Simple power system overhaul counter-proposal

[Dr. Whammy]

I've been doing some brainstorming about power recently. After trying to build hybrid ships to accommodate the current power setup and any reactors that Schine comes up with, I came to the conclusion that most of the issues that led to the idea of an over haul stem from the simple fact that there are way too many blocks required to power a combat-worthy ship.

My suggestion; Instead of completely redoing the power system and breaking EVERYTHING, has anyone from the Schine team considered doing the following tweaks?

Reactor Blocks
- Recommended name change; "Power Conduit".
- Greatly increase the amount of power regeneration given for efficient reactor group dimensions.
- Significantly reduce the amount of power regeneration given per reactor block.
- Retain the regeneration soft cap mechanic for this block; allowing small ships to have more power without encouraging giant-ism.

If the regen increase is large enough, "power cubes" and actual "reactor core" shapes could easily power a ship, while power strips" or "power lines" can still be placed without taking up the entire ship. The number of blocks needed to power a ship would be reduced; removing any supposed design restrictions. The soft cap discourages giant-ism like before.


Power Capacitors
- Stores power; same as before.
- Incorporate the above reactor blocks as "power conduits" so that power capacity is only added to the ship if the capacitor group touches a power reactor block group.


Auxiliary Power

- Recommended name change; "Reactor Core".
- Regenerates power at the the default rate when the entire aux group is surrounded by a reactor group with matching or greater dimensions like this...

Spoiler

Core surrounded; full power regeneration

- Multiply the aux group's power regen rate by the number of reactor block groups surrounding it

Spoiler

4 groups surrounding the core. multiply power regen by 4.

- If a surrounding reactor block group is damaged so that it no longer surrounds the aux block group, the system loses the regen bonus for that group. Only the complete groups give a bonus.

Spoiler

4 groups surrounding the core. 2 are damaged or incomplete. Multiply power regen by 2.

- Cut the power regen in half if the aux block group is not surrounded by any reactor group.
- Retain the regeneration soft cap mechanic for this block.

Similar modifications could be made to the shield and thruster systems as well but that's a discussion for another thread.

Your thoughts?

 

[Zekester81]

I honestly think power, and all other ship systems, where gigantism is concerned, are all linked. The real problem is that ships with an interior, no matter their size, will under perform anything of the same size without, no matter their configuration. I think the size of all systems need to be reduced(made more powerful, smaller), but interior needs to be meaningful for that to work. If interior is not necessary, then reducing system sizes is pointless. The same scenario will still be applicable, a ship without interior will be superior in every way. The large amount of systems needed now leads to gigantism in that attaining a powerful ship requires large amounts of blocks. In reducing system sizes, those same ships will become extra super powerful without needed interior space, because all the space that would be needed will be filled with yet more systems blocks. The whole thing repeats, on a slightly smaller scale and yet does not solve the gigantism in ship building. There are other factors that also lead to this, such as the fact that with blocks, the larger the object is, the more detail can be worked into it(more real and lifelike). And that's just one example of other reasons for gigantism, there are others.

All that said, I believe that this is a suggestion that has merit. I'm all for reducing system sizes and allowing more power out of them. I think systems take up entirely too much space. More power out of a smaller space benefits all ships and turrets equally. I'm not fully on-board with a reactor without more details, but think this fills that space nicely using assets already in game, and adds some more depth and required thought to building power systems.

Edit: Oh, and I also like how this make a direct connection from power gen to storage. Nice.

 

[Valiant70]

While the grids around an aux unit would be a baby step in a better direction, it wouldn't make a lot of difference in the end, not to mention ships would still be very regen focused.

Any change to power at all will break most high-performance ships, either by needing them so their systems don't work right, or by making something else more powerful and outmodong the old design. A game-breaking change to ship systems IS needed and should have happened long ago. Schine finally smelled the bacon, and good for them IMO.

 

[Ciggofwar]

I'm death experiencer from when back when I played with infinity

Any way the current systems has always be broke, the A+B+C of keeping it simple, The current reactor blocks are simple boring and well large chunks of 10 layers thick of everything leading to just a rectangles of boxes, not overly intuitive.

Ya I'm crazy person, you don't play with infinity, and not have your reality come undone too you, so I smoke weed to stay balanced lol
Back to engine crazy stuff!

You need a press key "t" on reactor blocks to make them the same as hull blocks, but with varied outputs for sizes, this will lead to creativity of designing engines , but you need heat to burn resources so you need a fuel type of a mix chemical compounds and that needs a reactor box, you have piping in game even tho its a decoration be nice to see it used for cooling and fans which are decoration item, cooling, venting ooohhh ya!

