Fractal Softworks Forum

Starsector => Suggestions => Topic started by: ufo1996215 on December 23, 2018, 11:25:16 PM

Title: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: ufo1996215 on December 23, 2018, 11:25:16 PM: English is not my mother tongue. These contents come from translation. There may be some inaccuracies.

I think flux system is interesting, but it lacks some realistic, I have a better realism overhaul:

use the reactor system or energy system instead of flux system.

Adding the reactor core system for the game. all hulls need to be installed with a reactor core. The reactors come in a variety of sizes depending on the size of the hull. And there are many different technology grade reactors that can be used (Such as nuclear fission, nuclear fusion, zero energy, cold fusion, sigma energy core, etc.). Large ships can be fitted with small reactors if you want LOL.
*Reactors are easily damaged during an explosion and can also be damaged in the event of severe structural damage.

Adding the Energy system for the game. The energy system is the energy container of the hull that stores the energy of the reactor for use. Energy system modules come in different sizes and technology levels (Nanocapacitor module, nuclear capacitor module, zero energy ring module, sigma module, etc.). Ultimately will depend on the size of the hull (large ships can install small modules).
*The energy system will operate inefficiently when subjected to severe structural damage.

When the weapon is activated, it is the same as the shield and requires static energy consumption to maintain.
Only activated weapons can fire. When the weapon fires, it needs to consume the corresponding energy value.

Shields needs energy to maintain (Equivalent to the previous soft flux).
The shield needs to consume energy to protect against every hit. The amount of energy consumed depends on the incoming firepower.
Shields can be at different 'hardness', from 0 to 100% resilience, and will cost different energy to maintain. At the same time reduce the corresponding damage.
Phase hull, entering the phase state will directly consume energy (This means that the phase hull must be cautiously fighting).

The reactor can charge the energy system if the reactor has surplus energy.
If the reactor is too weak or poor and there is no surplus at all, then the energy system will not be able to recharge. This means that once the energy system is used up, the ship must be evacuated immediately.

In combat, if the energy is completely consumed, the ship will be in a low-energy state, and the weapon or shield may off-line because there is not enough energy to sustain it.
At this time, the player has two choices, temporarily off the front line and waiting for the reactor to recharge. Or turn off some weapons or shields to ensure enough reactor power to sustain the battle.

If take the above improvements, the game will be more realistic. At the same time, every fight must be taken more seriously.
Players must match the ship's reactor and energy systems and weapon systems well, and manage and use energy, weapon systems and defense systems in battle.
Such improvements are far more meaningful than current fluxsystems.

I am looking forward to a more realistic combat experience. 8)

pinyin: you lai zi zhong guo de wan jia ma? zou qi! zhi chi yi xia ba!
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Deshara on December 24, 2018, 03:14:01 AM: I too look forward to a more realistic depiction of zero point flux reactors and energy shield wielding interstellar SSTO space battleships lol
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Sutopia on December 24, 2018, 06:32:26 AM: Your "reactor core" is equivalent to flux dissipation and your "energy system" is simply total flux pool. I don't see any magic in there.
It's just a different of full status being "full energy" or "empty flux". I don't see anything different from current system other than some wording.

The big difference, if any, is removing hard flux from game, which would be a disaster. Hard flux is one of the core battle mechanism. If you remove it you don't call it starsector, done. It's not a realism problem, it's more of a mechanism problem.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Inventor Raccoon on December 24, 2018, 12:13:57 PM: This kind of just sounds like you're over complicating the existing flux system unnecessarily. I don't really see anything that's functionally different except you're replacing the simple capacitor/vent system with upgradable reactors/energy systems and making weapons require an additional activation step before being used. Shields already vary in strength and upkeep costs depending on the ship. Phase ships already have a specific instant cost and upkeep cost depending on the ship. Ships already overload and are put into an extremely bad spot if flux isn't properly managed.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Tei on December 24, 2018, 01:41:16 PM: You want more "realistic" combat? Remove all shields, put massive emphasis on armor, hull, and point defense.

Suddenly everything plays like a love child of Battlestar Galactic and The Expanse. Extremely high lethality amd every blow HURTS.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Sutopia on December 24, 2018, 02:53:10 PM: Quote from: Tei on December 24, 2018, 01:41:16 PM
You want more "realistic" combat? Remove all shields, put massive emphasis on armor, hull, and point defense.

