the ships adapt to their location, the closer to edge words the better the ships need to be, sure outcasts have sabres but they only have daggers in liberty

Never thought about it like that. Good point.

What you figure would happen if boarder world outcasts ordered a couple of titans and 5 sabres into liberty and Rheinland outcasts shipped in 10 stilletos

Shigetah shigatah shwa[!

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What you figure would happen if boarder world outcasts ordered a couple of titans and 5 sabres into liberty and Rheinland outcasts shipped in 10 stilletos
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I have no doubt that Liberty would be Border World property if that happened.

" couple of titans and 5 sabres into liberty and Rheinland outcasts shipped in 10 stilletos "

Certainly you can't think 17 fighters is capable of taking out Liberty's seemingly endless number of Dreadnoughts and Cruisers do you? Battleships may be weak presently, but their number will eventually gain the upper hand. That and the large horde of Defenders

It's about play balance. I haven't discovered any in-game reasons for outlaw groups to have better ships. Usually they'll pay top dollar for parts (engines, etc.) imported from industrialized worlds. You'll also note that better ship types radiate out from Liberty - along the same path you'll follow in the SP game as a matter of fact.

In a realistic setting major powers would have access to a better industrial base and would have access to, and a desire to impliment, new technology especially in a setting like Freelancer's in which the major powers tend to mistrust one another.

Even in Star Wars there are explanations for why the Rebels have comperable, if not in some cases superior, technology to the Imperials. One factor is that The Empire was a relatively new phenomenon so individuals and, in some cases, entire corporations and industrial worlds, switched sides. Over time, though, the advances and balance of power would have lain with The Empire. The Empire simply didn't get that much time as its hand was forced by circumstance and hubris. In Freelancer, the disproportion of power supposedly lies with the settled worlds and many, if not all, of the outlaw groups have been well behind the curve for decades if not centuries. If they, in fact, had access to a good industrial and technical base they would be conquering planets not just raiding shipping and running contraband.

It's not at all a deal breaker for me because one can invent explanations (assuming I haven't just missed one that's deeper in the game) - for example, perhaps the old Coalition powers on Earth are covertly supplying high tech and weaponry to the Outcasts and other buccaneers of the fringe? Historically we can see all kinds of proxy wars in which major powers supplied minor powers, or even private individuals (Privateers), with military capacity to harry an opposing power or interest.

I think of it this way:

the reason the ships get stonger as you near the Edge worlds is because the environment gets more and more inhospitable (be it due to radiation or pirates) Therefore, in order to survive in the edge worlds you would need a stronger ship.

Now, as for the Outcasts; "Why don't they just send their Sabres to go and wreak havoc in Liberty?" you ask. The answer is simple- they can't spare them. Te Sabres (and titans in the case of the Corsairs) are needed to protect their homeworld(s) and if they sent all of their sabres elsewhere, they'd get smoked by the BHs in their hammerheads. So the ships are only as strong as their environment requires them to be.

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-From the gates of Heaven to the depths of Hell; one, the Protecter; sees all, knows all, defends the innocent.

I personally would like to see a mod that makes all the ships pretty much equal, though some ships would have a little advantage here and there. (Like Border World ships have more hull, due to radiation. Liberty guns would be tougher, due to the HEAVY pirate problem in the area. Pirate ships would be a little faster, for a quick escape, etc.)

I know DA didn't make the game like that for balance purposes, but a mod would be quite nice, after you've completed the SP game. That would make a use for that sweet looking Defender again (The only reason I don't use it is because it would be the equivalent of a bee stinging a whale)

It's kind of funny that you would use 'a bee stinging a whale'

after I finally worked out my relations with corsairs AND hussians<? Sold my Titan for a Sabre and just about have all cl10 weapons, I flew into Liberty for what I thought would be just sh*ts and giggles.... I got dead.

I'm not a bad pilot but for some reason, maybe circumstances, I ended up having multiple Liberty Rogues, Police, Navy, lane hackers and a few convoy escorts that were near the jump gate all taking shots at me... not to mention the guns on the near by trade lane and jump gate itself all firing...

so many lazers going past me I could hardly see....

was like 10,000 bees stinging a whale

so maybe what balances things out is that what liberty etc lack in individual ship power compared to the border worlds they more then make up for in numbers.

forget the hull breach, what about the FIRE?[!?[!?

