Wedged turret block and launcher rails

[willvette]

just two block ideas:

Wedged turret block, a turret docker but on the hypotenuse face of a wedge so now one has more options for the placement of turrets.
launcher rails, a special type of rail that accelerates a docked object and automatically 'un-docks' at the end. The rails add momentum at a decreasing exponential rate, aiming for about 50% max server speed at 10 blocks and 75% speed at 20 blocks long. Note that the power to the electromagnets very costly.​

 

[Lecic]

Wedged turret block, a turret docker but on the hypotenuse face of a wedge so now one has more options for the placement of turrets.

You can already do this with some trickery via rotors, but it'd be nice to not need to do chaindocks just to dock a turret at a 45* angle.

launcher rails, a special type of rail that accelerates a docked object and automatically 'un-docks' at the end. The rails add momentum at a decreasing exponential rate, aiming for about 50% max server speed at 10 blocks and 75% speed at 20 blocks long. Note that the power to the electromagnets very costly.

You can already do something similar by using a push beam to launch things right after undocking them.

 

[willvette]

You can already do something similar by using a push beam to launch things right after undocking them.

But you would have to keep your ship stationary to do that! Not easy to do when your in a firefight. I'm going for a fire and forget concept.

 

[Lecic]

But you would have to keep your ship stationary to do that! Not easy to do when your in a firefight. I'm going for a fire and forget concept.

There was a suggestion for docked entities to stay aligned to the main ship (like astronauts) for a bit after undocking, so that things like launching drones or fleeing in an escape pod mid battle don't cause a horrible, collision filled mess.

 

[Heillos]

There was a suggestion for docked entities to stay aligned to the main ship (like astronauts) for a bit after undocking, so that things like launching drones or fleeing in an escape pod mid battle don't cause a horrible, collision filled mess.

As far as I know, current collision checks rely on box dimensions already, so maybe undocked entities should stay aligned to their original host until their box dimensions no longer overlap?

 

[StormWing0]

Technically what'd fix the rail issue of things not moving correctly is a minor change to the physics so objects undocked from a main one will keep the speed of the main object and it's last known vector at that time it was undocked. Although yes some kind of high speed launching system would come in handy.

 

[therimmer96]

There was a suggestion for docked entities to stay aligned to the main ship (like astronauts) for a bit after undocking, so that things like launching drones or fleeing in an escape pod mid battle don't cause a horrible, collision filled mess.

I've done some high speed escape pod tests, thanks to them maintaining the speed of the host, there isn't really a need for this unless you want to be launching from deep inside the ship.

 

[Zaphord]

I find the push beam launch method on my carrier is haphazard at best. Unless I'm holding down forward thrust on my ship while it launches, it spins wildly out of control.

A launch rail would look and function better IMO.