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Came up with this in another thread, thought it might be more beneficial to pull it out and make it it's own thing.
Problem I think most of us have with the current Stabilizers is that, well, they feel tacked on. They're doing nothing but adding arbitrary dimensions to ships and being random gap filler. They're not interesting, they don't really add anything to builds in terms of creativity or complexity, they're just an arbitrary hoop to jump through. So, how about we switch things up a bit while keeping the basic idea?
One of the primary goals with reactors and chambers appears to be to create a cohesive and self contained discrete system. As in we have our blob of reactor blocks, we have our chambers, and we have conduit blocks physically connecting them all together into one single structure. And then for some reason we have stabilizers on the opposite end of the ship as random gap filler? That seems to break the idea of making a defined "core".
So, what if instead of the current stabilizer system, we actually go back and use some of the mechanics from the old power generator blocks? Namely the whole "bounding box creates multiplicative bonuses" thing. We then combine that with the idea of being able to determine distance from the reactor to create a "sweet spot" around a reactor. So if you are too close, the stabilizers don't work. If you're too far away, they're less efficient. And then we add on the way power generators work in the old system, so that the bigger the bounding box, the better they work.
Now we've got a system that promotes building a framework around the reactor. Like this:
We can then assign a "containment rating" to the outer shell, and have that rating increase using the same mechanics as the old power generator lines/boxes. Have the requirement be that the containment value has to equal or exceed the reactor output to get maximum efficiency.
Can't build the box to be huge, because going too big puts it outside of the sweet spot and reduces it's effectiveness. So now you're looking at having some skill in the build to try and get maximum effect out of minimum space/blocks.
Then, to tie it together with the concept of the reactor core being a single, discrete system, we connect the stabilizer/containment rods to the reactor with conduits.
Could make boxes, or could just do stabilizer/containment lines.
Or any combination of things that our design/space allows for.
As long as we keep the distance for the sweet spot from going out exponentially with size to create a whale of a reactor when we don't need to, the challenge of the build will be in working to maximize the containment field within as SMALL of an area as possible, with the counter-pressure being that you still want BIGGER lines for the multiplicative effect.
Plus it all gets tied together into a single cohesive unit via conduits.
And we don't have to completely throw out the existing generator mechanic we are all so familiar with, we just re-purpose it into a new system.
Problem I think most of us have with the current Stabilizers is that, well, they feel tacked on. They're doing nothing but adding arbitrary dimensions to ships and being random gap filler. They're not interesting, they don't really add anything to builds in terms of creativity or complexity, they're just an arbitrary hoop to jump through. So, how about we switch things up a bit while keeping the basic idea?
One of the primary goals with reactors and chambers appears to be to create a cohesive and self contained discrete system. As in we have our blob of reactor blocks, we have our chambers, and we have conduit blocks physically connecting them all together into one single structure. And then for some reason we have stabilizers on the opposite end of the ship as random gap filler? That seems to break the idea of making a defined "core".
So, what if instead of the current stabilizer system, we actually go back and use some of the mechanics from the old power generator blocks? Namely the whole "bounding box creates multiplicative bonuses" thing. We then combine that with the idea of being able to determine distance from the reactor to create a "sweet spot" around a reactor. So if you are too close, the stabilizers don't work. If you're too far away, they're less efficient. And then we add on the way power generators work in the old system, so that the bigger the bounding box, the better they work.
Now we've got a system that promotes building a framework around the reactor. Like this:
We can then assign a "containment rating" to the outer shell, and have that rating increase using the same mechanics as the old power generator lines/boxes. Have the requirement be that the containment value has to equal or exceed the reactor output to get maximum efficiency.
Can't build the box to be huge, because going too big puts it outside of the sweet spot and reduces it's effectiveness. So now you're looking at having some skill in the build to try and get maximum effect out of minimum space/blocks.
Then, to tie it together with the concept of the reactor core being a single, discrete system, we connect the stabilizer/containment rods to the reactor with conduits.
Could make boxes, or could just do stabilizer/containment lines.
Or any combination of things that our design/space allows for.
As long as we keep the distance for the sweet spot from going out exponentially with size to create a whale of a reactor when we don't need to, the challenge of the build will be in working to maximize the containment field within as SMALL of an area as possible, with the counter-pressure being that you still want BIGGER lines for the multiplicative effect.
Plus it all gets tied together into a single cohesive unit via conduits.
And we don't have to completely throw out the existing generator mechanic we are all so familiar with, we just re-purpose it into a new system.
