Will we have capital ships like battleships or dreadnoughts?

[LameFox]

So, over 1 year has passed, and we still have no answers whether there would be XL class non-carrier warships in X4. Maybe only after 30th November can we get the answer.

If not at first, I would expect them to turn up later either officially or in mods.

I have to wonder though, if now the carriers are just physically larger because more of their interior is being represented, whether or not they're actually more powerful. I think I recall seeing somewhere that there are decks which the player can visit, in addition to the mysterious depths into which fighters have always vanished in the past.

[csaba]

This has been stated year ago, I don't claim things didn't change, but it was after the announcement for X4 so probably the final version. Have fun:

viewtopic.php?f=146&t=397660&hilit=size&start=30

are there special requirements for ship models that can be included to X4 ? multiple mesh LODs for example (how many), or the scene's structure (node types) ? maximum element count per mesh (ushort or uint) ? any recommendations ? we assume that all models need to have a properly designed interior, do the meshes visible from within have to separated from the outer meshes (ship hull) ? and what's the scale of the dimensions (meter or mm) ? how big are the usual docking port dimensions for each class (s m l xl etc) ?

Let's try. Here is some stuff from our asset setup document.
I dont jump into the part count or polycounts, as this is a bit more difficult to quickly write down. Cockpits are seperated from the outer hull to have them fade out quickly.
The cockpits have to reachable by foot when the ship is standing on a planar dock, so have a ramp or ladder reach down to give acces to the cockpit (or a "transporter room" which functuíons as kind of lift- needed for m ships)

Following listed are the scale specs for all ships and their surface elements. These are bounding box sizes, a ship (with all surface elements) is not allowed to be bigger than this defined boundingbox size.
All dimension units are in meters.

With these numbers you can create some blocks in your favourite 3d modeling program and see how many elements you can stick together, before it starts to look cramped

Dimensions per ship class (width / height / length):
xs (ability drones, escape pods) - 2,5 / 2,5 / 2,5 (MAX)
s (fighter/scout ships/fighter drones) - 35 / 25 / 35 (MAX)
m (standart trading/mining ship, corvette, frigate) - 90 / 90 / 150 (MAX)
l (large traders, destroyers) - 600 / 600 / 600 (MAX)
XL (carriers/builderships) - 2000 / 2000 / 2000 (MAX)

Dock dimensions:

S (s hips can dock here) 40 / 30 / 45
M (m ships can dock here) 185 / 115 / 115

A ship can carry a dock of the size below its own category, a m ship can carry a single s dock. A l ship can easily carry multiple s docks but probably only a single m dock.
Docks are always a bit bigger than the ships which can dock there to have some space around the "airlock" for you to walk around.

Maximum weapon amount (this is a UI limit, we dont have more space in the HUD (crosshair element) to display more slots. (s/m ships. Larger ships are set up differently, they can hae more turrets, they are then grouped)

8 forward facing weapons and 8 individual turrets.

So far our most amount of installed weapons is 5 on a paranid medium sized ship. S ships have usually between 1 and 4 slots.

Talking about weapon (surface elements in general) and their slots, of course these elements also have dimensions. This means all elements of the same size are technicially exchangeable, sometimes restricted by gamedesign is think (defined via compatibility tags, so an xml edito can be used to mod that).


Weapons (forward facing pew pew)
s 2x2x6
m 8x8x24
l will be mayor part of a ship,
not exchangeable
"Model ship around weapon"
s/m weapons can gimbal about 10° to left and right or up an down, so keep a visual cone in front of the mount free to avoud bullets intersecting with the ship geometry.

Turrets
s Small ships wont carry turrets
m 16x16x16
l 64x64x64

Engines
s 4x4x8
m 12x12x24
l r=25 x50
xl r=75 x150

Shieldgenerator
s 2x1x4 (2m wide, 1m high, 4m long)
m 8x4x16 (unhittable)
8x8x16 (hittable)
l 32x32x64
xl 96x96x192

turrets
s Small ships wont carry turrets
m 16x16x16
l 64x64x64
fold the turrets when inactive.
max height should be only reached in active state.
max size includes the rotating barrel
(should not poke out of boundingbox).

m ships can only carry m turrets.
l and xl ships can carry l and m sized turrets.


