thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

... is the Weapon Mounts.
If you think about it, remove the weapon mounts and puff, the weapons are not as devastating anymore, regeneration becomes a must as well as damage resistance, smaller ships finaly get their stance against bigger ships. Technology difference between player becomes less important, and range is a must.

Even the almighty Allegiance Converter is only 70% effective, so its not a full convert, whether you have talisman or not.

and everything else.
Yet, it is a great feature to the game, but it breaks the balance in pieces.

So now i say. Next update should review the weapon mounts. Also i say that only penaltisized(sp) ships should get mounts - meaning BB, DN and BS. Only then it makes sense. Bases and WPs should have their mounts cut down too, though not as hard.

Anyone with opinions?
I will e-mail this suggestion to MM shortly.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

I'd say it's a slight exaggeration, but basically on target. My approach in Proportions mod was to give larger mounts greater and greater to-hit penalties, as well as higher costs. Combined with my sliding scale of to-hit penalties based on ship size, this means that large ships with heavy mounts start to have a hard time hitting small targets. I also added a sliding scale of maintenace reduction to ships based on size, so the large ships are more expensive, as well. Then with the scale mounts I added in Proportions 2.5, there are also good tradeoffs based on hull size for armor, cloaking, emergency propulsion, and other components that make sense to be more expensive in proportion to the size of the ship.

PvK

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

Yeah, I had basically this thought a while back as well. It's also the biggest change from a pure gameplay perspective from SEIII to SEIV.

It might be interesting as a test to simply play a game without the compenhancments.txt file and see how things work.

Geoschmo

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

In SEIV, big ships rule. I see this more as a premise than as an imbalance. But even if we agree that it is, in fact, an imbalance, I think the real source is the propulsion model, although the mounts are also an important factor.

In the unmodded game, a battle cruiser and an escort with the same speed will have the same tonnage set aside for engines. This obviously benefits larger ships and is the reason why QNP was developed.

Allowing larger ships to have larger, more efficient mounts seems reasonable to me; allowing them to have vastly more efficient engines does not.

That's my 2 cents.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

Both of those are equal culprits to the imbalance of larger ships. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

im not talking about the imbalance of small vs big ships or whatever, but about the overpowering of certain weapons over others, plus the early bonus to whoever gets LC first (i see absolutely no reason to be able to put L mounts on it, its a LIGHT cruiser after all).

What i am talking about realy is that many parts of the game are ignored due to mounts. Think shield regenerators. think emmisive armor. think the new OA. think EVERYTHING.
This also would solve once and for all all issues with the overpowering of psychic races as 70---50 is a decent chance of conVersion, and if you fail, you're dead meat.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

I also experimented with cheaper Bridge, Crew Quarters, and Life Support. This expense + Engines + Mounts combine to kill the small ships.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

How about one sided battles?
Having weaker or leaky shields, and a greater dependence on armor which must be repaired after combat could also have a big effect. If combat were to generate lots of damaged or crippled ships on both sides, then a slight advantage wouldn't result in a routing.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

In my experience, one-sided battles rarely result in great numbers of damaged ships. Many/most players use compact formations which allow concentrated fire on a few targets, rather than spread out fire. If one player concentrates fire and the other doesn't, the spread out player will die. He will constantly lose firepower, while the concentrated player stays consistent throughout the battle. The exception is if the spread out player has vast numerical superiority (which results in concentrated fire on a different scale).

Two reasons concentrated fire is so common on PBW are 1) it works http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif , and 2) strategic combat tends to use concentrated fire.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">This is why we need area effect weapons and collateral damage. Currently there is no 'downside' to packing your ships together in ranks like Napoleonic-era soldiers and mowing down the opposition with concentrated fire. If one weapon could hit several ships that were close together, and if a ship blowing up could damage other nearby ships, there would be counter-tactics to this method of slaughter.

As far as mounts are concerned, yes, these are what have rendered Emissive Armor almost useless, and broken a lot of other features of the game. Torpedoes are also nearly useless in SE IV due to the fact that any once-per-turn beam weapon can be made stronger by a mount and just as effective at breaking Emissive Armor as a torpedo would be...