The chemical compounds was fun, to make stuff with!, now use that to make fuels etc...of a wide variety now this way resources will yield meaning it would be in the bonding process of the % of the quality, now you can vary the way the fuel compound is added, like in a clocking or timing makes use of a negative from that of being efficient, you can dump burn to produce % or fine tune your reactor engine to produce % offsetting negatives like heat, and consumption etc... this way you can have multiple reactors, like a sister system which could make use of finer burning , your leaving it up too the players rather than telling them, one rule fits all?

Engines should be works of art as well like having an actual engine room rather than a solid ship. How you implement balance is what you invested in in your design and what you made for a fuel compound how much you put into cooling piping venting, some where in all of this is YOUR balance as a player, The Schine Team should deliver the tools the rest is up to the players to figuratively find! at the same point the thrusters should have the same for fuel compounds, the % and ratios will be all over the place the cooling should be the same dump cooling or timed cooling, part of thermo dynamics keeping within a % for efficiency and power output . This way balance is in everything, not set in stones,

Not sure about coding or math behind how design affects power could be with heat release and spacing plus distances, for instance in your reaction process the compound in waste can go towards your thruster % of a mixed burning compound This way you could have 1000's of different ways a system can be used, so innovation is a reward like good R&D work of experimenting same for cooling make a cooling compound as well, this way you have a huge multiple systems all interacting with each other and a newer innovative complete system! HELL ya scape that old ship.

OOhhh frigging hell let's go just crazy! and make all the blocks with the T-key feature so weapons can also be fine tuned and lots of crazy ass designs. This way your base ship can flow with a themed design much better! thruster designs, shield designs, the possibilities are through the roof
In basics you know what mathworks in outputs and follow rules of linking systems etc... rule sets could be shield closer to the outside body has more effect, thrusters on the outside operate at 100% spreading them out makes for the ratio aspect of that which is fine tuning the aspect ratio, this way size is not punished so if you want art, on your ship or a design that is unique where you put stuff is also balance. This way you as player have to find your balances between all the systems, and functionality VS designs being many of them.

Many new games with in a game! @v@ Schine Team

 

[Dr. Whammy]

Ummm. are you feeling ok Ciggofwar ?

 

[Ciggofwar]

Ummm. are you feeling ok Ciggofwar ?

Yes Quite feeling OK
Had a burst of thoughts, and had to write them down

What do you think DR Whammy of having your reactor blocks like your armor blocks for shapes and energy outputs, now before one comments what should think of the possibilities of design and structures from Fighters all the way to Titans and the use of 1000,s of different resource combinations to make a fuel type, This way there is competitive differences in the way you are building and the configuration, you have to make a reactor core and a reactor chamber. So the core and the chamber react to produce your power two designs that are trying to compliment each other one is projecting energy the other is absorbing energy. You still have the same rules of metrics of mass and new rules of course of dispersing heat and heat management can I use heat in another process of manufacturing? or in a weapon where heat can be utilized?

For instance you have a favorite design but you can not make the design function without sacking functionality, or you get to function and lose the design having to make it 3x bigger etc... or it's a decoration and not combat worthy.

This way someone could make an alien looking weapon that actually works has functionality.

This way your self is your only limitation on creativity and this way your designs are your gribbly, it can add functionality to gribbly or the state of gribbly can be enhanced.

 

[KaRe]

I find it quite laughable that there are many members of the community think that Schine would replace a system, let alone one of the base systems, just for the hell of it. As for my actual thoughts, it seems to literally only be a slight variation of the proposed power plans, that simply re uses textures but do effectively different things. It's going to confuse people for a good while.

 

[Dr. Whammy]

The concern is Schema himself said (twice) that the change WILL break virtually every ship ever made. Can you not see why that would make people jittery?

 

[Ciggofwar]

Not that laughable really, it's being competitive in a unique niche, to offer players there expression of creativity. rather than the usually box like mentality, which your not replacing it , but upgrading it to the next level.

 

[Dr. Whammy]

In the end, what we really need is a system where the ship doesn't have to be 50% power reactors and capacitors, to be effective. We also need to change the way shields work. Actual 'shield generators' that function like the "reactor core" system rather than the block spam that they are now would balance combat and make things more realistic.

