- make piloted strikecraft mechs launch from carriers at the start (if not deployed left/right in pursuit)?
- if there are carriers in the fleet (not wingcom), piloted mechs should be immune to environmental hazards like asteroids, hyperspace storms, solar flare etc.
- if there are carriers in the fleet (not wingcom), they should either receive a really boosted CR recovery outside combat, with consideration to fighters (which are immediate)
- special mech based carriers? minimal inherent offensive ability, more fighter bays but restricted to mechs (since most mech fighters are 1-wing). would be nice if there are special launch systems (you know, like those catapult systems seen in animes
) which can launch fighter (wing) fast and far into the heat of battle.
- more defensive mechs (like macross destroids) which have really low engagement distance (or even o) and stays around the carrier
- variable fighters/piloted interceptor mechs which uses another mode to travel fast over long distance (yeah.. macross fan)
- mech-use "endurance" type hull-mods, which add limited-charge use systems that restores CR without returning to carrier at the upfront cost of OP.
- mech-use "firstaid" type hull-mods, which add limited-charged use systems that restores some hull without returning to carrier at the upfront cost of OP. should be cheaper (in OP) than mods that adds directly to hull wrt to amount of hull restored (since it is temporary).
- mech-use "flux vent" type hull-mod, which adds limited-charged use systems that "ejects" some (hard) flux just before the mech is about to get overloaded. should be cheaper (in OP) to flux mods wrt flux capacity (since it is temporary)
- mech-use "prototype" type hull-mods, which adds OP (via negative OP cost?) at the expense of increased maintenance (null supply usage) and possibly lowered CR (max or efficiency). May allow for some interesting experimental builds where the OP cost would normally be impossible, at the expense of the above-mentioned.
- cosmetic variations (e.g. possible to customize look of piloted mechs without affecting the performance). Ideally, a framework can be made such that cosmetic-mods can be made by other creators (not just reskins, but each one adds more choices). e.g. color/pattern, slight variation in looks of the parts etc. would be even nicer if a (color) "theme" can be set on wing-com units such that all mech fighter wings under it would inherit that "theme" if supported. E.g. if a "funky rainbow" theme skin mod is added to a wing-com leader, then mech wings under it would inherit that theme which changes their looks if available (or just revert to vanilla if not). No, I don't want the actual "funky rainbow" mod. In fact, let's forget I mention that as example...
- also, this may be hard/impossible. Instead of adding the mech to "fighter bays" in wing-com piloted mechs (which sort of increase the overall fighter capacity of the fleet), maybe use a "place-holder" for "fighters" of the wing-com mechs (that costs nothing by itself), and add a special "wing-com support" hull-mod to carriers (which also costs nothing) that when there are piloted wing-com mechs that requires wing members (which is not added automatically), it will "grab" them from the actual fighters added to bays for carriers fitted with the "wing-com support" mod. So total number of fighters is always capped by the actual fighters carriers carry and launches from there. Special case may be required for "pursuit" type combat though, where wing members should start near the wing-com mech (though the actual carriers that provide the mechs will still have to be deployed). iow, if a wing-com capable piloted mech is deployed without enough support carriers that actually has that mech wing, it will have to fight alone. This will also remove the strange OP thing involved with adding a wing to a piloted mech (the OP costs is borne by the carrier now).
too many ideas.... taking a break for now.. lol.
