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I just wanted to write this stuff down.

Globals:
Heavy shields, 1.3 or better; not sure about recharge
Weak ship hull, .85 or worse
Normal Missiles
Weak PW damage, maybe .9
Speed and maneuverability are custom for each ship, so they fly much like in FreeSpace. The end result is that their top speed isn't the best, but their acceleration is very good.
Longish research time, maybe 3
Very thick station hulls, maybe 1.5 or more
Station shields either a formality or nonexistent. The latter would make them tt fodder, either one would make tt use possible. I like the idea of having a faction where tt assaults are worth trying.
Not sure about scan/sig/econ

Ships have Phoenix hulls, so expect to see lots of int bombing.
Strongly considering removing prox/minepack/caltrops from the faction, it messes with their style. I think I'd give them a cheap version of the AC drone to compensate for the caltrop. It's very FreeSpace to have several weak-hulled gun platforms shooting at you. Maybe give Adv figs their fourth hardpoint to compensate for minepacks, though that's probably unbalanced. Still, Maras would look silly with that fourth gunmount not firing. Scouts would be buffed in some way, maybe GT-style nan gunmount, maybe extra missiles.
Starting ships: not really sure, depends on how good the scout is. Probably the fig, almost certainly not lt int.

Scout: SF Manticore. Carries ltbooster, maybe booster as well. I thought about using the Scorpion here, as that's officially a recon fighter, but the Scorpion is pretty slow. Not sure how I'd do the gunmounts, as the ingame Manticore had chin guns and missiles in the arms, while the cinemas had the opposite.
Fig: SF Mara
Int: SF Dragon. Carries either small shield or a custom shield tech. Ints with shields? Insane! I know, but trust me on this one. One of things that makes ints great is their low sig when not boosting; having shields makes you choose between either being as visible as a fighter, or being easy prey because of the faction's thin hull and poor pw damage. Besides, it wouldn't be the Shivans without a proper Dragon, and those things were always a bitch to kill.
Stealth Fighter: SF Basilisk. Reasons: the Shivans don't have a real stealth ship, and the Basilisk always made most of its kills using missiles on whatever you're escorting. Plus, the Basilisk is sort of iconic, and I don't have anywhere else to put it.
Bomber/Gunship: SB Seraphim, the Shivans' most dangerous bomber.
Figbomber: SB Nahema. Yes, I know it's not supposed to have a turret, but neither is the Manticore or Scorpion, and you can still research heavy scouts for balance reasons. I know most (all?) factions use the fig model for the figbomber, but I wanted to use the Nahema for something, and the Mara seemed inappropriate.
Stealth Bomber: SB Taurvi. I just think it looks the part.
Carrier: SCv Moloch, maybe. I might have to alter the model to give it a forward fighter bay or something.
Transport/HTT: ST Azrael. Might have to shrink it. The turrets are a little obvious, I think I'd remove them from the model.
Miner: SG Rahu.
Constructor: Silly to reuse the Rahu, and the Mephisto might make a good corvette. The Asmodeus seems like Freighter material, so I guess that leaves the Dis, probably carrying its custom cargo container. I'd have to scale the thing down though. SFr Mini-Dis!

Light bases: like Giga, Shivan teleports and outposts can be destroyed by normal weapons fire, but the faction's thick station hull might make it a bit harder. I chose this because I wanted to use the Shivan Comm Node as the teleport model, and those things could be one-shotted from 5k if you brought Trebuchets with you. Might have to shrink the mesh, no big deal though.

Not at all sure what to do about capships yet, the big ones are so huge they couldn't maneuver through the asteroids, and I don't know if it'd look right if we shrunk the Sathanas. I'd want them to have thick hulls to make up for the faction global. That, or the fighters have custom hulls, and we get rid of the global. I've thought about doing custom ship classes instead of corvette/destroyer/cruiser/etc, so that the classes can have appropriate stats and weaponry. Models for bases are a problem; there are a few custom Shivan bases out there, but probably not enough, and while using the destroyers for bases could work, it'd be weird having them as bases and as capships.

Of course, the only capship to mount shields would be the Lucifer, and I might give it a custom shield tech. Maybe force you to galv/bomb it or something silly like that. In that same vein, the Sathanas should probably be able to carry the SRM Doomsday Res.

Custom tech:
Megafunk turret. I have to use that name. Slow refire, lots of damage, probably using the galv blaster damage class, or a custom that does a little damage to techbases.
No beams: decent looking ones aren't possible, Andon's beams are alright looking, I might consider adding them in. Unfortunately, as far as I know there's no way to make weapons that skip shields. I could make them extremely damaging to shields, but that's not quite the same. FS1 Shivans did fine without beams anyway.
I don't want to go overboard with the custom tech, trying to fit a bunch of Freespace weapons into the game for no real reason would just complicate the faction unnecessarily. GT and TF have more than enough custom tech as it is.

Got somewhere to get the models from?

I got the idea because I was screwing around with the models. That said, were I serious about doing this, I'd either have to use the original Volition models and hope no one cares, or (and this is only available for some ships) I'd have to ask the Freespace Upgrade Project for permission to use their models and textures. Might have to get permission from each individual modeler and texturer. Converting file formats isn't a problem for most ships. Well, it takes some work, but it's at least possible.

Yes, you could use different models.

