Thrust Mechanics Explained

[Calbiri]

Greetings Citizens!

As there are still planned improvements to the way the game and ship designers handle thrust (Which will be explained further on in this thread), I have continued to look for optimal basic mechanics for the thrust blocks on which the control system will be built. Players have asked that more discussion be had with the community well in advance before any more such changes occured, so this thread is to gather opinions on the proposed solution.

(Please note, this is not in the suggestion forum, it is meant to detail the plans for the Directional Thrust system and to explain and ask for opinions on a change to the basic thrust blocks values. If you have a suggestion on alternate methods of setting up the thrust in the game, please use the suggestion forum.)
​

I'll start by explaining the change that I am looking for opinions on first, and below that I will explain the Directional Thrust system that we have planned so that you can better see how the scope of changes might affect gameplay later on.

Linear Thrust, Exponential Power Usage​

Currently the thrust blocks on a ship are added up to determine the amount of thrust a ship gains. The thrust gained per block is slightly less for every additional block added, while the power usage is linearly based on the amount of thrust granted.

1 thrust block = 4.4 ship thrust & 4.4 power used
100 thrust blocks = 1795 ship thrust & 1795 power used
*Rough estimates*
​

The change to thrust blocks we are considering is to make the thrust gained per block linear, while putting the power usage on an exponentially increasing curve.

1 thrust block = 5 ship thrust & 5 power used
100 thrust blocks = 5000 ship thrust and 7500 power used
*Rough example*​

What this means is that ships can achieve higher amounts of thrust with the same number of blocks that they have now, however, this increase comes with an even higher cost to power the more thrust blocks their are on a ship. However, larger ships incurring this larger power usage can mitigate this power usage by slowing down when they need more power, or stopping entirely.

This is the change that I would like to ask for your opinions on in the comments below.
Thank you.​

Overall Plan for Movement​

• Direction Thrust Setting

This topic has previously been discussed in Q&A's, but it has been some time since those and most players are unaware of this planned system. So I'll try to catch you up on what we would like to try to set up for improved directional designs for ships.

Currently a player need only place thrust blocks anywhere on their ship without concern for orientation or location. They are then granted an amount of thrust that may be applied in any direction. Although simple, this leads to things like capital ships flying maximum speed backwards while firing their primary guns at any ship persuing them.

While it would be technically possible to use the orientation of thrusters and trying to force their placement in specific locations on a ship, this would not only effect performance, but would greatly hinder current and future ship designs (how to make a "Warp Nacelle" when forced to use conventional rockets?)

Instead, we would like to try using an Omni-Directional thrust assignment system.
Basically, you will continue to be allowed to place your thrusters anywhere on your ship, and they will continue to put all available thrust into a single pool. From here however, things change. Instead of being able to simply apply that pool of thrust in any direction, a player must first enter a GUI (I don't have a sample for you currently, sorry) and assign the amount of thrust from their pool that they would like to use for each direction of movement. This means that if you want to fly forward (relative to your front of your ship) you must assign a % of your thrust in that direction. If you want to be able to stop moving forward, or even begin to move in reverse, you must assign a % of thrust to the rear direction of your ship (or rotate your ship and retro-burn with your forward thrust.)

This assignment process applies to all 6 directions on you ship, forward/back, up/down, left/right, you may assign any amount of your thrust that you like (in percentages) until you have used the entire 100% available in your thrust pool.

Caution should be used when assigning the % of thrust to each direction of your ship, as this same % will apply to the maximum speed (based on the server setting) that you can acheive in the given direction. So that a 50% forward thrust also means a maximum of 50% server max speed in the forward direction.

Rotating your ship might also cost a % from your ships thrust pool, although this should not impact the maximum speed in any of your 6 directions of linear travel. (Essentially rotating your ship would divert potential thrust before it enters your thrust pool.)​

• Momentum Subsystems

These as a whole are all of the systems that can affect a ships movement besides the thrust blocks. These all serve to modify the behavior established by the Direction Thrust system detailed above. Not all of these systems are finalized, this is just the basic concepts we are currently working with, many of these are also different from what is currently in game.

