Reading other suggestions, it seems a good solution would be to add a new type of Port. A utility port. Items such as storm radars, mine sweepers, mineral scanners, cargo blockers/spoofers/scanners, and possibly new ideas could be added without sacrificing a ships fire power. It would however still be regulated by grid power and weight. Most ships don't use all of the grid they have available without using some special high grid equipment (he beams, cwm, gauss3).

Ideas? Additions? Criticisms?

It's been suggested before a number of times, and then I shoot it down expressly because I want people to make tradeoff decisions of weapon versus utility loadouts. And, also, because i think that has more potential for improving group dynamics.

Ok. Who spiked incarnate's drink? I don't think I've ever seen him this chatty on the forums. :P

I'm not sure how the status quo improves group dynamics but I agree players should be making trade off decisions. I wouldn't object to the op if the ship had a utility port at the expense of a small or large port, which would just be silly.

If you want people to make that tradeoff, make the utility addons useful enough to forego a Sunflare Rocket Launcher.

That is the litmus test that anything you put in a small port has to pass.

I personally think any telemetry addons should use none or very little grid power, so that higher-powered weapons can be equipped in the remaining ports to try and fill the gap.

I do agree with the points arf has been making in these threads. There just really aren't that many that are worth making the trade off besides mineral scanners and the storm extenders to a limited degree. The scanner spoofer is a novelty. No player pirate cares what cargo you are carrying. They just want the ransom or the pk. I will admit the cargo scanner is somewhat useful in picking out escort missions that can be expected to pay better. But for that I choose the UDV or Greyhound and bypass the whole add on thing.

There really just isn't enough value to the add on's we have to use them. NPC pirates that made attack decisions based on the value of a players cargo would create some value for the spoofers.

What everyone was trying to tell you in numerous suggestion posts before is... utility port is the way to go.

It makes for a greater variety of existing ships based on utilities used, it enhances the gameplay in a myriad of ways and it allows players to have something they always wanted the most - to customize their ships to their liking.

Long time players have tried every possible load out with the current S & L ports and I think I speak for everyone here - nobody will sacrifice 1 L or S port for putting in a widget instead of a gun. Among other things - skill & DPS wins fights not addon widgets. That is the reason everyone keeps suggesting over and over new ships variants or new ships with enhanced capabilities and ports.

Other games did it and it works for them. Why wouldn't it work for Vo?

when addons can actually augment my other weapons, only then would I consider using addons in combat...

The problem with drawing comparisons to other games is that all of VO's addons are legitimately hardpoint addons that should be equipped to a small or large port, as Incarnate has envisioned. A utility or systems port could be used for things like ship upgrades that are more internal in nature, and that don't currently exist in any form.

Things like armor upgrades (to include damage resistance), powercell modifiers, engine modifers, and possibly cloaking. This isn't an exhaustive list, but they're the type of things that wouldn't usually be installed on a hardpoint but would still need some method of mounting on the ship, thus a Utility/Systems port. However, unless Incarnate has revised his views since this thread even those would still be equipped to hardpoints.

That's just the thing, upgrading the radar on a fighter jet doesn't mean hanging a dish off the wing, it usually means swapping out the bundle of electronics in the nose. A utility port for things like scanners or armor or engine modifiers just makes sense.

I can see Inc's point about the tradeoff for using tangible items like scanners requires sacrificing a weapon port. Having upgrades for ship stats augmentation items like draugath describes would be nice both because it would offer more ship customization options and would also raise the value of ships as it would require more investment into getting a top-of-the-line ship (visit station A for the ship, station B for a weapon, station C for the stats augmentation item).

I would take it a step further and suggest that the stats augmentation type items not even be implemented as a physical item that gets equipped to a port but instead be a "mechanic tune-up" that is applied to the active ship. That way you cannot stockpile the augmentation upgrades or move them to a different station in advance. And limit the number of augmentation upgrades that can be applied to a given ship so that the tradeoff becomes which upgrade is chosen (maybe the number of upgrades depends on the ship type?).

I like @meridian's idea, however I also like the idea of being able to change the fitment of a ship. For instance, if a Trident has 6 utility slots I could augment the armor and shields to max, or perhaps add cargo modules, but forcing me to choose would box me into a role every time I lose my dent. Remember, all these modules would have mass, which would affect the way the ship they are applied to handles. I would be interested to see how PVP changes when you get things like thrust boosters on heavier ships like Ragnaroks and Centaurs. Maybe the way to balance the hands on feel would be to implement a manufacturing license and have the effectiveness of the utility module be tied to the manu level of the creator. However if this happens I would like to see a form of ship trading implemented and more manufacturing options.

"That's just the thing, upgrading the radar on a fighter jet doesn't mean hanging a dish off the wing, it usually means swapping out the bundle of electronics in the nose. A utility port for things like scanners or armor or engine modifiers just makes sense."

No it doesn't. Upgrading the engines on a fighter jet doesn't mean popping out the electronics from your nose cone and slapping in an afterburner. You have to add the afterburner to the engines, not the nose cone. For your argument to make sense, we'd have to have an Electronics Port, an Engine Port, a Cargo Port, an Armor Port, etc. (Obviously we'd need to find something else to call them besides ports...)