both a great story-campaign, as well as a supermelee that will carve its own niche as popular multiplayer game.

1v1 supermelee is just not that interesting. All nostalgia and personal enjoyment aside. It's just not that big a deal.

Now - assuming that premise - I don't say that alternate weapon layouts are required, but they are they type of idea that is worth looking into for that premise.

SC1 had simple ship upgrades in its strategy mode. So I do not see any reason why not allow it in the main game. It would enhance the experience and make melee combat more enjoyable for non-hardcode fans of super melee.

Of course, it should not be part of Super Melee, due to its competitive nature.

I think that the crew experience should be taken into account.  The more battles a crew member survives, the better the chances the ship's weapons will hit their target and if the ship has shields, there will be a greater chance of them coming on to stop a hit even if the Captain is unable to time it right.

On the flip side, the opponent's experience would be randomly generated.  If you have a ship full of green horns after a devastating fight, and you are about to face a veteran crew, discretion may be the better part of valour.

I mean, this would be cool, but Star Control isn't really that kind of game. A little more arcadey than that.

Not a fan of different weapons types for each ship. However, I did like the idea of Precursor artifacts, that may give certain ships boosts. Things like better maneuverability, faster recharge etc. If the ship that has them get's destroyed it's picked up by the victor in the debris. Allow one maybe two Artifacts to be used on a ship at once. Two would have both positive and negative effects, your weapons may charge faster and may get a DPS upgrade, but your maneuverability may be hindered or the crew space may be reduced to fit the hardware in. I would also give it a 1 battle delay for it to be active. After, all the crew has to have time to install it right? This is familiar to the original SC that would allow you to find artifacts that would help in certain ways. Maybe a capture the artifact mode as well.

There are a couple of ships that are scavenged sometimes that are basically useless in combat.  One is a yellow ship whose firing weapon has no range and another is a canon looking ship.

If we could get the reverse-engineer the basic designs of these ships we salvage and change the weapons for some which we have obtained during the game.   Could be the super-nuke, the plasma, the death ray etc.    Then the player could retrofit these ships so that they can become useful.

One ship for example fires a spray from the back but it has no range I'd replace that weapon with a plasma and put a death ray on the nose.

Some ships may have good weapons but a poor crew complement, I'd swap their weapons on a ship that has a big crew quarters and bad weapons.  The Starbase could be a chop shop where various combinations could be made from ships that are salvaged.

Also, I don't get why we don't get hyperdrives from those salvaged ships.

I do agree that there are some weapons which are relatively worthless and do not seem to compliment the ship's primary weapon well. The Tywom's primary gun is fine, I personally believe, as its mainstay is launching drones, and any further improvements to its main weapon would make it a bit OP for its fleet cost (after all, I only really use the primary weapon as a dire last resort, I don't think it is really intended to be the mainstay for the ship). One ship that I do think has a poor complimentary weapon system is the Caster, which has the laser bolt and the scout shot, the latter of which is utterly redundant as it has no real advantage over the laser bolt. I would propose either replacing the scout shot with something else (maybe a rearward shot to at least compensate a bit for the mediocre agility of the Caster? Though I am certainly not sold on my own ideas at present, so feel free to pitch in). The scout shot itself feels out of place on most ships it is found on, so I would almost suggest a revamp of it to give it substantially more range and speed, but to cut down its damage (after all, it is supposed to be a scout shot, which implies to me a relatively weak, but fast-firing and long-ranged weapon).

The cannon ship which you described is also a pretty weak candidate, I agree, but I don't know what could be done to improve it properly, maybe an increase in battery reserve and recharge rate?

Lastly, the salvage idea I think is quite clear why it is not present in the game, mainly due to balance considerations. Though I do think that if later on if there was some way to reverse-engineer these weapons it would be quite neat indeed, though early game I think it would greatly hinder balance instead of aiding it.

The last thing I wish to address is the super melee ship customization which, while exceedingly enjoyable and a lot of fun, seems to be lacking the full breadth of weapons available to all ships in SCO, which is a shame because there are some incredibly enjoyable weapons in this game that we cannot play around with in super melee. I'd love to see these weapons added (along with parts of the ships that have them if they are indeed missing) even if it takes some time to balance out the fleet costs of each weapon, I think it would just greatly add to the longevity of super melee as a whole!

The Melee module should have an option for Lander battle.   I find it very difficult to clear a planet when there are 30+ Armed drones available.   It's difficult to find terrain where you are protected and the only advantages a lander has is speed and range.  It's quite difficult to find a defensible spot and I find myself surrounded on all sides.   The drone weaponry can take out your lander with just one hit so there isn't much room for error.

Maybe if the Lander had some EMP weapons to turn off nearby drones or heat seeking missiles or something like that it would be better.

There are certain features of some Planets I couldn't explore because of this, and what upgrades I could find I found insufficient.   Why can't my main ship target them from orbit ?

There are Lander Crew pods and Lander Armor to prevent you being oneshotted and the Lander Stun Shot can oneshot drones.  Also drones do not respawn, so if you kill some drones but take heavy damage you can just leave and come back with full crew.

With all that Landers are balanced for current challenges, but I hope will be able to become more powerful in future DLC.

I do think lander combat is a bit dry presently, but I think that such can be improved immensely by potentially dumbing down the killer AIs a bit and making the more typical enemies encountered a bit more accurate. 

That's surprising to hear about the stun shot.  I wouldn't have expected a stun shot meant for animals to work on robots.

>The cannon ship which you described is also a pretty weak candidate, I agree, but I don't know what could be done to improve it properly, maybe an increase in battery reserve and recharge rate?

Offensively:
To do well, ships which have short range weapons, they need the ability to move in close to the enemy ship when its battery levels are low.  The Mu'Kay is capable of doing this with its primary weapon because it has a decent speed and turn rate.

Ships that are slow and have a cumbersome turn rate can compensate for this by having a long range weapon, possibly tracking.

Defensively:   Ships can do ok defensively if they can create some space when they are pursued by a faster ship which can do a lot of damage.   Ships that deploy mines,  Ink Blobs, shot rear missiles do ok there.

Bad Combos:  Ships that are slow with a slow turn rate and that have short range weapons.  That cannon ship has the worst of all options but it has a decent crew size.   Swapping out its primary weapon for a long range tracking weapon would help overcome this.  For example a nuke, a tracking plasma.   Since the ship can't turn fast, then the fired shot should have tracking capabilities.

A pet peeve:   If I have a secondary weapon such as Plasma and the enemy is behind me, the plasma will shoot forward instead of a rear shot even if the enemy ship is behind me.  This makes no sense.   The secondary weapon tends to be defensive and therefore ought to shoot backwards.    At the very least, have some arrow-like icon to indicate the direction of the shot when it is installed.

One configuration I used for a while was Tracking Plasma primary, Plasma Secondary it would have been great if the Plasma shot backwards.

Of the missiles options only one can shoot backwards, the rear shot missiles.   That makes no sense.   It should be possible upon installation to indicate which direction the missile is fired.   A broadside, rear or forward shot.    Even Canons in the 1700's could be setup to do this.   There is no reason a Missile system could only be configured to fire forward.    One use I would have for the black hole missile would be as a weapon to run away.    The pursuer would want to avoid the black hole.   A Scryve laser could also be used to keep away a pursuer or even the Trandal primary weapon providing it can fire backward.