I think that the idea of having a penalty to-hit for larger mounts instead of a bonus is a good idea. We also need to scale-back the degree to which mounts increase weapon power. It's one thing to have larger weapons with larger damage in the same proportion. The original reason for mounts was simply to decrease the number of wepaons that large ships had to fire in combat and so speed up combat resolution. But the VERY large bonuses in size/cost to damage dealt out is a real problem. Moo II actually offered a LOWER ratio of size/damage output for the 'heavy' mount. Remember? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif Some testing of new proportions for mounts is in order.

[ December 04, 2002, 02:13: Message edited by: Baron Munchausen ]

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">That is my point exactly.
If battles were made to GENERATE lots of damaged ships, then there would be less problem.

This can be done with leaky shields and armor, where finishing off a burning, crippled hulk takes a significant amount of firepower. If that firepower could be better used disabling another ship or two, the player who concentrates fire will be at a disadvantage.

Think of a situation where one player concentrates his fire on the enemy. He vaporizes one ship in the time it takes his opponent to reduce three of his ships to half capacity.
If decent strategies are in place, those cripples can be left behind, and out of range, while a new set of ships are crippled.
Player 1 has lost no ships, but has 6 ships out of comission. Player 2 has lost only 2 ships!

Now, when both players are dishing out damage in the cripple strategy, both fleets will be crippled first, and then the survivors will weakly duke it out, or be crushed by the remaining undamaged ships from the victorious side.
Either way, both players take a lot of damage.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

I know I keep tooting my own horn, but most of these things are dealt with in Proportions mod. The new armor types provide emissive effect that is not shot off immediately, as well as "leaky protection". Costs of small ships are signifigantly less than larger ships, thanks to QNP and reduced prices for required components, and so on.

The main difficulty when you adjust all these things though, is that programming the AI to use them effectively becomes a major chore. The AI assumes that biggest is best unless you really work to make it build mixed forces. Of course, I tend to think the AI will never be as interesting as human players anyway, but still, it is good to have a semi-competant AI for when players miss turns or an independent splinter colony breaks off, or whatever.

PvK

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

still, consider this, if current Large mount was put for Battleship, Huge for Dreadnought and Massive for Baseship *only*, would it make the game better?

(tactical game hell, though)

^ for this, just maybe make the damage-to-size increase ration 2:2 instead of 2:1.5

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

I agree; thoughts are the source of all problems... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

Well, then if more thoughts = more problems, let me jump into the fray too! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Why should the size of the vessel limit the size of mount? If the ship designer wants to have a huge-mount, why does it matter if the ship is greater than 1100kT (for example)? As long as the ship is larger than the final kT size/weight of the weapon, it should be fine. Obviously the answer is that the only way to link the mount size to the level of technological advance in non-gold was to have a ship size requirement. But in gold, you can introduce mount types through the tech tree.

My suggestion is to jetison the anacronistic handcuff (ya like that aliteration? wait, was that aliteration? did I even manage to spell aliteration correctly?) of total ship mass to mount requirement altogether. Instead, have a new field of study that allows for better and better mounts, all of which can be placed on ships of any size. That said, I'm sure that some of you out there have already done this in your mods (deathstalkers mount mod perhaps?)

This will give small ships yet another repreave.

I do however think that whacky-impossibly large amounts of damage, increased range and all that should still exist for the larger mounts. I think that mounts should be a big advantage, I just don't think only large ships should have access to them. (the lowered accuracy thing from proportions is a good idea though).

[ December 04, 2002, 23:09: Message edited by: jimbob ]

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

Setting damage:size to 2:2 would be effectively the same as setting it to 1:1. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif It negates one big advantage of mounted weapons--more damage in less space (proportionally). The advantage of mounts would be higher damage per shot=maybe first kill; disadvantage would be you miss, you waste all the damage. With unmounted weapons, you'd do less damage per shot, but have more chances to hit.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

Well there is some precedent and reasoning for hull limits for large mounts. A 15" gun might fit on an ocean-going destroyer, but it's going to unbalance and perhaps capsize the whole ship when it rotates or fires, there won't be much room for the ammo, power for the turret traverse, etc. In other words, there are engineering difficulties, which would be different for spaceships but probably it is true that larger weapons would be more practical to mount on larger ships.

