MeorrreiCorp, Koensayr-Meorrrei, and more!

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Trying to put out a few feelers here. Basically, I have written Taataani's business out in a few threads, and like any entrepeneur, I'm looking to aggressively expand into new markets, especially ship building. Is there any sort of shenanigans I should adhere to in order to create new ships? I don't see her as having anything major like military contracts, but wouldn't be surprised if she had a few armed options in the catalogue

[Travis North]

Have a clear purpose for your designs with the appropriate functions figured into the build. A common standard when creating new ships.

You'd be surprised how quickly the ideas come together and you're left picking and choosing what you want a ship to have. Starting an industry with this process is great because you can establish your R&D division as having things well underway with a variety of ships to market.

You just have to keep in mind who will makes up the majority of the market you enter and what types of ships those people are wanting to purchase, preferably in bulk.

Then it's just a matter of allocating time and resources, which at the civilian/commercial levels are in relatively infinite supply - unlike the stuff used in military grade ships.

That about all I can think of, right now.
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[Cayle Briggs]

Definitely keep in mind who you are selling to. If you create 1500 meter long ships, then basically you are selling to a major faction... and the rebels don't have money right now.

Making smaller ships suites a variety of people. Also being Cizerack would mean that some of your species' biases come into play.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Cizerack don't really have biases if customers have credits though ;)

[Cayle Briggs]

After reading the wiki bio of Cizerack, I saw that they hate smugglers and pirates. Would that dislike of them keep you from selling to them. Also, if you sale to them, would you allow them to enter your space to buy the ships or have to set up a "Space Lot" outside of your territory in order to sell them.

Actually I do have an idea to run by you if you go through with it.

[Keerrourri Feessaarro]

The Cizerack treat smugglers and pirates as enemies of the state, because they're a mercantile state like the Trade Federation, Banking Clan, etc. The official channels certainly wouldn't do business with them unless it was for very good reason.

What sort of idea you got?

[Oisin Ocasta]

I guess it depends.

As long as it's not Cizerack customs charges that the smugglers are trying to evade, they might not necessarily be opposed to selling to them: after all, it's not like they're going to try and tax dodge when they buy the ship in the first place.

To be honest though, how many smugglers are going to wander up to a ship retailer, and openly admit that's what they're buying the ship for?

[Sanis Prent]

Precisely. As long as you can make a good front about it, and as long as you're dealing with somebody who isn't looking that hard into it, you can probably get away with it if you're not being dumb about that sort of thing.

[Cayle Briggs]

I'm thinking of making my Galactic Shipwrights company as a "non official" organization. What if we contract to build some of the ships together? Or I could be the neutral party to sell your ships to the more "non desirable" clients

[Taataani Meorrrei]

That's a possibility. What scope did you have for Galactic Shipwrights? I don't really plan on MeorrreiCorp being a group by any means, it's a plot effect around the (albeit very influential) Meorrrei family, but I don't want to get too bogged into the mire. Even Madam Meorrrei herself probably couldn't tell what a repulsordrive looked like if one was sitting in front of her. She has people to do that for her. She's Queen Capitalism, more or less.

I could see a few possibilities really. If GSW operates in a core-centric or Imperial market, she could certainly license out MeorrreiCorp products for production closer to the Empire, much the same way that Daimler builds Mercedes SUV's within a few miles of my rural Alabama home.

The other possibility is that they compete. I'm all for this prospect too, because Taataani's very ruthless.

[Captain Untouchable]

That's a possibility. What scope did you have for Galactic Shipwrights? I don't really plan on MeorrreiCorp being a group by any means, it's a plot effect around the (albeit very influential) Meorrrei family, but I don't want to get too bogged into the mire. Even Madam Meorrrei herself probably couldn't tell what a repulsordrive looked like if one was sitting in front of her. She has people to do that for her. She's Queen Capitalism, more or less.

I could see a few possibilities really. If GSW operates in a core-centric or Imperial market, she could certainly license out MeorrreiCorp products for production closer to the Empire, much the same way that Daimler builds Mercedes SUV's within a few miles of my rural Alabama home.

The other possibility is that they compete. I'm all for this prospect too, because Taataani's very ruthless.