After all, they made it incredibly hard to cloak a large ship; a process that supposedly expends vast amounts of energy to bend light around a ships hull. Meanwhile, they made it super easy to shield ships; a process that creates a solid barrier that cannot be penetrated until the shield capacitors run dry. Science fiction or not, something seems wrong with this.

As it stands now, there is a lot wrong with this game that makes combat favor larger craft. Sure; there are ways around the power limitations but let's be honest here; the armor, armor HP and explosion updates nerfed the crap out of missiles and ruined combat for smaller craft; even against other small craft.

In the past, two fighters in this size range, armed with missiles could have a nice little dogfight and kill each other in just a few hits. May the best pilot win.


Now, you can pound on a fighter with those same missiles for up to 5 minutes before killing it. Don't even bother equipping rapid dumbfire missiles on a fighter for combat; you won't even scratch the paint. So how do you kill the little fighter? Simple; use bugger missiles.
So now it takes something like this to one-shot that same fighter...


There's something VERY wrong with this.

The bottom line is everything is way more tanky than it should be, so now everyone is obsessed with building the largest weapons they can power, just to be combat effective. ...or failing that, putting all their energy into stealing ships and griefing bases.

 

[KaRe]

The concern is Schema himself said (twice) that the change WILL break virtually every ship ever made. Can you not see why that would make people jittery?

I can see why this would make people jittery. The thing is, your system effectively does the same thing as the proposed heat system.

Not that laughable really, it's being competitive in a unique niche, to offer players there expression of creativity. rather than the usually box like mentality, which your not replacing it , but upgrading it to the next level.

I don't see how this would not be laughable. You're saying that replacing a system out of the blue is being uniquely competitive in order to provide creativity. The original system has problems, and they are trying to fix it. What I'm getting from you, is that completely replacing something just to provide creativity is ok, even if the old was perfect and the new is terrible, as long as it's competitive with other games?

 

[Dr. Whammy]

I can see why this would make people jittery. The thing is, your system effectively does the same thing as the proposed heat system.

Actually no. It uses the same blocks and block IDs so that nothing new needs to be added. It also makes use of the existing power system layouts. So instead of using something like this to squeeze 2m power out of a small-ish ship.


You would place your reactor core...


and use the existing reactor blocks (blue) as "power conduit" to create a connection to your existing power capacitors; kind of like plaing power lines in "Sim City" to power your houses/factories.

After that, you can start removing any extra reactor chains to make room for cargo, interiors, weapons, etc. There would be no "heat box" as all that does is push us back toward the"restricted designs" they're worried about.

My system allows for a simple transition, responsible rebalancing and would not instantly cripple all existing ships. There's enough wiggle room to allow the choice between a simple modification or a complete refit.

 

[Ciggofwar]

EG: Reactor blocks - You have a stack of block on the right and too the left a design that has the same effect in energy as the stack pile of blocks does, which one do you want to play with? I want too play with one on the left!! I just randomly made it up to show design can be anything.
[doublepost=1492543225,1492542596][/doublepost]

little larger

Than you could also add color and pick from a color pallet or by linking with a light etc... so it has a glow effect

Little more imaginative, but this could be my reactor and the inside place a design reactor core, color it and some timing blocks make it paluse in various ways come sundays, how ever I can being creative it has design, functionality, it is art that functions, now if it were weapons blocks this is my new weapon , or shields blocks part of my ships art that functions.

The question comes down too, do you want to play like this? Where design has functionality?

This what I have starting from scratch, a functioning rectangle solid box, just like everyone's flying box, just needs gribbly crap make it look spacy wow man cool! Time for a change!

 

[Ciggofwar]

See my reactor core is coming to life MUHaaaaa! bye bye block heads lol.

Again peeps which style do we want to play with? I have to make a reactor core now, most will probably build better than I can given the right tools, now if I could get the reactor core to spin and that caused a multiplication factor which essential is the power engine for your ship, so at a pictural speed is say will generate 500,000 power at so much heat value, at 1 million power will double the heat value and 2x consume more fuel compound using the same size reactor.
So at various reactor sizes will generate X- amount of power changing the spin rates can yield more power but will generate more heat and consume more compound fuel, now your looking how much space do I need, vs how much power do I need to generate, How much fuel do I want to use, what type of fuel, and what can do about heat, heat dispersal fans liquid etc....

 

[Dr. Whammy]

See my reactor core is coming to life MUHaaaaa! bye bye block heads lol.