Suddenly everything plays like a love child of Battlestar Galactic and The Expanse. Extremely high lethality amd every blow HURTS.
In sci-fi scenario, idk why but people kinda "expect" some form of shield for spaceships, which is nonsense, I have to agree.
A more realistic approach would be a hell ton of "Arena"-like system that detects incoming threat then fires defensive projectiles to intercept, which is just point defense as you mentioned. The armor is not gonna do much due to everything can accelerate to ridiculous speed and have incredible momentum thus avoiding direct impact is the top priority. Just a scratch is sufficient to tear a giant hull apart, given the incoming projectile have either good mass or good speed. A typical space junk is already flying at around 5 miles PER SECOND (over 20 Mach), even just a pinball can deal massive damage at that speed.
A "shield"-like defensive is possible nonetheless, but it would be a fleet-sized gigantic shield that basically using magnetic field, same as earth, to deflect charged projectiles. However, it cannot stop any neutral projectile, or enemy can carefully calculate the deflected course and lay down a "curve-ball" that you can hardly dodge.
Anything superior than that is pure fantasy, not realistic.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: ufo1996215 on December 24, 2018, 07:53:43 PM: Quote from: Sutopia on December 24, 2018, 06:32:26 AM
Your "reactor core" is equivalent to flux dissipation and your "energy system" is simply total flux pool. I don't see any magic in there.
It's just a different of full status being "full energy" or "empty flux". I don't see anything different from current system other than some wording.

The big difference, if any, is removing hard flux from game, which would be a disaster. Hard flux is one of the core battle mechanism. If you remove it you don't call it starsector, done. It's not a realism problem, it's more of a mechanism problem.

Yes, the reactor and energy system seem to be not much different from the flux system, but the core difference is that the game's realism is improved.

reactor and energy system VS flux system:

[Hull reactor and energy core VS hull flux core]
Cores with different sizes and technology grades, depending on the size of the hull. The hull can be installed with a low-tech core to reduce performance but reduce maintenance costs. or fitted with a high-tech core to improve performance but increase maintenance costs.
In the flux system, each hull has its own flux core features and cannot be core modified and replaced. Although you can increase the pool and the amount of dissipation.

[Variable Strength Shield VS flux Shield]
Shields require some energy for deployment and require energy to sustain. The adjustable shield strength and the required energy cost will also vary. Each time the shield intercepts or reduces damage, it needs to spend the corresponding energy value.
In the flux system, the shield is added to the flux, and when the shield up, it is unbreakable, This is a magic shield, isn't it?

[Low energy state VS flux overload]
If the energy pool is used up, the energy provided by the reactor is not enough to maintain a huge energy cost. The shield and some weapons are off-line, and the player can actively turn off some weapons to maintain the shield, or actively close the shield to keep some weapons working. If you don't do this, the ship will soon enter a low performance state.and must be supported and protected. And you need to find a short window to restore energy levels. and There will be no forced charging (forced dissipation/vent), there is no shortcut key V.
On the flux system, you can safely force the dissipation/vent of the flux to quickly re-enter the battle. Even if the flux is overloaded, if you are flying fast, you can still safely get out of the fight.

[change in combat strategy]
In the energy system, the player must reasonably manage the distribution of energy output, use weapons and shields reasonably, and if the shield is keep online, ship will enter the low-energy state more quickly. So players must use shields more wisely. Because there is no shortcut key V, once in a low energy state, the ship must be temporarily out of combat or get support from friendly forces, otherwise it will be at a disadvantage.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Sutopia on December 24, 2018, 08:47:48 PM: Quote from: ufo1996215 on December 24, 2018, 07:53:43 PM
TL;DR

Energy system is as nonsense as flux if you're really want any "realism". As yourself have admitted, it's nothing but wording change which make even more nonsense.

