New power generator setup? *UPDATED*

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    Perhaps you need to test it under fire.
    Is that just a guess on your part you think might help, or do you know something I do not and are giving me a hint?

    I've tested the shield supply system by having full shields and then adding a bunch more to test how fast it fills. It fills at exactly the rate the regular onboard shield rechargers fill it at, not a single point extra. I would think that would be much the same test as if the shield got reduced by weapon's fire.
     

    Groovrider

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    Is that just a guess on your part you think might help, or do you know something I do not and are giving me a hint?

    I've tested the shield supply system by having full shields and then adding a bunch more to test how fast it fills. It fills at exactly the rate the regular onboard shield rechargers fill it at, not a single point extra. I would think that would be much the same test as if the shield got reduced by weapon's fire.
    Power supply from docked reactors doesn't show so I figured shields would be the same.
     
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    I heard that shield supply causes the supplier to be "under fire", so available shield for transfer will be fairly low on long run. Not sure how shield system size and cap/recharge ratios play into regen under fire, though.

    Edit: if you test it out of combat and have reasonable regen in main ship, it's probably difficult to notice.
     
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    the shield supply beams from what I tested the other day require a few things... A. enough power, and B. Enough shields/regen to transfer to the other ship. For some reason they will not generate the shields, but rather only transfer them at a lower percentage. No idea if this is intended or not.
     
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    I finally got the shield supply module working, though at very disappointing transfer rate. My mistake was in having vastly more shield transfer modules than I should have. They instantly dropped any and all shield on the dockable platform down to zero whereupon the shield regen rate also dropped to negligable. By removing all but 12 shield supply modules (split into two alternating beams) I managed to reduce the shield drain to what the shield rechargers could handle. The shield recharge rate on the dock module as well as the transfer rate was roughly ten percent of what the shield rechargers could generate if they were on a regular ship. The readout said that I had in excess of 30K shield recharge per second on the module, but the system transferred about ten percent of that only and the system still struggled to keep it's own shields replenished.

    The docked module massed in at around 6700 blocks and provided shield regeneration roughly equivalent to 500 shield rechargers. For the life of me, I do not understand what the designers were thinking, to think this is not broken.
     
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    My guess Panpiper, is that they didn't think people would be using docked generators and shield supplies when the designed them. They likely assumed that you would have a support ship doing that job. Now... if the docked shield generator didn't take a generation hit when the ship is in combat, then in theory you could have 10% shield regen instead of 6%. I had been testing this myself to find out if I could replace regeneration completely with a docked shield generator just so I could have a much higher percentage of regen during combat. No such luck.
     

    jayman38

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    My brain is not agile enough any more to handle many of the complexities of logic circuits. This is the hack job I did to control a docked power module. It is built this way mostly to be easy for me to follow the logic of. While any of the bottom delays are active, they will activate the lower 'or' block that activates the bottom power supply beam computer. While any of the top delays are active, they will activate the upper 'or' block that activates the top power supply beam computer. All the delays feed into another 'or' block which in theory always stays 'on/high'. If for some reason however due to a reboot or whatever, the circuit is not working, that 'or' block will be off, which will activate the 'not' block to the left, which will restart the clock.

    I am pretty sure this is not the ideal setup, but this is as good as my limited understanding of logic circuits can do at the moment. Sven the Slayer has a video tutorial on clocks in which he describes what would clearly be a better clock, but despite watching it several times, I cannot understand what he has built or how it functions (my brain is not what it used to be).

    Anyone care to tell me what I should do differently? I realize I could likely do away with one of the rows of delay blocks and simply invert the signal for the other beam, but the one presented is both easier to understand for my brain and visually more pretty.
    I haven't tested the following 3-module logic in-game yet, having only used a logic simulator, but it reduces the logic to 10 blocks, and should be adequately fail-proof.

    1. Master Control Switch (Activator Block)
    2. Failsafe AND gate
    3. Master Control Failsafe OR gate

    4. Pre-delay AND gate
    5. Delay gate
    6. Post-delay NOT gate
    7. Computer Controller 1 AND gate
    8. Computer Controller 2 AND gate

    9. Failsafe OR gate
    10. Failsafe NOT gate

    A. Control Module (using blocks 1-3):
    slave both (2) and (3) to (1) (Both the AND and OR gates should receive a signal from the master control switch.)
    slave (2) to (3) (The OR gate should now receive a signal from both the master control switch and the AND gate.)

