Brainstorm This New Power Block

[Agent_Bladelock]

I had an idea the other day for a new power block: the Antimatter Reactor. It would give very high amounts of power -- but if hit by weapons, it's group would explode and vaporize anything close to it. Feel free to add suggestions below.


I had thought that this would make dogfighting between small ships more fun -- a few hits in the right places could destroy a fighter, and maybe you could link a reactor to weapons systems to make them more powerful in small ships to help you along with that.

 

[starhaiden]

this has been suggested before.
I think a majority of people want more power sources than one but the current power system would have to change.

 

[Ithirahad]

Yeah, I wouldn't mind this at all. The HP system eliminates core drilling, which was stupid, but ships -should- have some kind of weak point, particularly strong ships. Antimatter reactor cores deep in the heart of a ship (or wherever you want) would serve this purpose quite well without killing a ship completely or too easily, which was silly.

 

[TheOmega]

Now spies can change the BP of a ship to have a death star exhaust port where you hit a reactor on the outside and it disables the entire ship. I LOVE IT.

 

[Ithirahad]

Now spies can change the BP of a ship to have a death star exhaust port where you hit a reactor on the outside and it disables the entire ship. I LOVE IT.

People filling the blueprint will notice the extra AMRs though.

 

[Agent_Bladelock]

Thanks for the support and replies! I don't know if this would work with the new hp update though, I have yet to get an answer about warheads.

 

[BDLS]

Suggested long ago by calbiri, basically outputs a little extra juice over the normal reactor but acts like a Warhead if hit.

I do like the idea though, as long as it doesn't output a lot more.

 

[Agent_Bladelock]

Wow, I didn't know that he'd written that up. I just had the idea of something like that for a big central reactor as I was designing a ship.

 

[Keptick]

This is definitely an interesting idea. Should it benefit from dimension bonuses like current reactors do? Or maybe just a grouping bonus, except that the explosion also becomes more violent? There's so many fun possibilities!

 

[Lidren]

Yeah, I wouldn't mind this at all. The HP system eliminates core drilling, which was stupid, but ships -should- have some kind of weak point, particularly strong ships. Antimatter reactor cores deep in the heart of a ship (or wherever you want) would serve this purpose quite well without killing a ship completely or too easily, which was silly.

I'm of the opinion (and sometimes playstyle) that ships have plenty of weak points. I glory in disabling engines with carefully targeted explosive shots, or severing large weapons. I like targeting the bridge/core too, though it does make things entirely too quick. Am I saying I would mind additional weak points to fire at? Absolutely not, but there are definitely already weak points. I've won more battles by accidentally shattering my opponents power systems than core drilling.

 

[alterintel]

Or maybe just a grouping bonus, except that the explosion also becomes more violent?

Yes, yes, yes, please....

 

[starhaiden]

In addition to what you have suggested i will suggest what I have suggested often when a new power source suggestion came up is lava fueled reactors.
This is just a suggestion
CPR=current power reactor

• lava fueled reactors can produce 10~20 times the more power then CPR at maximum production
• each piece of lava provides 2~5 more power than CPR
• lava reactors produce heat and do 1 damage per second to non-hull blocks directly next to them
• has no cap and provides linear power.

pros:

• lava is very common and most people can get it
• provides power for large ships
• doesn't provide too much power
• has some disadvantages
• unlimited but has to be sourced

cons:

• current power system would have to change
• some other things

Might as well add this
Biofuels
I suggest a new block be added that turns flora into Fuel ethanol.

• each flora has a fuel value
• 1 fuel value= 1 block of ethanol fuel produced in the biomass convertors
• flora can reproduce so can be farmed for fuel
• ethanol is burnt in biofuel reactors
• one biofuel reactor can produce about 6 times more power then CPR
• one ethanol block produce about 2 times more power then CPR

pros:

• people can become farmers
• planets become more useful
• people could have farms on large ships resulting in more interior space

cons: industrial farming could cause lag
fauna replaced with flora

 

[TheOmega]

You do realize that faunas are animals, right? And ethanol is a byproduct of plants? AKA flora?

 

[Megacrafter127]

You do realize that faunas are animals, right? And ethanol is a byproduct of plants? AKA flora?

Ethanol is mainly produced by yeasts, which are fungi, but are usually 'fed' with plant-byproducts.

