It is the preferred form of in-system expansion particularly in early game (when PP are more scarce) because it's (at least slightly) cheaper than any other hull with internal slots. But it's not really gamechanging due to the very small difference in PP cost when you compare the total cost with the outpost/colony part mounted. In other words, using the base hulls instead of regular ships won't give you the edge to win any game. Late game, with PP overflow, expansion to new, uncolonized, multi-planet systems can be done faster by sending a fleet of as many outpost/colony ships as required, and the only thing that stops a player from doing it that way is the sense of PP inefficiency (that can be balanced anyways by the fact that doing it that way is overall faster than settling one planet and then waiting 3 turns to outposts the others from that first planet.
In the end, the only real advantage of base hulls regarding in-system expansion is the case where planets become inhabitable time after the system had some other inhabitable planet colonized, if and only if the empire didn't build a shipyard in that first planet, because the empire can build the colony/outpost bases without needing a shipyard in there. However, shipyards are cheap and relatively fast to finish, so again not using base hulls is not gamechanging. One could argue that by no using base hulls here we would be encouraging shipyard spam, but then the problem is that of a building that is necessary for many things (including drydocks for repairs), and so it is the mechanics regarding shipyards in general what should be addressed to fix the shipyard spamming (and drydock spamming) problem.
In previous FreeOrion versions, it was also useful as a cheap immobile ship (comsats) capable of stopping passing-by enemy ships to make them fight the planetary defenses in the system. That is no longer possible (ships won't be stopped except by armed ships capable of enforcing system blockades). Comsats were also great as inexpensive immobile chaff, but that was fixed by increasing cost of base hulls, so that now they are competitive with other small, cheap mobile hulls, and certainly not that cheap compared to mobile ships in general (plus there is the new Arc Disruptor that is quite effective at 1-shoting them from first bout of combat.
The only real chaff advantage that Comsats have compared to other cheap hulls is that they do not require a shipyard (again the same reason as with colonization mechanics, the shipyard) and so they can be pumped out right after a colony is conquered. That can be seen as good for gameplay, arguably, but I disagree: the conquering party is already expected to be the one with the upper hand, so allowing it to quickly reinforce its presence in the system with hollow hulls for chaff might be seen as unfair, or even nonsensical for what is worth regarding targetting mechanics, and is not necessary for gameplay.
Hence, I propose (I'm not the first one, e.g. Vezzra has been suggesting it for years now) to remove the base hull.
Benefits:
- A single way to colonise or outpost a planet for either in-system and inter-stellar expansion. That's simpler for new players (confirmed by recent experiences in multiplayer).
- Less cluttered list of available items to build.
Less clear or subjective benefits:
- Easier chaff balance (as can be seen in previous forum debates about chaff).
Drawbacks:
- Need shipyards on every multiplanet system or send ships from nearby systems (as well as the first colony/outpost ship, so only a source of extra work for the player, regarding "find nearest shipyard, build a ship there, send it here").
The spam shipyard problem could be solved by removing shipyards from the game. Rest of shipyard upgrades already take relatively long times to build, but if the faster times to get (e.g.) an Orbital Drydock or Orbital Incubator on a new planet are seen as a balance problem, all shipyard upgrades build times could be upped accordingly.
The only issue with this would be that the starting, basic hulls could be produced right away on every new colony. Is this really an issue? They are slow, have bad stats and are difficult to hide (stealth could be reduced to make it just impossible to hide). For further alleviation of this possible issue, ships could not be build in planets with happiness<5 (or <10, whatever we find good for balance).
Related threads:
viewtopic.php?f=28&t=11625
Another alternative:
swaq wrote: ↑Tue Apr 28, 2020 4:24 pm Although I voted for the last option here I think it is not possible to get rid of the colony base hull without either making a new colony base hull in disguise (cheap, low speed, low structure) or making early colonization significantly more expensive. If the colony base hull kludge is to be removed from the game I think it should be replaced by a new mechanic for in-system colonization. For example, a cheap building that when complete brings up the Colonize/Place Outpost option on planets in the same system.
As far as shipyards go I'm fine with removing them as long as something like the happiness requirement is added (makes sense for a population to refuse to build new ships when they refuse to repair ones) and the build time for the various shipyard upgrade buildings are reconsidered. Though I think this can be considered as a separate issue from the removal of the base colony hull.
