A More Realistic Thruster Scenario for Big Ships

[War Dog]

While I am for changing the speed problem of larger ships, namely where capital ships lolbackdash their way to victory, I don\'t think an arbitrary limit is going to solve the problem.

Maybe adding more setting to speed in server.cfg may help? Ships of X-Class mass have a speed cap of 100 where ships of the bigger Y-Class have a speed cap of 75 and so on.

Part of the problem is that ship turn rate is maxed out at around 3000 mass.

 

[Zutai]

though smaller ships should be able to get to their top speed at a high rate, if you use enough thrusters on a big ship, no matter the game or if it is real, then you should be able to move in the same ways. it should take alot more thrust, and fuel to move a huge ship like you would a small ship, but it should still be possible. there are already limits in place to keep this balanced. people just use more thrusters, to give it the speed and acceleration they want. there should be an issue with the grav units in the ship, dealing with the G\'s of the high rate of acceleration though. maybe you slide in the ship, or the \"bottom\" gets tilted relative to the G\'s being pulled. should make it so you want to get fast, slower, for all sizes of ships. smaller ships dont use grav units for the most part, and will not feel much of an effect. larger ships do use them, and anyone not in a block or \"secured\" will feel the effects of the acceleration.

 

[wilbee10091]

Big ships need speed shields and firepower to protect the ships they are carrying and or protecting so if you lower and nerd that then battles would be boring because the enemy would be to tired to fight so stop trying to make ships smaller its all about speed shields and firepower and the amount of stuff you blow up before u get destroyed

 

[Zutai]

too much nerfing has been done already, and should not be added to. if needed, make these things into server options. that would shut babies up, and help true fighters to get the joy out of having a hard fight on their hands. if a small fighter tries to take on a huge planet eating ship, it should not have any hope beyond boarding the ship. but i guess that is too real for some people.

 

[wilbee10091]

Well said zutai it is too real for some Pol ecspeacialy noobs

 

[Corros]

I wouldn\'t mind seeing a new type of engine for larger ships and keep the current thrusters valid for small mid sized ships. The engine could be very powerful but very fragile(possibly even exploding) that way it is best used in large heavily fortified ships. Not to mention how many ships above frigates use standard thrusters in most sci-fi?

 

[Feace Shlorfk]

Maneuvering Thrusters: simply blocks to improve turning speed.

 

[kazerima]

Traditionally speaking, a large ship should be more difficult to accelerate than a smaller fighter.

Balance-wise, this means you have to make a hard decision. Do you bolt on extra guns and armor at the expense of acceleration and turning rate? or do you make a lightweight glass cannon of a ship with barely a thing on it then hope to get lucky with your dodges.

I hear a lot bandied about with \"you can take down a giant ship with just one small fighter\". Has anyone tried doing it in practice? Both in reality and in game, it could be possible, true, but it would take ages to deal enough damage to have enough of an effect. One man with a handgun could indeed theoretically disassemble an aircraft carrier if given enough time, but usually the support forces on said carrier have more than enough firepower to take him out.

 

[Nootau]

An utter tank of a ship for its size, no internal weapons, just armor and speed. The trick? Option T! Turrets. Some might laugh at the idea of turrets, while others realize turrets could be shaped into 15-24 block wide arrays blasting targets head on for several million damage per second. With such a wide firing range, hitting targets at mid range becomes viable as a turret respecially when they can rotate in 360 from side to side, and a significant amount of distance upwards.

 

[wilbee10091]

There isn\'t any friction in space well there isn\'t any on my sp world but thrusters are fine the way they are and too much nerfing. Is BAD B A D BAD Ppl wont want to play its already fucking real u just cant handle the realism so shut ur fucking. Faces

 

[wolfgang115]

That is what I have been doing for my Captial Ship. Its entire inner volume is taken up by power and shielding, leaving the main deck for turrets which I have been slowly building.

