Ships

***Ships*** - or longer *space ships* - are divided into civilian and warships; accordingly, they are mainly needed for transporting goods and combat. They are divided into different ship classes depending on their purpose. From ship size 4, ships can have an officer.

In a broader sense, the term *ship* includes both space constructions that can move independently and space constructions without propulsion (space stations); synonymous with the term in a broader sense is the term *spacecraft*. In a narrower sense, a distinction is made between ships and stations.

Ships can be combined to form fleets.

## Construction and disassembly

Ships can be built on asteroids (Surface Shipyard) and Space Shipyards. In addition to normal goods, ships require a crew at the start of construction as well as a certain number of ticks to build. During the construction period, a ship occupies one to several shipyard slots. The construction time can be extended according to a random factor, should the space shipyards be understaffed. To build large ships, several shipyards must be combined into one shipyard complex.

If you cancel the construction of ships, you will be refunded no resources. Dismantle ships at a shipyard, you get 50 % of the raw materials back - this does not apply to *blueprint ships*. If you destroy ships yourself, you will not be refunded any raw materials. Dismantling attempts to transfer the cargo and crew aboard the ship to the asteroid or dropship. Food in the food storage and modules installed are lost, so modules should be removed manually beforehand. Units and officers should have been transferred before, otherwise they will be lost. Landed and docked ships should be separated from the dismantled ship beforehand.

## Destruction

If a ship is destroyed either by a hostile attack, due to starved crew, or by a damage nebula, the following happens:

* the ship is irretrievably destroyed; the ship ID is erased and never reassigned.
* all resources in the ship cargo are lost
* all food in the food storage is lost
* the officer and any crews such as units die
* all installed modules are lost
* any bookmark is irretrievably deleted
* all docked and landed ships are destroyed
	+ this does not apply to escape pods if the ship is destroyed as a result of combat
	+ if the ship has been destroyed in a battle, the docked/landed ships as well as their mother ship can still act, e.g. fire, within the ongoing tick or battle (exception: sentry guns)
* for ships with shipyard docks: all build orders are lost (exception may be shipyard complexes)

## Crew

Most ships have crews on board. There should always be the maximum number of crew on board. If there is too little crew on board, the functionality of the ship will decrease. From about 90% "undercrew" the ship will be damaged bit by bit (over several ticks) and finally destroyed.

See also units.

## Hull, armor and co.

Ships always have hull, and in some cases ablative armor, armor and shields. Shield protects the ablative armor, ablative armor protects the hull.

If the hull or ablative armor is damaged, the ship can only be repaired in a shipyard. Shields can be recharged, which requires ship energy. If the hull drops below 0, the ship gets destroyed. In contrast to normal hull, ablative armor protects 100% from enemy subsystem damage, such as disruptors.

In addition to hull strength, ablative armor, and shields, most ships also have "armor", perhaps better described as "armor thickness". Each point of armor more reduces the damage the ship takes from enemy missile fire. Also, armor mitigates the enemy subsystem attacks. Armor decreases in relation to the hull when the ship is damaged.

## Armament

Many ships are armed to defend themselves against attacks or to be able to act offensively themselves. Some armaments need ammunition. All information about ship weapons can be found here.

## Subsystems

The subsystems are necessary for a ship's basic skills. They can be damaged or destroyed by Disruptors, Stilettos, and other damage events once the ship has no shields or ablative armor (anymore).

 Weapons
 Communications
 Sensors
Without sensors, a ship can no longer locate other ships.

The sensor range of a ship is influenced by several factors. The default range according to the ship datasheet sets the base value. Modules, such as the scan modules, can increase the range. Damaged sensors or flying through fogs can decrease the range. Foreign, non-allied ships and stations, as well as closer information on asteroids, are only displayed on the star map if they are within sensor range of a friendly or allied ship.

## External docking system

External docking facilities are used to dock containers, sentry guns, fighters, bombers or escape podss to the ship's hull. This can greatly increase cargo capacity or allow stationary or slow objects to be transported more quickly. A similar facility is the ships#hangar.

Each docked object increases the ship's flight cost by 1.

Docked ships can still be detected by sensors, so it is possible to detect docked ships through reconnaissance. If the mother ship is destroyed, the docked ships are also destroyed (exception if destroyed by combat: escape pod). Furthermore, docked ships can be targeted in combat - so they are not protected by the mothership's hull. However, the mothership's shields can protect docked ships from the effects of damage fogs. If a mothership is attacked, the docked ships can undock and act in battle; note that previously docked sentry guns cannot fire in battle. In addition, the crews of docked ships count as the crews of the mother ship for calculating food consumptions, so you may save food.

