Shipyard

Shipyards are Space Station based system that allows players to not only design ships but mass produce them from a blueprint.

Overview

Shipyards are large, Space Station-exclusive systems that are used to design, build, repair and deconstruct ships with ease.

Construction

Shipyards are constructed of Shipyard Computers, Shipyard Modules, and Shipyard Core Anchors. The computer, as with any other system computer, must have all of the Shipyard Modules slaved to it, as well as the Shipyard Core Anchor. A shipyard is only valid if the Shipyard Modules form a C shape, with both "ends" of the C being straight across from each other. A player can build as many or as few C-shaped sections as they want without affecting the function of a shipyard, provided that they are lined up. The Shipyard Core Anchor can be placed anywhere within the perimeter of a Shipyard, but it is important that there are no solid blocks near it and that it is sufficiently spaced from the edges of the Shipyard to allow space for ships to take up.

Designing a Ship

Shipyards use a special type of item, Designs, to function. They are similar to blueprints, and can be interchanged with blueprints through the use of the Shipyard Computer's functions. To create a new ship, use the Create New Design function. This will create a blank design with a virtual ship core at the position of the Shipyard Core Anchor. Blocks cannot be placed on the virtual ship except in build mode. The virtual ship is almost identical in function to a normal ship, except for a few important aspects:

- The virtual ship cannot be edited except in build mode.

- The virtual ship cannot be undocked(however, use of Flight Mode without undocking is permitted, e.g. to test logic blocks)

- The virtual ship has a hologram-styled shader applied to all of its blocks.

- When editing the virtual ship, regardless of permissions, the player uses a Creative Mode inventory.

Test Sector

The Test Sector is a virtual space in which a Design can be tested. Although it would seem to be a special sector, it is not. It takes its surroundings from a specific location in System 0,0,0. As such, if there is a Pirate Station near the specific location, it can cause problems when testing. Nominally, there would be no such Pirate Station present, and the player would be able to spawn in enemies of their choosing to fight or spawn static armored/shielded targets.

It should be noted that, although it is assured that use of the Test Sector imparts no penalty on the player, death while in the Test Sector results in respawning at the player's most recently-activated Undeathinator. This can be problematic for some players who forgot to set their spawn point at their far-out base.

Mass Production

Assuming that all the necessary materials to construct ships are present in the Shipyard Computer's inventory(which can be expanded with the use of Cargo Space), ships can be constructed, undocked, and reconstructed at a very fast pace. The Shipyard will, regardless of size, place up to 2,500 blocks per tick, meaning that a ship would have to be massive to take more than a couple minutes to be fully constructed. Most small ships, such as drones, take only a few seconds to be constructed. In the Shipyard Computer, there is an option to undock the newly-constructed ship, so that all you have to do is move the new ship out of the way before re-loading and re-constructing the design again. When used properly, Shipyards can produce entire fleets of AI-controlled ships in a very short period of time.

Repairing

Shipyards can also be used to repair damaged ships or update mass-produced ships to a new standard. This is done through a function of the Shipyard Computer, which basically deconstructs the ship and reconstructs it according to a design. This design does not have to bear any resemblance to the original ship. Repairing, as it completely deconstructs the ship and builds it again, resets any hotbar configurations that the user may have saved.

Deconstructing

Ships can dock to a Shipyard Core Anchor as they would with any other Rail, but with a notable difference. They must (counter-intuitively) have a Rail Docker somewhere on the ship, but the position of the Rail Docker does not influence where the ship actually docks to the Core Anchor. Instead, as when creating or loading designs, the ship is docked with the Ship Core at the position of the Shipyard Core Anchor.

Functions of the Shipyard Computer can be used to deconstruct a docked ship and save it to a design, or simply deconstruct without saving the design. This can be used to rapidly disassemble unused AI fleets or drones.