This is actually a very simple idea but also one that could add much needed 'personalization' and customization to ships according to pilots preferences and greatly increase the gameplay.

Customization port will allow installation of an additional widget on your ship.

Widgets I have in mind are:

1. afterburner kit (available at Corvus)
Doubles the turbo thrust of a ship for 5 sec when engaged. After it runs out it needs to recharge for 90 or more sec.
Weight 100 kg. Price: 20.000 credits

2. armor reinforcement kit (available at Ineubis)
Adds 1-3k armor reinforcement to the ship hull.
1k increase = 300 kg Price: 10.000 credits
2k increase = 600 kg Price: 20.000 credits
3k increase = 900 kg Price: 30.000 credits

3. cloaking device (Serco ships only, available at Serco research stations)
Makes ship invisible on radar at distances over 1400m. This would affect players, border turrets, guards and strike forces as well, when ship is over 1400m away they won't be able to target or see it.
Weight 100 kg. Serco military personnel only, price: 20.000 credits

4. shield generator (Itani ships only, available at Itani research stations)
Adds a small shield (1000 hit points) around the ship. Once damage passes 1000 it deactivates, recharge/reactivation time 3 min.
Weight 100 kg. Itani military personnel only, price: 20.000 credits

5. radar enhancer (available at Xang XI)
Adds visibility in storm/fogged sectors up to 1000-1500m
Weight 100 kg. Price: 10.000 credits

6. combat kit (available at TPG)
Enhances ships thrust by 2 and spin torque by 0.2
Weight 200 kg Price: 30.000 credits

7. smugglers kit (available at Corvus)
Spoofs ships cargo as water. 70% chance of passing unnoticed.
Weight 100 kg. price 10.000 credits

We don't yet have 'contraband' but... this is easy. Make a few 'controlled substances' widgets available in greyspace that will force Nations station guards to react and attack ship carrying contraband stuff unless ship packs a smugglers kit. Smuggled contraband should pay extremely well.

8. pirate kit (available at Corvus)
cargo & add-on scanner.
Weight 100 kg. Price: 20.000 credits

9. nanite repair kit (available at Orion)
Device that employs nanites to slowly repair/regenerate your hull at 10-15 hit points per sec.
Weight 200 kg. price: 30.000 credits

10. Savet's passenger seat (available at Tunguska)
Installs additional seat in your ship so you can take a passenger.
Weight 100 kg. price: 10.000 credits

Cloaking and shields widgets will probably bring up a lot of controversy but.... they are consistent with the backstory.
Serco ships have cloaking abilities and Itani ships have shields.

Values and weights are arbitrary, it's just something I think would work and not tax ships overall maneuverability too much.

UIT need a goodie

I suggest the cloak and shield switch off when the turbo is engaged.

At this stage this is just a suggestion with some rough ideas.

UIT can use all widgets except those 2 serco/itani specific ones.

I think I made widget diversity pretty good so players will have plenty to pick from and we can always come up with additional ones if this suggestion gets any attention from the devs.

Bojan, surely you know this kind of thing has been extensively discussed already, and ultimately put to bed by incarnate. See:

http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/3/1494 (first post)

http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/3/22405 (incarnate comments on this idea --- from which I will quote:

People who keep arguing for "utility ports" so they can avoid the trade-off are missing this point.

Bojan, surely you know this kind of thing has been extensively discussed already, and ultimately put to bed by incarnate. See:

http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/3/1494 (first post)

http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/3/22405 (incarnate comments on this idea --- from which I will quote:

People who keep arguing for "utility ports" so they can avoid the trade-off are missing this point.

Yes I know, first discussion was in 2003 and Incarnate promised he will make things happen that will render the need for 'utility port' pointless but... he never delivered on his promise.

Other successful games have already proven Incarnate wrong about this.
Players love to experiment and customize their ships and actual ability to do this makes them very happy and improves player retention.

So... no reason not to bring this back up since it offers pretty simple and quick solution for individual ships customization according to players preferences.

Bojan makes the point.

Anyway trading off weapons against scanners or other utilities is silly.
You will have tradeoff in choosing between utilities; Imagine a sector with radioactive fog and nasty and fast aggressive armored bots which utility would you pick?
-radiation shield
-fog radar
-extra boost
-jamming device

If you ever played a game named Tachyon the frindge, you know you had some tactical moves in choosing the right utility to accomplish your missions.

