Power System Overhaul Proposal

[Nexusdog]

schema

But this got me to thinking. How do we get people to want to put crew on their ships and separate their systems with space? The closest analog that we have in real life to Starmade ships are Navy ships. Why do they have crew? If you think about it, the most expensive part of running a ship is maintaining the crew. Food, fresh water, plumbing, air filtration and temperature control, just to name a few. I was on a Ticonderoga class cruiser with a crew compliment of about 400 and it's only 170 meters long! Why so many crew in real life, especially when they are so fragile and expensive? Operations,Repair, & Maintenance. Almost all ship systems were accessible by a person for repair or maintenance( a pretty good way of putting spaces between those systems). So how can we incorporate this into grouping and space between ship systems.

Interesting stuff, very relevant and got me thinking (apologies for this side track):

How would crew be calculated based on size of ship (reactor & sundries)

As above, but addressing different ship types - miners, fighters, cargo haulers & traders

For example, how would you go about recreating the Rocinante using your references and the suggestions you've made? Current crew is 4, or 5 including Miller) for a Corvette class vessel with an original crew of over a dozen.

Thanks for giving me food for thought!

 

[Mr.Steam]

"Form follows function" This is an old saying in engineering that means what something looks like is determined by how it works.

Maybe it is time for Schine to bring order to chaos by creating lore for their universe that determines how their power systems work. If they use Arc Reactor tech then maybe power needs to be torus shaped. If it is a warp core then a cylinder would be appropriate.

If this sounds too limiting then it probably is, but it would at least bring consistency to the way the power physics work.

When you board another ship you could say "here is the power core" it's pretty universal.

As Scotty always said, "I canna change the laws of physics!"

 

[Edymnion]

Yeah, giving it some time to think over, and I'm thinking the chambers thing may be too much.

A reactor core, coolant tanks, and coolant pipes sounds more intuitive and easier to manage to me.

Way I'm seeing it:

Power Reactor
Similar to capacitors we have now in that they represent a maximum capacity. Lets refer to this as power. Each system then requires X amount of power based on it's size. So lets say you had a reactor big enough to generate 100 power. Your thrusters could require 50 power, and the shields 30 power, and two weapon arrays requiring 10 power each. These would be static values. Basically, systems would be on a point buy, with the reactor size determining the number of points available. Bigger reactors give more total power points for you to build with, but produces more heat.

Coolant Tanks
Once installed, systems would create heat when used. Coolant Tanks would represent the maximum amount of heat that can be absorbed at any given moment. This would be similar to the current power consumption we have now.

Coolant Pipes
Each system that generates heat must be connected to coolant tanks to disperse that heat. Coolant pipes would be required to physically connect each system to the tanks. However, each block of pipe has a fixed amount of heat it can carry per tick. If you want more heat dispersion per tick, you need more/bigger pipes.

So what we end up with is a limiting factor on system size.

You CAN make a huge weapon array, but the amount of heat it would generate per shot would require massive amounts of coolant pipes. Meaning the bigger the weapon, the more support blocks it needs, putting a downward pressure on the array size in addition to it needing power points from the reactor just to install.

Hmmm... weapon firing speed could then be made a factor of coolant, perhaps? Weapon fire creates heat, and it can't fire again until that heat has dissipated. Big shots generate lots of heat, and hence take longer to cool down before they can fire again, while small weapons can fire much faster because they cool down faster.

Would mean we could stop using X/Cannon for faster firing weapons, and instead increase how much coolant they require (which would increase how many pipes they have to be connected with).

 

[Comr4de]

Not sure if this has been touched upon but will critical damage be a thing? If so, can core detonation explosion size increase exponentially with complexity?

 

[AlabasterJazz]

Is there any possibility that the power cores could become multiblock structures? ie. you build the reactor dimensions with various reactor blocks, and once you place the "core" all the blocks become a single reactor entity? The HP, Mass, Power-gen, (fuel requrements?), etc are all based on the initial block design, you would add an item that can convert the single reactor entity back into a block structure for editing purposes - this method could actually be used to great effect for all systems: build a cannon structure with blocks and once you add the "cannon core" all attached cannon-type blocks become 1 entity; System HP, Damage, Rate-of-fire, etc are all calculated once the system-coreblock is placed. I figure this would also improve performance in the long run, it should be easier to calculate damage to a few large entities over several hundred/thousand smaller ones