Flux can be explained in the following, if any, realism explanation:
Consider a computer. It generates heat when it's on, it generates more heat if it's under heavy load. If you don't dissipate the heat, the CPU and other electronics can be cooked and suffer permanent damage.
Flux serves similar purpose, assuming human have some high-end energy reactor that supplies any energy you want, now the only problem is the dissipation of waste heat. If you don't dissipate it, it'll fry your hardware sooner or later, and overload is there to prevent permanent damage to hardware, just like fuse. You're a temporary sitting duck if you got overloaded, you're ~~a permanent sitting duck~~ 100% dead if hardware burned, so you'd better go overload right?
Under this perspective, flux system is actually much more credible than energy system since you did not regard where all the waste heat go, or rather it's just much lower tech battle when weapons don't even generate large amount of heat.

Either way, energy system doesn't sound any realism to me.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Mr. Nobody on December 25, 2018, 04:36:28 AM: Quote from: Sutopia on December 24, 2018, 02:53:10 PM
The armor is not gonna do much due to everything can accelerate to ridiculous speed and have incredible momentum thus avoiding direct impact is the top priority. Just a scratch is sufficient to tear a giant hull apart, given the incoming projectile have either good mass or good speed. A typical space junk is already flying at around 5 miles PER SECOND (over 20 Mach), even just a pinball can deal massive damage at that speed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whipple_shield
*shatters ur hypervelocity round*
"Heh- nuttin personnel, kiddo"

Spoiler
I never thought it was possible to cringe to the point of actually feel physical pain before
[close]
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: DatonKallandor on December 25, 2018, 05:16:30 AM: Quote from: ufo1996215 on December 24, 2018, 07:53:43 PM

[Hull reactor and energy core VS hull flux core]
Cores with different sizes and technology grades, depending on the size of the hull. The hull can be installed with a low-tech core to reduce performance but reduce maintenance costs. or fitted with a high-tech core to improve performance but increase maintenance costs.
In the flux system, each hull has its own flux core features and cannot be core modified and replaced. Although you can increase the pool and the amount of dissipation.

[Variable Strength Shield VS flux Shield]
Shields require some energy for deployment and require energy to sustain. The adjustable shield strength and the required energy cost will also vary. Each time the shield intercepts or reduces damage, it needs to spend the corresponding energy value.
In the flux system, the shield is added to the flux, and when the shield up, it is unbreakable, This is a magic shield, isn't it?

[Low energy state VS flux overload]
If the energy pool is used up, the energy provided by the reactor is not enough to maintain a huge energy cost. The shield and some weapons are off-line, and the player can actively turn off some weapons to maintain the shield, or actively close the shield to keep some weapons working. If you don't do this, the ship will soon enter a low performance state.and must be supported and protected. And you need to find a short window to restore energy levels. and There will be no forced charging (forced dissipation/vent), there is no shortcut key V.
On the flux system, you can safely force the dissipation/vent of the flux to quickly re-enter the battle. Even if the flux is overloaded, if you are flying fast, you can still safely get out of the fight.

That's just inverting the flux bar and having it start full and go down instead of start empty and go up.

Your customizable reactors is exactly what the flux dissipation and capacity buttons are. Better reactor = more dissipation/capacity.

Your shield is just like the current shields - the amount of flux taken already depends on the strength of the hits and it already has an upkeep for being toggled on.

Your low energy state is just removing the vent button and does nothing else new.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Sutopia on December 25, 2018, 01:08:35 PM: Quote from: Mr. Nobody on December 25, 2018, 04:36:28 AM
Quote from: Sutopia on December 24, 2018, 02:53:10 PM
The armor is not gonna do much due to everything can accelerate to ridiculous speed and have incredible momentum thus avoiding direct impact is the top priority. Just a scratch is sufficient to tear a giant hull apart, given the incoming projectile have either good mass or good speed. A typical space junk is already flying at around 5 miles PER SECOND (over 20 Mach), even just a pinball can deal massive damage at that speed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whipple_shield
*shatters ur hypervelocity round*
"Heh- nuttin personnel, kiddo"

Spoiler
I never thought it was possible to cringe to the point of actually feel physical pain before
[close]

For space war, if exists, it's not hard to imagine crazy engineers making projectiles as fast as possible and eventually everyone go for projectiles with over 100 Mach speed.

