Solar Sail???????

Emperor Zodd · #1 January 7th, 2001, 09:23 PM

The idea of a solar sail giving you extra speed is idiotic!!!
If a ship running on it's own engines deployed such a device, it would act as a drag chute,slowing down the ship not speeding it up!!! This needs to be removed from the game. Besides wouldn't you only move in the direction of the wind?

Baron Munchausen · #2 January 7th, 2001, 09:44 PM

quote:
Originally posted by Emperor Zodd:
The idea of a solar sail giving you extra speed is idiotic!!!
If a ship running on it's own engines deployed such a device, it would act as a drag chute,slowing down the ship not speeding it up!!! This needs to be removed from the game. Besides wouldn't you only move in the direction of the wind?

The rationale for the component's ability is stupid, yes. And it should not work in systems without a sun -- but it does! All you need to do is change the description to something that makes more sense and find a better graphic. One of our "serious" modders who has some graphical skills could do that, I think.

In my own tech set I edited its size, making it 30kt, and added a 20 percent "to hit" penalty because it's so large & bulky that it must slow the ship down. This makes it useful mainly for NON-combat ships like transports. It ought to cancel cloaking, too, but there's no way to do what in the current game abilities. I'd invent a different technical description for it, but I can't make a decent graphic so I'll wait for someone else to do it.

[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 07 January 2001).]

disabled · #3 January 7th, 2001, 10:09 PM

Well, Solar Sails could be made into a new tech tree, starting before ion engines.

Kagetora · #4 January 7th, 2001, 11:30 PM

quote:
Originally posted by Emperor Zodd:
The idea of a solar sail giving you extra speed is idiotic!!!
If a ship running on it's own engines deployed such a device, it would act as a drag chute,slowing down the ship not speeding it up!!! This needs to be removed from the game. Besides wouldn't you only move in the direction of the wind?

Well there is no wind in space nor is there anything to create any "drag" so a solar sail would most certainly not slow you down any. Whether it would speed the ship up or not depends on how fast it can go already. A solar sail over time could get you very close to the speed of light at least theoretically.

Sabre21 · #5 January 7th, 2001, 11:42 PM

Drag in Space..hehe...sounds like a cheap sci-fi movie. As for the aerodynamic qualities of a "Solar Sail" in space...well..there is none. Drag is not an issue in a vacuum. The item could be as big and bulky as the empire state building and it wouldnt matter. As far as the collection of solar energy, again, a sun in a local system is not needed. The energy is collected from the billions of stars that permeate space. Now it is possible that a nebula or black hole may cause some interference, theres not enough data to support any theory here, just speculation. As far as ship maneuverability, this would depend on the proximity of large gravity wells and the design of the ship and the solar sails. But it would have to be a pretty large gravity field to reduce maneuverability significantly. The biggest problem a ship with any large set of solar panels (as we think of them today, would be with damage caused by micro-meteorites. But if someone in the future is gonna "invent" shields, warp drive, and a host of other sci-fi stuff, well, why not, some type of super efficient extra small hi-speed "solar sails". It's no more unrealistic than the rest of the items in the game. But its a game I do enjoy. Oops...gotto go, my flight to Alpha Centauri leaves in a few minutes..hehe

TerryM · #6 January 8th, 2001, 12:56 AM

Actually a solar sail uses the solar 'wind' to drive the ship. Course it has to be BIG to make any difference.

And it could be used for braking when entering a solar system.

But for game purposes, I like to think of it as that big-ballon type thing (can't think of the name) racing yatchs use on the downwind leg of the race course...

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TerryM