So we all love to play around with fleet doctrine. I noticed something cool the other day: They actually use player-made loadouts for hulls that have them. But they seem to mix and match these with other general loadouts. Reading the threads for the last couple of days has given me some ideas that could make it into the fleet doctrine settings.
The settings are already fairly in-depth, but they all work more like suggestions than actual rules. This can be both a good and a bad thing. Good, when the game tries to match fleets up to their intended size, or finding alternate fittings to stay within OP limits which may be different from player ships. Bad when you see ships you don't want in your fleets, or loadouts with weapons you have excluded.
Here's a couple of possibilities:
- The ability to set a desired burn level for small / medium / large fleets. If you have Atlas selected as the only cargo hauler, the game won't put Atlas in fast medium-sized fleets. This could be a 'soft' setting as the ones currently in-game are.
- Instead of a 'none' and 'preferred' status for weapons and hulls, open this up to 3 settings. 'Forbidden', 'allowed' and 'preferred'. More control for the player, as well as the possibility of *** it up.
- Separate settings for trade fleets vs. combat fleets. I may want to stick a few Mules in a combat fleet, but make Prometheus or Atlas the mainstay of trade fleets.
- The ability to set and / or build preferred loadouts for fleet doctrine yourself. This could either be separate of, or it could replace the preferred weapon list completely.
If you have any others, feel free to post them. I don't expect these will make it into the game, as complexity for its own sake is not something Alex usually goes for. But maybe we'll dig up a nugget or two.