One could, alternately, make a Freespace Core, with all three factions, custom weapons, all custom ships, and no need to balance against the existing factions. But frankly, Star Wars Core would work better than Freespace Core, and I've never even had a chance to play Star Wars Core. No idea if it's any good, but if it were great people would play it.

Compellor wrote:QUOTE (Compellor @ Jul 30 2008, 06:24 AM) No idea if it's any good, but if it were great people would play it.

sadly, but wrong. we have a number of good-to*great cores that are not played because people are lazy, and don't want to play something too different from the alleg they are used to play (dn, and it's derivates).

Ship maneuverability analysis:

Scout: Default scout top speed is 160, but those without boosters will take forever to get there. Shivan scouts have a top speed of only 87, making them incredibly slow. However, they can mount boosters, which allow them to reach speeds of 155 with booster 1. Advanced Shivan scouts have a top speed of 120, versus the default of 180. On the plus side, they can reach top speed in 3 seconds, and that's without using boosters.

Fighter: max speed of 70 vs 100 default. Can reach 120 while boosting. Again, much better accel than standard. Advanced fighters can reach only 78, versus 120 default. You'll have a hard time catching anything without booster 2/3.

Int: top speed of 75 vs 80 default. In this case your acceleration gives you a decisive advantage. Can reach 150 under afterburner. Even better, at 90 the shivan hvy int has the same top speed as default heavies.

Stealth: At 65 vs 140 default, Shivan stealth fighters suck. Adv stealth has 68 vs 160 default. Like Belters, though, they can carry boosters, allowing them to reach speeds of 110 if they don't mind the signature.

Bomber: Shivan bombers have the default top speed of 60. Shivan Hvy Bombers are incredibly fast, able to reach 90 mps in 4 seconds, as opposed to the default hvy bomber speed of 75. The bad news is, you can't nan them. On the other hand, Phoenix has neither fast bombers nor a global speed buff. Fear the Seraphim.

Stealth bomber: Default is 80, I have a choice between 65 and 72 for the Taurvi. I'm leaning toward 72.

Transport: I might just leave them at the default of 75. 55 is far too slow, and who would notice?

Conclusion:
Slow and proxless, scouts suck. Shivan comms would do well to get adv scouts early, just so you can probe faster. Tac probably isn't worth the trouble, because SFs are so slow. I might have to give Shivans some kind of signiture and scan buffs to make up for this. That, or remove boosters and just give SFs the 110. Supremecy suffers from slow figs, but hvy bombers are truely scary. Expansion might be better, though, what with the shielded, highly maneuverable ints, and the need to intbomb.

Did someone do something like this for 'nix in another core? I swear I played one game where 'nix had shielded ints. Or maybe that was another faction. I hope it wasn't that all factions' ints had shields. That'd be stupid.

General Concepts for Custom Capital Ships:

If I'm using custom capital ships, I won't be using the SFr Mephisto. Might switch it over to con duty.
Most capships can carry normal aleph res anyway, so I won't mention those.

All custom capships can rip. HP numbers are tentative, I'll probably adjust them upwards to account for lack of shields and faction hull nerf.
Cain: A corvette, 2000 HP. Almost certainly not worth the bother, because Shivans don't have prox. Maybe I'll make them cheap.

Rakshasa: 4000 HP. 2 turrets, 3 forward AC/SC/LT guns.

Lilith: 7500 HP. 2 turrets. One of the two forward guns is AC/SC/LT/MF, MF is for MegaFunk.

Moloch: 8000 HP compared to 3000 for a normal attack carrier. One forward AC/SC/LT, 3 turrets, XRM Hunter-Killer, smallrip.

All turrets can be Megafunk on the following ships, not that you'd want to. All can carry XRM Hunter-Killer and SRM Tactical Nuke/XRM Cruise. All have 4 turrets, act as a carrier, and have largerip.
Demon: 16,000 HP compared to 8,000 for a normal cruiser. No forward guns.

Ravana: Only 10,000 HP, but its 2 forward guns can equip SkyRip in addition to AC/SC/LT/MF.

Lucifer: 80,000 HP compared to 10,000 for a normal Battleship. Can carry a custom shield that can only be damaged by anti-base weapons, and maybe Galvs. If possible, I might make the shield only damageable by aleph res, then give the hull a custom armor class which is very vulnerable to aleph res. Carries the full variety of anti-base weaponry. 2 forward guns, four turrets.

Sathanas: 100,000 HP (is this even possible? Starbases have only 25,000 HP), but mercifully can't carry the Lucifer shield. 4 forward guns, the full list of anti-base weapons, and SRM Doomsday res. Can rip out before the Doomsday goes off, but it'll be close.

Comments:
The Cain's only redeeming feature is that it's cheap and dies a little less quickly than the Shivan gunship. The Rakshasa will be your bread and butter, while the expensive Lilith is the only light class in the game that can kill teleports and outposts. The medium class consists entirely of the unholy offspring of a destroyer and an attack carrier. Its inability to kill bases makes the Shivan medium class a bit useless. Heavy class is where things start getting good, with carrier/cruisers. I've never even seen SkyRip used because it's limited to Devastators and Super Heavy class ships, I guess it makes the Ravana worth buying. That brings us to the Lucifer and Sathanas, which are just ridiculous. Maybe some comms will skip buying the Demon and Ravana, and get just one of these invincible super weapons.

Dear god, I need to get a life.