Equipping an auto-loader into a weapon port of your ship would would allow missile launchers placed in the cargo hull to be used as reload clips for matching launchers in your weapon ports. Loaders would have to match the port size of the missile racks to be loaded. Loaders could have an impact on standard missile fire rate, a delay before a new rack is inserted into the firing bay, or a recycle time like nanite clouds to keep them balanced.

It's been mentioned before, and I still agree.

Buffing AOE and fire-and-forget weapons in this way is completely unpalatable to me. Taurs/Rags/etc. with large reservoirs of swarms to spam sounds unfun.

Maalik, theres a simple enough fix, change the cubic units attached to these weapons. Also, don't forget they weigh a ton as is.

Move to change the title of the thread from

"Auto-loaders for missiles"

to

"Auto-loaders for flare-type weapons".

That fixes the swarm spamming problem. Auto-loaders for missile-type weapons (those that track a target) might be feasible for capital ships, however, because it makes no sense for them to have to dock again just because their tubes are empty. They are supposed to be (more or less) self-sustained.

flares are already good enough, lets not kill off energy completly.

Tie the weight to the "clip" itself, ie: the ammo doesn't way anything, but the container used to store it in your hold does (similair to the tube maybe). And make it significant. That way, bombers can be more effective, while at the same time needing more defense should they choose to weigh themselves down with surplus ordinance, and it should discourage flare spammers from loading too many up.

And as Ryan said, change the CU of the clips so, say a cent or a valk, could at most load in one.

I think that would solve most problems with this, while maintaining the benefits. Swarmers could certainly have near-unlimited ammo, but given nobody likes them, it's not likely they would be able to defend themselves or run. Small flare boats would be significantly overburdened. Bombers could stay out for long periods if they were properly escorted.

And as Ryan said, change the CU of the clips so, say a cent or a valk, could at most load in one.

just make the autoloader take up a pile of cargo space

Proms with even two or three times their current amount of ammo and only a marginal mobility penalty would be unfair.

I agree and disagree with this idea. I agree because I do use flares every so often and I would love to have extra ammo heheh.
If you could only have a maximum of one or something it wouldn't be too bad...

However, from a general gameplay perspective I find it quite unbalanced... Energy users would suffer largely from something like this, it's allready a major pain in the ass trying to run someone (who is good with them) out of flares when you are fighting them with energy... if they had 24 flares it could become aggravating and take some of the fun out of combat..

-1
I'm vehemently opposed to anything making flares more powerful/weaker than they are. The best option I find would be that an auto-loader weighs a crapton, so that every ship that has one turns and moves as well as a Rag on booze.

Hopefully player controlled cap ships will alleviate the annoyances of having to leave the battlefield to reload.

Energy fights are dying as it is. -1 for missile buff.

Maalik +1

Atice: Once upon a time, the flare was much more potent than it is now. It did not make energy fights go away.

Didn't say it was a solo cause tosh, just saying I like my energy fights :p.

I remember the old flares.... BABOOM

If you take the time to see how it would work instead of thinking that some one would be lobbing their cargo hold at you all at once consider the actual effect of my suggestion. I fly a rag and I put in a large loader which leaves me one large port, I place a stinger in it. Now instead of 2 large missiles at once I can only fire one large missile. when I hear click I wait for the loader to kick in (say they used my suggestion here of 15 seconds to reload) so for 15sec I have to go without large missiles then I can fire again and still have 45 second cool down before I can reload another missile bay. Also by using actual purchased launchers in your cargo bay as reload racks you jack up the credit cost of loosing a ship. Loaders wouldn't mean a thing in skirmish battles where u can dock and reload in field. They count when you can't reload like on hive skirmishes. Loaders in effect lower your immediate damage dealing capability but give you sustainability on the battle field.

Loader modification:
- loose one ship weapon bay
- Rearm one missile rack every 60 seconds of equal size as loader
- raise replacement cost of ship if destroyed by each extra rack of missiles.

Example: A hornet with 4 small bays has a loader placed in one and missiles in the other three. After emptying all three racks with one final linked shot the loader takes 15 seconds to reload missile bay one then one minute later finishes reloading missile bay two and 60 seconds later finishes reloading missile bay three. 45 seconds later it is ready to begin reloading the next bay that may be empty.

As for flairs, what's good for the goose is good for the gander. It's all good.

or you could listen to people who have played the game for years and would know that this would turn everything into a flare spamming furball of no fun and take more skill out of the game allowing people to use 2 - whatever times as many AOE weapons as they originally had.

-1 (and i use flarewers alot)

but a flare support reloader taking a large port, that could only be used to rearm another player: Why not?
Providing the two ships be both at zero speed and within 100m and the reloading of each flare takes twice as the delay of (re)shooting one : p

reload well : )

BABOOM