On the other hand, it also makes sense that some large mounts could be made for smaller ships. They might not be the same exact mount, however. For instance, a spinal mount on a destroyer is an interesting idea, although it would tend to be less accurate than a turreted weapon, because it would require the whole ship to rotate to aim it. However, a destroyer is more nimble than a battleship (at least in Proportions mod http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif ), so that would tend to balance out.

PvK

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Hmmm, I'm not so sure about that. Thoughts are the source of some problems, but not all: some problems are caused by the lack of thoughts! I'd say that the real source of all problems is the sun. If there were no sun, there would be no problems. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Hmmm, I'm not so sure about that. Thoughts are the source of some problems, but not all: some problems are caused by the lack of thoughts! I'd say that the real source of all problems is the sun. If there were no sun, there would be no problems. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">No human problems, anyways... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

In terms of “Realety”, Hm, Yes, large guns on small ships would be a problem on Earth today. Those are weapons with a Recoil.
My itterpretation of the wepaons in SEIV do not use Recoil based weapons. The point about Spinal Tap weapons beling less accurate is certaily valid. I wonder what a 15” gun in a Destroyer hull would have done with WWII technology. Anybody here know the math?
I would think if you could close to within Direct Fire Range that accuracy would be fairly high when aiming at a Cruiser size hull. Imagine 3 direct hits from 15” guns at fairly close range. Too bad we will never know.
I can see a Mod for a “Spinal Tap” weapon
Low to hit
High Damage bonus
1 Per ship
At least a 3 reload time.
At least 50kt.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

Only question I have Gryph is does your Spinal Tap weapon power knob go to eleven? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

[ December 05, 2002, 14:48: Message edited by: geoschmo ]

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

I see it also that weapon mounts are a big problem in SEIV. As I have mentioned several times before, more is not always good. Mounts are not necessary in the game. I could easily do without them being in the game. (as well as designable unit-types like armies which are also useless in the current stage)
MM did developed too many things in SEIV without much initial conceptation and the result is sometimes frustrating game play and a mediocre AI.

For example I dont need a designable ground combat unit without a ground combat system which take care of my design.

I can design a indefinite number of different satellites, but I never had games where more than 2 different types of satellites of the same generation operated at the same time in my empire (1 longrange and 1 point defense)
Instead of such feature, MM should have brought along a concept of satellites initial placement options before the first round of combat.

These are only 2 examples of misconception and unnecessary complexity in the game. Mounts are are 3rd one.

bye
Klaus

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

I don't think any of those are unneeded.

Troops: simultanious combat, same as with ships. The design of a troop makes a difference. Cheap riot-control troops, heavily armored main line troops, heavily -armed- backup troops, etc. To say nothing of what it lets you do in terms of moddng.

Same with fighters and sats. In one game I currently have 7 different types of fighter active. Ship attack, interceptor, fast ship attack, fast interceptor, smaller Versions of same (they build faster). Sats: missile sat, sensor sat, ripper beam sat. One or two generics just doesn't cut it. Again the modding posibilities as well.

Mounts: see modding possibilities AGAIN. Especially with the new Gold patch that allows different things with then, solved a lot of problems for me. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif In the standard game, they're OK if a bit overpowered. But then I don't see you suggesting removing the PPB from the game because it's overpowered..

Phoenix-D

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">In the standard game, they're OK if a bit overpowered. But then I don't see you suggesting removing the PPB from the game because it's overpowered..
<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Oh, of course there is a certain imbalancing. But this is just a matter of modifying it. (editing capabilities are very fine in SEIV IMO)

The problem is that MM has removed some very good game ideas from SEIII and instead has introduced some cumbersome game mechanics. These mechanics lead to a frustration and a bad AI which cannot handle it. I would have wished that the developement time which has been spent on introducing the new ship building system (the old one was much better), the change from predefined units to designable ones and all those unnecessary diplomatic mumbojumbo which is of limited use had been used for a better, more intelligent AI.

