something I do not like in gold patch - Page 2

PvK · #11 April 16th, 2002, 12:04 AM

quote:
Originally posted by Suicide Junkie:
Ah HA!
I think I see our problem. You see supplies as power (reactors), while I see them as fuel..

Ya, I see supplies as various forms of fuel and food and spare parts and ammunition. I'm not entirely satisfied with these all being one value in SE4, but it's ok.

quote:

I am curious as to how your reactor model explains "running out of supplies" and the fact that even one supply component can use all of its supplies anywhere from instantly to year-long spans.

The engines still require fuel to run them. Their high supply "storage" compared to "Supply Storage" components reflects their ability to generate energy as they burn fuel. Using supplies "instantly" (in the case of a lot of fighting or component use) means they burned a lot of fuel to generate power to run demanding components. During long-distance travel, a ship won't need to run its components very much (but will still use power and food and spare parts and other supplies, although we don't have a per-turn supply use ability in SE4 (yet?)).

quote:

There are mods which change supplies into reactor power, by having reactors that generate as much as they can store each turn.

If there were a way to do this without using the solar-based ability, I would have put this in my Proportions mod. Sadly, I don't think there is a way to mod this currently without linking to the number of suns in the system, which to me was worse than the abstraction of just adding more supplies to represent generation.

For instance, for Quantum reactors, I extended the tech tree several levels before getting the "truly infinite" Q reactor, adding several stages before that which are called Q reactors, but are actually just supply components with massive storage abilities.

PvK

Sinapus · #12 April 16th, 2002, 12:20 AM

quote:
Originally posted by PvK:

If there were a way to do this without using the solar-based ability, I would have put this in my Proportions mod. Sadly, I don't think there is a way to mod this currently without linking to the number of suns in the system, which to me was worse than the abstraction of just adding more supplies to represent generation.

For instance, for Quantum reactors, I extended the tech tree several levels before getting the "truly infinite" Q reactor, adding several stages before that which are called Q reactors, but are actually just supply components with massive storage abilities.

PvK

Well, you might be able to use drones as various types of missiles. (Or at least I tend to name mine after various naval missiles of this era.) Maybe make a few adjustments to the cargo capacity of the launchers to store more of them. (Or halve the size of them and use component enhancement to make half-size mounts or something. Or both.)

Suicide Junkie · #13 April 16th, 2002, 02:13 AM

quote:
If there were a way to do this without using the solar-based ability, I would have put this in my Proportions mod. Sadly, I don't think there is a way to mod this currently without linking to the number of suns in the system, which to me was worse than the abstraction of just adding more supplies to represent generation.

The easy solution is to make one star in every system, hidden as a pure-black masked square. Then your reactors always work.
When your reactors generate as much as they store, there is no diff between single, binary and trinary systems.

quote:
The engines still require fuel to run them. Their high supply "storage" compared to "Supply Storage" components reflects their ability to generate energy as they burn fuel.

Sooo ... the fact that they generate energy from fuel ... means that they can store more fuel than a dedicated powerplant/fuel tank.

PvK · #14 April 16th, 2002, 04:03 AM

quote:
Originally posted by Suicide Junkie:

The easy solution is to make one star in every system, hidden as a pure-black masked square. Then your reactors always work.
When your reactors generate as much as they store, there is no diff between single, binary and trinary systems.

I wouldn't expect that to work, though, if the ship has other supply storage aboard. I.e., a ship with such a generator AND a supply storage compartment, I would expect to get its storage filled up by an amount proportional to the number of stars in the system... which again, seems worse to me than the problem it attempts to fix.

Seems like the black-masked sun would cause other possible sillyness as well, such as the ability to hit it with a core instability, sun destroyer, or to build planets without a star, and not be able to create a star in the system, and solar collectors working without a "real" star, etc.