    B. Alternating Clock Module (using blocks 4-8):
    slave (5) to (4) (AND gate drives the delay block)
    slave (7) to (5) (DELAY gate drives the AND gate for computer 1)
    slave (6) to (5) (DELAY gate drives the NOT gate for computer 2. Alternatively, slave (6) to (7) instead to have the computer 1 AND gate drive the computer 2 NOT gate.)
    slave (8) to (6) (NOT gate drives the AND gate for computer 2)
    slave (4) to (6) (NOT gate drives the pre-delay AND gate, restarting the cycle)

    C. Fail Detection Module (using blocks 9 and 10):
    slave (10) to (9) (OR gate drives the NOT gate, so that if both OR signals are false, the NOT gate creates a true signal.)

    D. Overall Module Linking:
    A -> B:
    slave (4) to (3) (The OR gate should drive the pre-delay AND gate)
    slave (7) to (3) (The OR gate should help drive the computer 1 AND gate)
    slave (6) to (3) (The OR gate should help drive the computer 2 NOT gate)
    (This allows the master control switch to shut down the entire operation without the failsafe restarting it again.)

    B -> C:
    slave (9) to (7) (The computer 1 AND gate drives the failsafe OR gate)
    slave (9) to (8) (The computer 2 AND gate drives the failsafe OR gate)
    (This allows the failsafe module to recognize when both outputs are off together, suggesting a fault.)

    C -> A:
    slave (2) to (10) (The Failsafe NOT gate drives the Control Module AND gate)
    (This allows the failsafe module to restart the master control in case of a fault.)

    Finally, slave the support effect control computers to blocks (7) and (8), respectively. (The controller AND gates will alternately drive the support control computers.)

    At this point, if both computer controllers are off, suggesting a problem, the failsafe module (C) generates a positive signal, restarting the cycle at gate (2). You may also want to implement reset links from a delay-and-not pair of blocks running off the Failsafe NOT gate to reset all the gates along the Clock module (B), which will bring the block count up to 12. If implementing such a reset, the link from module C (failsafe) to module A (master control) should go from the failsafe reset Delay block (instead of the Failsafe NOT block) back to Module A, to avoid timing problems with the reset.
     

    AtraUnam

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    I finally got the shield supply module working, though at very disappointing transfer rate. My mistake was in having vastly more shield transfer modules than I should have. They instantly dropped any and all shield on the dockable platform down to zero whereupon the shield regen rate also dropped to negligable. By removing all but 12 shield supply modules (split into two alternating beams) I managed to reduce the shield drain to what the shield rechargers could handle. The shield recharge rate on the dock module as well as the transfer rate was roughly ten percent of what the shield rechargers could generate if they were on a regular ship. The readout said that I had in excess of 30K shield recharge per second on the module, but the system transferred about ten percent of that only and the system still struggled to keep it's own shields replenished.

    The docked module massed in at around 6700 blocks and provided shield regeneration roughly equivalent to 500 shield rechargers. For the life of me, I do not understand what the designers were thinking, to think this is not broken.
    When a ship is under fire its shield regen drops to anywhere between 5 and 10 percent of the norm, with the numbers you have just supplied it would seem that shield supply beams provide 7.5% of the normal shield regen. This makes perfect sense because if they did not count as under fire then they would allow ships to effectively ignore combat regen. That said they still have 2 advantages:
    • The main ship will never be afflicted by shield outages (shields not regening at all for a few seconds after being dropped to 0)
    • IIRC shield supply modules tic more than once per second meaning low capacity/high regen shields are less likely to zero out.
     
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    Thank you jayman38, I really appreciate that extraordinarily detailed description. I dare say I might even be able to follow that. ;-)

    AtraUnam, from what you say, I begin to suspect that combat has changed enormously from when I last played. (I've been away a few months.) When last I was here, I was able to take my ship (1M block, good offense, great defense, mining ship) into a pitched battle with large numbers of seriously beefed up pirates and literally keep fighting for half an hour (more kept spawning). If shield regeneration instantly drops to 10% of listed the moment you are under fire, well, that has to be something new, no?
     
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    AtraUnam

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    Thank you jayman38, I really appreciate that extraordinarily detailed description. I dare say I might even be able to follow that. ;-)

    AtraUnam, from what you say, I begin to suspect that combat has changed enormously from when I last played. (I've been away a few months.) When last I was here, I was able to take my ship (1M block, good offense, great defense, mining ship) into a pitched battle with large numbers of seriously beefed up pirates and literally keep fighting for half an hour (more kept spawning). If shield regeneration instantly drops to 10% of listed the moment you are under fire, well, that has to be something new, no?
    It was quite a few updates ago (around the weapon update?) but updates have been coming faster lately and I don't have the best sense of time so it may well have come in after you left. And yes combat has changed, armor now boasts better protection than shields when used correctly at the cost of lower sustainability.
     