1. Defensive Push (self buff)
   • This system will operate on a system/ship ratio, you will gain up to a cap, an increase to your ships thrust amount (acceleration), at the cost of even higher power usage than normal. (This will not affect maximum speed)
2. Offensive Push (effects target)
   • This system converts the damage of the weapon it is linked to into momentum to shove the impacted target.
3. Defensive Pull (self buff)
   • This system will operate on a system/ship ratio, you will gain up to a cap, an increase to the rotational acceleration of your ship, at the cost of even higher power usage than normal. (This will not affect your maximum rotation speed)
4. Offensive Pull (effects target)
   • This system converts the damage of the weapon it is linked to into momentum to pull the impacted target.
5. Defensive Stop (self buff)
   • This system will operate on a system/ship ratio, you will gain up to a cap, resistance to outside forces pushing/pulling/stopping your ship
6. Offensive Stop (effects target)
   • This system converts the damage of the weapon it is linked to into momentum to stop the impacted target.
7. Defensive Overdrive (self buff)
   • This system will operate on a system/ship ratio, you will gain up to a cap, an increase to the maximum speed of your ship (based on server max speed)
8. Anti-Gravity Module (self buff)
   • This system will allow your ship to hover in the gravity of a planet
9. Thrust Supply/Drain (Very hypothetical idea's currently, they might not be in game)
   • A pair of support weapon systems, they will work similarly to power supply/drain beams, in that they will transfer thrust (instead of power) between your ship and the target. Based on the size of the system, an amount of thrust is given to one ship as a buff for a period of time, and the other ship is given an equivalent nerf to its thrust. This does not remove control of either ship, nor impart any specific momentum of its own, it simply modify's the available thrust of both targets for a period of time.
10. Jump Drive / Interdiction
    • The plans for FTL are listed below, but the same system blocks may be usable offensively to tackle other ships preparing to use their Jump Drives.

• FTL

To everyone wanting a jump drive, or a wormhole gate, or a hyperspace, fret not, your getting all three!
But first, more warnings, these are still working concepts, and until they are implemented and working (or even after :p ) they may be subject to change, as pretty much anything is in an alpha. I appreciate your understanding and not mobbing me in the future if we change something

There are three basic ways of getting around really fast, (even in all of your sci-fi's they all boil down to some variation of these three.) We will of course put our own spin on them to fit the universe of StarMade, while allowing you to treat them as the FTL system of any sci-fi universe you prefer.

Jump Drives (any ship type, short range)

This system can be installed on any ship, it will require power to be channeled into it for a period of time to charge up (based on system and ship size.) After charging has completed it will instantly jump the ship to a pre-selected sector coordinate. This system however has a limited travel range, so going longer distances may require multiple charge-ups. (The distance we are considering is about 8 sectors distance currently, this may change)​

Gates (Station only, long range)

These gates are installed in pairs, up to 8 Systems apart (1 system = 16 sectors currently) They constantly drain power from their host stations to open and maintain a ring of blocks. Withing this ring, a passageway between the two gates forms allowing instantanious travel between the two stations by flying through the rings Any looped shape may be used, so caution is advise on flying through unknown gates, as you may have parts of your ship lost if the paired gate on the other end is too small to fit you. ​

Hyper-Drives (Capital Ship Systems)

This subsystem, when placed on your ship, will activate a "capital ship" flag in your ships meta data, imparting a permanent debuff to your ship (currently we plan to have it set your ships thrust to 0 and reduce the ships max speed to 0%, based on server max speed.)

However, in exchange for this debuff, your newly minted Capital Ship will have the ability to charge up and activate its new hyperdrive, dropping the ship into a sort of hyperspace. You will have a few seconds to orient your ship, and then the acceleration will kick in, you cant slow down, and you cant stop without dropping from hyperspace (and loosing all of your charge) you can still steer however. You will have a set amount of time to navigate while in hyperspace, after which you will drop out. Charging takes a good deal of power and time (based on ship mass), so this is not something most smaller ships will want to do on their own, instead they are advised to hitch a ride with a carrier, or to use a Gate network.
​

​

Thanks for taking the time to read all that, and thanks again if you decide to provide your opinion on the Thrust Block's - Power Vs.s Thrust settings I proposed near the top of this post.