Moreover, although I do have some solar supply generation in Proportions, in general I'm not really happy with it, because supplies to me represent ammo, food, parts, etc, as well as fuel/energy, and these components allow theoretically unlimited operation without returning to resupply those. I don't mind that much because it's ok for the game's abstraction level, and several types of supplies would likely complicate play for marginal gain. However, this to me is a reason against wanting to give engines supply generation - really they should convert fuel to energy - not generate unlimited fuel.

quote:
Originally posted by Suicide Junkie:
Sooo ... the fact that they generate energy from fuel ... means that they can store more fuel than a dedicated powerplant/fuel tank.

No. As you know, adding engines increases fuel consumption as quickly as it increases supply. So, if you have a design with X engines, and room for either another engine, or the same space in supply storage, adding an engine will not increase range, but adding supply storage will. Engines include some fuel (the supply storage ability), and (the way I rationalize it) the ability to convert engine fuel to energy, both for movement, and as a side-effect of generating movement. A ship with more engines may also have a more efficient (economy of scale) and certainly a more powerful system than a ship with fewer engines, and this is abstractly fudged in the only way that seems acceptable to me in current SE4, by the supply storage. (Actually, this is a rationalization of the de facto SE4 system rather than a cause and effect.)

As I've said before, I see engines and supply storage as different types of device altogether (apples and oranges). Their shared ability (supply storage) is an abstraction forced by SE4's single type of supplies. Engines probably take less design space than they actually involve if they were an internal system, but are limited by the max engines spec of the design. A non-engine component for generating energy for the ship without propulsion, I would probably give more supplies per kT than a supply storage component, but make much more expensive than a supply storage component (the supply storage components in Proportions are quite cheap).

As an example, suppose you have a Proportions ship design with 4 engines, some supply storage, and room and design allowance for two more 10-kT engines, or a 20-kT supply storage component, and for argument assume the engines have twice the supply rating that the 20-kT supply storage would have. If you add two engines, the ship will be faster, but will have less range (greater consumption, and the other non-engine supply will be constant, and so used up sooner). If you add the 20-kT supply, the ship will be slower and less expensive, but will have greater range. If the ship is defensive and doesn't move far from a supply source, the ship with more engines will have more shots with its weapons (more total supply, representing more efficient and powerful energy generation from fuel).

For the unmodded set, I think of it the same way, except the very high expense of supply components wants an explanation. I tend to think that this is to make extending fleet range a more expensive proposition, and assume there are a number of possible rationalizations for why it could make sense and exactly what it could represent, but I've never bothered.

Not entirely consistent, but about as good as other rationalizations, given the limits of the system, it seems to me.

PvK

Andr�s · #15 April 16th, 2002, 04:27 AM

Another problem I found with the B5mod engine/reactor system is that all ships have unlimited range.
If you don't include reactors ships have 0 supplies and cannot move, if you include a reactor it will be refilled every turn making supply consuption null.
An ability to generate a fixed amount of supplies would be useful, but I don't think that solar generation can simulate it in any way.

Baron Munchausen · #16 April 16th, 2002, 05:50 AM

quote:
Originally posted by Andr�s Lescano:
Another problem I found with the B5mod engine/reactor system is that all ships have unlimited range.
If you don't include reactors ships have 0 supplies and cannot move, if you include a reactor it will be refilled every turn making supply consuption null.
An ability to generate a fixed amount of supplies would be useful, but I don't think that solar generation can simulate it in any way.

I've been saying this since before the first release of the game. As with all other ideas that involve changes to abilities, MM seems to have very fixed opinions and needs to realize that many people want this. Send an email expressing your frustration with the inflexible Quantum Reactor ability. All that is required is for the Quantum Reactor ability to take a number. If the number is 0 then it can be 'infinite' like the current QR ability, otherwise it can generate exactly the given amount of supplies per turn. This would open up the possibility of all sorts of cool new supply technologies and even special goodies like self-regenerating engines.

[ 16 April 2002: Message edited by: Baron Munchausen ]