Even if they're not coming in that extreme speed, bear in mind that warheads are NOT easily shattered if using correct material to build it's bulk. That shield is not gonna do a thing against a specially hardened shell (especially HVAP-like shells).
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Death_Silence_66 on December 25, 2018, 01:48:13 PM: Quote from: Sutopia on December 25, 2018, 01:08:35 PM
For space war, if exists, it's not hard to imagine crazy engineers making projectiles as fast as possible and eventually everyone go for projectiles with over 100 Mach speed.

Even if they're not coming in that extreme speed, bear in mind that warheads are NOT easily shattered if using correct material to build it's bulk. That shield is not gonna do a thing against a specially hardened shell (especially HVAP-like shells).
It absolutely is. Material properties are irrelevant as velocities exceed 20 km/s. The projectile will instantly flash to plasma on contact with any physical barrier. The resulting plasma will expand as a cone, allowing spaced whipple shields filled with aerogel to defeat any projectile attack if sufficiently thick.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Sutopia on December 25, 2018, 06:26:14 PM: Quote from: Death_Silence_66 on December 25, 2018, 01:48:13 PM
It absolutely is. Material properties are irrelevant as velocities exceed 20 km/s. The projectile will instantly flash to plasma on contact with any physical barrier. The resulting plasma will expand as a cone, allowing spaced whipple shields filled with aerogel to defeat any projectile attack if sufficiently thick.

Any reference on this? There is no reason materials magically turn into plasma.
To be precise, if only you're able to heat the material to enough temperature then you get plasma. 20 km/s is insufficient.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: intrinsic_parity on December 25, 2018, 09:28:32 PM: An impact at 20 km/s would absolutely heat any material immensely. Some kinetic energy is going to be absorbed and converted into thermal energy. If all of that kinetic energy was converted directly into thermal energy, aluminum could end up at temperatures exceeding 200000000 C. I got that just using simple linear kinetic energy equation and specific heat capacity of aluminum, very back of the napkin and not very accurate, but the point is the amount of energy not the exact number. The vaporization temperature of aluminum is ~2300 C so even if a small fraction of the total energy were converted to thermal energy, aluminum would vaporize. The transition to plasma is a bit more tricky, it doesn't happen at an exact temperature but gradually since plasma is just highly ionized gas. I don't know enough to say exactly what would happen, but it's clear that the energy is there to turn any material to plasma.

Also mach number is not a relevant quantity in space. Mach number is the ratio of velocity to the speed of sound in the current medium (i.e. air or whatever fluid is being flown through) which is a function of the medium temperature, density and a gas constant. It's obviously only relevant when moving through a gas/fluid. In space, there is no medium being moved through therefore there is no speed of sound and thus no mach number.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Sutopia on December 25, 2018, 10:33:01 PM: Quote from: intrinsic_parity on December 25, 2018, 09:28:32 PM
TL;DQ

It's LMAO math you got there. The kinetic energy doesn't go anywhere, they remain on the projectile itself and dig deep into your hull until it eventually vaporize or put another hole and just leave.
You get the very least possible assumption that all kinetic energy turn into heat immediately, which is 99.99% not the case, especially for very high speed projectile.

Forget about mach, talk in SI, sure. A 20 km/s projectile is more likely to punch nice hole through your hull, leaving with 19 km/s instead of magically stuck in your hull and release all that kinetic energy, unless otherwise designed to do so.
Even modern tank shells and naval gun shells don't magically stuck on enemy tanks or vessels. APFSDS can easily just put two holes on a tank and pass right through, same goes for navy gun AP shells would put two holes instead of correctly detonate it's charge inside the vessel.

So I'm seeing where you get all wrong. What you observe is APHE shell behavior. The are designed to put a hole in enemy armor, THEN detonate the charge it carried within the hull to directly kill the crew. It's still NOT the kinetic energy doing any real damage, but the HE charge carried by the shell. Spaced armor CANNOT defend against pure AP shells. They are designed to defend against HEAT shells such as well-known RPG-7.

Go play some more tank games before judging physics.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: intrinsic_parity on December 26, 2018, 12:27:02 AM: LMAO imagine using experience playing tank video games to make arguments about hypervelocity physics. (this was made by the aerospace engineering gang)

I clearly stated that only a small fraction of the energy would need to be converted to heat to vaporize the object and I wasn't suggesting that anything like a 100% energy conversion would actually occur.
Quote from: intrinsic_parity on December 25, 2018, 09:28:32 PM
... even if a small fraction of the total energy were converted to thermal energy, aluminum would vaporize...
If as you stated, the velocity changed from 20 km/s to 19 km/s and only 1% of the lost energy was converted into heat, aluminum would still reach 1.55 million degrees C (again using a bunch of bad assumptions, but the even if the order of magnitude is off by 2, it still proves the point). There's so much energy involved that if any noticeable amount is converted into heat, the object would vaporize.

