Station explosions

[george moromisato]

Over at the UTF, a couple of players (digdug and Bobby) have come up with a mod that causes stations to do damage when they die.

This makes it so that players can't just sit on top of a station to kill it.

What do you all think? I think it's a pretty neat solution.

Check it out: http://z8.invisionfree.com/Transcendenc ... topic=2344

[Betelgeuse]

very nice solution 8)
as long as the blast radius isn't too big killing all the guards

[Periculi]

I have been looking forward to this mod- read the thread yesterday and it seems like a great idea, and a really great way to add some more realistic and effective details to the game.

[darksider]

Well, not a bad idea I guess (I thought hostile stations should "bump" the player and other ships like the arena walls) but currently it looks like it's very off-balance and unrealistic - I don't think those light recoilless cannons can inflict those massive nuclear explosions, or, every station should go fusion explosion. (I should say if it is a better killing method than any weapons they have, then it is wrong.)
Honestly, I don't think those helium3 rods can explode so easily - in fact, they are extremely stable and you need massive (or extraordinarily advanced) equipment to cause them to give out the energy.

As for the strongholds, citadels, fortresses, Rasiermesser factories... GO EXPLODE!! Yay!

[Periculi]

Didn't you try the momentum mod, darksider? That was intended to keep people away from station hovering exploits, right? I use the momentum mod on most of my trans versions. It's fun to get bounced around.

[OddBob]

I like it, but I'm not sure how effective it is in keeping players off the station- after all, you can inflict 99% of the damage and then run away for the killing blow.

Also I agree with the realism issues - helium isn't volatile and you only need to poke enough holes in a station to "destroy" it.

It would be cool however to have weapon stores cook off - say destroying a Sung fortress occasionally results in a shower of Nandao bolts through nearby space, and similar with Ranx/akan and pirates/missiles (even if the station doesn't shoot weapons they probably have ammo around for their ships - it doesn't even have to be any type of ammo, you could just use the recoilless graphic for "generic ammo" or random ammo images)

[Kamikaze]

Honestly, I don't think those helium3 rods can explode so easily - in fact, they are extremely stable and you need massive (or extraordinarily advanced) equipment to cause them to give out the energy.

As for the strongholds, citadels, fortresses, Rasiermesser factories... GO EXPLODE!! Yay!

Well, it's the idea of it being a fuel depot. Fuel depots go sky high.

[Fossaman]

I've always figured that explosions weren't so much from the fuel rods exploding as losing containment on your fusion bottle. THAT would probably be able to make the fuel rods go boom.

I like this. It's an elegant solution.

[OddBob]

Well, it's the idea of it being a fuel depot. Fuel depots go sky high.

No, they don't, not if they're just full of helium.

[F50]

but if a reactor explodes (that runs on helium....)

[darksider]

If you want the "fuel depot" to explode so badly, you probably have watched too many cheap Hollywood movies

I think fusion reactors are not likely to cause such a massive explosion and, what can be really dangerous about the fusion reactors is not really explosion itself but dreadful amount of high-level radioactive waste and lethal enviromental radioactivation.
They are even worse than fission reactors, I believe.

(After all, the Chernobyl accident, being the most disastrous nuclear power plant accident in the history, didn't cause "massive explosion" compared to the atomic bombs which instantly devastated whole two cities - instead, the radioactive fallout killed so many people and is still killing, I guess)

Yep, I admit too much realism will spoil the game, much as thoughtless insertion of silliness, but this is my thought anyway.

[F50]

Fusion will never cause a meltdown because fusion reactions don't expand like fission reactions (as I understand it). Fusion reactions only produce one particle to continue the reaction while fission produces two. I am speaking out of ignorance and haven't done even as much research as going to wikipedia so I might not understand things properly.

Radiation isn't a problem in space. Radiation can kill living tissue exposed to it. In space, no living tissue is exposed to it. Now if there is a large hole in the station, that can happen, but there aren't many holes in operating stations.

As for reactors not exploding...I guess the only way to make that happen would be to cut off the cooling, which would cause an explosion that might be able to use fuel outside of its (now breached) holding area (reactor).

[Fossaman]

Fusion reactors work by confining very hot plasma in a magnetic field. They're simulating the environment of a star. If you lose that magnetic containment, you have very hot high pressure plasma spewing everywhere. I suspect it would look extremely similar to an explosion.

And let's not forget that later game reactors use antimatter (read the description on pteracnium) and even more exotic stuff to power themselves...

[OddBob]

Fusion reactors work by confining very hot plasma in a magnetic field. They're simulating the environment of a star. If you lose that magnetic containment, you have very hot high pressure plasma spewing everywhere. I suspect it would look extremely similar to an explosion.

I suspect it would as well. It wouldn't however, I suspect, cause ALL of the helium in the entire station to spontaneously undergo fusion - so the presumably small reactor require to power an automated fuel station would blow up less than the one required to power a large warship.

[Fossaman]

Oh, certainly. You might get a tiny bit of peripheral fusion if they were storing the fuel, you know...RIGHT NEXT to the fusion reactor. But there's no reason for a fuel depot to go up in a big boom.

Well, until you start using antimatter fuel, anyway. All guarantees are off, then.