Calbiri​

 

[MossyStone48]

I've been curious about it myself. Thanks, Cal!

(YES FTL)

 

[timethatswasted]

Great to see a detailed plan!


The directional thrust system sounds awesome. My only concern is that there would need to be some sort of cool down after you have assigned your thrust directions so you can't immediately change your settings. Otherwise people could just put 100% of thrust into reverse on a whim and kite backwards like they do now.

I would personally need to see the directional thrust in action before I can make a judgement on the overall thruster values.... as long as we still have the ability to modify them via the block behavior file I don't see an issue. I am always of the feeling though that big ships should be slow =p

I personally have always felt overdrive should work a little differently... It would be nice if it was more effective for large ships then for small ships. I would like to see larger ships have an overall higher top speed then smaller ships, but with much slower acceleration. Overdrive on large ships is currently almost useless.

Don't really see the point of thrust supply and drain... seems redundant when we have power drain, pull and push effects

Hyper drive sounds great, Gates sound great, ... jump drive.. eh..
There doesn't seem to be any planned distinction for ship size. It would be nice if larger ships could have a longer range. So the more "jump drive blocks" the farther you can jump. If every ship can only jump 8 sectors that is kind of lame. The way it is worded it sounds like larger ships will require a longer jump time.

I would propose that the distance you can jump and time it takes you to charge up is determined by the number of "jump blocks" rather then the size of the ship.

While in hyperspace will you clip through objects? When Overdrive first came out it had no cap, so you had people flying 400b/s into partially loaded stations and planets causing all sorts of server crashing issues.

 

[takethispie]

OH GOD YES the new thrust mechanics are PERFECT

but I don't really understand the part with the hyperdrives :/
it means that if you have hyperdrives on your ship it can't move except in hyperspace ? :|

I'm so happy to see what you are planning :D

 

[Krosulhah]

Hyperdrive makes you Immobile? I doubt that many people will enjoy that.
Other than that, however, it all looks pretty awesome.

 

[Dark-life]

Hmmm seems cool. (starts planning such ships)

 

[Eldergroan]

'hey boss, at least the slipstream drive isn't broken!" -Harper, "Gene Roddenbury's Andromeda" FTL FTW!

 

[Crimson-Artist]

Ok let me try to understand the FTL mechanic. they act like

Jump Drives
(see the way ships appear and leave)

Gates

Hyperspace

Personally i think that the Jump drives and the Hyperspace methods should be switched. Smaller ships should zoom to a destination while a Capital ship should be able to just teleport there

 

[Criss]

Pretty awesome stuff. As for the power and thrusters change, I have to agree. Placing down tons of thrusters AND power blocks to make it all work is a problem that I am seeing as I design my ships. I don't want to resort to filling in every gap in my ship just to get better numbers.

As for the directional thrust I think there is one thing that might be worth thinking about. If say I put 100% thrust into the forward direction, does that mean my ship will not stop? Currently we have inertial dampening, but perhaps it's overall effectiveness should be turned down if someone tries to do that.

Momentum systems
First one is basically an afterburner.
Third one is basically an inertia stabilizer.
Four is a tractor beam.
Six is stasis webifier. :D:D:D
Seven is more akin to a micro warp drive. :D:D:D
Not sure I can completely agree with number nine.

Interdiction = HNNNNNNNNNNNG

Jump drives and the gates seem perfect. I do have an issue with hyper drive though. Even if I equip this module to my capital ship, it is still a capital ship. Would it be possible to make the debuff not equal 0% ? I still want to move the ship, even if its stupidly slow like 5%. Perhaps a config option for it? At that point its basically a hyperspace capable station. I also think the FTL implementation would call for a change in default settings for sector size and whatnot.