Tank shells are fired at a small fraction of orbital velocities, and kinetic energy grows with velocity squared so the difference between a 1500 m/s armor penetrating round (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armour-piercing_fin-stabilized_discarding_sabot) and 20000 m/s is a factor of 177 (i.e. 177 times as much energy). Tank shells are designed to work at specific velocities and with the material properties associated with impacts at those velocities. Arguing those principles extend to much higher velocities is ridiculous. Any chemically reactive material would undergo reaction on impact (i.e. explosives detonate on impact), and then the result would be a bunch of plasma (explosion + impact would definitely release enough energy for that) that could be redirected with magnetic fields. Would that actually work? Who knows, but trying to use modern military tank shells as evidence for the behavior of a 20 km/s projectile is nonsense. We have very little idea how those sorts of events would actually occur, because they've never happened where we can observe them to take measurements etc. We can't do much beyond computer simulations (based on our assumptions) of that sort of velocity on earth.

For reference, here is video of an impact experiment at 2 km/s
Spoiler
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4Uhn8S9I-4
[close]
The aluminum sphere and impact area are clearly behaving as a fluid and that's only 2 km/s, slightly faster than the high velocity armor penetrating tank shells cited (you can find that information in the youtube description)

Also here is a paper studying some hypervelocity material properties through computer simulations
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/257657164_The_12_th_Hypervelocity_Impact_Symposium_Large-scale_Molecular_Simulations_of_Hypervelocity_Impact_of_Materials
There's some discussion of ionization so magnetic field based deflection approaches seem potentially plausible.

I found some other papers but I can't share them because I only have access through my university
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Goumindong on December 26, 2018, 12:30:16 AM: Kinetic impacts do indeed produce thermal impacts. Most modern kinetic penetrator “explode” as a result of the kinetic impact. Other examples include meteor strikes. When meteors enter the atmosphere they collide with the gas and heat it up via compression. This produces what we know as reentry heat. This can heat the meteor enough to cause them to explode in the air. If it impacts the ground it will also produce heat and an explosion.

So like, you can say the math doesnt work all you want but well... it clearly does... You have probably seen it happen.

Realistically hypervelocity weapons aren’t the be all and end all of space combat nor are missiles nor do whipple shields protect from hypervelocity rounds*. Lasers can kill kinetic rounds just as well as they can anything else (you can vaporize a projectile as easily as a ship with a laser) and hypervelocity weapons are mass and energy intensive. Lasers of course have range issues but these become increasingly less relevant the closer you get to the energy required to shoot hypervelocity weapons

*the splatter is, after all, still traveling very fast. You’re at the mercy of the same total energy equation as if it has hit the ship and the total energy equation turns your ship into a slag of molten parts regardless of wether or not you you have a kilometer of whipple shielding in front of you.

Of course none of that matters because I don’t want to play a realistic space simulator. In a realistic space war simulation either no one ever meets or everyone dies instantly. Which is boring. I want to turn the safeties off and make “dakka dakka” noises as and teleport over missiles. That is not boring.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Mr. Nobody on December 26, 2018, 12:14:47 PM: Y'all niggas need Children of a Dead Earth
_{Ancient meme plz no ding dong bannu}
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Sutopia on December 26, 2018, 04:59:32 PM: Quote from: intrinsic_parity on December 26, 2018, 12:27:02 AM
LMAO imagine using experience playing tank video games to make arguments about hypervelocity physics. (this was made by the aerospace engineering gang)

I guess I should change my previous post to TL;DRT(didn't read through)

Aerospace does NOT care about artificial projectiles encountered, at least you don't see them on public papers. Maybe they do exist in military researches.

I have no idea why you insist using aluminum, not to mention sphere is not even made to do any penetration. None of the AP shells are made of those fragile metals. Plus, the projectile is not large enough.
A typical modern APFSDS or APCR shell would be made of Tungsten carbide, which has a melting point at over 3k K and boiling point at over 6k K.