## Hangar

The hangar of ships, also called *fighter and bomber dock*, is located inside the ship, unlike external docking systems. Only fighters, bombers and escape pods can be stationed here. Landed ships cannot be attacked; however, if the mothership is destroyed, the landed ships are also destroyed (exception: escape pod). Landed ships cannot be detected by sensors, nor can they be damaged by damage fog. If a mother ship is attacked, the landed ships can launch and act in battle. However, the hangar is not only used to house ships, but its personnel also coordinate fighters in torpedo defense, if available, see Hit Probability#Torpedo Defense.

In contrast to docked ships, landed ships do not increase flight costs. In addition, the crews of landed ships count as the crews of the mother ship for calculating food consumptions, so you save food if applicable.

## Ship flag

Some ships have special abilities or properties, so called flags.

A flag is a special property or ability that some ships have. If a ship has a certain flag, you can see it in the ship data sheet. However, NPCs can manually give ships additional ship flags. These remain invisible and cannot be seen by colonists. In case of a capture, however, the flags remain per se. Likewise, ships can receive flags through added modules; these are then also not displayed in the ship data sheet - but in the module info toolitp ()..

Partially and inconsistently the designation Flag is also used on special characteristics of ammunition types or weapon systems (e.g. LR for Long-Range-Weapons / -Muniton).

If you move the mouse over the ship flags in the ship data sheet, you will get a more detailed description of them via a tooltip.

### List of all flags

* **Fighter / Bomber** (allows the ship to dock with other suitable ships; docked ships remain hidden from other ships, especially enemy ships, until undocking)
* **supply ship** (allows the ship to automatically supply other [own or optionally allied] ships with food; can be turned on and off in the ship menu)
* **second row** (allows the ship to switch to the second row in combat; can be turned on and off in the ship's menu)
* **interceptor** (allows the ship to shoot at ships fleeing from the battle)

* **fast battle readiness** (This ship is already ready to go in the turn it joins a battle, so it doesn't have to join until the next tick as usual. Can be optionally turned on and off).
* **very small** (An object with the *very small* property cannot be located on long-range sensors due to its size.)2
* **Colony ship** (allows colonization of uninhabited asteroids [note: see GTCol Hephaistos).
* **Officer Transporter** (This ship can transport officers at the level of its max crew).

* **AWACS-SRS** (with AWAC short-range sensors, the ship can analyze the propulsion superheat of other ships in the sector; in addition, the scan overview in the sensor window displays supplementary information on row stability)1
* **enhanced AWACS-SRS** (With the enhanced Awac short-range sensors, a detailed analysis of propulsion superheat, crew and energy reserves of another ship in the same sector is possible).

* **Shipyard complex** (allows a space shipyard to join with other shipyards that have the same flag in order to share the capacities of the individual shipyards)
* **Trading Post** (This ship is a trading post.)
* **Protection Shield** (Protects allied ships from attack. Must be destroyed first in battle).
* **Damage Absorption** (Damage absorption ensures that a maximum of 25% damage measured by the maximum hull strength can be inflicted on the ship per combat round. [Note: formerly also known as *destroyer armor*])

* **unhijackable** (This ship cannot be hijacked, but it can be looted. See picture on the right.)
* **not transferable** (You cannot transfer this ship to other [players or NPCs].)
* **no transfer possible** (No goods can be transferred to or from the object, because the hold is sealed. This also applies to looting).
* **not lootable** (You cannot loot goods from this ship.)
* **unstable** (An object with the unstable property will disintegrate once looted).
* **no row stability** (This ship does not contribute to stabilize the second row in battles).
* **Asteroid Scanner** (This ship can scan asteroids, but also planets, suns and moons. It consumes 75 energy per scan. If you scan alien asteroids, the built buildings are displayed; if you scan uninhabited asteroids, the stockpiles are also displayed; if you try to scan your own asteroid, the asteroid menu is displayed, energy is not consumed).
* **Nebula Scanner** (This ship can display boulders and asteroids on the star map, which are located in damage or deuterium nebulae).

**Notes:**

1In the sensor window, three small symbols (either  or , see also corresponding tooltip) indicate whether the own fleet, the fleets of allies (allies incl. their own ships on site) or the enemy fleet is row-stable. The display of allied and enemy fleets may be incorrect if 2nd row ships have been manually placed in the first row.

2Very small ships can only be located if a ship is in the same sector.

## Ship name and ship ID

When a ship is built, it is automatically given a name. You can change the automatic ship naming in your own settings.
Each ship can be renamed as often as you like later. Unchangeable is the ship ID, which allows a unique identification of the ship.

Each ship has an individual ID. The older a ship is, the smaller the ID. New ships always get a new ID.

## List of all ships

Open the individual categories to get an overview and a description of each ship type.