Additionally, I think it would be a good idea to observe modded Minecraft for how to consider power generation/transportation (I'm not saying make Starmade into a Minecraft clone, just to take note/inspiration from some of the most popular ideas of progression/automation currently available); There should be many different options for power gen, not just reactors: We're in space, what about solar panels? Sci-fi tropes like Di-lithium crystals? Dyson spheres being built around suns filling planet sized capacitors which wirelessly send energy to our ships through tesseracts? Power-gen should require fuel one way or the other, the free energy of a reactor as-is breaks the game; again variety is the key, everything from heavy/inefficient fossil fuels, more efficient liquid hydrogen, slow but reliable solar panels, powerful but potentially dangerous nuclear reactors, etc; each option which requires some kind of infrastructure to produce, and waste products to consider

The same philosophy should apply to other systems as well; have various forms of thrust each with their pros/cons, same for shields, scanners, cloaking, crew, etc. We currently have an almost endless capacity for creative design from an aesthetic point-of-view, it would be great to have a similar depth of possibility from a system design POV. Currently only weapons have this variety, and that is a shame in my opinion, when all systems could have this complexity

Finally, why not consider similar variety/complexity for item sorting, transport and storage? (although I do like Starmade's current storage system), we should have conduits and pipes transporting materials, not just wireless transport of everything (wireless transfer should be possible, but it should be a mid-late game goal for advanced factories with massive power generation) If you build a multi-tiered progression into the game it would have a lot more playability in my mind. As it stands now there is no reason for me to play this game in survival, as there is no progress besides just building bigger ships with the same systems over and over, the fun is currently in aesthetic design (creative mode), but the tiered progression would make me want to truly play this game

Just my $0.02 on the issue. Starmade has much more potential than Minecraft in my mind, but unless it can match modded Minecraft in terms of progression/complexity/variety/exploration the only reason I can see to play it is for the advanced build mode of ship creation; it doesn't stand up to survival game-play expectations in it's current state.

 

[NeonSturm]

I really like the chambers system for reactors, thrusters, weapons, …

CHAMBERS !!!
​

It's not the heat-stuff or balance in terms of power which excites me about this update.

I am EXITED about "bigger = more complex".

Big complex guns, many small ones … gives fighters vs bombers a reason. Fighters kill small turrets, bombers kill big turrets.
Ships with many turrets or few small ones …​

 

[GorillaB]

Schema, excellent proposal, though the exact nature of implementation is still a bit vague.

I few suggestions:

1. Reactor placement affect on heat boundary box
2. Heat mechanics
3. Thermal optics
4. Thruster Mechanics

1. Reactor placement affect on heat boundary box

I'd like to layout another option with respect to your original suggestion to keep the heat boundary box within the ship. To make the learning curve easier and to extend gameplay mechanics, I suggest leaving the boundary a fixed radius from the core; regardless of position.

This means that placing a core at the edge of a ship will allow you to eliminate heat externally. (meaning that the outline quoted below is not used.​

• Keep in mind that the heat boundary box doesn’t go out of the ship dimension box. Putting your reactors on the edge of your ship will make the heat boundary box move till it’s not overlapping with the edges. It’s basically forcing the heat boundary box to be more inside of the ship than the reactor itself.

The reasons are related to items #2 & #3: Heat mechanics and Thermal optics.​

2. Heat Mechanics

The heat generated by systems and the core would function as follows:

Components would have two bounding boxes: The base heat bounding box, and 2nd bounding box which is the heat emissions box.

The heat emissions box would start as equal to the base bounding box used for the cooling mechanics as outlined by Schema. It would grow based upon ship systems usage.

• Systems may, or may not, generate heat.
  • Systems that generate heat have their own heat emissions box
  • Systems that don't generate heat instead draw power, and increase the emissions box of the Core itself
• Heat signatures (the visible emissive bounding box) would be different colors for (core, systems, thrusters, etc.)

This allows for some systems to generate their own heat (like thrusters or some weapons), while others do not but due to their power draw the increase the heat generated by the reactor core, resulting in the emissive bounding box increasing in size (like a scanner or other electronic systems).​

3. Thermal Optics

This is where it all comes together. Ships would be able to place an IR/Thermal Camera block through which you could visibly see the emissive boundary box from heat sources if they expand beyond the outer edge of the hull.​

3.1 Balance

To balance this, I would suggest something along the lines of an impact on shields. The lore being that shields reduce thermal visibility up to 100% invisible at full strength. Reducing shield strength would increase visibility on a scale from 0 shields (full visibility) to max shields (impossible to see heat emissions).

