A few stats about ship-variations

johnsteward

So when it comes to console layout, we now have at max 11 slots

the constraints seem to be:

-no more than 5 consoles in any category
-at least 1 per category

with 11 total to distribute over 3 categories we get a total of 15 different console layouts:

5 tac 5 eng 1 sci
5 tac 4 eng 2 si
5 tac 3 eng 3 sci
5 tac 2 eng 4 sci
5 tac 1 eng 5 sci

4 tac 5 eng 2 sci
4 tac 4 eng 3 sci
4 tac 3 eng 4 sci
4 tac 2 eng 5 sci

3 tac 5 eng 3 sci
3 tac 4 eng 4 sci
3 tac 3 eng 5 sci

2 tac 5 eng 4 sci
2 tac 4 eng 5 sci

1 tac 5 eng 5 sci

Of these 15, only 3 have no 5th console slot anywhere so thats only 20%, or 80% that will have at least 1 category with 5 slots.

If we exclude every layout consiting of 2 categories at 5 consoles the total number of configurations reduces to 12.

That is quite low tbh.

If they allowed for a 6th console somewhere we would get all of the configurations above plus the flowwing:

6 tac 4 eng 1 sci
6 tac 3 eng 2 si
6 tac 2 eng 3 sci
6 tac 1 eng 4 sci

4 tac 6 eng 1 sci
3 tac 6 eng 2 sci
2 tac 6 eng 3 sci
1 tac 6 eng 4 sci

4 tac 1 eng 6 sci
3 tac 2 eng 6 sci
2 tac 3 eng 6 sci
1 tac 4 eng 6 sci

so an additional 12 configurations to further differentiate ships.


Now if we look at boff-layouts, we have say 12 powers to ditribute over 4-5 "slots" and 3 categories, 4 if we include universal.

Constraints seem to be (at least):

- at least 3 different categories used (including universal)
- exactly 1 commander
- no 3 ltc's (not counting commander)
- no more than 8 powers per category (counting universal as different category)
- at least 4 slots, at most 5 slots
- a tac heavy ship has at least 2 boffs of that kind, same for eng, sci

(tac 4 = tac com, tac 3 = tac ltc, ..)


tac 4 :: tac 3 :: tac 1 :: eng 3 :: sci 1
tac 4 :: tac 3 :: tac 1 :: eng 2 :: sci 2
tac 4 :: tac 3 :: tac 1 :: eng 1 :: sci 3

tac 4 :: tac 2 :: tac 2 :: eng 3 :: sci 1
tac 4 :: tac 2 :: tac 2 :: eng 2 :: sci 2
tac 4 :: tac 2 :: tac 2 :: eng 1 :: sci 3

tac 4 :: tac 2 :: tac 1 :: eng 3 :: sci 2
tac 4 :: tac 2 :: tac 1 :: eng 2 :: sci 3

tac 4 :: tac 2 :: eng 3 :: sci 3
tac 4 :: tac 2 :: eng 3 :: sci 2 :: sci 1
tac 4 :: tac 2 :: eng 2 :: eng 2 :: sci 2
tac 4 :: tac 2 :: eng 2 :: eng 1 :: sci 3
tac 4 :: tac 2 :: eng 2 :: sci 3 :: sci 1
tac 4 :: tac 2 :: eng 2 :: sci 2 :: sci 2
tac 4 :: tac 2 :: eng 1 :: sci 3 :: sci 2

tac 4 :: tac 1 :: eng 3 :: eng 3 :: sci 1
tac 4 :: tac 1 :: eng 3 :: eng 2 :: sci 2
tac 4 :: tac 1 :: eng 3 :: eng 1 :: sci 3
tac 4 :: tac 1 :: eng 3 :: sci 3 :: sci 1
tac 4 :: tac 1 :: eng 2 :: sci 3 :: sci 2
tac 4 :: tac 1 :: eng 1 :: sci 3 :: sci 3

21 combinations in total. Some are not present in the game right now, afaik there is no ship with com in one category and two ltcs in a single other one so in actuality there are constraints used that were not included here. It will propably be more like 18 in total.

For eng or sci heavy ships we get the same basically by switching either tac <> sci or tac <> eng.

So if we assume that each ship has some focus on tac, eng or sci we continue with the following constraints:

- each tac heavy ship will have at least a 2 boffs in that category, same with eng/sci
- if a ship is tac heavy, no other category will have more consoles than tac

The first assumption just means the list of boff variations above is complete. The second one just means that the actual number of console layouts per ship is reduced to 7 down from 15. And even further down to 5 if we exclude ships with 5 consoles in more than 1 category.

So that means, obvioiusly based on all the (although quite reasonable) assumptions made, we get a total of 5 console layouts times 18 boff layouts equals 60 different ship configuurations.

60 times 3 to include the other 2 focus types eng and sci, so 180 ships.
Not counting differences in hull/shield/maneuverability/inertia/power boni/special consoles/hangars/...

While that 60 per category may sound like a lot, its actually extremely low. If you factor in stuff like universal consoles per ship which lets you basically ignore the actual number of non tac consoles you are reduced to 4 different layouts total over all 3 types. (2-5 tac consoles, rest uses mostly universal consoles anyways).

If we assume a player wants to have at least 3 tac abilities, the number of total layouts over all 3 types is reduced from 54 to 30 or to 24 if you want at least one ltc tac.

Including the last considerations, the total number of (actually) diffrent (useable) configurations is further reduced to 96. That means we are long past the point where ships where actually different layouts, but now are often differentiated by other state like shilds, hull, hangar, clcoak, consoles, weapon slots and all that.



I'm just posting all this cause mainly i was bored and secondly to say that we definitly need more flexible rules with layouts and maybe even the option to have 6 consoles in one category.

I'm not saying the secondary stats are not important, but similar to the other rules, most eng based ships have high hull medium shild and 4/4 weapons, while sci has 3/3 weapons, low hull and high shield, so a lot of the possible setups are factored ouut by correlating one variable with the others too heavily.

I would like to see a bit more extreme cases like maybe a 3 commander ship, or stuuff like that. There are enough other variables to balance that out but the further down the line we go the worse it will get.

Yes they try with intel boffs and what not, but that just feels like a low lvl short term thing thats also only mildly interesting to me.

lets hope for some more out of the box kind of ships down the line.

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