 

[Johnathan Dahmnation]

Overall Plan for Movement​

• Direction Thrust Setting

This topic has previously been discussed in Q&A's, but it has been some time since those and most players are unaware of this planned system. So I'll try to catch you up on what we would like to try to set up for improved directional designs for ships.

Currently a player need only place thrust blocks anywhere on their ship without concern for orientation or location. They are then granted an amount of thrust that may be applied in any direction. Although simple, this leads to things like capital ships flying maximum speed backwards while firing their primary guns at any ship persuing them.

While it would be technically possible to use the orientation of thrusters and trying to force their placement in specific locations on a ship, this would not only effect performance, but would greatly hinder current and future ship designs (how to make a "Warp Nacelle" when forced to use conventional rockets?)

Instead, we would like to try using an Omni-Directional thrust assignment system.
Basically, you will continue to be allowed to place your thrusters anywhere on your ship, and they will continue to put all available thrust into a single pool. From here however, things change. Instead of being able to simply apply that pool of thrust in any direction, a player must first enter a GUI (I don't have a sample for you currently, sorry) and assign the amount of thrust from their pool that they would like to use for each direction of movement. This means that if you want to fly forward (relative to your front of your ship) you must assign a % of your thrust in that direction. If you want to be able to stop moving forward, or even begin to move in reverse, you must assign a % of thrust to the rear direction of your ship (or rotate your ship and retro-burn with your forward thrust.)

This assignment process applies to all 6 directions on you ship, forward/back, up/down, left/right, you may assign any amount of your thrust that you like (in percentages) until you have used the entire 100% available in your thrust pool.

Caution should be used when assigning the % of thrust to each direction of your ship, as this same % will apply to the maximum speed (based on the server setting) that you can acheive in the given direction. So that a 50% forward thrust also means a maximum of 50% server max speed in the forward direction.

Rotating your ship might also cost a % from your ships thrust pool, although this should not impact the maximum speed in any of your 6 directions of linear travel. (Essentially rotating your ship would divert potential thrust before it enters your thrust pool.)
​

So, in trying to understand this it sounds as if there is no way to get 100% movement speed in all directions even with a vastly overprovisioned thrust pool compared to mass. If I make a 6:1 thrust to mass ship I would think I should be able to achieve full speed in all directions with an even split.

If mass isn't considered then backpedalling capitals doesn't seem like it would be resolved since the easier to achieve high thrust:mass of smaller ships can't be put to use and still leaves them with the same gimped speed in splitting their thrust or sacrificing the usability of their greater agility to make ships that just go strait.

 

[Criss]

So, in trying to understand this it sounds as if there is no way to get 100% movement speed in all directions even with a vastly overprovisioned thrust pool compared to mass. If I make a 6:1 thrust to mass ship I would think I should be able to achieve full speed in all directions with an even split.

If mass isn't considered then backpedalling capitals doesn't seem like it would be resolved since the easier to achieve high thrust:mass of smaller ships can't be put to use and still leaves them with the same gimped speed in splitting their thrust or sacrificing the usability of their greater agility to make ships that just go strait.

Pretty sure mass would still be a factor or you could literally use one thruster and get the same efficiency as 100. It would be an incredibly stupid move to remove the effect mass has on thrust entirely don't you think. It's a combination of the two systems. Sounds like mass would effect acceleration and the percentages effect top speeds.

 

[MossyStone48]

What this means is that ships can achieve higher amounts of thrust with the same number of blocks that they have now, however, this increase comes with an even higher cost to power the more thrust blocks their are on a ship. However, larger ships incurring this larger power usage can mitigate this power usage by slowing down when they need more power, or stopping entirely.

This is the change that I would like to ask for your opinions on in the comments below.
Thank you.​

Why not use both? The capship flag lets engines use more juice but get way more thrust. If it's not a cap the engines might have to be bigger but they'll be a lot less energy hungry. This could be useful if a ship has taken damage. Take off the capship flag and let it cruise until the reactor can be repaired.

