In regards to the component system can you discuss some of your recent accomplishments with this. Also do you expect we will be able to get a component stats page similar to the ship stats page we have now. Have you considered adding a ship designer page to the website so we can tune our builds before committing?---Will changing the components of your ship have a noticeable effect on its performance and capabilities? Are there plans to have multiple viable upgrade paths in order to prevent everyone gravitating to a single build? Are you considering a balancing mechanic for upgrading so that improvements in one system come at the expense of another?---Aloha Devs, how are the gameplay concepts of 'modular components' and 'component tuning' materializing themselves in design of the components for the latest and future ships coming off the pipeline? Are they interacting as these components become real things, with size, shape, mass as well as output forces/effects and corresponding draws on the components which provide energy, cooling, compute cycles?asked by Daz / Halbard / Tommytrain

This is a big topic. We are currently tackling each of the components one system at a time. I'm sure you've noticed that we've recently just refactored the coolers that did involve resizing the components because there will be real components in the game, on the ships.

Taking up volume.

Yup, they'll be size appropriate for their capabilities, placed on ships, with ships that have interiors such as the constellation or the future Idris or any of the larger ships we will have access to them from the interior so that when we implement damaging gameplay, which were still designing at the moment, you will be able to access them and have a crew member run down the hall, go down to the powerplant that has been damaged and then actually repair that by access the component from a panel say in the hall that contains that particular component. So there will be real physicalized items that are in the game.

Treat it a lot like Scotty from Star Trek kind of thing where someone has to go down a fix the shield generator or fix the warp core or something like that.

Exactly. So if the engineer does notice that, "hey we got the coolers damaged, now we don't have cooling on the right side of the ship." You can send the engineer down to physically fix that component or perhaps even trade it out for a brand new component and get back instant access to the cooling capabilities that you just lost.

So just hope you don't have to run a whole kilometer length ship.

Yes, So, that may be a possibility. What does that entail? Well we're refactoring all of our component so that we actually keep in mind the capabilities, the positive and negatives of each of the functions of that particular component. Dave mentioned coolers so cooling capability, power draw, signature, these are things that are going to be integral for how the coolers will work. What we need to do then is get that system in and then take a balance pass to figure out, "Okay we have a size one," let's say, drake ... I don't know if they've actually created a cooler at the moment but, Drake cooler well, where does that sit as far as its capabilities. Is it a C grade item? What does a C grade item mean?We define that and then we can place those on ships that would be appropriate for that part. Size two or a medium sized cooler would go on one of the larger ships. It has it's own determinants and positives which you can decide how you want to output your ship by the purchasing the component or when we have future gameplay which you can salvage components, perhaps you can actually pry one off a large shipment and say, "Hey this is way better than mine, I'm gonna go and place it on the holotable and include that on one of my loadouts for one of my ships." Also in the future we may allow the capability of particular like craftsman to hone certain components so that they can actually improve them. Maybe the get better at improving a certain manufactures coolers and power plants.

Tuning and overclocking and stuff.

Yup and so that would be great, it would be a great career for someone to be a specialist in.

You're a ship mechanic.

Yup and then you can earn your credits or do whatever you want to do and become that go to person in the Star Citizen Universe to get better at that particular skill. What else did they ... Oh, so the tuning, So what does tuning and balancing mean? Well it means different things for each of the components. What is ultimately does mean is that we figure out what each of the components do, what their range of capabilities are for their particular stats and then we make realistic ranges for those particular values.We've done a pass of coolers, we're in the middle of doing powerplants and we are in the middle of refactoring shields as a system entirely so we will have shield emitters on the ship that are powered by shield generators. So when you upgrade shield generators by purchasing a new one, you will increase the shield capabilities of your ship. Things like, well a number of faces will most likely be tied to the ships but, the regeneration rate of the ships, the absorption of the shields rather, how quickly it can shunt power from the primary face that you set onto the ship, these will all be things you can upgrade by purchasing new shield generator components.

Speaking like someone in the middle of combat, you want to redirect further energy to the front or to the aft or from the you know forward starboard side.

So if you have a lesser performing shield generator for example, it may take longer for a shield face with zero health to recover and get back any shield capabilities. So you may consider purchasing or finding a better shield generator to upgrade that particular capability. That may mean more power draw so you actually have to purchase a powerplant that is capable of powering all the components that you decided to fit onto the ship. So that's what balance entails.We're currently, most of our components are outclassing their capabilities so powerplants generator more power than you'll ever need, coolers can cool more heat than you could ever generate. What we need to do is as we implement this components, we need to step back and take a look at what the actual values for the components that we've created, what are those ranges? What are those extremes? How do we figure out how these components fit within those extreme ranges and then figure out, "Okay, this is the sweet spot for that particular component, and this is where it sits."As the player, you decide by mixing and matching the components onto your ships, how they actually work and whether they provide the desired functionality that you want to implement.

While still maintaining usability and functionality.

Yup.

I'm trying to remember correctly, I think Matt Sherman explained it to me. For example the ship had two shield emitters, it could be there's one in the front, one in the back or one left or right, I mean you pretty much have two halves of a shell correct?

Right and so.

One has four and you've got much more control because now you've gotten quadrants.

So those are faces. I want to create six because to me four doesn't quite make a lot of sense.

Right.

Front back makes sense.

And you've top and bottom as well.

Right so bubble makes sense, front back makes sense, I think six is the next logical step, but that is a function of smaller ships. Now when we get to capital ships, ultimately what we want to do is, you'll want to have say four shield emitters, one that controls the front quarter, the second quarter, the third quarter and the rear quarter. Each of them controlling their own faces, that way we'll have gameplay in which you destroy the shield emitter or the generators that are connected to the front port faces, you actually have a chance in now infiltrate the ship from the front and give you an incentive to go after the sweet spot in the front that you've dedicated so much time to destroy with a squadron of small fighters.

Well now let's say you have a long carrier like a Bengal or Pegasus or even an Idris I mean you set up something that long, you could even have mid bulk emitters so if one of those gets taken out you still have an opportunity to have something sneak in while one of those shields are still on before it pops back up.

Right, exactly.

We can create some really cool missions.

And I think it'll allow players to figure out strategies not only to attack shields, but defend themselves. If you find that you frequently outclass in the front, well let's get some shield generators and upgrade them on the front side because we know that's our weakest point of entry.

A very spartan type of attack. Or you can lower one of them and try to lure them into it knowing that's where your main guns are.

Yeah, eventually we'll get to actually figuring out how the engineer can do things like shunt power or priority to those shields and so, this is a big discussion on one of these systems and we're doing this for each of the components as we go down the line.

It's pretty exciting stuff.