The point is, heating process does not instantly heat up entire shell and vaporize it, given the shell large enough. Only the impact area would be heated up.
For properly designed warhead, it would be designed to deal with such impact-caused wear. For instance, additional coatings or just make it a literally kinetic "pin".

Molecular simulation is not very credible to say it would be same for macroscopic hyper-velocity impact. What I see in the report is they fire nano-particles all around, but that would be very different from the case when moles of particles - that is some kg-weight warhead - just shatter like that.

Quote from: Goumindong on December 26, 2018, 12:30:16 AM

Lasers can kill kinetic rounds just as well as they can anything else (you can vaporize a projectile as easily as a ship with a laser) and hypervelocity weapons are mass and energy intensive. Lasers of course have range issues but these become increasingly less relevant the closer you get to the energy required to shoot hypervelocity weapons

I'm not sure about this but LASER have very narrow spectrum thus if enemy knows your operation wavelength they can apply high reflectivity coating against it. For instance, silver has 99.9% reflectivity against any visible light.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Goumindong on December 26, 2018, 07:03:07 PM: Material doesn’t matter all that much at hypervelocity speeds. Only mass. Aluminum was just convenient to get it going that fast*. If you get hit by a potted plant going 30km/s you will explode in a ball of fire. Back of the envelope it contains about 14 tonnes of TNT worth of explosive energy(1KG plant)

If you want to rule out lasers for whatever reason you can still kinetic kill hypervelocity projectiles with non-hypervelocity projectiles.

*semi-technically hypervelocity occurs when the impact velocity is higher than the speed of sound in the object. This is the point where solid materials can behave as liquid. Vaporization won’t occur until much faster speeds however we are talking dumb science fiction so we can suppose Delta V at whatever fraction of C we want!
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: intrinsic_parity on December 26, 2018, 07:53:38 PM: **some of this was already said by @goumindong but I typed the whole thing so I'll leave it**

The exact material doesn't matter for the point I was demonstrating, aluminum is an easy example and commonly used material in aerospace applications. Doubling the melting temperature does not matter if the energy involved is orders of magnitudes higher than the the amount required to melt either material. Tungsten carbide actually has a lower thermal capacitance than aluminum meaning it takes less energy to raise its temperature so it may perform worse in that respect.

Molecular simulations are necessary to understand hypervelocity impacts because assumptions about molecular interactions break down at such high energies. A macroscopic collision is just a bunch of molecular collisions. The point of citing the article was to point out that ionization is happening on the molecular level during a 20 km/s collision meaning it may be plausible to deflect the projectile using magnetic fields once it has gone through an initial impact causing ionization. Not to mention you could heat it will a laser to help ionize it also.

More broadly from the article, you can see that we have a poor understanding of what really happens when material collide at 20 km/s. Arguing that something would happen at 20 km/s based on happens at lower speeds is nonsense. The design principles that work at certain temperatures and velocities do not hold for all temperatures and velocities. 20 km/s is dramatically different from 1.5 km/s so ideas that work for tank shells will not necessarily work for a hypervelocity projectile. Citing tank projectiles as evidence is not valid.

Another example of high energy/velocity phenomena is reentry gas dynamics. Figuring out the aerodynamic forces and temperatures for a vehicle reentering the atmosphere at a couple km/s is totally different from figuring out the forces on an aircraft, even at supersonic speeds. This is because the assumption that the gas is in thermodynamic equilibrium no longer holds for reentering vehicles and chemical reactions begin to occur because there is so much latent energy (stuff like atmospheric O2 and N2 disassociating into O and N that have different chemical/physical properties causing new reactions like the formation of O3 ozone). These new behaviors/ interactions totally change the behavior of the system such that trying to apply equations and principles from low speed flight will result in wildly inaccurate results. Trying to apply tank shell designs that work at 1.5 km/s to a 20 km/s projectile is like trying to use commercial airplane designs for a reentry craft.