Hope that helps a bit to visualize dimensions and especially relations between these sizes. A fighter is a tiny tiny dot next to a carrier.

[Len5]

What they said in a video from last year, is that carriers in size will be between a real life aircraft carrier and the BSG. Able to carry 40 S ships and 15 M ships.

[BigBANGtheory]

Is that not true today though? I mean to my knowledge no nation has built a dreadnought class since WW1 era and destroyers are significantly smaller than carriers.

Worlds biggest military ship to date is the Gerald R Ford carrier.

I think in space sim terms dreadnoughts are capital class killers and planet destroyers.

Destroyers would work in groups to take down a bigger ship as opposed to outclass it and take it down solo.

[razor202]

This has been stated year ago, I don't claim things didn't change, but it was after the announcement for X4 so probably the final version. Have fun:

viewtopic.php?f=146&t=397660&hilit=size&start=30

Well, a little disappointed if this was true. Not only have we lost the XL non-carrier warships, but also the amount of weapons a ship could installed has reduced. After all, everything is unsure until we get the game copies, or maybe in patches or DLCs the XL non-carrier warships can be added in?

[13913408324]

It is better to design an elaborate ship model than to design a big one！Bigger is not always better！

[csaba]

This has been stated year ago, I don't claim things didn't change, but it was after the announcement for X4 so probably the final version. Have fun:

viewtopic.php?f=146&t=397660&hilit=size&start=30

Well, a little disappointed if this was true. Not only have we lost the XL non-carrier warships, but also the amount of weapons a ship could installed has reduced. After all, everything is unsure until we get the game copies, or maybe in patches or DLCs the XL non-carrier warships can be added in?

They probably deducted from XR that different ship classifications don't make sense inside the same size group. The Taranis destroyer was beaten badly by the Arawn carrier in any situation although they were in the same XL size class.

What I was thinking actually is what if the classifications don't matter at all. Since we know the ships are modular maybe we can switch out the Hangar bay of the Colossus with a BFG so we get a more heavily armed version with much smaller fighter support essentially turning it into a battleship. So the name "Colossus" is the base structure and we can make a Colossus-carrier or a Colossus-battleship. This would make sense since balancing racially different ships is easier this way which is important for a dynamically changing universe.

[LameFox]

This has been stated year ago, I don't claim things didn't change, but it was after the announcement for X4 so probably the final version. Have fun:

viewtopic.php?f=146&t=397660&hilit=size&start=30

Well, a little disappointed if this was true. Not only have we lost the XL non-carrier warships, but also the amount of weapons a ship could installed has reduced. After all, everything is unsure until we get the game copies, or maybe in patches or DLCs the XL non-carrier warships can be added in?

Having fewer, better weapons on a ship should be better for performance than lots of little ones anyway. And when you've got like 8-12 weapons in a single 'turret' that all fire at the same target, it may as well be a single stronger one.

[ajime]

(...)
So why have both if you can have the better iteration of it?
(...)

This actually raises important issue- balance is everything. Each ship should have its strengths and weaknesses.

I agree. I think it is imperative to have both the "weaker" AND the "better" versions.
-snip-
- Fourthly, there's the aspect of role-playing, and this *requires* diversity and options. As an example, when I play X3 I role-play whichever race's start scenario I've chosen, which includes self-restriction to that race's ships and stations - so if I'm playing as Teladi, I use their slow-ass ships and learn to adapt my play-style to that handicap (which also adds: 4.5 - Challenge, for those of us who don't like things too easy.)

- Fifthly, there's the aspect of simple fun, and its different definitions for different players: for some people, just getting "the best of everything and ubering their way across the universe" is fun - but for many of us that is the very EPITOME of dull! As soon as I start massing the "best" assets (be they ships, armour sets, or whatever is applicable to the particular game) I also start thinking about what I'll be playing next, because at that point I'm already about done with whatever I'm playing. (Some games restrict one's access to higher tech through skill requirements - many veterans of a certain well-known space MMO will argue that it was the introduction of a way to shortcut training those skills that has been the primary cause of that game's abrupt recent decline.)

