Airship building

[Aeyis]

I guess I got unlucky with the voyage. Our first one only gave 24 crystals in each zone.

[Mini_Me]

We constructed our ship with all HQ materials the whole way through 100%. We acheived Excellent condition twice, but we have no point of reference to compare anything to at this time. Our second ship is under construction currently. We also did a level 2 Aetherial Wheel but used NQ for that since its a furnishing anyway.

[SeraviEdalborez]

The problem I'm seeing is that there is currently no option to actually ASSEMBLE an airship after your first. Despite claims that we can build up to 4. Is it locked by airship level (IE, need to get one to say 10/20/30 to unlock more airship slots), schematics, what?

We have the ability to make Invincible parts (6 bamboo weave on the schmatic board to research, airship level 5 needed to equip), but there is no option to put together our 2nd set of Bronco parts into another airship.

[Pterois]

doesn't the whole HQ thing affect that final stats on the piece?

[BonzaiFerroni]

doesn't the whole HQ thing affect that final stats on the piece?

It does not, the stats are independent of what conditions you get during the phases and your quality rating. They will be the same every time!

[Sigmakan]

Just a heads up, there is a "capacity" to the Airship in regards to what components you can add. Ours is rank 5 and has a capacity of 17. Each base level airship component takes up 3 capacity. The next tier takes 6 each.

[Mini_Me]

Hi Guys, do we know yet if you must follow the prototype progression ladder from I to II to III etc, or can you jump straight into IV? I'm already assuming we can't craft a second one straight up, but for the purposes of upgrading the first ship, can we skip tiers?

[SeraviEdalborez]

You can jump but you'd need to get the parts for the schematic board which you will probably not obtain out of order.

[Mini_Me]

From what we're seeing there appears to be the ability to skip prototype tiers, but you cant make a complete set of parts and build a whole new airship because you're restricted by component capacity(?). So in order to upgrade your ship completely it appears we need to buy the next step up and craft four new parts, upgrade the existing ship in full after it reaches a rank that grants enough component capacity. Skipping tiers means you have to rank up a lot further before all parts can fit within the component capacity restricion.

Please tell me if this is correct and/or makes any sense.

[hqdm]

From what we're seeing there appears to be the ability to skip prototype tiers, but you cant make a complete set of parts and build a whole new airship because you're restricted by component capacity(?). So in order to upgrade your ship completely it appears we need to buy the next step up and craft four new parts, upgrade the existing ship in full after it reaches a rank that grants enough component capacity. Skipping tiers means you have to rank up a lot further before all parts can fit within the component capacity restricion.

Please tell me if this is correct and/or makes any sense.

You can skip tiers, yes.
You can craft whatever prototype whenever you have the mats. It's a separate system than the actual airship ventures. You can also trade/sell the airship components once crafted.
But ultimately, ability to equip components is limited by capacity, which is defined by what rank it is.

What's unknown is:
- do we get more airship slots at higher ranks, to be able to send out multiple airships concurrently.
- if some materials are indirectly limited by components equipped (because your airship won't be able to reach the higher-rank zones on ye olde Bronco parts)

Rank7 unlocks Zone4, which is what's been dropping us Balsa Scrap. That's the only gate for Tier3 ship prototypes, which I think, going by ilvl, is the "Enterprise" series.
To actually construct the components you'll need a bunch of vivianite & red moko grass. Vivianite's common, but red moko not so much currently. As they're airship venture mats only, there's another time gate on waiting for favorable rng to supply these.

I don't think capacity will ever be a problem with skipping tiers, as you'll get the ranks while you wait for the component materials. The materials themselves will likely be the largest time gate. Not skipping tiers, while more expensive mat-wise, may be more efficient in the long run if the increased stats mean decreased time required to venture.
Atm ours is rank9, still using Bronco, and it's about 30h per trip. I only see this increasing in the future higher/further zones are discovered, -if- there's not a hardcap on how far the crappy tier1 airships can go, based on fuel distance or something.

regardless of stance on hq vs nq, the biggest argument to be made for hqing your crappy mats is to potentially cut down on the airship mats required by proccing excellent or outstanding.