Of course this would require a mechanism to 'throttle' shields: dynamically set the max shield strength between 0 and 100 of your theoretical max (what your blocks allow for). This adds a risk vs reward.

Alternatively the camera could also drop shields similar to transporting making it high risk vs. reward.
Of course, communities like this one have a way of making ideas better and feedback is welcome.​

3.2 Gameplay

Having thermal visibility of heat sources would add a new tactical layer. Building ships with heat sources on external walls may allow for easier cooling and more systems, but it would make your vessel vulnerable to tactical fire from your enemies. Enemies would know where to concentrate fire to take down a specific system.

As well, this allows for an extension of thruster mechanics to allow for low-heat or stealth thruster blocks.

​

4. Thruster Mechanics

Thrusters should take space and mass, forcing design to accommodate them.

1. It doesn't follow that thrusters should function like the power revamp an free up space.
2. Thrusters should be one of the systems that continue to take up room on the ship, though their implementation can be improved and tuned.
3. This leads to the recommendation of a engineering terminal

4.1 Engineering terminal

This would be an accessible terminal that allowed for a configuration of engines. A suggestion would be a triangle with the following 3 points: Thrust, heat signature, power drain. Allowing you to 'move the dot' within the triangle to choose how you want to tune your engines.

This could also include a scalar bar on the side that simply scales the affect of whatever ratio you've selected in the triangle. Meaning it scales up heat signature, thrust, and power draw proportionally to how you've set them up.

The min/max possible would be defined by the size of the thruster, making size still relevant for ships.

The heat would be the heat visible from the thruster iteself. I'd recommend that the bounding box for heat in a thruster slews towards the output end. Meaning that the heat is always more visible at the thruster ports rather than simply the whole system collection of blocks.

The power draw would increase load on the reactor and cause the reactor to generate more heat, and a larger heat signature.

This adds tactical gameplay allowing for the choice of 'where' your heat exists and is visible. Leading to fast, hot, engines. Or low heat stealth engines. Or low heat, fast, stealth engines that shunt their heat to a well cooled core.​

Discuss away!

 

[Admiral_Kirk]

Well if they did that'd be cool, but Any reactor would be fine. Even if we can't eject part of it I might still remake my eject able warp core to use again.

Yes I agree it would be cool and great if they add that. I am going to upload next Monday a logic lit up color changing warp core and ejectable logic for the warp core. so that it uses logic and the shootout rails and pickup rails to launch the warp core and close the blast doors. I purposely added the pickup rails so that if you just wanted to show someone the ejecting then I have added a pickup rail so that you can retrieve the Warp Core. It is only about a 4x4x10 compact logic for the ejecting and about 5x5x5 compact logic for the lockdown doors and emergency lights + a 2x3x4 warp core light logic.

It is also really not expensive. And it is expandable so if you need a taller warp core I have it so it is possible copy and pastable as a template. I guess I will do is I will upload it as a template so that there will be the warp core template + the logic template.

but it will good for this update if it comes out, because then I can add the reactor inside of it. which I have made space for.

 

[NeonSturm]

Is there any possibility that the power cores could become multiblock structures? ie. you build the reactor dimensions with various reactor blocks, and once you place the "core" all the blocks become a single reactor entity? The HP, Mass, Power-gen, (fuel requrements?), etc are all based on the initial block design, you would add an item that can convert the single reactor entity back into a block structure for editing purposes - this method could actually be used to great effect for all systems: build a cannon structure with blocks and once you add the "cannon core" all attached cannon-type blocks become 1 entity; System HP, Damage, Rate-of-fire, etc are all calculated once the system-coreblock is placed. I figure this would also improve performance in the long run, it should be easier to calculate damage to a few large entities over several hundred/thousand smaller ones

Additionally, I think it would be a good idea to observe modded Minecraft for how to consider power generation/transportation (I'm not saying make Starmade into a Minecraft clone, just to take note/inspiration from some of the most popular ideas of progression/automation currently available); There should be many different options for power gen, not just reactors: We're in space, what about solar panels? Sci-fi tropes like Di-lithium crystals? Dyson spheres being built around suns filling planet sized capacitors which wirelessly send energy to our ships through tesseracts? Power-gen should require fuel one way or the other, the free energy of a reactor as-is breaks the game; again variety is the key, everything from heavy/inefficient fossil fuels, more efficient liquid hydrogen, slow but reliable solar panels, powerful but potentially dangerous nuclear reactors, etc; each option which requires some kind of infrastructure to produce, and waste products to consider

