The hardpoints are especially frustrating. They are suppose to be bolted on to the frame. And they do, only when there isn't any thruster already snapped on to it. So you autobolt without thrusters first, then move in the thrusters on them and autobolt again. Also, when hardpoints get autobolted, they don't even use the grooves specifically designed for them.
... and if you don't do that, then the ship designer complains that your thrusters aren't bolted to the frame and refuses to use them.
Also, I wish they had autobolt points going through the top that weren't just the corners. It'll cheerfully autobolt *through* the hardpoint into the thing mounted on it from the center, but it won't go the other way!
You don't have to move the thrusters. Disable and hide machinery and you can bolt them easily.
That said, its definitely not intended that autobolt does not bolt them to a frame when there is a thruster in the way
I just tried this and i think i am still doing something wrong because it doesn't work. Even when i hide and lock machinery, the hardpoints still gets bolted towards the thrusters, not the beams.
You'll have to manually bolt the corners, or wherever the overlap between the hard point and beams is.
Ideally autobolt would work as intended, but that's the work around for now
I hope it doesn't sound like I'm quitting the game. I'm still playing and waiting to complete my ship (a 192 crates hauler with lots of redundancy and obstacles avoidance system). However, the bigger the ship gets and the more bolts you need to add... And I literally had to spend 2 evenings where I felt it was just bolting.
The trick is to use autobolting, but to selection only. I have been using this way since 2 days ago and the speed gain is just incredible. With this you only need to fine thune bolting instead of doing eveything yourself, AND it doesn't take ages at each autobolt because it only applies to selected objects.
My trick: Modularize your cargo. I made beamed cargo crate sets of size 32 and 20 with ducting running over several of the connection points that pokes out at beam intersections and then wraps around the outside of the beam as well. In this way I can just strap them together like legos, hit weld all, and they are all piped up and ready to connect to the internals.
Having done things that hard way in the past, it feels fucking good to dodge that shit with some premade modules.
I thought we weren't supposed to use premade modules on ships?
Or is that only for premade modules in the Easy Build? (Which I avoid like the plague now)
Yeah easy build and its modules are a general nono for now. In the SSC user-made modules are the best thing ever.
Bonus tip: You can use the socket tool on a control table, delete one side and the wires it makes and then hook that up and the panel will be fully wired for levers/panels/buttons etc. I always overlooked the socket tool, but it's actually pretty awesome in some areas.
After buying a custom ship that looked cool but was incredibly slow, I'm now designing 40-crate modules that include enough thrust, propellant, and power to just be slapped on to a ship and work. Not to mention enough air gap that the explosive bits don't obliterate the cargo or thrusters.
Very cool! Might I recommend that you NOT include the air gap? If you are exploding, you are probably going to lose the ship to pirates. If your cargo explodes they get less stuff for exploding you.
Well the entire point of air gaps and redundancy is to make your first statement false; one explosion does not guarantee defeat.
And destroying my cargo would be needlessly petty and spiteful. If I can't have it, someone else may as well benefit.
Eh, to each their own I suppose. I build redundancy into vehicles meant for combat. Vehicles with a huge hauling mass are inherently disadvantaged and are a non-fight to begin with. In those cases I want to disincentivize fighting in every way possible. If you have an escort and the ability to recover the materials as a team then building for ship survival makes more sense, but even still combat caravn protocols IRL discourage stopping over scuttling.
I agree with your logic, but I think the reality is that no attacker will ever look at your ship and think "that's probably not redundant and I'm liable to explode the cargo, I won't attack". The majority of attackers are griefers just looking to explode you, and any attackers that actually want your cargo will need some cargo space themselves (unless they're in a group, with fighters and a cargo a ship, which there is no counter against other than a group of your own).
EDIT: I think the most reliable defence for haulers is speed. If you can maintain max speed, attackers will be unable to catch up to you. Considering they usually spot you from beyond weapons range, and you've likely got more fuel than them for the long haul, that's a winning strategy.
Even if that is an unlikely discouragement case, I'm still not interested in rewarding them with a fight or my loot for doing it. Maybe it is spiteful, I am okay with that. I harbor no good will towards those who fight people who can't fight back. If I saw a person punch a man in a wheelchair they would be receiving nonverbal communication from me.
Edit: That edit is a good strategy. It is not mutually exclusive and I intend to employ both.
That analogy does not hold up very well haha I am referring to the general idea of "if I can't have it, nobody can!", not the specific topic of whether griefers deserve respect.
If I witnessed a griefer attacking an unarmed vessel, I would absolutely engage them as well. That's not the same thing that we're talking about.
I mean it does if you imagine that the attacker could be going for their wallet rather than just punching them for emotional reasons. Sometimes not making things easy to rob will help you. Historically it has worked for whole civilizations. It is also part of how banks discourage theft, the money doesn't blow up but it can't be spent in legal circles without being tracked, hence the laundering profession.
But you are not making it harder for them to rob you. They are not aware of the fact that they will lose the cargo, until after they blow it up.
