Safe Zone Jumps (Fast Travel)
I like Fast Travel in SE2, it should be possible to jump between own Safe Zones not only discovered economy stations. From a mechanical perspective, this is effectively the same jumping mechanism already used by Jump Drives, just applied to static infrastructure instead of mobile ships. For clarity, the rest of this suggestion will refer to it simply as a jump.
Safe Zones should work around an energy storage model rather than constant extreme power consumption. Charging a Safe Zone would require a large upfront amount of energy, but once charged, it would consume relatively little power to remain active. The maximum stored energy would effectively represent the Safe Zone’s HP.
When performing a jump, the Safe Zone would consume part of its stored charge. The amount used would depend on both the mass of the ship and the distance to the destination Safe Zone. This naturally limits jump range: heavier ships would be able to jump shorter distances. After the jump, the Safe Zone would automatically begin recharging back to full using available grid power.
Incoming fire would also drain the Safe Zone’s stored charge. However, as long as sufficient power is supplied, it would recharge extremely quickly, allowing it to sustain enormous DPS. Disabling a Safe Zone would therefore be less about raw firepower and more about depleting its energy reserves. In practice, the amount of sustained damage required would be prohibitively high even for a full fleet, making such attacks technically possible but extremely unlikely.
Zone Chips could be expensive, but consumed only once to activate a Safe Zone, and optionally once per jump.
For economy stations, jumping from within their Safe Zones would consume credits, again scaled by ship mass and distance. To avoid exploits and keep the system simple, economy Safe Zones could always be treated as having infinite or maximum charge.
Overall, this would add a compelling alternative for the "mobile" jump drives, which can be balanced too btw. And it would remove the constant pressure to mine tons of just to sustain the constant Safe Zone power draw.
Thx for reading.
I like this feedback
You still need a Jump Drive (JD) to travel long distances and build a Safe Zone (SZ) there; otherwise, you would need to spend real-life hours or even days getting there. Obtaining a Mobile JD might be more difficult, but at some point it should become available and usable on certain ship types.
There is potential to use energy requirements to balance the jumping mechanics between Safe Zone jumps and mobile JDs. As mentioned earlier, a JD might not charge in advance but instead draw power at the exact moment of activation. Its energy input would be extremely high, with a threshold below which activation would be impossible. This would require either very high-output power generation or many heavy capacitors.
The JD would also be quite expensive and could require non-craftable exotic components. I also like the idea of preventing drastic changes in speed or rotation during the charge phase (or just cancel the activation if you accelerate or rotate too fast). Together, these limitations would make mobile JDs suitable mainly for large exploration/carrier ships, rather than small ships or fighter or even regular warships.
Safe Zones would naturally become points of interest, where fleet battles could occur. At the same time, Safe Zones would be much cheaper to maintain, offering a reliable way to protect against offline raids. An enemy ship or fleet could still conduct a siege near your Safe Zone, slowly depleting the grid's energy reserves, giving you time to prepare a defense or call for help.
Another potential mobile JD feature is a jumping bubble. This would function similarly to a Safe Zone: all grids within the bubble would jump together, not just the grid that has the JD installed. This would allow for synchronized fleet jumps and remove concerns about physical connections between grids or whether all crew members are seated in cockpits or chairs.
You still need a Jump Drive (JD) to travel long distances and build a Safe Zone (SZ) there; otherwise, you would need to spend real-life hours or even days getting there. Obtaining a Mobile JD might be more difficult, but at some point it should become available and usable on certain ship types.
There is potential to use energy requirements to balance the jumping mechanics between Safe Zone jumps and mobile JDs. As mentioned earlier, a JD might not charge in advance but instead draw power at the exact moment of activation. Its energy input would be extremely high, with a threshold below which activation would be impossible. This would require either very high-output power generation or many heavy capacitors.
The JD would also be quite expensive and could require non-craftable exotic components. I also like the idea of preventing drastic changes in speed or rotation during the charge phase (or just cancel the activation if you accelerate or rotate too fast). Together, these limitations would make mobile JDs suitable mainly for large exploration/carrier ships, rather than small ships or fighter or even regular warships.
Safe Zones would naturally become points of interest, where fleet battles could occur. At the same time, Safe Zones would be much cheaper to maintain, offering a reliable way to protect against offline raids. An enemy ship or fleet could still conduct a siege near your Safe Zone, slowly depleting the grid's energy reserves, giving you time to prepare a defense or call for help.
Another potential mobile JD feature is a jumping bubble. This would function similarly to a Safe Zone: all grids within the bubble would jump together, not just the grid that has the JD installed. This would allow for synchronized fleet jumps and remove concerns about physical connections between grids or whether all crew members are seated in cockpits or chairs.
You read my mind!
I just finished this in my mod for SE1 running at my multiplayer server. Feel free to jump in and see it in action. I'm now installing prototype jump rings between planets.
The block is called Jump Bridge and is variant of Safe Zone using Jump Drive technology to transport objects on large distances.
Basically it reverts the rules - with Jump Drive everything connected to its grid is transported.
With Jump Bridge everything which is NOT connected to its grid is transported. This can be player character or other grid.
It uses standard jump drives as energy source, but they must fit inside safe zone. It consumes grid's energy and zone chips like regular safezone do to upkeep bridge activation but takes additional energy from jump drives depending on mass of transported object. Jump drives need then recharge as usual.
When Jump Bridge is deactivated the grid can be converted back to ship and use its jump drives as regular so it allows to build capital ships with Jump Bridge for fleet transport.
You read my mind!
I just finished this in my mod for SE1 running at my multiplayer server. Feel free to jump in and see it in action. I'm now installing prototype jump rings between planets.
The block is called Jump Bridge and is variant of Safe Zone using Jump Drive technology to transport objects on large distances.
Basically it reverts the rules - with Jump Drive everything connected to its grid is transported.
With Jump Bridge everything which is NOT connected to its grid is transported. This can be player character or other grid.
It uses standard jump drives as energy source, but they must fit inside safe zone. It consumes grid's energy and zone chips like regular safezone do to upkeep bridge activation but takes additional energy from jump drives depending on mass of transported object. Jump drives need then recharge as usual.
When Jump Bridge is deactivated the grid can be converted back to ship and use its jump drives as regular so it allows to build capital ships with Jump Bridge for fleet transport.
Screenshot of Jump Ring station with Jump Bridge activated and deactivated.
Screenshot of Jump Ring station with Jump Bridge activated and deactivated.
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