Navy ships should ALWAYS beat other ships (interms of stats =P)
think about it.... yeah yeah more hostile enviroment meaning better ships in the border worlds.... BUT what is more hostile? abit of radiation and mines or all out war between kusari/liberty/rheinland/bretonia????
there "might" have been a "few" fighters and battleships destroyed in the nomad crisis... but the funktion is still the same (hehe Juni's ship could take on battleships and fighters ANY day =)

What I mean is, while there is a reason for lesser poor criminals to fly in scrap (xenos =P) and more powerfull and richer ones in better ones.
And even police have limited funds for their local flights, that WORKS....
but the navy of the four nations are clearly too damn nerfed to be ANY threat at all.

The 4 nations were at the brink of war, all of them were powering up for it....
and though they lost some (alot) they technologi is still the same(apart for the
cloaking), and the remaining ships are not lesser ships but the same.

This is what the whole use of jumpwholes in those systems SHOULD be used for....
AVOIDING the navy if they are hostile to you.... not as it is now, just used as a quicker means of transportation.....
in a VHF fully armed and really, you can go anywhere and only doing dumb things or (VERY) bad luck gets you killed...

In SP, the 4 nations were kinda equal in power(storyline), but look at the game...
picture 4 ships dueling 1 on 1 matches... which nation would win? heh

IMHO the 4 nations navy ships should be equally tough and BE tough....
ofcause not the toughest, but alot stronger, as to be challenging....
meeting 5 ships from a nations navy, should make a really tough fight,
and in a VHF like sabre/eagle/titan, it SHOULD make you atleast work abit for it....

and NOMADS!!!! they should be like 5 x harder.. ATLEAST... I mean, no CD's
no shields..... the radiation at the jumpholes pose more of a threat than they do.

"Keep it icy, man .. I dont want to end up a corpse before my time, because YOU were daydreaming[!"

Well, there seems to be a story for the Corsairs that I've just discovered. Ran into a chatty sort on a Freeport. He said that folks often wonder (like us I guess) how Corsairs ships are so tough when they're just made out of parts from old hulks. The secret, says he, is that they learned advanced tech from the artifacts they trade...

That makes sense. I still say it's the way it is for playbalance reasons but getting an edge on tech from artifacts works as well as getting it from the Coalition (my pet theory) and it wouldn't require a deep research or industrial base to maintain. Still, that explains the Corsairs but not the Red Hessians or other toughies. Maybe they have stories too.

Sometimes I wish you can mod your ship in the game. Maybe purchase a better thruster, better turn rates, more cargo holds, bla..bla..bla...

Maybe you are level 100, but you still can get toasted by a horde of liberty rogue in their csv and bloodhound.

Maybe corsairs, hessian and outcast can't spare their ship to figth into liberty, but hey, these are the same pilot who fly kamikaze into mine fields.. Talk about idiocy..

At least, in game modding or customization will make players think twice before just swithcing to another ship, in case they can't find those upgrades anywhere else...

..and I just wonder, where do I buy one of those?...

Of course the border world criminals have better ships. Why wouldn't they?
For a successfull criminal, money is no object. For most government projects, the budget is the big limit. A legitimate shipyard would have regulations and taxes for every nut, bolt and wire on a spacecraft. Their ships would be hellishly expensive. Frontier worlds would tend to be populated by people who don't like big government and would have less costly regulations to hamper innovation.
Also, a crimianl with a lot of money buys 1 or 2 ships. A government buys a bunch of cheaper ones to patrol more territory.

As for seeing the better fighters in the inner systems, you probably wouldn't. If you owned one of these high end fighters that was built for piracy, why would you get close to all those police and military? It's the same sort of convoys that tend to pass through the border worlds near your home base.
The local outcasts wouldn't import many of them since the local bases would tend to be set up to service smaller, lighter fighters. And being a bigger threat makes you a bigger priority for the police and military. (Then the bounty hunters are after you too.)

Shouldn't really be able to own one legitimatly either. Too much weapons/armour/ shields would be frowned upon by the military in the inner systems.

SMS...

I can see both sides of the arguement. Would a common thief in America be able to outclass both the Police and Armed forces? VERY Unlikely. In a Realistic FL universe, this would be true. Yes, the Corsairs and Hessians will be strong, but not strong enough to 0wn the Four houses.

However, if you follow the FL Story Arc, you'll see that having a fighter superior to that of the Criminals would be pointless. You can acquire the Defender early on. Imagine how easy SP would be if the defender was on par with a Titan. See what I mean? DA had to weaken the ships you get early on so that the story line is challenging.