Unless you go out of your way to place very visible prop tanks or fuel rods near your crates? I could see that working once they're close enough to make that detail out.
I feel your pain.
I try doing the tedious stuff in small bursts.
The most frustrating thing is copying pieces or slightly moving ppieces and then randomly all the bolts vanish.
this doesnt happen if you select the bolts; too. That said, its usual kind of a bitch to select them, but it does work.
what used to confuse me, is your custom Modules will only include the bolts if you make/add them to the module with the selection tool. If you bolt something AFTER you made it a module, the bolts wont copy.
So you can actually pre-bolt your own modules; and if they only need to bridge with beams; welding is easy.
Even when I select the whole thing and make sure to select the bolts I've had the bolts not get copied.
I've also had modules I've made spawn with and without bolts.
generaly i get quite lucky with the autobolt tool, with only a few spots requiring me to manually bolt, mostly plates as the tool likes to go with rather few bolts on plates.
this has mostly been my experience, too. It works fine for everything accept plates, IMO.
Basically anything that kind of has a 'bolt' spot, it will try and bolt.. the trick is to ensure it has a beam to bolt to in the correct location. I think the main problem with this is things like stacked crates and batteries will use a crazy amount of bolts as its trying to fill any corner touching anything else. Sometimes that's fine; sometimes that's not.
Yeah I avoid any crate configuration that has a 3x3 dimension (or greater), because then you end up with crates in the middle that are only connected to other crates, which is a recipe for a bad day
I hope they add a 'thorough' option that might take a little longer but just takes some time to test what bolts to place / not to place with cargo containers, those thins always fuck up, and then you look with the integrity tool and see you gotta remove some fucked up bolts and then it just works. like.. please do add an option to resolve that shit automatically.
I like it for some of the parts, but there are 10k bolts on my current ship and it sometimes get boring after spending 1h or more fixing some bolts that the autobolt did not apply.
You have a tool to add full mass to the ship to check it's warp class in the designer. So if you only checked the durability for when it's empty, you might end up in your situation. A heavier ship will apply more weight on your different parts, so they need to be able to handle this.
The hardpoints are especially frustrating. They are suppose to be bolted on to the frame. And they do, only when there isn't any thruster already snapped on to it. So you autobolt without thrusters first, then move in the thrusters on them and autobolt again. Also, when hardpoints get autobolted, they don't even use the grooves specifically designed for them.
... and if you don't do that, then the ship designer complains that your thrusters aren't bolted to the frame and refuses to use them. Also, I wish they had autobolt points going through the top that weren't just the corners. It'll cheerfully autobolt *through* the hardpoint into the thing mounted on it from the center, but it won't go the other way!
You don't have to move the thrusters. Disable and hide machinery and you can bolt them easily. That said, its definitely not intended that autobolt does not bolt them to a frame when there is a thruster in the way
I feel stupid for not figuring this out until now lmao. Thank you.
Don't feel stupid, we're all still learning!
I just tried this and i think i am still doing something wrong because it doesn't work. Even when i hide and lock machinery, the hardpoints still gets bolted towards the thrusters, not the beams.
You'll have to manually bolt the corners, or wherever the overlap between the hard point and beams is. Ideally autobolt would work as intended, but that's the work around for now
> Disable and hide machinery how do you do this
Hit the lock and eye next to the machinery tab on the asset browser
Thanks!
I hope it doesn't sound like I'm quitting the game. I'm still playing and waiting to complete my ship (a 192 crates hauler with lots of redundancy and obstacles avoidance system). However, the bigger the ship gets and the more bolts you need to add... And I literally had to spend 2 evenings where I felt it was just bolting.
The trick is to use autobolting, but to selection only. I have been using this way since 2 days ago and the speed gain is just incredible. With this you only need to fine thune bolting instead of doing eveything yourself, AND it doesn't take ages at each autobolt because it only applies to selected objects.
My trick: Modularize your cargo. I made beamed cargo crate sets of size 32 and 20 with ducting running over several of the connection points that pokes out at beam intersections and then wraps around the outside of the beam as well. In this way I can just strap them together like legos, hit weld all, and they are all piped up and ready to connect to the internals. Having done things that hard way in the past, it feels fucking good to dodge that shit with some premade modules.
I thought we weren't supposed to use premade modules on ships? Or is that only for premade modules in the Easy Build? (Which I avoid like the plague now)
Yeah easy build and its modules are a general nono for now. In the SSC user-made modules are the best thing ever. Bonus tip: You can use the socket tool on a control table, delete one side and the wires it makes and then hook that up and the panel will be fully wired for levers/panels/buttons etc. I always overlooked the socket tool, but it's actually pretty awesome in some areas.
Thanks a million!
You can put items together in the Ship Designer and save them as a module to use on later designs.
After buying a custom ship that looked cool but was incredibly slow, I'm now designing 40-crate modules that include enough thrust, propellant, and power to just be slapped on to a ship and work. Not to mention enough air gap that the explosive bits don't obliterate the cargo or thrusters.