You can see what happened to aluminum on impact at only 20 km/s. Tungsten carbide (TC) is harder and stiffer than aluminum, but that just means TC deflects less when force is applied. If the forces applied are high enough, TC will also behave in the way aluminum did on impact, and 20 km/s is almost certainly fast enough to cause that. Feel free to prove me wrong on that point. The projectile will not maintain its shape so designs that depends on it maintaining its shape will not work. Coatings are just layers of particles that are also impacting at 20 km/s, they would do nothing to change the structural impact. The exact interaction (structural and thermal) would depend on what surface it is impacting which could also be made of whatever material you want in whatever geometry you want. Basically, we (all of humanity) have very little idea what will happen under such extreme conditions. That's why science fiction is fun.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Sutopia on December 27, 2018, 08:29:49 PM: Quote from: intrinsic_parity on December 26, 2018, 07:53:38 PM

Meteorite are already good enough examples. They got ionized, burned, vaporized or whatever interactions on their surfaces but some eventually managed to keep it's core intact and eventually land on earth.
I don't really care about how the frontal part of warhead is destroyed as long as the following kinetic hit or payload is delivered.
Human have yet to fire anything over kilogram scale at hypervelocity. Observing surface interaction DOES NOT justify your argument that such destruction would be apply to entire bulk GIVEN THE PROJECTILE LARGE ENOUGH.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: intrinsic_parity on December 27, 2018, 09:40:06 PM: An impact is not a surface interaction... a shock wave will travel through the projectile, and if the magnitude of the shock is large enough material behind the shock will become liquidized/vaporized. The shock will lose strength as it travels into the material, but certainly it can travel through the entire object if there is enough energy. A larger projectile may require a thicker shield to see the same behavior, and there are likely some other interactions from relative hardness of the materials. As I said, I am not an expert and do not know exactly what would happen, but I have learned enough from material science and dynamics courses to know that the projectile will not be staying in anything remotely resembling its original shape during an impact at 20 km/s.

Here is some more light reading if you are interested:
https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_memoranda/2006/RM3490.pdf

This is a journal article, but unless you have access through a university, you will likely not be able to read it. You should still be able to read the abstract:
http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1742-6596/98/4/042025
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Sutopia on December 28, 2018, 12:19:12 PM: Quote from: intrinsic_parity on December 27, 2018, 09:40:06 PM

You see, the impact is bi-directional, which also applies to the object it hits. If your statement hold true, same goes for the target, so it's mission completed.
Viewing from projectile, it's rather the case when target fly at it at 20 km/s.

Material science focuses on single layer or pure materials, however, structural science is where you should be looking into where they use different materials in layers to serve different purposes.

Simply by multi-layering a shell, creating disposable impact-mitigating layers would allow the shell to dig deep enough into the hull, then it can be free to just vaporize and implode.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: intrinsic_parity on December 28, 2018, 01:29:36 PM: Material science does not study only single layers of materials or pure materials. Most interesting materials being studied now are composites meaning mixes of different materials and interesting arrangements of molecules (crystal structures). The molecular structure of materials is interesting because it dictates the macroscopic properties which is why many material science studies are focused on micro-scale stuff. The goal of this however, is to determine the macro scale properties such as hardness, stiffness, thermal resistance and capacitance etc. Interesting molecular structures can cause behavior like anisotropic properties (properties that are not the same in all directions meaning a material may bend more in one orientation than in another or may be harder in one orientation etc.). Molecular interactions also dictate what happens during impacts on a thermodynamic level etc. Carbon fibre is an example of a composite with anisotropic properties. The application of material properties to larger structures is structural engineering which is also relevant certainly.

A shell with layered protection would be interesting, however, in order for the outer layers to do anything, they would have to be sufficiently far from the core and thick so that they do not crumple into the core causing their own impact at a similar velocity. If they offered very little physical resistance, they would do nothing. Also if the outer layers are absorbing a significant amount of the impact energy (and velocity) are are also attached to the core, they would be slowing the core projectile down meaning they would reduce the effectiveness of the actual projectile.

This design could result in the projectile becoming quite large/heavy meaning the strategy is more of ramming the enemy ship with an unmanned vessel than firing a projectile. You would have to do a lot simulation to figure out if that would work and also how large/massive the projectile would have to be (and how/if you could actually accelerate something that large to sufficient velocity for it to be effective without damaging it etc.). It's certainly not obvious that it would work, but also not obvious that it wouldn't. Im sure someone with more expertise could give a better estimate of what would happen than me though.

