Cruiser Command

Upgrades is already frequently used in combat, without the shield switching upgrade. So adding shield upgrades would make "a person sitting on upgrades, solely for the purchase of shields"? Are they suddenly just not going to purchase any other upgrades in combat anymore? Additionally, many upgrades are purchased outside of combat, so why would shields have to be purchased in combat?

Alternatively, Science is not frequently used in combat by a human, but putting it on Science would create "a person sitting on [a console], solely for the purchase of shields".

Also, you seem to be talking about the purchasing of shields. What about activation of shields? You think this should be on Science too? (not arguing here, still just trying to understand what you are proposing)

I was thinking a good model would be to have the purchasing of the shield upgrades to be on... well... Upgrades...
And then the activation to be on Power.
This avoids the exact issue Siretu brought up of "several semi-combat consoles".
But, as I've said before, I would be fine with part of it (purchasing?, activation?) to be on Science as long as AI can do it; ie, you can tell the AI specifically which shield to purchase or activate in the AI console, that way you don't have to go over to science and sit through the cooldowns/purchasing time. But I think having both purchasing AND activation on Science is a bit much...

Oh, the reason I was arguing for purchasing to happen on science console is because people were arguing about having "purchasing" be the means of activation. If that was to be the case, it would be similar to yamato and I think it would fit better on the science console.

If there is a separate purchase and activation (which I would prefer) it completely makes sense to have purchase be on upgrades and activation on science or power.

The reason I'd prefer to have it on science instead of power is both what I explained before and because it would further increase the required skill of the power console.

(EDIT: I changed the last sentence to reflect what I actually meant. I want to have it on science instead of power. Not the other way around.)

Siretu wrote: having "purchasing" be the means of activation

oooh okay. I can think of a couple of ways this would work, but I don't like either of them.

What I was suggesting is exactly what you said in the last 2 lines.

Siretu wrote: If there is a separate purchase and activation (which I would prefer) it completely makes sense to have purchase be on upgrades and activation on science or power.

The reason I'd prefer to have it on power instead of science is both what I explained before and because it would further increase the required skill of the power console.

I agree with you on the first part, but not so much the second - why do we want to further increase the skill required of the power console? as Degra put it, "one must have a minimum of 200 rep to be adequate on power" - do we really want to make it even more noob-unfriendly?

_My bad_, I meant to say "The reason I'd prefer to have it on science instead of power."

I want to make science into a viable combat console. I don't want to add more stuff to power, since it already has a high skill requirement. With those thoughts in mind, the only thing that makes sense is to add shields to science.

Putting it on science now creates a "semi combat console", which is exactly what no one wants. I suppose the positive side, however, is that if you plan to add more combat relevant abilities to Science in the future, this lays the groundwork.

Exactly. Semi-combat consoles are often a bit hard to avoid if you're trying to make a console into a combat console. I think it's the best way to do it though.

Ahh okay, I'm all for it being on Science then.

maybe we can move the tractor beam to science as well then

The way I see it, Science is already a 'semi-combat console' -- only it's in a simple enough state that a drone can man it.