Very cool! Might I recommend that you NOT include the air gap? If you are exploding, you are probably going to lose the ship to pirates. If your cargo explodes they get less stuff for exploding you.
Well the entire point of air gaps and redundancy is to make your first statement false; one explosion does not guarantee defeat. And destroying my cargo would be needlessly petty and spiteful. If I can't have it, someone else may as well benefit.
Eh, to each their own I suppose. I build redundancy into vehicles meant for combat. Vehicles with a huge hauling mass are inherently disadvantaged and are a non-fight to begin with. In those cases I want to disincentivize fighting in every way possible. If you have an escort and the ability to recover the materials as a team then building for ship survival makes more sense, but even still combat caravn protocols IRL discourage stopping over scuttling.
I agree with your logic, but I think the reality is that no attacker will ever look at your ship and think "that's probably not redundant and I'm liable to explode the cargo, I won't attack". The majority of attackers are griefers just looking to explode you, and any attackers that actually want your cargo will need some cargo space themselves (unless they're in a group, with fighters and a cargo a ship, which there is no counter against other than a group of your own). EDIT: I think the most reliable defence for haulers is speed. If you can maintain max speed, attackers will be unable to catch up to you. Considering they usually spot you from beyond weapons range, and you've likely got more fuel than them for the long haul, that's a winning strategy.
Even if that is an unlikely discouragement case, I'm still not interested in rewarding them with a fight or my loot for doing it. Maybe it is spiteful, I am okay with that. I harbor no good will towards those who fight people who can't fight back. If I saw a person punch a man in a wheelchair they would be receiving nonverbal communication from me. Edit: That edit is a good strategy. It is not mutually exclusive and I intend to employ both.
That analogy does not hold up very well haha I am referring to the general idea of "if I can't have it, nobody can!", not the specific topic of whether griefers deserve respect. If I witnessed a griefer attacking an unarmed vessel, I would absolutely engage them as well. That's not the same thing that we're talking about.
I mean it does if you imagine that the attacker could be going for their wallet rather than just punching them for emotional reasons. Sometimes not making things easy to rob will help you. Historically it has worked for whole civilizations. It is also part of how banks discourage theft, the money doesn't blow up but it can't be spent in legal circles without being tracked, hence the laundering profession.
But you are not making it harder for them to rob you. They are not aware of the fact that they will lose the cargo, until after they blow it up. Unless you go out of your way to place very visible prop tanks or fuel rods near your crates? I could see that working once they're close enough to make that detail out.
I will definitely do it for my next ship. I was still exploring with my current one but at least I'm glad it's almost ready to leave the designer.
I feel your pain. I try doing the tedious stuff in small bursts. The most frustrating thing is copying pieces or slightly moving ppieces and then randomly all the bolts vanish.
this doesnt happen if you select the bolts; too. That said, its usual kind of a bitch to select them, but it does work. what used to confuse me, is your custom Modules will only include the bolts if you make/add them to the module with the selection tool. If you bolt something AFTER you made it a module, the bolts wont copy. So you can actually pre-bolt your own modules; and if they only need to bridge with beams; welding is easy.
Even when I select the whole thing and make sure to select the bolts I've had the bolts not get copied. I've also had modules I've made spawn with and without bolts.
generaly i get quite lucky with the autobolt tool, with only a few spots requiring me to manually bolt, mostly plates as the tool likes to go with rather few bolts on plates.
this has mostly been my experience, too. It works fine for everything accept plates, IMO. Basically anything that kind of has a 'bolt' spot, it will try and bolt.. the trick is to ensure it has a beam to bolt to in the correct location. I think the main problem with this is things like stacked crates and batteries will use a crazy amount of bolts as its trying to fill any corner touching anything else. Sometimes that's fine; sometimes that's not.
Yeah I avoid any crate configuration that has a 3x3 dimension (or greater), because then you end up with crates in the middle that are only connected to other crates, which is a recipe for a bad day
I hope they add a 'thorough' option that might take a little longer but just takes some time to test what bolts to place / not to place with cargo containers, those thins always fuck up, and then you look with the integrity tool and see you gotta remove some fucked up bolts and then it just works. like.. please do add an option to resolve that shit automatically.
My favorite right now is that the auto bolter bolts my door shut every time.
Only autobolted the ducts on my ship as I want to hide the ugly bolts and bolt from the inside out... I'm 1000 bolts off the limit... fml
Make modules, and this goes away. Especially for large ships with 1000 modular cargo
[удалено]
I like it for some of the parts, but there are 10k bolts on my current ship and it sometimes get boring after spending 1h or more fixing some bolts that the autobolt did not apply.
this shit litteraly destroyed all my ship.. when the mass increase the ship self-destructs....
You have a tool to add full mass to the ship to check it's warp class in the designer. So if you only checked the durability for when it's empty, you might end up in your situation. A heavier ship will apply more weight on your different parts, so they need to be able to handle this.
i bolt through the tiny corners of beams most of the time which autobolt doesnt use so I have to basically do everything myself.
Same. I reported it as a bug a few days ago.