 

[Pacific_Jim]

This is definitely an interesting idea. Should it benefit from dimension bonuses like current reactors do? Or maybe just a grouping bonus, except that the explosion also becomes more violent? There's so many fun possibilities!

Almost definitely grouping with a bigger risk for this I'd say. I'd even be tempted to say that the new power block's don't benefit from shields (or at least take a penalty), so they're even more of a risk to use.

Something I would also suggest is to make the new power blocks take into account how much of the ship's mass they account for percentage wise, so every ship benefits (and suffers) from their use.

 

[Knack]

• lava reactors produce heat and do 1 damage per second to non-hull blocks directly next to them

I love the idea of system which need some kind of space around them. I hope glass is a hull-block

 

[Visitor]

I wouldn't mind such kind of block, however it'd be important to change how shields and HP system works for the sake of it. I would need to look for the suggestion, but I regarded it in recent post:

applying and deriving HP only from certain blocks so ships with a hole blown in the side will have to protect its 'guts' from further attacks and a bunch of guys in a boarding party will be able to enter and damage internal components of a ship without shields and armor magically inverting itself to protect every computer and a pot-plant.

Currently, with shields protecting interior of a ship and armor granting durability and being based on all blocks instead of just external/hull ones, I am not sure how much good exploding reactors would do - they would be horribly hard to balance, since some ships with still potent shields and armor would simply shrug off their explosion and some would be totally eradicated with no chance to avoid their fate, often based on a freak chance of 'it had a few seconds to recharge' which shouldn't matter much in case of something important exploding inside of the very ship.

We need the non-hull interiors of ships to be weak so wrecking stuff, be it through critical reactor meltdown or - maybe one day - actual saboteurs and boarding parties would make sense. We also need the shields and HP modified so once exposed the reactor won't be protected by the rest of the hull/recharged shields - because if one has to go through all the armor and all the shields anyway, the whole exploding reactor thing is just afterthought since the ship most likely already lost and is ripe for pickings.

Other than that, I'd rather leave energy generating blocks just that. While I understand the sentiment of greater customization through changing weapon etc power based on what the blocks are connected to, I think it would be just a gimmick not worth another long process of balancing energy, balancing weapon output, balancing it in regards to shields and hull etc. What would need to be balanced is the current power gen blocks - they should scale harshly enough to not be viable to maintain very high drain well on their own - otherwise people will just keep using the 'old' generators with new ones being just small boost providers for times of greater need, not actual basis of ship's power. And then again, there wouldn't be much worth exploding.

Edit: And yeah, regarding points raised above - I wouldn't mind thr grouping and gain of dimensions increase the power as it happens with current power gen blocks, but with a curve in scaling making really low amounts of power till the generator gains certain size and with the rise in size, the size of explosion should rise considerably, for the actual 'whole Death Star goes boom' potential, though with perhaps about 15-20 seconds of warning before explosion, for the sake of core jetissoning/evacuation pod deployment and delightful 'uh-oh' impressions.

 

[shadowulf]

To add to this, perhaps implement it as a system, not arbitrary blocks. Add a computer for them, and with this computer, if you need to, you can temporarily 'overcharge' the output. However, the cons are a more violent explosion if these are hit when 'overcharged' and the array needs to shut off after 15 minutes of overuse. Risk VS Reward. Say, if Sven had activated this at the right time in the Star side Tournament, his shield wouldn't have fallen, or fallen later. However, if his modules were hit, even more of his ship would have been vaporized, killing him faster. Just a thought.

WARNING:Slightly off-topic idea follows:
I believe power generation should be controlled by a configural computer, as this would ensure ships can specialize a little more.
[DOUBLEPOST=1434378198,1434377262][/DOUBLEPOST]Edit
I agree visitor, that balancing needs to be done before this works, but IT IS being balanced. On the dev build it seems ship HP was being integrated.

 

[Visitor]

I agree visitor, that balancing needs to be done before this works, but IT IS being balanced. On the dev build it seems ship HP was being integrated.

Yup! Though right now the HP as shown in dev build seems to be calculated applied to all kinds of blocks, including fragile electronics and the shields still protect both exterior and interior of the ship, which things pose a problem I've regarded above.

 

[jorgekorke]

I also think that thrusters should behave the same way, going BOOM when hit, but making them to benefit when built on groups, making the explosion more violent.