Extending the car metaphor further, there are various models of modern car that are practically the same, built in the same factory, but have a couple of cosmetic differences and a different badge slapped on. It might be interesting to see identical ships but with slightly different finishes, names, etc, for sale in different markets - one brand selling to the Independents, on to Imperial markets, one to the Hutts... etc.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

As a Ford owner, I like that analogy! :)

[Aura Kolar]

Extending the car metaphor further, there are various models of modern car that are practically the same, built in the same factory, but have a couple of cosmetic differences and a different badge slapped on. It might be interesting to see identical ships but with slightly different finishes, names, etc, for sale in different markets - one brand selling to the Independents, on to Imperial markets, one to the Hutts... etc.

Like the C.E.C. Strident Class was the same thing as the Mon Cal Viscount, same ship since it was a joint venture, but different names.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Got another question here. Any issues with MeorrreiCorp buying out Koensayr? Kinda want to make a subsidiary called Koensayr-Meorrrei.

[Park Kraken]

Have to talk to the Alliance about that, since they buy Y-wings from Koeynsar.

Funny you should mention shipbuilding though, since that was included in the plans I had for Mustafar in the other thread. =D

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Koensayr is better-known for just being a giant parts manufacturer than from their Y-wing stuff, so it makes sense to control that company and use that to get access into different markets by economy of scale.

But yeah, talking to Jace about it who seems receptive.

[Oisin Ocasta]

Indeed I am receptive! I am a recepticle. :angel

Care to share your plans with the class, Park? There are a bunch of us involved with the constructiony development type side of things; it'd probably make sense to make some effort towards not tripping over and contradicting each other's plans. :)

[Park Kraken]

Well basically I take my alliance character, set up a small garrison on Mustafar, and re-activate the Sep Droids leftover there. We get a materials manufacturing going, and while that's happening, a base is set up in a nearby but desolate system.

Basically the procedure goes as outlined in one of the NJO Novels: A droid builds a factory to build more droids, those droids build different factories to build different kinds of droids, then from there it telescopes into mining, processing, manufacturing, and production of starships.

Mustafar has a lot of the raw materials needed for starship construction. Basically a 'Hidden' Alliance Shipyard would be built there, but any starships constructed there would be sent to the new base in the nearby system instead of straight to the front lines.

Commerce raiding activites undertaken would help to get the other materials needed for useful for starship construction.

I plan to start out with starfighters and armaments, and work my way up to escort and frigate sized vessels.

[Captain Untouchable]

Hmm. An interesting notion.

What kind of starfighters, starships, etc are you planning on building? Existing designs, or new ones? Some of us are planning on RPing out Koensayr, Incom, and SoroSuub type stuff, so we'd have to work out how that would factor in, and all that jazz.

Definately like the idea of rekindling the mining and processing on Mustafar, though. Ain't like anyone else is making use if the resources there! :)

[Park Kraken]

I thought about starting out with Uglies, called Y-TIEs, that married a Y-wing fuselage with the wings of a TIE Interceptor (the former would be manufactured or recovered from battle debris, the latter would jacked in a freighter shipment of wings enroute from a parts manufacturer to a starfighter production plant).

After building about fifty of those puppies, we would be experienced enough to move up to perhaps A-wing production, then shuttle production, then a homegrown gunship design, and the culmination would be the B2 Escort Frigate (of which we should already have several in our possession).

Also, I think it would be neat if our facility was the one to eventually develop and start manufacturing of the E-wing.

[Captain Untouchable]

The E-Wing is something that we're looking at developing through RP - a couple of us are planning to play Incom developers / designers, so part of our intended arc is to develop the E-Wing. We were also thinking that the grander scheme could bring about the V-Wing (and ultimately K-Wing).

I like the Uglies idea. With the DYE-Wing in particular, having Koensayr-Meorrei onboard means that we wouldn't necessarily have to jack the shipment of wings: we can come up with some sort of arrangement with KM. Or, we could "fake" the jacking I suppose - Taa puts the parts we need on a freighter, flies it from A to B, and we snag it in the middle.

Further to that, maybe we could secure some sort of licence with KM, so that we're able to produce full Y-Wings as well? That might be a good precedent to eventually make it a production facility for the K-Wing, perhaps.

A-Wing production is a good idea too. They used to be built all haphazard in various different locations, all with whatever parts were available. We've sorta been assuming that Mon Cal has started churning out a "standard" version, while Sullust is producing the A2: having a production facility for 'em on Mustafar would be a very good idea.

With regards to larger ships: have you considered throwing in a few CEC numbers, like the CR90 Corvette and the DP20 Gunship? One of my Captains (Soto Terius) is a former designer / developer from CEC, and he has a brother as well - could potentially roll out the brother as someone for you to interact with, who helps on that front.

