Spaceships

Ah, what would we do without the pleasures of modern faster than light spaceships? They ferry us to the stars in their protective shells and make modern interstellar civilization possible. To a Captain a ship is like a sweet nectar of life. They cannot go without, lest they perish in the dark cold night of space.

Spaceship Stats
Spaceships have a number of stats that signify their abilities. While the concept of "larger number equals better ship" holds true for Prospector ships, it is still useful to know what those numbers actually do. Remember, the stats you see for the hulls in the shop are maximums, to utilise your ship's potential you have to buy the nessecary upgrades.

Hull Points
Also known as HP, Hull Points reflect the structural integrity and hardiness of a ship, if it reaches zero the ship goes boom and everybody in it dies. Every hull has a maximum number of hull points and every ship has a current number of hull points, which reflect the status of the hull at the time. Hull points can be replenished by repairing your ship at a spacestation, which costs 100Cr per HP. When you buy a new hull, hull points do not fill up to the new maximum by themselves, so remember to leave some credits over for repairs when you upgrade.

Shields
Shields are like a regenerating protective skin for your ship. It protects your HP allowing you to take more punishment and even shrug off weak attacks. Shield slowly regenerate 1 point every combat turn and instantly come back to full strength after combat. Its possible to augment the rate shields regenerate by installing a auxillary shield generator in a turret module. Be warned however, shields don't always hold water, from time to time enemy attacks will prenetate your shields and directly damage the hull.

Engine
The engine is what makes the ship move from point A to B. The more powerful the engine the faster the ship in combat and the easier it is for the pilot to maneuver the ship without damaging it. Engines can be damaged in combat and thus permanently downgraded, so keep tabs if you've been in combat.

Sensors
Sensors, a science officers can use them to scan planets, asteroids and gas giants. In combat they determine the extent of your line of sight. With a Ship detection system, they determine the range at which you can see other ships, fleets and derelicts on the main map. They also help the gunner in aiming your ship to ship weapons. Sensors can be damaged in combat and thus permanently downgraded, so keep tabs if you've been in combat.

Crew
Crew space sets the number of people that can travel with the ship, this includes you and your crew plus security.

Cargobays
Number of cargobay is the number of tons of cargo your ships can carry.

Weapon turrets
This tells you how many weapons your dreadnaught can fit. Every weapon takes up one turret. In addition, you can convert turrets into more space for cargo, crew or fuel and you can also install special devices in them instead of weapons. Anything mounted on a turret can be destroyed in combat.

Fuelcapacity
The size of your gas tank. Since all ships require the same amount of fuel in prospector, probably because Mister Newton fell asleep, the fuelcapacity of your ship determines how far you can go before you're stranded in space with no hope for rescue.

Spaceship Hulls
Hulls are the carcass that ships are built around. They create potential for the ship to become what they need to become. Hulls can generaly be divided into four tiers of progressing potential and price.

1st Tier
The hulls in the first tier are of the most basic kind. They're cheap, but offer very little room for upgrades and have the lowest HP.

2nd Tier
These ships are made for the small wallet, and captains who think spending more than 10K on a hull is a waste.

3rd Tier
The biggest ships availiable at spacestations. For even bigger vessels you need a planetside shipyard. (There are rumors that there is a privately operated shipyard out there, who doesn't care about the credentials of their customers)

4th Tier and beyond
Since 4th tier ships are not availiable at spacestations they are presented on a seperate page