Also defenses like lasers could potentially remove outer layers if they are thin enough rendering the design ineffective. There are many considerations to be made, but certainly an interesting idea.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Sutopia on December 28, 2018, 04:03:39 PM: Quote from: intrinsic_parity on December 28, 2018, 01:29:36 PM
A shell with layered protection would be interesting, however, in order for the outer layers to do anything, they would have to be sufficiently far from the core and thick so that they do not crumple into the core causing their own impact at a similar velocity. If they offered very little physical resistance, they would do nothing. Also if the outer layers are absorbing a significant amount of the impact energy (and velocity) are are also attached to the core, they would be slowing the core projectile down meaning they would reduce the effectiveness of the actual projectile.
It does not have to be thick by any means, it just need a relatively weak connection to main bulk such that all the energy on first impact does not conduct to other parts.
An easy design would be a projectile that is consist of a chain of simple shells connected with fragile fodders. The fodders gets destroyed when frontal shell impacts the target, leaving the following shell almost intact and keep on the destruction, until the target eventually got penetrated.
An advanced design, well you have probably guessed it, a chain of bullets aimed perfectly in one line. The doom of first bullet would have nothing to do with the second. An N layered defensive bulk go doom with equivalent N count of perfectly aimed bullets.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: intrinsic_parity on December 28, 2018, 06:51:13 PM: The core of the projectile will still collide with the inside of the layers around it, but if the design worked, that collision would be less damaging. If the outer layers were too thin or not spaced far enough from the core, that internal collision would not be sufficiently different from a 20 km/s collision to change the outcome.

Multiple separate projectiles hitting the exact same location would definitely be an effective method of penetration. In that sense, starsectors armor mechanic is most similar to the defenses we are discussing here. Multiple successive hits in the same location will penetrate further until ultimately reaching the hull.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Deshara on December 29, 2018, 05:45:15 PM: Quote from: intrinsic_parity on December 28, 2018, 01:29:36 PM
A shell with layered protection would be interesting

no its wouldn't lol

it would be such an intricate detail that you would never be able to interact with the mechanic in any meaningful way (size of ships * how slowly they change momentum * how small the projectiles are * how many there are * how fast they move) -- effectively meaning you've implemented the world's most complicated [10% chance to ignore the player's armor]
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: intrinsic_parity on December 29, 2018, 08:36:02 PM: Not actually modeling it as a game mechanic , just interesting as a concept. All of this can be thought of as some lore for the armor mechanic. Armor is a bunch of layered whipple shields, HE are special projectiles designed to penetrate etc.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Troika on January 16, 2019, 08:01:42 AM: I'll take a hard pass on this suggestion. I like the flux system the way it is.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Vulpis on January 16, 2019, 09:15:29 AM: Bringing this back to the initial idea; it seems interesting but I suspect it would be too difficult to implement much less balance.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: JustALittleGravitas on January 16, 2019, 11:56:06 AM: This is actually much less realistic. The principle limit on how much energy you can get out of a reactor in space isn't how much energy the reactor has, but how much waste heat you can vent. Combat vehicles can (theoretically) overload by storing waste heat in heatsinks to dump later, which is exactly what flux is modeling.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Alex on January 16, 2019, 01:18:35 PM: For what it's worth, in veeeery early builds flux was inverted and called "energy" instead. In some old code the variable names even reflect this :) IIRC - and since it's been a while, it's a bit hazy - I ended up flipping it around because it made more in-fiction sense for causing overloads due to shield damage, and for the venting mechanic.
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: Deshara on January 17, 2019, 01:49:24 AM: and it was a great choice, Alex. Building flux, overloading at max and having (getting) to vent flux is so much more interesting than just a static "energy" meter that I can't play Everspace bc of it
Title: Re: realism overhaul: Replacing flux system with reactor system and energy system
Post by: FreedomFighter on January 17, 2019, 02:26:52 AM: Quote from: Deshara on January 17, 2019, 01:49:24 AM
and it was a great choice, Alex. Building flux, overloading at max and having (getting) to vent flux is so much more interesting than just a static "energy" meter that I can't play Everspace bc of it

This is what got me interest in Starsector as well.