Possible solutions to expeditions taking 236 years to set up during events, and some other issues

[Dreamix]

The problem:
There's an event. We are no longer a station, but rather a ship, so it'd be nice to make use of that quality, and have Horizon go out to meet other people, instead of people coming to see Horizon.
But expeditions take approximately 236 years to set up during events. Some time for roundstart setup and everyone to get on. Then command needs to talk to whoever other party.
Then crew needs to assemble at the Intrepid. No matter what expedition this is, probably not everyone can go, and some crew is forced to stay on Horizon and not participate.
The Intrepid needs to actually fly to the other ship or station or planet.
It is maybe something like 00:55 by the time Intrepid arrives at the other ship/station/planet/whatever. Only about an hour at least of actual event things happening.

 

The other, related problem:
There's an event. But it's not happening on Horizon, but instead on some event-only map. It's probably made on a short notice, by a limited number of mappers, and probably not fully functional.
Even if that map is perfect, it's likely not going to accommodate everyone, and someone will have to sit in the bar or whatever and do nothing because they can't do their job as usual, and there's only so many people that can participate in the action.
See the Episode Two: Redocking event.

 

 

Horizon docks to a thing.
As simple as that. Whether it is a space station or some other big ship or whatever.

 

 

...the thing has a free-use elevators or shuttles.
Same as previous thing, but! What if it had some free-use elevators, or shuttles, or even an actual space elevator?
So crew could freely use them, to go to some other place and back, without needing half an hour to prepare Intrepid crew, and allowing more than just one expedition team to participate.
Elevators or shuttles could be used to go to a bigger station or whatever, on a different map/z-level, so it wouldn't all need to be crammed on the Horizon map.

And an actual space elevator? Very cool and scifi concept. Basically a super huge and long elevator, connecting a planet's surface to some space station above it.
This would allow people to just freely go down to a planet, and back to Horizon. Awesome.
Wouldn't transit time be super long, since it's like a million kilometers ride? Handwave it with bluespace or something.

 

 

...teleporters???
Wait, did I just say bluespace? Teleporters use bluespace I'm sure. So... Why not like, have a big teleporter to go down between the planet and Horizon?
Say it's very cheap, cause it's calibrated and specifically made to go between a space station that Horizon docked to, and that planet.

 

 

Why couldn't big ships dock to us?
Imagine the Episode Two: Redocking event, but instead of it happening on some random station, FSF and SFA would instead both dock to Horizon, with their whole big ships.
The stakes would be infinitely higher, and security definitely would put up a fight at the environment they are very familiar with, instead of just letting the SFA march past them without putting up a fight

 

 

Using the hangars bays as docking ports.
Just like remove the Intrepid, temporarily, and set up some kind of staging or resupply area, or whatever else.
Or maybe have the thing dock to the other hangar bays, where the ops shuttle docks, or the two others.

 

Really wild idea ahead: Horizon LANDS on a exoplanet.
This is really wild, yes, I know. Maybe jetpacks would have to be removed so they are not absolutely breaking the balance.

 

 

Technicalities:
Okay so like. Relating to Horizon docking to things. There's no need for new mechanics to make Horizon work like a shuttle, and move to navpoints on other maps or whatever.
The Horizon map could just be remapped to have added new "static" things, with Horizon itself being "grounded" and immovable.
Or even, it could be "reversed" - Everyone is told that Horizon docks to a space station, but actually, in the mechanics, the space station is actually a ship that has docked to Horizon itself.
But just that admins emote Horizon approaching to the station, and we roleplay it as so.

Also the images above are mockups and super simple examples.

 

 

But why
Dunno tbh. I've been thinking about ideas like these for a while now, but they're like, too big to discuss on the discord.

Edited September 30, 2022 by Dreamix

[Captain Gecko]

The Horizon landing is... A bit wild. As far as I know, it's not even made for atmospheric flight. The using the hangars as airlock also sounds like a recipee for incidents.

The other propositions however? I'm all for it. For events or not it sounds like a good thing in any case. +1

[Owen]

I think that all these ideas are worthwhile to at least consider using for future events. Could very possibly solve a lot of the issues we've been seeing in the past since moving over to the Horizon. Not to mention, I think it does make things a lot more interesting. Not certain about the whole landing on planets, but I mean--if we can justify it our heads and it wouldn't be too much work for devs to implement, I'd be all for whatever. 

[greenjoe]

Even if the horizon did land on a planet, the hanger couldn't be used as an exit to ground level because of the residential levels below

[Alberyk]

We kinda have the solution which is to use the event maps we have, like it was done with other events. Way faster than transfering people around.