 

[Vakna]

Completely agree with the basic thrust changes, also makes sense scientifically - talking about sub-light speeds, the closer you approach the light barrier the more energy is needed to achieve the same increase in thrust.

Most of the FTL stuff sounds awesome (FTL HYYYPPEEEE!!!). However, I must vehemently oppose that a ship carrying a hyperdrive module is completely immobile just by having it. Perhaps this was a typo on your end and you meant only when you activate it/charge it? If the plan is to make capital ships immobile just by having that module then nobody at all will actually use that FTL system, they'll just build a network of gates. No point designing something no one will use!

Also this:

Interdiction = HNNNNNNNNNNNG

 

[Johnathan Dahmnation]

Pretty sure mass would still be a factor or you could literally use one thruster and get the same efficiency as 100. It would be an incredibly stupid move to remove the effect mass has on thrust entirely don't you think. It's a combination of the two systems. Sounds like mass would effect acceleration and the percentages effect top speeds.

I never spoke to acceleration, just to the presented mechanics of top speed and how driving it purely by percentages doesn't sound like makes sense. From a speed perspective the very same "1 as effective as 100" you stated still remains true by the reasoning you present. I guess I'm not seeing how it's ok for acceleration to reap the benefits of low mass compared to thrust but speed not getting the same.

 

[Criss]

I never spoke to acceleration, just to the presented mechanics of top speed and how driving it purely by percentages doesn't sound like makes sense. From a speed perspective the very same "1 as effective as 100" you stated still remains true by the reasoning you present. I guess I'm not seeing how it's ok for acceleration to reap the benefits of low mass compared to thrust but speed not getting the same.

Maybe they are making it so the acceleration plays a larger part in top speed. So if mass has no effect on a ships top speed, then we can see how it would play out on a server. A fighter could accelerate in any direction to top speed in about 2 or 3 seconds right? What about a capital ship. If the acceleration is much slower, then it would take minutes of constant movement before it got close to top speed.

Another possibility is that the thrust to mass ratio determines top speed in junction with the percentages set by the player. As it will be harder to get a 1:1 ratio on a larger ship, it will move less then top speed at its own max speed. Personally I think this one makes the most sense. It does seem like the thrust to mass ratio plays more of a role in acceleration than top speed because we actually have a top speed unlike real life.

 

[Johnathan Dahmnation]

Maybe they are making it so the acceleration plays a larger part in top speed. So if mass has no effect on a ships top speed, then we can see how it would play out on a server. A fighter could accelerate in any direction to top speed in about 2 or 3 seconds right? What about a capital ship. If the acceleration is much slower, then it would take minutes of constant movement before it got close to top speed.

Another possibility is that the thrust to mass ratio determines top speed in junction with the percentages set by the player. As it will be harder to get a 1:1 ratio on a larger ship, it will move less then top speed at its own max speed. Personally I think this one makes the most sense. It does seem like the thrust to mass ratio plays more of a role in acceleration than top speed because we actually have a top speed unlike real life.

My original post was mostly in hopes of clarification, but I think the latter best suits smaller ships being able to fully use their agility advantages better so I'm more in favor of that. Also having a low thrust:mass already caps max speed so if thrust is being split I would think I should be able to use a high thrust:mass in a similar but opposite fashion.

 

[0ldSkull]

Caution should be used when assigning the % of thrust to each direction of your ship, as this same % will apply to the maximum speed (based on the server setting) that you can acheive in the given direction. So that a 50% forward thrust also means a maximum of 50% server max speed in the forward direction.

I don't like this; it's unrealistic and counter-intuitive. The server speed limit should be treated similarly to the speed of light--any ship should be able to reach or approach it. It should simply take a long time and a lot of power to get there, but improve with one's thrust to mass ratio. "Slow" capital ships should accelerate [and decelerate and turn] slowly due to their large mass, not accelerate quickly to an artificially reduced speed cap.

Edit: I meant to also give an example that if one has 50% forward allocation and then doubles the number of thrusters on the ship, the top speed would still remain at 50% of server speed cap. That's the counter-intuitive (as opposed to just non-intuitive) part.

