Since I Can't Keelhaul People I Don't Like...

[TheGT]

Ships of the frontier have always ended up creating some form of execution for traitors. In the day's of pirates and wooden tall ships, it was having the traitor be keelhauled by dragging them along the barnacles under the ship. In The Expanse, the threat of getting spaced and thrown out the airlock is a constant deterrent for would-be traitors. In Firefly, they persuade the henchmen of a mob boss to deliver a message by pushing them one by one into the massive turbines of their ship.

Unfortunately in StarMade, I don't have a keel to haul traitors on. Neither do Daves suffocate in space, so I can't flush them out my airlock. And I don't have large turbines that can chop someone up with the sickening sounds of crunching bone. So this is why I think that the reactor power stream should do damage to astronauts.

And I'm not talking a puny 10pts/sec damage, I'm talking vaporized by a meter thick stream of plasma in a manner of seconds, with bits flying off. Hell, lay the Wilhelm scream over it.

You may be thinking, "Interesting but perhaps a bit morbid idea, TheGT. But why don't you just shoot them in the back of the head or make a room filled with beams?"

And I would respond to that, "You're missing the point; every ship had a keel back in the day; every ship in the expanse has an airlock; every ship in StarMade has a reactor power stream. We kill them in an entirely inhumane and gruesome manner using only what we have at hand. It's a sort of disrespect: 'we didn't even want to waste energy from our capacitors or bullets from our guns on killing you.'"

It might also make mussin' around with the reactor all that bit more dangerous. And If Schine was really brave, they could have it do damage to other ships, letting you make a sort of high-powered energy slicer.

TL;DR I want to keelhaul people, but I ain't got a keel so I'd like for the people I'm trying to hurt to die when I throw them into the plasma stream of my ships drive.

 

[Agame3]

And how exactly do you throw them if they are not cooperative? Push pulse?

 

[Captain Fortius]

Reactor stream shouldn't exist.

 

[madman Captain]

Its maybe because I heared to much Alestorm the last days but yes why not.

 

[JNC]

Hmm, I like it for RP but I dont see any of it happening for real players because a captured player could just logoff. It wouldnt be fun if your character were captured and just held in a cell block somewhere indefinitely, unable to do anything.... A system for AI characters should totally be a thing though! I'd also wager that there's some sort of galactic law system, or systems in the AI controlled space, so throwing someone over probably wouldnt be the best.... bounties/ransoms could be a thing, or slave traders, labor camps, etc etc. If reputations ever becomes a thing than executing everyone would probably have negative effects.

If the teleporter worked like in star trek you could just use that to send someone into a sun or disintegrate them by sending them nowhere?

 

[Agame3]

If NPC crew would replace AI I would probably send them regularly into a sun for incompetence

Inside a 1 person escape pod on clock-push pulse propulsion.

But I suppose a death ray (like proposed in this thread) crossing their cabins is even more just (can never mistake and kill innocents, since the AI forever was and forever will be incompetent) and it's easier and cheaper to implement.

 

[TheGT]

I mean, I don't got crew on my ships, but that don't mean that I don't build them gallies. I'd always be RP or something promised in a faraway crew update. But nonetheless, I like to know that the gruesome death is always an option. It could be a mite interesting in combat too; for example, if you have your power stream routed around your interior and the blocks that redirect it get hit out, you might find yourself having to dodge a whole bunch of plasma on the way out of the ship when you finally get it back to dock.

I mean, of course, all these bits are edge cases. But (and as someone who has worked with developers in the past, I know that this upcoming phrase is the herald that an idea is impossible) it doesn't seem that hard to implement.

 

[Lone_Puppy]

Oh, I like the high powered energy slicer idea! I can imagine a cool weapon like that slicing through a ship/station/whatever.

Deadly reactor beams could be a great little booby trap for unsuspecting thieves/intruders.

However, I would still like a turbine with sliced and diced body parts spraying out the other end. Should keep all those would be deserter NPC's in line. ;-)

 

[OfficialCoding]

this is so funny 100% AGREE!

 

[TheGT]

Reactor stream shouldn't exist.

Perhaps it shouldn't. But if we concede that it does exist, can we not use it to execute the damned traitorous men and women who have no concept of real loyalty?!

 

[MacThule]

This would make the stabilizer streams even more stabby... hmmm

 

[OfficialCoding]

I still wish we could toss people out the airlock like in Star Wars

 

[Briaireous]

If they ever add something like oxegen or some sort of survival related feature to the game, I think it might be one of the last things they add...
[doublepost=1527866317,1527866286][/doublepost]

If they ever add something like oxegen or some sort of survival related feature to the game, I think it might be one of the last things they add...

Because it might not even rely on blocks

 

[Nosajimiki]

The devs have stated IF they ever add life support, it will likely be a radius effect like a shield bubble for performance reasons, and not airlocked. In that case, spacing someone won't help if they just align to your ship and stay in your bubble.

What you may want to do is decorate your engine room with lava and use a gravity trigger to "suck" someone in if they get too close. or make a rotating thing made of lasers so it looks kinda like a spinning turbine.

As for the reactor line? No that is a terrible idea. They glitch out and send beams right through your RP areas enough as it is. Last thing we need is for that thing to get rerouted through your core because you lost a node in battle just to burn you the second you hop out.

 

[MacThule]

I still wish we could toss people out the airlock like in Star Wars

Like almost every space show. Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, The Expanse, Aliens, man the list could probably go on for quite a while. I think that this is one of those things that might eventually come around if they ever do life support for crews and make airlocks a real thing, but it'd almost certainly be several years away from happening.

 

[TheGT]

What do you mean they glitch out, Nosajimiki ? Do they go off the nodes just randomly? Honestly, if what looks like a meter thick jet of plasma goop is going through your interior because of battle damage, I'd expect that it'd be a bit of a pain. And if it is next to your core, that's also pretty bad. But it's more of a "sucks for you" pain than a "this is unrealistic and ruining the game" pain.

It's not like there aren't ways to circumvent it. For example, if you don't sustain battle damage then it ain't a problem. If you protect the nodes carrying your plasma juice then it ain't a problem. If you design your ship such that there aren't any interiors in the path of the power stream (which would be an extreme reaction) then it ain't a problem. If you don't doublecross your captain and make him think he needs to throw you in then it ain't a problem. And most of the time you don't have to do any of those things. Because, how often do you get in a situation where you need to fly through a power stream anyways? It's a rare thing.

The power stream looks dangerous; I don't want to touch it when I'm in EVA. And it makes sense that it would be dangerous: it's in the name, it's not a reactor line like some sort of random metric that shows up in advanced build mode. It's a Power Stream, a Stream of Power. I mean, if Schema ever makes it an invisible logic conduit looking thing, then I don't have a problem. But as long as it looks like some kind of fusion product, goddammit, I want to throw people into it!

 

[MacThule]

Yeah, but first we need the ability to grapple toons and 'throw' them! I want that too...

 

[Nosajimiki]

By glitching out I mean that sometimes you can leave the game and come back and the game will have decided to reroute what nodes it uses. Not that this isn't 100% avoidable under certain circumstances, but consider this. A core used as a cockpit, a reactor, and your forward stablizer all make the most since centered on the X,Y plane for various reasons; so, it is not uncommon for people to have those 3 things in alignment with one another... I don't do that on every ship, but for any ship I do it on, I don't want to have to trust my nodes to keep plasma out of by bridge.
[doublepost=1527882245,1527882146][/doublepost]Put differently, for every player you get to throw into that plasma steam, you will kill yourself in in 100 times.