And I'm sure there are reasons I haven't even thought of (some likely very obvious ones, even) for keeping "both iterations" instead of only the "better" one.

I tend to hire only humans in my crews in my last xr play for some reason #humanityfirst. But my X3 Boarding parties were all Teladi's. idk i just love their boarding dialog with hissess. .
I'm in the masochistic camp too, i guess. I don't buy ships, I acquire them only.
Still struggling to get my boarding crew mechanical to 5 in my current AP play to start farming terran ships in my AP play.
challenge 1:get a boarding crew-done
challange 2:get a 4 star mechanical boarding crew-done
challange 3:cap a missile frigate via spacewalk-done.
challenge 4:cap a split tiger for personal yacht using m7m-done.
challange 5:WIP-Farm Terran ships-need top 5 star troops.

[shudragon]

I think most of these posts are missing the point and going back to old X3 X2...when space games besides their sandbox aspect have evolved past the "slowly buy bigger badder ships with THIS specific loadout" from the 90s and 00s space game design.

Egosoft has had some significant design changes since X3, XR being an obvious departure (as it was not supposed to be an X game at all...). From what I've seen with the modular station design, what is to say that the player doesn't have complete control over blueprints in terms of "heres a hull it has X hardpoints to fill out." We probably aren't going to see full hardpoint loadouts but it will be interesting to see how Egosoft has kept up with more modern space sim design in terms of weaponry and ship customization.

Don't get me wrong, I have ~550 hours in X3 and wouldn't mind seeing that design again; but that puts the entire state of balance in the DEVELOPERS hands, not the players, which I think counterpoints why we all want to play the X series: player freedom.

[Tomonor]

I'm pretty sure the Argon Colossus that we have already seen has XL classification while the rest cap ships were L.

[razor202]

I'm pretty sure the Argon Colossus that we have already seen has XL classification while the rest cap ships were L.

However, the Argon Colossus is sure to be a carrier. So, the XL class combat ship is equal to the carrier?

[csaba]

I'm pretty sure the Argon Colossus that we have already seen has XL classification while the rest cap ships were L.

However, the Argon Colossus is sure to be a carrier. So, the XL class combat ship is equal to the carrier?

As I sad I'm expecting it to be a modular either carrier or battlehsip. Would make sense with the direction they are going with X4. So I'm not so sure it is only a carrier.

[ishmaeltheforsaken]

I'm pretty sure the Argon Colossus that we have already seen has XL classification while the rest cap ships were L.

However, the Argon Colossus is sure to be a carrier. So, the XL class combat ship is equal to the carrier?

In pre-Rebirth games, M1s and M2s were about the same size. The difference was in purpose, not tonnage.

[mr.WHO]

I'm pretty sure the Argon Colossus that we have already seen has XL classification while the rest cap ships were L.

However, the Argon Colossus is sure to be a carrier. So, the XL class combat ship is equal to the carrier?

I think that Argon Behemot is XL size destroyer that might be a bit smaller than Collossus.

[Tomonor]

I'm pretty sure the Argon Colossus that we have already seen has XL classification while the rest cap ships were L.

However, the Argon Colossus is sure to be a carrier. So, the XL class combat ship is equal to the carrier?

As I sad I'm expecting it to be a modular either carrier or battlehsip. Would make sense with the direction they are going with X4. So I'm not so sure it is only a carrier.

Yeah, the ships have module spots designated for shields, turrets, deployable assets.

But there's not a chance that they would make bigger surface assets modular, such as docking bays.

Also, regarding the Behemoth and carriers in general, ever since Rebirth it doesn't make sense not to add at least a docking port to an L+ ship. M ships can get away with it (for example, Peregrine), because they can simply dock into any station. But L and XL ships have to be approachable by the player. Thus what defined Destroyers before in X3, have been retconned since Rebirth. So what I'm trying to say is almost every ship gets a docking port.

What will really differentiate real Carriers from a ship with a few docking ports is the launch bays, that can rapidly deploy ships without unloading delays (docked ships have to be brought up from the cap ship's belly - thus there's a longer animation delay that renders a quick fighter launch impossible). Also, meet the Colossus. Doesn't seem too modular to me.