The same philosophy should apply to other systems as well; have various forms of thrust each with their pros/cons, same for shields, scanners, cloaking, crew, etc. We currently have an almost endless capacity for creative design from an aesthetic point-of-view, it would be great to have a similar depth of possibility from a system design POV. Currently only weapons have this variety, and that is a shame in my opinion, when all systems could have this complexity

Finally, why not consider similar variety/complexity for item sorting, transport and storage? (although I do like Starmade's current storage system), we should have conduits and pipes transporting materials, not just wireless transport of everything (wireless transfer should be possible, but it should be a mid-late game goal for advanced factories with massive power generation) If you build a multi-tiered progression into the game it would have a lot more playability in my mind. As it stands now there is no reason for me to play this game in survival, as there is no progress besides just building bigger ships with the same systems over and over, the fun is currently in aesthetic design (creative mode), but the tiered progression would make me want to truly play this game

Just my $0.02 on the issue. Starmade has much more potential than Minecraft in my mind, but unless it can match modded Minecraft in terms of progression/complexity/variety/exploration the only reason I can see to play it is for the advanced build mode of ship creation; it doesn't stand up to survival game-play expectations in it's current state.

Many blocks, one hp value? Good! The why:

8 times volume, 2 times armour + 4 times hp.
armour = armour thickness, individual shot damage reduction up to 80% of damage.
hp = hp depends on the armour area.
​

Observe Minecraft? Yes! Why reinvent the wheel?

Ion thrusters, atomic thrusters, …? As long as every choice is preferred for a certain task …

Affecting item sort systems? Why not? Once chamber functionality is ingame, it could be used by those systems as well.​

 

[Ithirahad]

I Like To Type with Random Capitalized Words and in an Annoying Colour and In Bold so Everyone's Eyes Hurt.

First of all, in English (and, actually, every other language I know of that uses the Latin alphabet) you don't capitalize a ton of random words in your sentence, and you also don't capitalize common nouns, only proper nouns referring to specific, named things. (Not even in German do they capitalize every word like that - they only capitalize nouns)
Please don't do that.

Second, making all of your words pure, bright white, and in bold, doesn't make people more likely to pay attention to what you're saying. In fact, in my case at least, it makes me more likely to skip over what you're writing entirely. Notice that plenty of influential community members (basically all of them, actually) type in normal text and people read their posts just fine.
Again, please don't do that.

kthxbai

 

[MacThule]

I still think that it's odd that performance is barely being discussed at all.

I could care less about building new ship models, I enjoy building. I've never cared about how 'pretty' a ship is (all that leads too in MP is player after player after player demanding that everyone on the server "look at" their ship/station, then getting miffed and leaving when most players don't care because they spent weeks designing it; like they don't realize that it's the 7th super star destroyer / enterprise xyz model to be shown around the server in a month. so pretty. and then?).

I like to PLAY; I have a drafting program for drawing stuff to show people - I don't need this 'game' to be a voxel model kit. Reactors, conduits, system clusters sound awesome. I think block reduction is brilliant (but redundant when the proposal involves replacing all the blocks saved with pointless filler blocks). I'd love to see systems miniaturized quite a lot. I agree with the respondents who think even if you do go to reactors, balance can be better achieved with crew & fuel than with the heat box idea.

These are all secondary concerns though. How would the proposal affect day to day performance on servers? How would it affect client performance in acutely intensive situations? Would I lose more ships to random nul point drops, or less? Would the new style ships be able to actually interact more seamlessly, or will combat get choppier? First & foremost, I'm concerned about how it will affect playability, and I get the impression that heat box checks, calculating & recalculating system penalties and the like will be MORE processor intensive than the current system of just summing up power capacity and generation based on the existing blocks.

 

[Jolly Roger]

The Heat boundary being within the ship blueprint is a stupid idea. You think that the power having to reach out to the extremes of the ship are a problem and limit design? Wait until all systems are put in the center of the ship. This will severely limit interiors. Ship systems should be able to be placed anywhere on the ship. Otherwise, What happens when you want to build a carrier with a large hangar bay going down the center? Do you have to put your docked ships around your ship systems? Does this mean due to the limits of Java all of the ships in the hangar need to be one third as large, and not as effective since weapons are weak?

With this change, if you want a large room in the center of the ship, it becomes a design choice that limits how you do your interiors, whereas you can put anything wherever you want right now. The only limit right now is when you want to build a ship that is separated into unconnected pieces.

Sometimes I think people are just making changes just to make changes. Different is not better.