Rotating your ship might also cost a % from your ships thrust pool, although this should not impact the maximum speed in any of your 6 directions of linear travel. (Essentially rotating your ship would divert potential thrust before it enters your thrust pool.)

The thought of including rotation in the allocation mix, or as an independent allocation among the three axes, might be interesting. It could be a useful and cool way to customize the maneuverability of larger ships. Also hopefully rotation speed will also increase with the thrust to mass ratio? Not to the same scale as linear movement of course, but it would be nice to be able to influence this aspect of ship movement.

 

[Criss]

I don't like this; it's unrealistic and counter-intuitive. The server speed limit should be treated similarly to the speed of light--any ship should be able to reach or approach it. It should simply take a long time and a lot of power to get there, but improve with one's thrust to mass ratio. "Slow" capital ships should accelerate [and decelerate and turn] slowly due to their large mass, not accelerate quickly to an artificially reduced speed cap.

Edit: I meant to also give an example that if one has 50% forward allocation and then doubles the number of thrusters on the ship, the top speed would still remain at 50% of server speed cap. That's the counter-intuitive (as opposed to just non-intuitive) part.


The thought of including rotation in the allocation mix, or as an independent allocation among the three axes, might be interesting. It could be a useful and cool way to customize the maneuverability of larger ships. Also hopefully rotation speed will also increase with the thrust to mass ratio? Not to the same scale as linear movement of course, but it would be nice to be able to influence this aspect of ship movement.

I believe the thrust to mass ratio will determine acceleration. The percentages configured by the player determines a ships top speed. And considering we are seeing the beginnings of actual FTL systems it wouldn't be right to think of the server max speed as light speed. Also there is no such thing as decelerating. You accelerate in a direction opposite of which you are traveling till you reach 0 or begin reversing.

 

[Gamel]

Oh yeah! Hyper-Drives!!!
A must to all carriers

 

[MrFURB]

The change to thrust blocks we are considering is to make the thrust gained per block linear, while putting the power usage on an exponentially increasing curve.

So what I'm getting out of this is that ships that don't specialize in mobility won't be spending nearly as much mass on thrusters as they are now. By your current example numbers I'm seeing the difference in mass spent on thrusters increasing the larger the ship in question. Ships that do specialize in mobility will be spending less mass and much more energy, which is a net positive change as power is a much easier to handle limiter in ship capabilities than mass is. It also creates a point where adding more thrusters will hurt more than it helps, which didn't exist before. I can see this having a MASSIVE effect on people trying to make their titans mobile, as the new power requirements of thrust make good mobility in ships above a set mass... Well, just too costly to justify. The larger the ship, the smaller it's % in blocks it can logistically handle in thrusters.
The power use is something that might end up needing a few tweaks before it's in a comfortable spot. The higher the power use, the smaller the ship you could realistically get a good thrust/mass ratio on. Thus, the line between 'fighter' mobility and 'capital' mobility moves down in mass. Vice versa, too. Not that I think about it... It's actually a great way for server operators to optimize the experience around the average size of vessel they'd like people to be using without any overly harmful restrictions.

Caution should be used when assigning the % of thrust to each direction of your ship, as this same % will apply to the maximum speed (based on the server setting) that you can acheive in the given direction. So that a 50% forward thrust also means a maximum of 50% server max speed in the forward direction.

Rotating your ship might also cost a % from your ships thrust pool, although this should not impact the maximum speed in any of your 6 directions of linear travel. (Essentially rotating your ship would divert potential thrust before it enters your thrust pool.)

Dividing 100 by 6 gives 16.6, so a vessel with 'balanced' thrust on a 500 speed server would have a maximum speed of 83 units in any direction as well as a presumably low acceleration.
While this may be good for a vessel focusing on docking, or something land-based/station based, it is not an acceptable rate of travel or acceleration for a smaller vessel. With a large ship this matters less due to you not being able to dodge anyways. Still... Too slow for something that you will be using to travel.

