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[BCS]

This is something that came up in the "Uniquifying the Factions, Part 2" thread: if D-mods can be instantly removed at any station, why is the player seemingly the only one who can do it?

For Pirates and Pathers you could make the money argument but then you get to large factions like the Luddic Church who surely could scrape few hundred thousand to fix their ships. It gets even more bizarre when you get to player colonies - why are a bunch of MY patrols flying around with 3-4 D-mods each when I could remove them at the press of a button and I'm sitting at 20+ million credits? And in the general game world sense, what even is the "point" of nanoforges affecting ship quality if you can just throw money at the problem instead?

On the gameplay side of things the ability to press "Restore" basically makes D-mods completely meaningless as a mechanic outside of the niche Derelict Operations skill(which runs into the opposite problem - there's no easy/simple way to ADD D-mods to a ship, nor to remove them selectively; it's all or nothing) Removing D-mods costs money but money is not a factor past the first few hours of the game if you know how to make money and are not actively roleplaying.

The easiest and simplest way to fix most of this is to completely remove the "Restore" button from Refit screen. This way the only method to remove D-mods is the Hull Restoration skill. Since Hull Restoration is a finisher for Industry tree it's easy to rationalize why no one else can seemingly do it(hell, Navigation gives you Transverse Jump that no one else in the sector can do and it's an opener skill) and the fact that you have to wait literally months per ship to actually fully restore them is a much better balancing factor than money.

As for players without Hull Restoration, they will actually have to check the D-mods - some of them are more debilitating than others(i.e. less cargo space on a combat ship - who cares) but currently it doesn't even matter as they're all gone at the press of a button. Finally, this would be an indirect nerf to Brawler LP - which definitely needs a nerf - because of the Ill-advised Modifications D-mod.

Another possibility is to allow the player to remove D-mods without Hull Restoration but using SP and not money. This also fits in the game world since the entire point of SP is to do exceptionable things that no one else could do. In addition being able to pick which D-mods to remove would also go a long way for the Derelict Operations skill.

tl;dr: Removing D-mods costs SP instead of credits, you get to pick which to remove, if you don't want to spend SP get Hull Restoration and wait.

[Megas]

I would not like this.

The problem with Hull Restoration with regards to repairing your fleet is the player often has a huge backlog of ships to fix, and using Hull Restoration alone will take several months or even a few years to fix all the ships.  Also, it would encourage the player to reload the game after any casualty because he does not want to wait even longer for ships to get fixed.

Restore is expensive.  It is cheaper to build a new ship than to restore a damaged one.  Factions do not restore their ships because they can simply build a new one for less cost (if we pretend NPCs have resources, which they do not thanks to infernal game magic).  In earlier 0.9.x releases without s-mods, Hull Restoration, and exotic ships (no Automated Ships skill or Ziggurat), when a ship died late after I have Orbital Works, I scuttled it and built a new one.  Now, with s-mods and exotic ships, player is encouraged to keep their ships permanently and revive them somehow like jRPG party members, while NPC factions can simply replace what they lost.  Restore should be kept for player who has money to burn and needs their party member resurrected now.  (I will use Restore on anything worth about 50k or less late in the game if it means less backlog for Hull Restoration.)  That said, I almost pity the one who wants to pay nearly two million credits to restore Ziggurat after looting it from Alpha Site.

Nearly all of the anti-Ordos fleets are fully min-maxed for combat, and Industry after tier 2 is avoided aside from Derelict Operations builds.

If things changed so that Hull Restoration is the only way to fix ships, then new Hull Restoration should be tier 1, although that would probably mean no bonus max CR per s-mod (which is critical for Ziggurat and alpha Radiant).  Even then, it would be very annoying for players who literally cannot spare a single point in a tree.  The current build I use has no Leadership, which means no carrier skills (to make bombers useful) or Wolfpack Tactics (for frigates to have enough PPT) or Crew Training (to boost max CR).  One point cost for tier 1 is not cheap enough when I want all fifteen points elsewhere.

Not fond of the idea of using s-mods on Restore.  The game needs less ways to turn s-mods into a currency that encourages players to grind multi-Ordos late for story points.  Currently, story points are effectively rare green credits to be spent on permanent upgrades instead of story things, and every story point spent gets tracked by historian's journal, which gets messy with all the upgrade purchases.  The game needs to make several things that use story points (especially colony upgrades) use credits or another limiter instead so that endgame is less about grinding Ordos two or three at a time for story points.

[BigBrainEnergy]

Restoring a ship already costs more than buying the ship, even if you buy one with no d-mods. The point of nanoforges is you're paying for the ship one way or the other but if it comes with even one d-mod then the price has instantly gone over double. Unless you're willing to live with said d-mod.

The factions aren't limited by fleet size like us, so why would they pay for an expensive restoration when they could use the money to build a whole new ship?

[Megas]

Restoring a ship already costs more than buying the ship, even if you buy one with no d-mods. The point of nanoforges is you're paying for the ship one way or the other but if it comes with even one d-mod then the price has instantly gone over double. Unless you're willing to live with said d-mod.

That reminds me, with Hull Restoration, I sometimes buy damaged ships with one d-mod and rely on Hull Restoration to remove the d-mod, hoping for a lucky roll with the "recently acquired" feature.

I do save-scum new ships built with my Orbital Works.  If I get a d-mod, reload.  If the ship comes pristine, save.  95% from no forge industries love to torture me with damaged ships.

[Stormy Fairweather]

i hate d-mods, and i always beeline to the skill that lets them be repaired. which both makes every early game the same, and undermines the entire story purpose of d-mods. imo, d-mods should not be able to be repaired or removed by the player in any way EXCEPT for new d-mods acquired from recovering the ship post battle.

so basically i think d-mods should come in 2 types. inherent that can NEVER be removed or repaired, is just part of that ship' personality, and acquired from battles that can be. both your own ships and the ones you just blew up. i would make the permanent ones red, while keeping the orange for the ones that can be.

come to think of it... if i had the know how i would make this a mod right now.

[robepriority]

Restore is only the better options when s-mods come into play - otherwise it probably is better to scrap it and buy another ship.
IMO if the bonus xp for scrapping a ship was boosted higher (honestly, I'm up for boosting it BEYOND initial investment, simply because bonus xp is hard to burn through in the first place), maybe restore would be less impactful.