Make ships go kaboom instead of spawning

[Snk]

Instead of ships despawning after their core overheats, they should explode.

 

[killerdude8]

Curious why this hasnt been added already, Always thought ships went out kind of pathetically.

 

[kiraen]

I think the core should explode, doing more damage. But the rest of the wreckage should remain until the sector unloads.
Without the core, it's basically just an asteroid ready for harvesting. But we don't want to many derelict ships cluttering things up, so they 'disintegrate' if they aren't harvested.

To the victor go the spoils.

 

[Dellexe]

This would be amazing. Battles in this game, though very fun gameplay-wise, leave a little to be desired on the visuals.
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A capital ship's destruction should be a huge event during fleet conflict, not it just suddenly disappearing. I remember reading about the biggest battle in Eve Online's history a few months ago, how the battle was was outlined by lasers and explosions, and then everything being overshadowed by the destruction of a massive ship.
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Expanding on this sort of idea, why not have cores throw off a damage-pulse style blast when they initially overheat? I know Starmade isn't the most "realistic" game, but its pretty safe to say that a ship being critically damaged should throw off enough shrapnel/debris to damage nearby ships.
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Spoiler

On other "improving the look of battles" stuff, me and my small amount of coding experience is trying to figure out how to make a custom mod for shield effects. Basically my current plan has the shield effect appearing in an ovoid/egg shape around the struck ship, calculated and shaped based on the ship's dimensions. Think the shield effects from Starcraft or Stargate. I had a C code lass last year (though my teacher REALLY sucked) and that translates to Java reasonably well, if I recall correctly. There are a few fundamental differences, yes, but they do behave quite similarly. My issue is that I'm much better at debugging code rather than writing it. :P

 

[ltmauve]

Expanding on this sort of idea, why not have cores throw off a damage-pulse style blast when they initially overheat? I know Starmade isn't the most "realistic" game, but its pretty safe to say that a ship being critically damaged should throw off enough shrapnel/debris to damage nearby ships.

They have pilots get ejected from the core when it overheats. Small random explosions on an overheating ship? Sure. In fact, that would be the "timer" for the overheating. Once all of the ship has exploded, well, it's gone.

Though we do want larger explosions as well, and it'd suck to get hit by a random explosion and die, so how about a sparking effect that starts right before a block or chunk explodes?

 

[DivineEvil]

They have pilots get ejected from the core when it overheats. Small random explosions on an overheating ship? Sure. In fact, that would be the "timer" for the overheating. Once all of the ship has exploded, well, it's gone.

Though we do want larger explosions as well, and it'd suck to get hit by a random explosion and die, so how about a sparking effect that starts right before a block or chunk explodes?

Nobody has spoken about dying instantly. Still, the risk of dying from several internal explosions would encourage the use of medical storages and leaving a ship in escape pods in critical situations and might make it more challenging to capture an overheating ship, adding an additional slice of protection for original designs.

 

[Wolverines527]

Hmmm i like this idea alot and hope it happens

 

[Valck]

I think the core should explode, doing more damage. But the rest of the wreckage should remain until the sector unloads.
Without the core, it's basically just an asteroid ready for harvesting. But we don't want to many derelict ships cluttering things up, so they 'disintegrate' if they aren't harvested.

To the victor go the spoils.

Why not remain indefinitely?
I think there's no reason to have ships disappear completely from "overheating", so if they didn't blow up or aren't harvested immediately, they should still stay adrift, even if just as a reminder to future generations...


Also I think all system modules should have a certain chance to go out in an explosion when destroyed, enough to possibly destroy adjacent modules of the same type and set off a chain reaction. This way there's more risk involved in putting all your eggs in one basket, so to speak.

IMO it would make for much more dramatic fights if one chance penetrating hit can take out the entire main gun, and a good chunk of armour with it, than if you have to almost surgically remove block by block to disable it, since even cutting it in half won't render the disconnected portions useless.

Going to get my fireproof gear now.


EDIT: reminder, not remainder.

 

[GaeasSon]

What if.... When the ship is damaged to the point of "overheating" All of the power generation and weapons blocks take on the properties of "warheads". This could cause uber-lag, but the effect of chain reaction explosions cascading through systems would be epic.

if we had different power generation systems, I'd say there should be different death scenarios for each. Chemical reactors would end in an expanding cloud of gas. Antimatter would create an effect of a "star" in the sector for a few seconds, damaging everything nearby.

Edit: In essence, the more power, the more "boom". Fighters should go "PFT!" Dreadnoughts going critical should encourage all craft, friend and foe to flee for their lives.

 

[Rixxan]

-The scissors found this-
In essence, the more power, the more "boom". Fighters should go "PFT!" Dreadnoughts going critical should encourage all craft, friend and foe to flee for their lives.

That would be awesome to see Skylord's Infinity or the Black by Orphinal to go up in a blaze of glory... The fighting style of close-quarters to avoid the heavy turrets would also make it hard to get away.

 

[nightwalker_007]

This would be cool... but also cause quiet a bit of client-side lag for big ships. Still, I'd love to see it pop, and leave floating space junk.

 

[Dire Venom]

What about using a minute sun effect??
You know the bright glare from stars?
Why not have one appear when a ship explodes, with its size and intensity dependent on the size of the ship which just finished overheating, grow, do a bright flash and then disappear. Damage would be delt be tick to organic objects inside the explosion (like how suns do atm but at a lesser rate.)
Something along the lines of these BOOMS would be cool:

 

[GaeasSon]

OK, so how about this:

1. When the structure goes critical, the game engine notes the current power output.
2. Client then displays a solar flare effect at the ships core, size proportional to the total power output.
3. The game then removes the exploding ship from the game, saving its current structure (briefly).
4. The following transformations take place unrendered to save CPU.
   1. * The engine removes a spherical area, including the core (proportional to the power output) from around where the core used to be.
   2. * The engine increases the radius by 1 removing and replacing all non-empty blocks on the edge of the vaporized sphere with "lava"
   3. * Any non-contiguous structures remaining are separated into individual "wreckage" entities.
5. Wreckage is re-spawned into the game where the exploding ship used to be.
6. Any ships, structures, and entities nearby receive the effect of (Damage pulse+Push pulse+ Ion effect) Proportional to the power output of the exploding ship divided by the square of the distance to that ship.
7. Finally, the solar flare is removed.

Of course... all of the above should be optional and configurable in the server config.

 

[Snk]

I just want a giant kaboom

 

[Aynslei]

As long as I still have a chance to collect goods from my fallen enemies I am happy with ships going kaboom.

 

[nightwalker_007]

Actually, I'd love it if a chest was destroyed by a warhead block that it didn't drop anything... it would make self-destruct systems all the more fun.