There hasn’t been a Merchantman post for hours and hours and I’m losing my mind, so here’s the thing that’s foremost on my mind regarding this ship (and many of yours, I suspect):
Which way will the Merchantman go?
- It’ll stay a size that justifies its current price
- It’ll increase to a size that justifies all its stats and goals
There’s an argument for both, and of course I know which way I’d like it to go (#2 – duh). So I’m going to lay out both arguments as I understand them:
1. For the first, there are going to be a LOT of disappointed people. Really, no matter what happens with this ship, I think if it’s not the size of a Bengal and armed like a Kingship (however that is), some people will be disappointed, but I’m not talking about them.
The belief here is that at its entry price of $250, along with a size that’s equivalent to the Starfarer, that the Merchantman will stay small, and that the listed stats (as the webpage warns) are flat-out wrong.
I could see this being the case, and CIG raising the price slightly as they zero in on what, exactly, this ship is (+ alien premium).
2. This one goes with the belief that the Merchantman will be THE pinnacle trade ship [note: TRADE ship, not hauler – that’s obviously the Hull E], much as the Carrack is the pinnacle explorer, etc. In other words, it’s an end-game ship – once you have a Merchantman, you’ve got the best ship for that role.
In this belief, the Merchantman is a blockade runner, a fast ship, a huge trader, and so on. It has a lot of features packed in there, along with an internal cargo capacity that’s larger than that of the hauler-dedicated Hull C. In this view, the Merchantman HAS to grow, and not just a little bit, but a lot.
The Hull C is listed as 104m long while the BMM is 100m. Especially since the cargo is internal, that suggests a big, big ship; the “largest that can land on a planet” (which also isn’t true as evidenced by the landing gear on the Javelin – and the BMM won’t be that big no matter how many people wish for it).
3. I could see it being somewhere in between these two: the stats and purposes shrinking to a more focused level, but growing size-wise (and price-wise) to match a more upper-tier ship.
The Carrack is 123m long (ALLEGEDLY) and I could easily see the BMM bulking up to that, if not a little larger (135m sounds more likely). This is especially true given the Merchantman’s colossally porky 811,395kg UNLADEN mass (compared to the “larger” 180,000kg Carrack).
So what do you think? Which way will CIG jump with this one?