I don't see how that's fun at all. The purpose of the ox is to sacrifice sensor profile to increase burn speed for large fleets. Having to abandon and lose a nanoforge just because you didn't have an ox with you.
Why do you presume that you would lose it? Have you never noticed that cargo can be put into a stable orbit?
The requirement to use an Ox is fun because:
- It eliminates the immersion breaking absurdity that gigantic ship building machinery is transported inside the ships that it builds.
- Satisfies the gameplay design principle of increased resource expenditure for larger rewards.
- Increases the viable threat scale of the proposed high value salvage attack mechanic due to the potentially required fleet preparation with a return trip.
(which isn't a viable ship for early game seeing that it massively increases sensor profile for fleet that is already quick enough and is somewhat uncommon to find on the market).
Nanoforges and Synchrotron Cores should be mid-game! The increased sensor profile is a good thing because it adds to the challenge! Why do you insist on transporting the most valuable and most gigantic items in game without any challenges?
Now pirates demanding high value cargo when they catch you is something interesting.
That's very dull compared to making the salvaging and use of the most valuable items in game a unique gameplay experience by means of salvage specific attack fleets.
Yes, cargo can be put into stable orbit.... for a month, I hope you got a notebook and a pen on you while playing because your going to need them with that.
Also, having this item being only available for haul by a single ship is just plain stupid, Oxen are extremely fuel hungry and not a viable option for a small exploration fleet, they also are somewhat uncommon on the market which means you wouldn't consider exploring ruins and looting research/mining stations in the early game at all for fear of loosing a limited and valuable item. Even if we made it so it required a salvage rig instead of an Ox, that's still a terrible idea because we're restricting that item to a single ship.
Also Oxen increase the burn speed of the fleet. So if I had 5 of them all the time because I didn't want to miss out on any forges/cores then I'd be impervious to any threat because I'm constantly at burn level 20 with all of these tugs which completely defeats your point of wanting an extra challenge, it's just making me have less fuel efficiency so I'll be constantly making trips back to refuel which isn't fun.
Also how do you know that nanoforges are gigantic ship sized machines ? Clearly many colonies can build ships without the use of forges albeit with defects, so the forge isn't some magical ship 3d printer that poops out an entire paragon just by shoving metals and transplutonics from the other side, it just builds the more complex component so that they can be put together by the rest of the factory.
As for synchontron cores they don't need to be ship sized, they're just super advanced antimatter refinement tanks, if you want them to cost more cargo space then I think that's logical, but requiring a specific ship to be carried is just not a fun concept.
And finally making it so scavengers and pirates are more agressive if you carry such valuable cargo isn't a bad idea, but forcing us to use tugs to carry that cargo defeats the whole purpose.