Manual: Ship refitting

Refitting an existing ship costs production according to the old design, the new design, and the hull used by the new design. Making a small change still has a minimum cost, while replacing equipment with a more expensive design increases the cost.

In a Pre-warp game, refitting becomes available with ship construction after Chemistry and Nuclear Fission; Cold Fusion is not required.

Standard refit cost

First calculate the signed difference between the two complete design costs:

difference = new design cost - old design cost
minimum cost = new hull's standard cost / 4, rounded down
refit cost = greater of (2 x difference) or minimum cost

The difference is not made positive. Refitting to a cheaper design therefore costs the minimum rather than twice the size of the reduction.

Feudal and Confederation governments apply their normal ship-cost reduction to the minimum portion only. Other reductions already included in the displayed design costs affect the difference through those costs.

Alternative refit cost

Some mods enable the alternative formula:

difference = new design cost - old design cost
refit cost = greater of difference or 0, plus minimum cost

This charges the full minimum in addition to any increase in design cost. The standard formula is the version 2.00 default; a mod can change it for that game.