I am sure 8 of 10 SEIV players are playing only against the AI and not against other humans. The main focus of SEIV should have been the AI developement and not all these useless chrome.

bye
Klaus

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">No, and no. "Anachronistic handcuff" is only alliteration if you have a Cockney accent. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">A DUC would have recoil. Many Star Wars weapons seem to have recoil, but that's Lucas physics. However, as I said, the problems would be different, but probably there will still be engineering issues and tradeoffs due to size and mass, power requirements, spacial issues (massive turret blocking other surface facilties), etc.

In WW2, a destroyer with a 15" gun would I think be technically problematic or even impossible due to mass. A destroyer is also not a very stable firing platform, which would mean that even if you could fire without capsizing (or even sail without capsizing), the gun would be very inaccurate at long range, and one of the main points of having a 15" gun is to be able to out-range your opponents. The reason a WW2 battleship is superior to a WW2 cruiser is that it can nail the cruiser before the cruiser can even get in range. The 15"-armed destroyer probably wouldn't be able to hit anything at the gun's longer ranges. Much more practical was the heavy weapon which was given to destroyers - the torpedo, which would do as much or more damage than a 15" gun, and may have had similar accuracy when mounted on a destroyer, to what a 15"-armed destroyer would have had. I suppose with enough engineering, maybe a spinal-mount heavy cannon of some sort on a destroyer might have had intermediate range and been an interesting and perhaps feasible alternative weapon. I tend to think they'd still be held at bay by the more accurate long-range guns of larger ships.

In any case, though, WW2 destroyers were rarely able to close the range with capital ships, because they would get nailed by direct-fire before they got within torpedo range, more often than not. But sometimes they did, and the threat of them doing so was tactically important, and of course destroyers were extremely useful in all sorts of other roles.

Of course another major factor would be expense. A 15" gun was expensive to produce, much more so than a torpedo tube.

PvK

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

In empty space, with no friction, a flash light is an engine!!! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif Still Going!!! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

So firing Ionic Dispersers, Meson guns and whatever is gonna rock the boat for sure.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">But can one actually capsize in space?

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Which is why the Imperial Japanese Navy attacked at night, where they could get in close and not worry about those big, bad cannon! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

1) If you're firing at something 1000s of km away, a small recoil & a little bit of torque and you'll miss by some way if you don't correct your aim.

2) 15" shells weighed a ton (literally) - you wouldn't be able to put many in a destroyer without slowing her to a crawl, and if you tried it you'd make a very pretty firework display if the enemy hit your unarmoured magazines... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

IMO the mount system is good. If you want to have starships built like Napoleonic ships of the line with numerous rows of small guns, go ahead, but I think I'll be 'borrowing' the idea of giving large mounts a to-hit penalty.

*re-engaging lurking device*

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">But can one actually capsize in space?</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">He was talking about WWII ships, not space ships.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">But can one actually capsize in space?</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">He was talking about WWII ships, not space ships.</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Ya, I was, but while you couldn't capsize per se, you could have other problems if you apply a large force off-center - the ship could spin and tumble, which could be quite a problem for the people and equipment inside. Your stabilizer system would also be more challenged to deal with such. But, as I said a couple of times, the engineering problems and trade-offs might be somewhat different in space from those faced by sea vessels, but there would undoubtedly still be major effects of deploying massive weapons on small ships. It would be more interesting to model the effects rather than just disallow them, at least as far as they are still practical and not just a model of a bad idea.

It would be nice though to be able to mark unit sizes and mounts as obsolete, and filter the view. Otherwise, if you mod many interesting new types in, it can start to clutter the interface.

PvK

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

"It would be nice though to be able to mark unit sizes and mounts as obsolete, and filter the view. Otherwise, if you mod many interesting new types in, it can start to clutter the interface."

Same with mounts.

