I’d originally thought give each ship a number of shuttles based on it’s class/engine nacelles. Excalibur, Hunter, and Lancer (yes, this breaks the pattern) would get one. Phoenix, Horizon, and Viper would get two, and I could see arguments for Raven getting two or three.
Here’s a mock-up for a shuttle. Things to call out in particular. Relative to the Allard FXI, its weapon does half the damage and the cycle rate is twice as long (effective one quarter the damage rate). All the homing torpedoes have been removed. Shields have been slightly increased, but it moves and turns more slowly than the standard TSN fighter.
<vessel uniqueID=”120″ side=”7″ classname=”TSN shuttle Mk.I” broadType=”player fighter”>
<art meshfile=”TSN/fighter.dxs” diffuseFile=”TSN/fighter_color.png” glowFile=”TSN/fighter_glow.png” specularFile=”TSN/fighter_spec.png” scale=”0.06″ pushRadius=”70″ />
<shields front=”30″ back=”30″ player=”240″ />
<!– for fighters, front shield here is actually total HP–>
<performance turnrate=”0.020″ topspeed=”0.6″ shipefficiency=”1.0″ warpefficiency=”1.0″ jumpefficiency=”1.0″ />
<beam_port x=”0″ y=”0″ z=”0″ damage=”0.1″ playerdamage=”1″ arcwidth=”0.1″ cycletime=”1.0″ range=”500″ />
<engine_port x=”-101″ y=”0″ z=”60″ />
<torpedo_storage type=”0″ amount=”0″ />
<!– Type 1 Homing”–>
<long_desc text=”TSN bulk shuttle^Capable of transferring a platoon of marines or up to 100 cubic meters of cargo^Armament: 1 mining beam (can be used for defense in an emergency).” />
</vessel>
As far as the look of the shuttle, I suppose we could just grab one of the existing freighters and scale it down but for the moment I left the skin and wireframe as the TSN fighter for ease of use. The only other change that should be required would be setting any ship that would carry these shuttles to side=7.