How about a different example... 50% forward thrust with 10% in the rest of the categories. Okay, so I'm going to assume strong forward acceleration and a top speed of 250 units, so you'll be zipping past the fellow with balanced thrust. If you're going forward. If you're not going forward... Top speed for your other thrusters is 50. We can assume that for anything that isn't getting into a docking position you won't be making much use of your non-forward thrust.
I'll go ahead and say that this is preferable in almost every conceivable case to a 'balanced' thrust. For fighters, you should have the thrust/mass and thus acceleration to easily reach that 250 top speed on a whim, and be able to zip around at your leisure. The same goes for medium-sized ships, who only have to worry about nominal power costs from their thrust systems. The downsides kick in when you start to lose your turn rate. If a vessel can't turn fast enough to view an opponent and doesn't have turrets to increase their firing arc, then they might as well just keep accelerating, as you won't be able to strafe or backpedal to keep opponents within the sights of your forward weapons. This comes down to fitting capital vessels more like capital vessels, without a central weapon array or designated firing position.

For a final example I'm going to try thinking through a 30% forward, 30% backward, 10% to the rest setup. This allots your vessel about 150 units in maximum speed both forwards and backwards and supposedly average acceleration. Your strafing will suffer minimal acceleration and 50 units top speed.
I feel that a setup such as this one will be the most common for anyone that can get some speed going. The reasoning behind that is that it allows the ship decent travel speed and the ability to backpedal. This keeps forward weapons on target even if the enemy is otherwise more mobile than you. So long as your vessel has forward firepower, the ability to backpedal from an enemy's advances while keeping them in your sights will have more value than being able to move forward quickly as that implies you are not always facing the enemy and thus not applying weapon damage to them.

About turning, you mean to say that if you move forwards and begin turning your forward thrust is lowered? I'm curious about the numbers for that. Will turning at 100% of your ship's turn rate have a massive effect on your directional thrust or only a negligible one? What about 50% of your ship's turn rate?

Thrust Supply/Drain

Yeah, I kinda see these being redundant with the current pull/push/stop offensive effects and the push defensive effect. The only use I can see them having is similar to external reactors, where you can sneak past the regular scaling limitations by having docked external sources beaming you extra thrust, making your massive ship much more agile at a much lower price. Not sure if that's something that you want in this thrust system, though.

• Defensive Push (self buff)
  • This system will operate on a system/ship ratio, you will gain up to a cap, an increase to your ships thrust amount (acceleration), at the cost of even higher power usage than normal. (This will not affect maximum speed)

At what point would it be better to use the push passive over simply adding more thrusters? Yes, it allows you to have 'afterburners' where you can switch on or off your extra thrust, but that is a gimmick with very specific uses. Having a % increase to thrust would be wildly helpful for blockade runners, but if the energy cost of keeping the push effect active is based on the energy cost of using the base thrusters, the afterburner shall be mostly a tool for the fast to become faster, as the potentially truly outrageous energy costs that large thruster arrays have is not something that a capital ship wants to multiply in combat. Neither could it be used as a travel tool unless acceleration is ungodly low compared to top speed.

Defensive Pull (self buff)

• This system will operate on a system/ship ratio, you will gain up to a cap, an increase to the rotational acceleration of your ship, at the cost of even higher power usage than normal. (This will not affect your maximum rotation speed)

Rotational acceleration? There's going to be rotational acceleration!? BOO YAH! I don't really have much to say about this. Normally I'd be worried about changes to turn rate as it affects different ship sizes in varied ways, but the addition of rotational acceleration and a way to increase it is fine in my opinion. There's absolutely no way that could be broken and overpowered, right? Right...?
Eh, anyways... I know I won't be using it except under the distinct circumstances that I have a ship with a much lower turn rate than top turn speed (possibly a bad thrust/mass ratio?) but I can see other people putting it into turrets and whatnot to make their aim a bit more snappy and sharp.