That gives us a nice balance between what's being built at Sullust, Mon Calamari, and Mustafar I think: and means we can get a nice, dynamic political aspect to R&D going on. :)

[Park Kraken]

Actually, the Y-wing was superseded to a point by the B-wing, but they aren't available in large numbers, so perhaps Mustafar can partner with the Verpines in producing additional B-wings at a plant located there. That would give us valuable additional punch against Imperial capital ships as well.

And I wasn't talking about jacking the Y-wing fuselages, but the TIE Interceptor wings that would be the second part of the shipment, something that isn't produced by Koensyar. I was thinking of taking a freighter that would be transporting one hundred of the wings to a finishing plant for TIE Interceptor production, and mounting them on the fuselages of the Y-wings for a production run of fifty or so Y-TIEs. Dye-Wings are already taken, named for marrying a TIE Ball cockpit to the Y-wing engine nacelles, so I'm using Y-TIEs for this fighter's designation.

The Y-TIEs would need a new form of propulsion, though. Perhaps as a prelude to A-wing production, if we wanted to go down that path, would be to build A-wing engines and mount them in the rear of the Y-wing, shuffling the astromech forward to replace the rear gunner seat? That would give this new Ugly type good speed in addition to improving the manueverability.

[Park Kraken]

The groundwork writing will begin tomorrow night, and I should have a sizeable thread up by this time next week. When I said a homegrown gunship design btw, I was thinking of the DP-20 Gunship, just slightly modified as needed.

[Captain Untouchable]

Actually, the Y-wing was superseded to a point by the B-wing

That's not entirely true. Granted, the B-Wing has superceded the Y-Wing in terms of starship assault, but their design makes them pretty rubbish as planetary bombers. The Y-Wing would still be a useful craft to have around, particularly for ground support missions.

Personally, I'd prefer to keep the B-Wings rare - for now, at least. Producing B-Wings is the only thing that Slayn & Korpil do at the moment: might be better to have a bit more variety in what is getting produced in different locations, just to give the respective players something unique to bring to the table, etc.

Re: the uglies - I got what you were proposing backwards in my head. Might be worth bearing the Toscan 8-Q (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Toscan_8-Q_starfighter) in mind as possible inspiration for your Y-TIE. Since we're having a production facility, we can build a new fuselage, rather than having to hack up a Y-Wing fuselage.

[Park Kraken]

My mind is overloaded right now with different ideas and designs, and its beginning to become frazzled thinking each of them through. There is just so much you can do with different designs.

I'm thinking or leaning right now towards doing a dedicated A-wing production facility, and perhaps a bomber variant of the A-wing where the engines are reduced to one, and two small bomb bays either side of the single engine are installed. Carrying capacity would perhaps be six proton bombs or four space bombs.

Matter of fact, I went ahead and drew up a picture of it. Basic stats, after looking online, would be;

Length: 9.6 meters
Width: 6.48 meters
Armament:
2 Laser Cannons
2 Concussion Missle Launchers (6 Missiles each)
2 Bomb Bays (4 Heavy Rockets or 6 Proton Bombs, etc)
Speed: 85 MGLT
Shield: 50 SBD
Hull: 15 RU
Hyperdrive: 1.0 Past Lightspeed

[Captain Untouchable]

It's a novel idea, but I'm afraid as a former physics undergrad, I have to point out a couple of flaws in your logic.

First of all, you haven't reduced the mass of the design (you've taken out an engine, sure, but you've added in the bomb bays and added payload, so that probably balances out), and yet you've halved the thrust. Simple physics says that you'd pretty much halve the speed: that would give you 60 MGLT, not 85.

Second, by shifting to a single, central point of thrust, you create a much more unstable craft. You won't be able to vary the thrust in one thruster or another in order to perform easy yaw manoeuvres, and if you read up on the A-Wing itself, there's actually a degree of vectored exhaust going on there as well.

In essence, you've crippled the speed and agility of your craft, which are the two selling points of an A-Wing. Even with your over-estimate of speed, it's still only marginally faster than a Y-Wing, and has considerably worse weapons and armour.

Like I say, it's a novel idea, and it's just my $0.02, but I'm not sure how it's an improvement over the existing designs we already have. :\

[Parack Bell]

(stands ready to underwrite more than a few of these clever business plans)

[Gallus Tagge]

Perhaps we ought to talk Madam Meorrrei.

