Suggestions!

So I really like this game. Once it hits steam, I will buy it, guaranteed. There are some things I'd like to see though, and as I can't find a list of planned features, I don't know if they're already things you thought of. In the hopes of helping in some tiny way, I am going to post them here!

First up: I'd love to have an option to create ships in a separate mode. Just a "create ships, test them, save them" mode, allowing me to fiddle with ship design without the pressure oif actual incoming attacks. Then I could not only fine tune my designs, but make them pretty, instead of "Shit shit shit I'm under attack I've got to slap more guns on this cube that I call a spaceship" and just load them as I have the resources to do so.

Secondly: Drone ships. There's an AI for enemy ships, it'd be cool if I could whip up my own AI controlled ships as well. Perhaps a new attachment called a "drone core" - It'd be like a power core, but powers half as many systems, is more expensive (by 10 or 20?) and provides a basic AI. I'm thinking "defense core" and "attack core" - defense core would just orbit whatever planet the ship was at when it spawned, and auto-attack any enemies that come within range. Attack cores would seek out new life, new civilizations, and blow them to heck. It'd just randomly fly around the galaxy on a seek and destroy mission.

Third: More for planets to do. It's one thing to capture planets and then park above them mining, using them for new tech and all, but I'd love to see that go further. Colonize them! Have an actual population that grows as you protect the planet. The longer you can go without attacks getting through (such as the shield going down, or ships orbiting the planet getting blown away) the more the population will grow, and this will unlock passive perks. More effective shields! Surface to space weapons that allow the planet to defend itself to a basic level (maybe even just in the form of the planet being able to fire gun turret shots at ships)! Automining, allowing the planet to produce a trickle of resources even if you have no ships parked over it in mining mode. I could probably think of other things, but I think it'd be neat to see new tech and ship upgrades and such become available at certain population levels.

Fourth: Space Stations! They could be build similarly to how ships are built, but with a "build new space station/load existing space station" option. Instead of a ship core, it'd have a space station core that would be functionally identical, and many of the same blocks. Space stations would be immobile, and instead of thrusters would offer other options. You could dock ships there for free repair, but it's trickle repair over time and during the repair process ships are immobile and unable to fight. Space stations could even be built over places other than planets. One build over a planet would be better at mining, while one built in space would be good as a defensive option.

Fifth: Difficulty! I imagine you're planning to dramatically flesh out game modes, as right now we've only got one form of planet defense for single player. I find it too hard, as I get my butt whipped by the 5th or 6th wave and can't even get missiles before dying horrible. I bet an extra hundred or so starting resources would make a huge difference though. I hope we'll be able to configure custom single player game types. Maybe choosing how many planets, how many starting resources (for all sides) how many AI sides (which could war with each other, or just gang up on you, or even team up with you) - so team options.

Sixth: Creative explorer mode. Infinite resources, huge galaxy with lots of planets, a mode to just explore and try things out, and the ability to activate enemy sides and add enemy ships at any time if you want to test skirmish.

I'll edit this post to contain more as I think of them.