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    Ok, I did a very precise test. I had the docked power generator docked and firing at a test ship. The test ship had zero power generation of it's own and no battery. Having worked out the precise number of blocks needed, with a stop watch set, I placed 200 million power storage onto the ship. It took precisely 766 seconds for 2890 power supply modules to fill up 200 million power. That translates to just over 90 power per second per module.

    Note that that does NOT make a docked power reactor 3.5 times more effective than simply adding power blocks, as it does not factor in the docked power reactor's own power blocks or logic, etc.. My docked reactor (which is not particularly optimized) has 6600 blocks. 6600 power blocks added to a ship would generate 165000 power per second. The docked power reactor was providing 260000 power per second. That is certainly better than just a whole mess more standard power blocks, but not 'so' much more so as to imbalance things overly.

    Someone who goes to the trouble of figuring out and building docked power reactors certainly has an advantage, but it is not necessarily so overwhelming as to render someone else who did not utterly incapable of giving them a fight.

    I should note that the reactor I was using was 'not' an optimum reactor. It was built as a learning exercise for me. It is highly likely that a somewhat smaller reactor would be more power efficient, perhaps even a good bit more so, as there are diminishing power returns for large reactors. This does not change the 90 power per second gained from each of the power supply modules. It 'would' change the overall efficiency of the docked reactor itself.
     

    Keptick

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    Ok, I did a very precise test. I had the docked power generator docked and firing at a test ship. The test ship had zero power generation of it's own and no battery. Having worked out the precise number of blocks needed, with a stop watch set, I placed 200 million power storage onto the ship. It took precisely 766 seconds for 2890 power supply modules to fill up 200 million power. That translates to just over 90 power per second per module.

    Note that that does NOT make a docked power reactor 3.5 times more effective than simply adding power blocks, as it does not factor in the docked power reactor's own power blocks or logic, etc.. My docked reactor (which is not particularly optimized) has 6600 blocks. 6600 power blocks added to a ship would generate 165000 power per second. The docked power reactor was providing 260000 power per second. That is certainly better than just a whole mess more standard power blocks, but not 'so' much more so as to imbalance things overly.

    Someone who goes to the trouble of figuring out and building docked power reactors certainly has an advantage, but it is not necessarily so overwhelming as to render someone else who did not utterly incapable of giving them a fight.

    I should note that the reactor I was using was 'not' an optimum reactor. It was built as a learning exercise for me. It is highly likely that a somewhat smaller reactor would be more power efficient, perhaps even a good bit more so, as there are diminishing power returns for large reactors. This does not change the 90 power per second gained from each of the power supply modules. It 'would' change the overall efficiency of the docked reactor itself.
    That numer is supposed to be a lot higher, according to the config. So basically, it's bugged again (unless there was a stealth nerf which wouldn't even surprise me anymore since complete changelogs seem to be too hard for Schine at times...)
     
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    I have what I believe is probably the best layout for power lines for a compact structure. It is scalable to whatever size one prefers. Sadly for me, this was a fair amount of work and it seems like I've badly placed my ship core, as I would like to make this a bit bigger still. (I certainly could push this existing build a couple more squares without great inconvenience.)

    Has anyone calculated an 'optimum' size (in terms of power) for a docked reactor? Am I close to an optimum already at this size (350K power), or should I be pushing for closer to 600-700K?

    Edit: Well, I pushed the size outwards by two in all dimensions and more than doubled the power output. I also discovered that one can slave cannon modules to the power supply modules to create a single uninterrupted beam. This would 'greatly' simply the logic to a mere 'on' switch would it not?

    Edit to the edit: Linking cannon to power supply modules does indeed work great, when activating them manually. However it appears that one cannot use logic on systems that have slaves (no doubt this is why everyone has a clock on docked power modules, d'uh). Worse is that if you try, it appears to break the 'ship' you are working on such that the computers won't take logic signals even if you remove and replace them completely without slaves. I'll have to restart this experiment with a blueprint, which I fortunately made when I finished the power structure.
     
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    Optimum power is 745,164 e/sec. Granted, that's in a single line. you lose a bunch of efficiency by increasing the number of lines.
    The best clock I have seen for a cannon slaved output is a .5 second clock using 2 wireless modules, an AND, NOT, DELAY, and OR block. the number of cannons is e/sec / 480 (80% of the 300/sec consumption) and make up for the overdraw with a capacity of e/sec /4
     
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    If anybody knows of one that could be downloaded to test out it would be greatly appreciated :)