[Pax]

Originally posted by DirectorTsaarx:
So the engine mount also affects the supply use per move? What figures did you use for that?

Here, here's a pair of Engine mounts from Exodus; keep inmind the engines will be some 1,000kT in mass, prior to applying a mount:

code:

---

Long Name                      := A Series Engine Mount

Short Name                     := A Series

Description                    := Engine mount for 100kT hulls

Code                           := A

Cost Percent                   := 1

Tonnage Percent                := 1

Tonnage Structure Percent      := 1

Damage Percent                 := 0

Supply Percent                 := 1

Range Modifier                 := 0

Weapon To Hit Modifier         := 0

Vehicle Size Minimum           := 100

Vehicle Size Maximum           := 100

Comp Family Requirement        := 

Weapon Type Requirement        := none

Vehicle Type                   := Ship



Long Name                      := H Series Engine Mount

Short Name                     := H Series

Description                    := Engine mount for 1000kT hulls

Code                           := H

Cost Percent                   := 10

Tonnage Percent                := 10

Tonnage Structure Percent      := 10

Damage Percent                 := 0

Supply Percent                 := 10

Range Modifier                 := 0

Weapon To Hit Modifier         := 0

Vehicle Size Minimum           := 1000

Vehicle Size Maximum           := 1000

Comp Family Requirement        := 

Weapon Type Requirement        := none

Vehicle Type                   := Ship

---

The A-series is (as labelled) for 100kT ships -- Exodus will place Escorts at that size. The H-series is a mount for much larger ships ... in fact, ships 10x larger than the Escort, at 1,000kT.

The A-series engine is 1% the base size, structure kT, and supply usage; the H series sets those at 10% ... ten times as much.

Fuel consumption, like engine mass overall, is directly tied to ship mass in a linear fashion. Figure, if you broke that 1000kT ship up into 10 seperate parts (each with an equal share of the total engien mass) ... why should fuel consumption improve, or get worse?

Twenty 100kT Escorts will burn exactly as much fuel per movement point expended, as two 1,000kT Cruiser ...or ten 200kT Frigates ... or one 2,000kT Dreadnought ... and so on.

IOW, to move 2,000kT of ship, one sector, at a given total speed ... will cost the same fuel, regardless of how many "packets" that 2,000kT of ship is divided up into.

However, unfortunately mounts do not allow me to adjust the amount of supplies STORED; an Escort can get away with relying on it's "sump" tanks, a Dreadnought can't. Essentially, as the engines get larger, the "fuel tank" aspect occupies a smaller and smaller percentage of the engine's total mass; more fuel tanks, or supply-generation components, or a combination of the two, will be required to move that big Dreadnought at any real speed (unles syou're satisfied with running it around on 0 supplies, at a speed of 1 and with no way to fire it's guns, forever ... heh).