[Park Kraken]

It's a novel idea, but I'm afraid as a former physics undergrad, I have to point out a couple of flaws in your logic.

First of all, you haven't reduced the mass of the design (you've taken out an engine, sure, but you've added in the bomb bays and added payload, so that probably balances out), and yet you've halved the thrust. Simple physics says that you'd pretty much halve the speed: that would give you 60 MGLT, not 85.

Second, by shifting to a single, central point of thrust, you create a much more unstable craft. You won't be able to vary the thrust in one thruster or another in order to perform easy yaw manoeuvres, and if you read up on the A-Wing itself, there's actually a degree of vectored exhaust going on there as well.

In essence, you've crippled the speed and agility of your craft, which are the two selling points of an A-Wing. Even with your over-estimate of speed, it's still only marginally faster than a Y-Wing, and has considerably worse weapons and armour.

Like I say, it's a novel idea, and it's just my $0.02, but I'm not sure how it's an improvement over the existing designs we already have.

Firstly, we could probably replace the single engine with the drive unit from a B-wing class starfighter, and therefore have four engines and 100 MGLT worth of thrust power, without too many problems. It'd be a snug fit, but I think it'd work nicely.

Secondly, the little slabs on the rear of the bomb bays? Those are actually fins (the actual chutes are directly under the bomb bays, which you can't see from the topside view), to help give it a degree of restoration concerning balancing.

Thirdly, anytime something in regards to the bolded section gets mentioned when talking about designing Sci-Fi ships....|I

[Captain Untouchable]

Thirdly, anytime something in regards to the bolded section gets mentioned when talking about designing Sci-Fi ships....|I

My appologies for trying to offer the benefit of my knowledge and experience. And here was me thinking that "common sense" was the governing rule here on Fans. :\

I think the craft - as you propose it - is overpowered, for all of the reasons I stated.

[Park Kraken]

My appologies for trying to offer the benefit of my knowledge and experience. And here was me thinking that "common sense" was the governing rule here on Fans. :\

I think the craft - as it stands - is overpowered, for all of the reasons I stated.

My apologies, I wasn't rejecting your critique outright, that degree statement just reminded me of a rather unpleasenent and long lived arguement on TRF about R&D where a few select younger members kept insisting that they were right since they had certain degrees concerning engineering and etc, that no one else had.

[Captain Untouchable]

It's not my intention to use it to prove that I'm "right" - just merely to put my statements in context. Didn't want you to think I was making up arbetrary crap just to nitpick the idea. ;)

With all due, though: just because someone is a "younger member" doesn't mean they know less than you. Having studied to degree level in a particular field, there's actually a good chance that they actually do know what they're talking about. :mneh

[Taataani Meorrrei]

As a former engineer-turned-banker, I believe I shall say "ugggh let me just pay somebody else to worry about the designs"

[Dasquian Belargic]

As a literature graduate, I think you will find I am the most qualified to talk bullshit and nonsense :cool

[Droo]

As a geordie, I think you will find I am the most qualified to talk bullshit and nonsense :cool

:mischief &nbsp;

[Elaine Alastor]

As a scouser, let me say, go ahead and design your ship, put up your money to build your ship, and say whatever you want to say about how great your ship is, but the moment you leave it parked unattended for five minutes in Mos Liverpool, I'll have all the copper wiring in it yanked out and nicked for a coupla quid

all too easy

[Amés Falcon Liszt]

It's a good job that starfighters aren't typically reliant on wheels to function. :rolleyes

[Park Kraken]

The main function of Mustafar was to produce escort capital ships, like the DP-20 Gunship, the CR-90 Corvette, and the B2 Escort Frigate, all modified as needed for Alliance duty.

[Travis North]

TRAITOR!
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[Rinzai Terius]

In that case, allow me to volunteer my assistance. I spent the last few decades working for the Corellian Engineering Corporation; my brother and I were part of the design team that developed the Vanguard c20 (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Vanguard_c20_retrofit_suite) suite, and I've personally spent the last twenty years or so working on pretty much every Corellian keel under three hundred meters.

I would be more than happy to lend my time and assistance to your escort development, once you've got yourself all established on Mustafar. :)

[Anne Phoenix]

I would be more than happy to lend my time and assistance to your escort development, once you've got yourself all established on Mustafar.

Ok sounds good. That'll be a little ways down the road, but we should be able to get you involved within a couple of weeks.


TRAITOR!

Like your one to talk. I'm just too lazy to constantly log in and out between different accts is all. :p