Phoenix-D

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

In terms of WWII
I have no idea how the enginerring would work. since they did not do it, I'm sure there was a reason.

In terms of Sci Fi
DUCs I imagined were using Linear Induction to propel the objects. I think it is also reffered to as GAUS weapon. I don't think there would be significant recoil from that. Nothing a ships systems could not adjust for. The same for "Light" based weapons.
When all is said and done, < insert Sci Fi explanation > and it works because the author said it works.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

It does not matter how would you propell a shell - by expanding gases or EM field, recoil will be exactly the same. Nobody yet cancel Newton' third law.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

Oleg, your gun could fire two shells in opposite directions and end up recoilless.

Or it could have a really quick-acting thruster on the back to counteract the recoil, maybe along with a sliding mount to give the thruster more time to complete its job.

The trick is to dump the recoil force into some throwaway matter.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

I don't understand.
I thought Linear Induction is where a string of magnets get turned on in sequeance and off pulling an object with them.
This accelerates the object.
I don't see how that could have a recoil.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

Regardless of how the object is propelled, whether it be with a string of magnets, or whatever, a force was applied to it in order to cause the acceleration. Whenever there is a force acting on an object, there exists a reaction force of equal magnitude in the opposite direction.

Suppose that you have a strong electromagnet in the launcher, which you power on. An iron projectile is attracted towards the magnet, and starts accelerating in that direction. The force of attraction does not occur in just the single direction - from the magnet to the projectile; the force is equally strong in the opposite direction - from the projectile to the magnet. The reason that the magnet doesn't seem to move much is because it has a much larger mass (and attached to a support that is also a large mass), and therefore the same magnitude of force causes only a minor acceleration backwards. The projectile, having a small mass, is accelerated faster with the same magnitude of force.

You can't pull an object towards you without the object also pulling you towards it. You can't push an object without that object pushing back on you.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

Alright, so as long as you're dealing with a mass projectile (DUCs especially) then we'd observe this type of recoil. But once we start to employ non-mass weapons (esp. lasers, phased-polaron beams, probably anti-proton beams) where the mass is negligible and the damage is due to the underlying principle of the "ray" on physical objects, we should lose the recoil problem, right?

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

A photon in a laser-bLast (for example) may not have any mass but it still has momentum. Beacuse of conservation of momentum you'll get recoil.

EDIT: For example, consider how a comet's tail always faces away from the sun because of the solar wind (i.e. light) pushing the recently-melted ice particles directly away from the sun.

This page might or might not help:
Link

[ December 08, 2002, 01:31: Message edited by: Wanderer ]

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">The solar wind is made up of charged particles, not photons.

Momentum transfer from photons is how solar sails work.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Wow ! You can also tie two AK-47 to fire in opposite dirrections. That will make very handy weapon. I think we should patent it and sell for big $$ to Osama. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/rolleyes.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">The solar wind is made up of charged particles, not photons.

Momentum transfer from photons is how solar sails work.</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">The fact that a beam of light has a momentum which is transfered to solid objects upon reflection/absorbtion of light has been established by Russian scientist Lebedev in the end of 19th centuary. The discovery ressurected Newton's theory of particle nature of light and ultimately led to the modern quantum theory.

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">And magnetism works both ways http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I find it hard to believe anything is recoilless, due to the laws of physics http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

[ December 08, 2002, 14:45: Message edited by: Suicide Junkie ]

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

The main consideration with recoil isn't going to be it moving the ship around anyway. The vast differences in mass between the projectile and the ship says that the counter force isn't going to move the ship all that much. Certainly nothing that thrusters designed to move the ship around to begin with can't handle.

The main problem is the stresses that are placed on whatever mounting points you have for the gun. Before the force is applied to the mass of the ship as a whole it has to be transfered through the mounting hardware, and it would be very dificult to design a rigid system that could handle those level of loads.

That is the reason the 15in guns on the WWII battle ship recoil like they do. Not because the ship would roll over or anything, but because the counter force would break stuff the first time you shot it if you tried to mount it rigidly.