A solution would be to only allow Ship systems to fill up 1/10 of any ship's footprint, and allow you to put it anywhere, while making systems 10x as strong. This will limit the amount of systems blocks required in the ship allowing room for interior and freedom in design.

 

[Edymnion]

How would the proposal affect day to day performance on servers? How would it affect client performance in acutely intensive situations?

Well for one I would hope it would help quell the docked reactors even more than we do now. That alone will be a big improvement for the servers.

 

[NeonSturm]

The Heat boundary being within the ship blueprint is a stupid idea. You think that the power having to reach out to the extremes of the ship are a problem and limit design? Wait until all systems are put in the center of the ship. This will severely limit interiors. Ship systems should be able to be placed anywhere on the ship. Otherwise, What happens when you want to build a carrier with a large hangar bay going down the center? Do you have to put your docked ships around your ship systems? Does this mean due to the limits of Java all of the ships in the hangar need to be one third as large, and not as effective since weapons are weak?

With this change, if you want a large room in the center of the ship, it becomes a design choice that limits how you do your interiors, whereas you can put anything wherever you want right now. The only limit right now is when you want to build a ship that is separated into unconnected pieces.

Sometimes I think people are just making changes just to make changes. Different is not better.

A solution would be to only allow Ship systems to fill up 1/10 of any ship's footprint, and allow you to put it anywhere, while making systems 10x as strong. This will limit the amount of systems blocks required in the ship allowing room for interior and freedom in design.

Good point!

Chambers are good for modular systems.
Heat boxes are as bad as the boxed docking areas we had in the past!

We need empty space between the topmost and bottommost hull block (or rightmost/leftmost or frontmost/rearmost)​

 

[DKMSH8R]

I do like where your going with this. Separate the power systems on a ship to do certain functions i.e. turrets, thrust, weapons. Using less blocks would be a big help as it seems most of my ships are made up of mostly power anyways. Maybe using a power capacitor that stores power for each function listed above. I think most of us would appreciate a somewhat complicated system. Maybe include using a fuel that would have to be mined and processed for the bigger ships.

 

[Jarraff]

I have a few concerns with the proposed changes.

My understanding of the proposed system is to use a similar amount of space for the heat system as the current power system. This sounds like a good plan but it seems that both interior and systems blocks would have to be replaced. The volume of ship that would have to be given to heat dissipation would almost certainly not coincide with the current interior of any current ship. The volume of interior might be enough but the location would probably be in the wrong spot.

System blocks are relatively easy to refit. but interior spaces would be very difficult if not impossible in some cases to refit.

 

[Katorone]

Trade is scuppered already. The economy needs an overhaul in general. Buying and selling a large variety of blocks is a pain and specialization is nonexistant. I agree though that if you reduce the number of systems you make building ships somewhat easier, aside from crafting armor. Armor is already a pain to get the resources for so this new system would certainly further tip the system off balance.

What is there to specialize in though? There are a few minerals with exceptional uses, eg fertikeen. But besides that, all the mineral stuff is just too random. I do agree that the trade system needs an overhaul, but before this can happen, there's needs to be had a critical look at the crafting system.

 

[Genkis]

This idea sounds great and I hope you have a similiar idea for overhauling other systems.

I dont know about the heat replacing energy but it could be a great aditional factor.
I would love to see a modular building system also with the other systems.

if an energy weapon would actually consist of a generator and barrels that also are affected by heat but i guess you will have to do enough for now.
I would suggest you just do it and let us try.

 

[Edymnion]

What is there to specialize in though? There are a few minerals with exceptional uses, eg fertikeen. But besides that, all the mineral stuff is just too random. I do agree that the trade system needs an overhaul, but before this can happen, there's needs to be had a critical look at the crafting system.

And before we can really do the crafting system we need everything else in place to know what really needs focusing on. Not a lot of point in revamping crafting right now when we don't even really know how many of the blocks are going to work (would have been a waste of time to fix crafting to make all the different hull blocks easier to make, just to turn around and implement the block consolidation stuff we have now, for example).

Basically, we need to get the mechanics of how the game works done first. Then we can fix the meta-mechanics. Then tertiary stuff like trade can be seriously dealt with.

Get the engine in the car before we start quibbling over what color to paint it.

 

[Gasboy]

So why was fuel discarded as an idea? Curious as to why the simplest solution was overlooked.

I don't think it is discarded, from what I have heard, they've not made a final decision. Stuff like food, on the other hand, is not going to be in StarMade. This is from Criss and Saber in one of Criss' streams.