Incarnate in this thread decided to choose an easy implementation, sacrificing gameplay. Nobody will ever make a trade-off with a weapon; (And remember back then you only had to carry a radar in your cargo bay with no weapon tradeoff to camp IS). This is just another content delivery failure with an old soon(tm) perfume.

And you know only idiots never change their minds.

Incarnate promised he will make things happen . . . but... he never delivered on his promise.

Inconceivable!

"Nobody will ever make a trade-off with a weapon"

False. I generally don't make those sorts of tradeoffs when flying a Corvult, but I've made it plenty of times in other ships -- when I'm operating out of Latos, for example, I sometimes fly a Taur or Orion Hornet with a cargo scanner in one of the small ports while I grind up convoys. I used to do that with the Cormaud as well, back when I thought Hounds cost more than they were worth (but that changed as I got better at flying, though I still sometimes used that ship rather than go all the way to Odia for a Hound before they made it available in Sedina and Bractus). And I'm perfectly willing to give up one small port on a Rag in exchange for a radar if I'm trying to kill a queen in a storm.

I also routinely use dual ravens in lieu of more powerful weapons.

As long as there is a tactical benefit to the tradeoff, which is agility and acceleration for the ravens.

But the suggestion focused more on a non weapon slot. Something that grants a boost to an attribute, so people can min/max in ways that compliment their play style.

This suggestion is about additional 'non weapon slot' Rin and widgets proposed (and a myriad of others people can come up with to suggest) enhances the gameplay and provides small specialized ship customizations.

More customization means more variety in ships based on players preferences or circumstances at any given situation.

There is a trade-off even with this additional customization port - if you decide to install certain widget, it adds additional weight to your ship, some widgets might introduce additional drain to the battery or use grid power that will not allow you to use combinations of weapons you would normally use.

I say give players the ability to better customize their ships as they want. This is new content, this is good for the game, this is good for player happiness and retention.
Introduce the dreaded 'trade-off' by upping the weight of the widgets, adding battery drain or grid power if you are so damn adamant there must be a big trade-off, BUT DO IT!

I generally don't make those sorts of tradeoffs when flying a Corvult,
Quid erat demonstrandum.
Then be consistent and ask for removal of built-in scanners.

I'm not sure why you're acting like the fact that I don't make a trade-off with a weapon every single time I fly means I have validated your claim that "nobody will ever make a trade-off with a weapon". Do you really think everybody is so stupid they wouldn't notice how illogical that is?

@bojansplash: I know exactly what this suggestion is, and if you look more closely you'll notice that I wasn't arguing for or against it -- this is because I don't actually care whether the devs add utility ports or stick with the current system. What I do care about is correctness. DeathSpores said something that was untrue, so I chimed in to correct it.

Maybe because sacrificing a port on a rag or an hornet or a taur to go botting ok kill npcs isnt really a trade-off for a vet like you.
Do you think everybody is so mentally challenged they fail to see your argument is poor or even dishonest: "I am making trade off only when there is absolutely no risk" that's what you basically admitted.
So i am asking you where the fuck is the trade off you speak of in your examples?
Drop a gauss from your vult for a scanner and go chase/camp other pilots in Ion storm then you can say you are making a trade off otherwise that's just plain bullshit.

Mobile players find already very hard to kill assault or guardians with full gun equipped try to get in their shoes for a minute.

I do neither really care about using or not a utility port, i care only the game keeps to be attracting new targets. People love to play lego to customize their shit. It gives them incentive to test new things cos the possible number of combinations could become easily huge without having to design costly contents or rely only on "player cooperation". And it would allow to launch new widgets for the crowd at low cost.

This idea has been brought up many times.
I like the general thought of it; but I believe it needs a slow approach. So while we should not directly bring in all your proposed "widgets", we should start with a small list to see how it works and how the playerbase copes with it.

To the idea as a whole: +1 to more strategy for me to experiment with.

However, I'd like to criticize some of your proposed widgets:

Both of the faction exclusive widgets are silly. A shield for Itani ships would give a Valk an immense advantage. In a 1v1 he would be invulnerable for as long as he doesn't get hit by a flare or two consecutive energy shots. And if the pilot is even half capable of flying that ship, he can make BIG use of this.
While that is a cool idea, it simply doesn't fit in the skill based combat I love.
Same goes to the cloaking for the Serco. People in their skyprom could be even pickier then when they deem it's not a good moment to come within 1400m. Those two are just combat breaking.