Again peeps which style do we want to play with? I have to make a reactor core now, most will probably build better than I can given the right tools, now if I could get the reactor core to spin and that caused a multiplication factor which essential is the power engine for your ship, so at a pictural speed is say will generate 500,000 power at so much heat value, at 1 million power will double the heat value and 2x consume more fuel compound using the same size reactor.
So at various reactor sizes will generate X- amount of power changing the spin rates can yield more power but will generate more heat and consume more compound fuel, now your looking how much space do I need, vs how much power do I need to generate, How much fuel do I want to use, what type of fuel, and what can do about heat, heat dispersal fans liquid etc....

To be honest; I think this belongs in separate thread. It doesn't address any of the problems with the current power system. You're also inviting new problems as well.

1) We don't need the reactors to spin. It does nothing to fix power and it's a lag bomb just waiting to happen; just like the old docked reactors.
2) We don't need shaped reactor blocks. This does nothing to fix power. You can build around your reactor using any aesthetic style you want.
3) Fuel is yet another complication that is not needed at this stage. Once again; you're putting the cart before the horse. Power needs to be fixed first before we worry about how it looks.

I'm not trying to be rude but this isn't helping. You are not seeking a solution to the reactor issue but are instead focusing only on aesthetics. You didn't even give your input on the system modification I proposed or compare it to the heat box system Schine is talking about.

 

[MacThule]

I find it quite laughable that there are many members of the community think that Schine would replace a system, let alone one of the base systems, just for the hell of it.

Nobody thinks that.

 

[Ciggofwar]

Ok I'll start my own thread. by the way turrets spin move by your accounts causes lag. really you want to go back to 2012 ideals right to deal with lag issues if you turn off the animations you'll save ram? It's being innovative and pushing boundaries than coming up with means to solve lag issues. Your stuck inside the box you have build for yourself?

 

[Lecic]

The real problem is that ships with an interior, no matter their size, will under perform anything of the same size without, no matter their configuration.

This is a myth I am tired of hearing. STOP COMPARING SHIPS BY SIZE. A ship with an interior of the same MASS or BLOCK COUNT of one without interior can compete just fine. At that point, it is down to the skills of the engineer who built it and the skills of the person piloting it, and not down to balance issues. Of course a corvette is going to lose to a destroyer in a head on fight, so why would you think that a corvette that's the same size as a destroyer would have any chance?

not to mention ships would still be very regen focused.

Ships being regen-focused is not inherently a problem. The fact that being able to chose between regen-focused or capacity-focused is not a real choice is the problem.

 

[Dr. Whammy]

Ok I'll start my own thread.

Hey man, I'm not trying to chase you off. There are a specific set of problems we're trying to discuss. You are always welcome to join in. All I'm asking is that we try to keep it on topic.
[doublepost=1492626716,1492626014][/doublepost]

This is a myth I am tired of hearing. STOP COMPARING SHIPS BY SIZE. A ship with an interior of the same MASS or BLOCK COUNT of one without interior can compete just fine. At that point, it is down to the skills of the engineer who built it and the skills of the person piloting it, and not down to balance issues. Of course a corvette is going to lose to a destroyer in a head on fight, so why would you think that a corvette that's the same size as a destroyer would have any chance?

I think I understand the methods people are using to get more power/fire power out of their ships. Maybe my 'experiments' were the answer all along and I just didn't want to admit it. If everyone else is using these 'outside the box' methods, I suppose it's time for me to do what I have to do.

Ships being regen-focused is not inherently a problem. The fact that being able to chose between regen-focused or capacity-focused is not a real choice is the problem.

I think I understand what you mean by this but, I've not had any caffeine today. Can you break it down further?

 

[Valiant70]

This is a myth I am tired of hearing. STOP COMPARING SHIPS BY SIZE. A ship with an interior of the same MASS or BLOCK COUNT of one without interior can compete just fine.

That's not strictly true. If you leave an open space, it takes more armor blocks on the hull to cover the same volume of systems. You can alleviate this to some degree by placing interiors outside the armor shell, but that limits options and still adds mass. Granted, this is not all bad for an armor tank, but this is not desirable because it pushes you to make an armor tank. Also, decoration blocks like motherboards do not contribute armor which makes them even worse, further limiting good aesthetic options if performance is a concern. My experience has been that ships with much interior have more armor and way more HP than they need, and lack other things in comparison, especially shields.

This problem is far less severe than it was before the ship armor/HP update. It was horrible before that because the interior blocks added absolutely nothing to the ship. The effect now is that instead of a severe decrease in performance, an interior forces focus from shield to armor and usually decreases overall performance slightly, still enough to make a difference in serious PVP.