Standardize/Normalize Drop Pods

[evandorf]

This applies mostly to 3rd party ships but I can see a use case for the Horizon itself. It would make a good deal of sense for the eventual NBT2 ship as well.

3rd party ships often have a single crew member and if they are incapacitated while away with that ship's shuttle then other crew that wake up after have no way of retrieving the fallen or the shuttle. It also makes sense for other quick deploy scenarios.

We'd have to alter their mechanics slightly. IIRC the current working drop pods only have a few set destinations on the Horizon zlevels, but once that is ironed out it should really only be a mapping issue.

[Fyni]

Perhaps unrelated, but I'd love to see Horizon drop pods to send a crew member to an away site in an emergency, or to send cargo down too.

[evandorf]

1 hour ago, Fyni said:

Perhaps unrelated, but I'd love to see Horizon drop pods to send a crew member to an away site in an emergency, or to send cargo down too.

This is a pie-in-the-sky scenario but it would be wild to have the ops elevator shaft be sealed against void and you could load it up and drop the bottom out to send emergency shipments down on what would essentially be a 4-tile drop pod.

The airlocks would need a bolting system to keep people from venting the ship but it would be neat.