 

[MrFURB]

The idea of balance I\'m most fond of is one where people don\'t feel forced into flying big clumsy ships if they want to feel effective. I\'m absolutely fine with smaller ships not standing much of a chance of even getting past a giant\'s shields. If you put a crapton of shields onto a ship it deserves to be tanky.

What I\'m NOT fine with is making certain types of ships objectively better than others.

Frigates and fightercraft should be lean and mean. Inexpensive to use so you can use more of them. Ten 200 mass smaller craft should be a lot more effective than a single 2K mass ship because you\'re requiring more pilots to put themselves in more danger than that one larger ship\'s pilot and his massive shield array.

I\'d also like to see capital ships move a lot more like people see them in popular tropes, but that\'s a complicated issue and could use a lot more discussion to fully flesh out.

 

[Captain Fortius]

I absolutely agree with the op.



Large ships need slower acceleration, -but! Also greater top speed.

Reason; Small ships are used for short-distnce flights where acceleration and agility matters more than insane top speeds. Anyway, you couldn\'t fit enough supplies, ammunition or fuel in them for a prolonged flight. And who wants to sit in a one-man bubble cockpit for weeks, all alone in the emptiness of interstellar space?

If you want to travel far, dock on to a carrier, which was made for travelling interstellar distances, and can support it\'s crew and fighter wing for months on end.



However, what I\'m more interested in, is having a blast of flames shooting out from the thrusters - scaled in length and diameter to the size of the thrusters themselves- instead of the current tiny shining circle.

Say, you could open up a settings panel on the thrusters like with the AI modules, where you could adjust flame length and color.

 

[notgodsarmy666]

Actually it is wrong that mass doesn\'t matter in space.. Mass stays the same mass no matter where you are.
(I recomment playing KSP for this. Pretty good physic simulation on mass and thrust)

And big ships have already a disadvantage. Turning speed. Small ships are maneuverable enough to literally rape the ass of you big ship. Especially since all guns can only shoot forward. Anyway since SM has artificial gravity units the turn speed argument and the resulting effects are void.
And physic isn\'t applied in SM (yet).

To make it really correct, those things have to happen:
Gravity would affect even very far objects which would make trajectories bending.
When exiting a (fast) moving (not accelerating) ship you would be moving with the same speed.
There would be no friction anymore. Means any moving Ship which isn\'t stopped, would move forever. Which would create gigantic maps...
Assuming Planets will stay the same size, would mean everything with at least 1/10 of the size would collaps under its gravity field, or at least should have one....

I suggest let it be as it is. Making it (consequently) more realistic would break the game.
And it is kinda cheap just to say: \"Oh, just make this part of the game \'more realistic\' just because it gives ME advantages in the way I play\"

 

[z1967]

If a large ship wants to have a decent speed, but does not want the power requirements, maybe a trade-off could b emade where a low-yield, low-power engine is made? The engine/thruster could be slightly more expensive, but be a bit more useful if you don\'t mind a slower acceleration for less power consumption. this is just an idea I cobbled together as I reading this, so it is going to be an interesting to see what you guys think of it.

I also agree with notgodsarmy666, Elements of real physics should not be forced in at every given oppurtunity if it only presents an advantage for you.

 

[Ayatollah_RockNRoller]

Because the bigger is better way the game is turning out is stupid. Everyone will just make the biggest ships they can with 25 million shields and every server will run like shit. No reason for anyone to make anything but giant ships to compensate for their little weiners. That\'s why I fly under 50 mass fighter religiously. Because I got big brass balls.

 

[Ayatollah_RockNRoller]

Because the gaming world is full of casusal idiots these days who only want a big fat I Win button to mash repeatedly.

 

[Ayatollah_RockNRoller]

Pretty sure the Japanese sunk the shit out of a bunch of large ships with some fighters and bombers.

 

[Ayatollah_RockNRoller]

Eat a bag of dicks