And if you were gonna be straight about, of course the UIT need a goodie of their own. Your point was "UIT can buy all of it but the Itani and Serco thing". Serco and Itani can buy all of it exept for the side they are at war with. I think the problem at hand is obvious.

Other than that, I like all of the other proposed widgets. Can imagine doing some neat stuff with them in combat.

Something like a shield generator or cloaking device should definitely cost you a weapon port.

Both of the faction exclusive widgets are silly.

No, they are not, they are consistent with the backstory.

As I said in the beginning, this is just a rough suggestion and widgets are just a sample of what can be done to further customize ships. Trade-off for some widgets can be extensive including additional weight, additional power cell drain or grid restrictions.
It's up to Inc to decide how will he 'punish' us for using them.

A shield for Itani ships would give a Valk an immense advantage.

This is simply not true, a 1000 hit points shield is more of a cosmetic addition the something very useful. 1 flare hit and it's down, 2 neut hits and it's down, 3 AGT hits and it's down.
Nanite repair kit, afterburner or combat kit would prove to be far more useful for light fighters then this shield.

Same goes to the cloaking for the Serco.

Cloaking is a tricky thing but it opens a myriad of possible new gameplay styles.
My 'rough' idea only includes weight trade-off.
Maybe shield and cloaking widgets should have a constant power drain when activated to make them useful just for a short period of time and, as Harpo suggested, activating turbo disengages the device.

Everything is open to improvement, balancing and additional suggestions.

...of course the UIT need a goodie of their own.

UIT is a corporation/trading conglomerate. Imho UIT widgets should be aimed at expanding cargo hold of the ships but since majority of players are UIT and they are the most vocal whiners in VO - UIT can get some exclusive combat related widget too.

If it was up to me I would have killed the UIT faction long time ago or include in faction redux that UIT cannot go past neutral with any of the warring sides.
Majority of players choosing UIT as their nation is the biggest fuckup in this game.

P.S.
One additional thought that could make this suggestion come to life pretty fast - at least as an experiment.

Instead of adding customization (utility) port, proposed widgets can be built in into 'specialized' power cells.

In short: Itani would get military grade power cell with built in shield generator, Serco would get military grade power cell with built in cloaking device, etc, etc.
New power cells would have different grid requirements, weights & capacity/drain stats.
Rinse and repeat for all proposed widgets.

Only additional intervention into user interface would be adding a widget activation key that can be defined/assigned by the user.

This is simply not true, a 1000 hit points shield is more of a cosmetic addition the something very useful. 1 flare hit and it's down, 2 neut hits and it's down, 3 AGT hits and it's down.

You didn't understand the point. If the pilot is any good at dodging, he can make sure that the shield doesn't go down long enough for him to get himself into a big advantage. It takes 2 consecutive neut hits on the Valk to get the shields down. 2 over time won't do the trick since shields recharge. Of course the flare does the trick here. (But how hard is it to dodge flares in a Valk...?)

Heh. I would comment on the rest, but I don't mean to drag this thread into misery again.
So let's go with the optimum way: Let's wait and see what the devs will decide. Maybe they don't even like this idea and we'd be discussing for nothing.

However, I'd like to add that the situation has changed rapidly. Barely any of the newbies go UIT. They go Serco and Itani, with the exception that the Serco newbies do not stay or switch to Itani.
Only a handful UIT vets are left active, there are many more Itani vets playing.
But let's not start this again.

P.S.: I'm not opposed to a cargo buff widget if I can equip it to my Trident :P

Sieger, I think you are overreacting, if you can't hit a valk with dual flares at least 2 times out of 12 you have on your disposal, or with 2 jacks out of 12... you already lost the fight, no matter if it has some puny shield or not. Not to speak of a one hit winners like megapositron or gauss mk2/3 ...

Adding weight to the widget will affect valk maneuverability and also adding power drain and/or grid restrictions will limit weapons that can be used.
Shield can have the same recharge rate as dent shield (6 min) and getting hit will restart the recharge timer. Will that work for you?

Again, widget stats are not carved in stone, this is just a proposal.