i got this idea a while back and didn't bither sugesting it because i figured the devs already had some ideas about this, but what the hay...

capitle ships could have a docking port that would essentialy be an apendage (possably retractable) that would stick into the docking bay allowing the capitle ship to dock. once docked the capitle ship should probably disapear to clear the bay, but it may be cooler if the ship remains (to allow grater realisam)

now, discuss

I was thinking something more along the lines of having an airlock at a point on the station, that the ship could "land" on, separate from the docking bays. Or, a large hangar for the mid-sized ships to all land in...

Maybe we ought to have larger stations to accomodate this.

Larger stations?

Wow. Now that'd be an amazing site… "Greetings, welcome to the UIT Wet-docks."
*sun gets blocked out*

While hitting a dedicated docking port may seem cool, in practice it is very, very difficult and takes lots of practice. Even then it's hit-or-miss. What I would suggest instead is something more along the lines of the a Star Trek spacedock:

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That way, ships too large for the dock would be able to connect with a station. The trick of course would be to keep some arse with a large freighter from going AFK in the dock to prevent others from using it.

To this end, I suggest that the undocking animation automatically remove you from the dock (starting with a constant velocity of 30 and locking down the thruster for ten seconds or so).

This also leaves the question of where the ships go after logging off. It would be odd to see ships popping in and out, particularly large ones.

What has always confused me, is why I dock at one port, and come out another. I mean, what the heck? My ship got transported through the station?? Larger docking bays would increase realism, at least in my perspective. Maybe these bays should have 2 sides, one for entrance, once for exit. Larger stations could have more than one, or giant ones.

Also, backwater stations in greyspace & such might not be able to afford huge docking bays, etc. In this case, I'd suggest that you dock at a moderate sized dock, and come back out of that dock when you leave.

This however, leaves room for griefing. It's a part of MMOG games, no matter how you look at it. My solution? Switch to a different character. In terms of ingame play, no way would I launch immediately after somebody tried to kill me. I'd go have a cup of coffee.

Oh, don't bother with a big dock for the IDV "Itanic". It never has a chance to come back. As an Itani taxpayer, I say that it would be a waste of our money to build one around Itan.

I suggest instead that we begin building better and bigger escape pods for the Itani capital ship. Think of the lives that could be saved! All those poor crewmen, lost due to asteroid collisions...

the advantage of having docking arms is it allows the devs to add cap ship content before the have redone the stations.

idealy there will be both cap ship sized and fighter sized stations, but that meand more atr, more testing, and larger objects in existing systems.

This is of course assuming that player owned capital ships come before they revisit stations in order to put abandoned ones around. I say, if they're going to do it, do it right the first time. Saves time in the long run.

harry: maybe all the docking ports lead to a common bay, and then there's a set of exit elevators and cranes that move your ship to an exit bay based on your status in the exit queue.

As for what happens to player controlled ships after the player leaves, maybe the ship remains in the dock, until the player returns. It simply becomes a part of the scenery.

Yeah, it's just like an aircraft carrier. They have elevators, catapults, and cables to help move fighters around.

As far as "docking" cap ships, would they have to physically dock with a station? Why couldn't it just be serviced by a series of supply busses that ferry back and forth between the cap ship and the station?

This has always been how I envisioned cap ships docking ( ctishmans picture ) and it makes the most sense. Why should all these ships dock internally with the station? Why not just have large arms that have air locks that the ships attach to and extend an embilical attachment for passangers/pilots to get out and in. Simply convert some of the existing solarpannel art for the stations into docking arms with ports.

There is always the ferry approach where you can communicate with the station and purchase goods and have them ferried via small atlas type vessels. This is a better idea for grey space and fringe territories. This would also require no new artwork, simply a small script of animation for having ships ferry supplies accross.

As far as logging in and out is concerned, is it really that big a deal if large ships pop iin and out of existance when someone decides to log. When we die we maraculously arive at our home station, now that seems more unrealistic to me.

I'd imagine big ships that couldn't dock would be more along the line of guild or nation property, if the pilot logs off, another person of an appropriate rank would take control. If no one is piloting it will either stay their if in a safe area or AI would pilot it to such space. Smaller ships that aren't so crucial could be sent to a shipyard to be stored along with very heavy defenses. If the shipyard is destroyed that guild or nation would have a huge blow to their fleet, along with you. Shipyards would pay a fee for safe storage, the better the shipyard the higher the fee, the bigger the ship the higher the fee, et cetera. You could of course take your chances and leave your ship un-piloted in open space. Nations might frown upon this and kinda tow you away from stations. Open space of course would be dangerous, some one would find your ship unattended and decide to see if they can 'borrow' it or its equipment. Log off in open space, and come back to your ship missing several engines, a couple generators, some targeting systems and weapon systems. Oh joy.