You must understand that the site is not desinged to give super ships, it is a guide and many of the ships were designed many rounds ago. Some of the stuff has changed like Defense bonus and swarm bonus. but a ship with defense is designed to be used as a swarmer in larger numbers to take advantage of the Defense bonus.
I understand that def should be used for swarmers, nor was I trying to get a super ship. I also got that the guide was written and not updated for several rounds. I was looking for parity in size/cost ratios to effectiveness.
What I wasn't sure of was the intended usage for ships designed using this system (is it an attack ship, mission ship, power ship.....). I don't think emi has made signifigant changes to the hull size/price ratio. Even factoring in changes to def and swarming, this system seems to make overly large ships. If you are going to pay 999 trillion or more for a ship, why the concern over the cost of the components used? I mean 999 trillion for the hull, what's a few mil on components.....
The issue is that the system doesn't work for superships or swarmers that are worth the extra money. I mean 2 ships built using this system with each costing well over an additional 2.6% each can't meet one I can build using my newbie understanding of design.
I see a lot of people trying to minimize weight on components. The issue is that sure, you have an awesome weapon with 1 wt and 1 cost and 50% acu, but the power requirement means you can't use it on many ship types or even 'cheap' ships. And if the ship ain't cheap, why worry about wt/energy/cost ratio so much?
That was more like the point I was trying to make. Why the attention to detail if the ship is going to be so massive as to require you to make a donation to afford just one?
The size of the components is the limiting factor here. Reducing weight is great if you have the money to pay for the hull that your massive powercore requires. The more space it uses, the bigger the ship needs to be. The bigger the ship, the more it costs.
Like I said, I've not got the fine details down, but this is simple. Bigger does not mean better, just more expensive.
The system for ship building given here is not effective for the game as it exists now. I also doubt that it was the most effective method even several rounds ago. Worrying about the powercore last is a mistake when designing. Obsessing about minimal weight is also a mistake. Concern over minimizing the cost of the component is only an issue if you don't have large amounts of money laying around.