Defensive Stop (self buff)

• This system will operate on a system/ship ratio, you will gain up to a cap, resistance to outside forces pushing/pulling/stopping your ship

I honestly don't know about this one. I can definitely see it'll be a good addition, but I'm confusing myself on if people will see it as viable in combat. Possibly... Turrets with stop or pull effects are known to be especially good against lighter vessels and I can see the stop passive being used on scout vessels or suicide vessels. On the other hand, that's 10% of your ship right there. Unless you're sure that your opponent is going to try to interdict your movement then I would want to fit more combat equipment in that space instead.

Defensive Overdrive (self buff)

• This system will operate on a system/ship ratio, you will gain up to a cap, an increase to the maximum speed of your ship (based on server max speed)

Awesome. No, wait, I've got another thought... Nope, just more awesome. Probably going to be used a ton for anything that move around a lot in combat. Fighters using the 50/10 thrust layout suddenly begin moving at server cap with much better strafing... *Drools*
A couple of questions though: How does the max speed increase interact with the speed cap of the server? If your ship has more than 50% thrust in one direction and your overdrive doubles your top speed, is the extra top speed past the server cap wasted?

Interdiction

YES! Yes!
I must wonder how these work, though. If they are added to weapons as an effect, do they flat-out cancel and warp/jump charge, or do they delay it according to the damage dealt? Would a bunch of interdiction drones let loose as you're trying to escape constantly destroying your hopes of saving your capital ship or would their measly damage only slow down your ship's impressive charge rate?

Hyper-Drives (Capital Ship Systems)
This subsystem, when placed on your ship, will activate a "capital ship" flag in your ships meta data, imparting a permanent debuff to your ship (currently we plan to have it set your ships thrust to 0 and reduce the ships max speed to 0%, based on server max speed.)

However, in exchange for this debuff, your newly minted Capital Ship will have the ability to charge up and activate its new hyperdrive, dropping the ship into a sort of hyperspace. You will have a few seconds to orient your ship, and then the acceleration will kick in, you cant slow down, and you cant stop without dropping from hyperspace (and loosing all of your charge) you can still steer however. You will have a set amount of time to navigate while in hyperspace, after which you will drop out. Charging takes a good deal of power and time (based on ship mass), so this is not something most smaller ships will want to do on their own, instead they are advised to hitch a ride with a carrier, or to use a Gate network.

This one here worries me a bit.
First, having the maximum speed of the 'capital ship' be set to 0 might have adverse effects when it begins to interact with other vessels. Not only is push/pull/stop all completely worthless to a capital ship, but should one somehow find itself glitched into another immobile object such as a planet, station, or other capital ship, things could get disastrously laggy until one or the other is finally teleported away. I have a feeling that with hyperspace that will happen a lot. Then again, if the maximum speed is set to anything greater than 0 people would use push weapons to move capital ships. Ah, heck, I can't think of a reason not to give capital ships a tiny amount of thrust/speed... Like, 10% normal. If the ship puts all of it's thrust in one direction, it'd still have pitiful speed, unusable for anything but precise maneuvering/stabilization.
Second, there is no specified range limitations, and I assume that the maximum range for hyperspace travel is quite large. Even assuming people don't just add and afterwards remove the hyperspace module whenever they need to travel halfway across the galaxy, an infinite range works against any worthwhile exploration and resource collection standards. I feel that any sufficiently long range FTL that simply allows you to enter coordinates and pop over will wreak havoc with multi-player population densities and player hotspots by allowing people the option to separate themselves with nearly infinite distances without much effort, isolating them from interactions with other players. In addition, I believe that messing with population density also changes economy and exploration greatly. I'd love to be able to see a difference between the 'core' systems near a server's hotspot or spawn and the wild 'frontier' where people are still expanding in their hunger for unexplored ruins/stations and more minerals. If people are given the ability to create an exploratory carrier that can quickly warp them into a random and likely unexplored sector... Then there is no frontier and there is no core. If you want resources you don't have to worry about competition, or market, or area specific goods, or pirates, or faction borders, or much of anything that isn't out in the wild.