Geoschmo

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

geoschmo, SJ, and kamog,
Thanks, that all makes sence.
Apriciate the edification.

[ December 08, 2002, 16:15: Message edited by: Gryphin ]

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Actually, 'solar wind' really is a wind. There is a stream of super-hot gas coming from the sun and streaming out into deep space at all times. It's very, very thin compared to the atmosphere that we live in but it still exerts far more force than light. This is the main reason for comet tails.

There was a discussion thread here about solar sails some time back that covered the two different types, too. The shiny/silvery ones are indeed relying on light, but there is also a 'magnetic' sail in development that uses the pressure of solar wind on a cloud of plasma. This has the double advantage of not being degraded by micro-meteor punctures and not losing effectiveness with range from the sun! The density of light is of course reduced at a considerable rate as you get further from the sun (hmm, there's an exact formula that I've spaced). The solar wind also gets less with greater distance from the sun, but the magnetic sail expands as you get further away. It reaches it's 'equilibrium point' based on the pressure of the solar wind itself and produces the same force no matter where you are in the solar system! It would only become ineffective at the 'heliopause' where the solar wind fails completely and you hit interstellar space (which is far beyond pluto).

[ December 08, 2002, 19:27: Message edited by: Baron Munchausen ]

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

Ta, BM. Sometimes I wish I'd studied physics at university rather than copmuter science. Then I remember how much time my physicist friends had to spend in labs whilst I was messing about playing SE3/4.

Geo wrote: <font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">That depends - a small ship will only have small thrusters. You'll not veer the ship around crazily with recoil, but you might throw off the aim of the next shot. I guess it depends how quickly your computer/thrusters/aiming system (or SJ's opposite-firing gun) can adapt.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Yes - very good point. Why didn't I think of that?

Another point is that very large energy weapons will require a lot of power. Would you want a large weapon on a destroyer if you had to turn off shields and life-support to recharge it?

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

Kamog,
Ok, I will accept your statement that there is an opposite and equal reaction in a Linear Induction Motor. Where is the "Opposite" energy being applyed. What is assorbing it? In my mind it is hard to imagine it is working in such a fasion that it generates a Recoil. I also admit that I have no concept of the ammount of energy being used or the mass of the object.
Sidebar: I do know that Linear Induction is used to move Hanger Doors which are masive but very slow.
Here is a link to a site that might explain them. I have to admit I don't follow the explanation of the motors. I guess I have a much more abstract understanding (or lack there of).
Can anybody translate this for me?
http://www.theproductfinder.com/motors/linind.htm
< hmm, I thought I was more technical than this >

[ December 08, 2002, 12:40: Message edited by: Gryphin ]

Re: thoughts - the source of all problems and disbalances
 

Well, if you're talking about putting a 90-kT projectile weapon on a 150-kT escort, I think there might really be some recoil problems, especially if the 90-kT weapon is turretted and can face in arbitrary directions. Just rotating the weapon, if it has a non-circular turret or a long barrel, could change the center of gravity of the whole ship.

That was a side-point, though. Again, engineering is about finding efficient solutions to problems, and every decision generally has a tradeoff. It seems reasonable to assume that a huge weapon will be more efficient on a similarly-huge starship design, compared to a small one. Take the opening scene of Star Wars (episode IV) for example. Remember how the Imperial Star Destroyer had engines which appeared larger than the whole Rebel Blockade Runner it was chasing? Looks like those could also generate an immense amount of power which the small ship, given equivalent tech, could never hope to generate. Even if you assume some fantasy-tech devices which generate more power than engines, there is a lot more space, mass, and expense available in the design of the massive ship, compared to the tiny one. It seems pretty likely that the largest and most powerful weapons available will probably make a lot more sense, and work better, on the massive ship design. Not, perhaps, in ALL fantasy-tech, but in general, one would expect it to work out that way. If you want to model a tech that makes that untrue, SE4 of course allows it (woo-hoo! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif ), but all else being equal, I think if a single weapon is becoming a major percentage of the whole ship design, it's going to present some engineering disadvantages of one sort or another.

PvK