Ship role and design

[ductape]

ORIGINAL: Tanaka

ORIGINAL: BigWolf

ORIGINAL: Tanaka

Could you describe the roles and what they are used for? In other words why would you not only build the biggest ships possible?

You could build the biggest and baddest if you wanted
But, would it help you win? Or leave you short because or you cannot build as many (ie. Forces over-stretched)
Like the real world, smaller vessels have uses, they can response to minor threats faster, afterall, why send in a 200-size ship to take out a lone weak sand worm, when a 100-size one can get there faster and still deal with the threat

Bigger is not always best for everything, just unfortunately, games tend to be programmed where they are

Another example, you're building a killer Capital Ship that could turn the tide of battle... but it will take alot of time to build, so use other ports to build smaller ships in order to ensure you're not taken out of the fight while it's building

But, there is nothing wrong with designing like they are classes, just remember that any sized ship can be used for escorting, for example

How is it that smaller ships are faster if bigger ships hold more engines etc? Are they coded to automatically be faster?

basic physics really. greater mass takes more work to accelerate, and then more friction to decelerate. they turn slower, notice how ships must "align" to the their new "warp" driection before intiating travel.

if each little action takes longer. slower turning, slower acceleration, slower deceleration. big ship go slower.

how it work in the game, i'm not sure. but that how it would likely work if we had spaceships in space (yeah right).

[Xenoform21]

ORIGINAL: ductape

ORIGINAL: Tanaka

ORIGINAL: BigWolf



You could build the biggest and baddest if you wanted
But, would it help you win? Or leave you short because or you cannot build as many (ie. Forces over-stretched)
Like the real world, smaller vessels have uses, they can response to minor threats faster, afterall, why send in a 200-size ship to take out a lone weak sand worm, when a 100-size one can get there faster and still deal with the threat

Bigger is not always best for everything, just unfortunately, games tend to be programmed where they are

Another example, you're building a killer Capital Ship that could turn the tide of battle... but it will take alot of time to build, so use other ports to build smaller ships in order to ensure you're not taken out of the fight while it's building

But, there is nothing wrong with designing like they are classes, just remember that any sized ship can be used for escorting, for example

How is it that smaller ships are faster if bigger ships hold more engines etc? Are they coded to automatically be faster?

basic physics really. greater mass takes more work to accelerate, and then more friction to decelerate. they turn slower, notice how ships must "align" to the their new "warp" driection before intiating travel.

if each little action takes longer. slower turning, slower acceleration, slower deceleration. big ship go slower.

how it work in the game, i'm not sure. but that how it would likely work if we had spaceships in space (yeah right).

In game the speed of your ship is directly related to its size, and how many engines and vectoring engines you have. So my little 115 point escort only needs four engines and two thrusters to get 9.8 m/s^2 of thrust, 20 degrees of turn per second, where my 200 point destroyer needs 11 engines and 6 thrusters for the same specs.

[PDiFolco]

Well, that's not real physics - rather, it's Earth physics ! In space with no gravity size doesn't slow anything, so we have an unrealistic game convention based on earthling experience [:D]

[Korvus77]

Well turn off the gravity plating so you won't have to worry about slowing down. I'm sure everyone will love prolonged zero G exposure. [:D]

I did note there is a point where adding engines just slows the ship down due to tonnage, at a guess.

[tuser]

It's an abstraction of sorts. In reality, there's only acceleration and the speed of light, not some arbitrary low speed limit. But that doesn't work in games, at least i've seen none past Elite try it. Anyway, acceleration depends on mass, so having a ship's speed go down with higher mass makes some sense.

[JonathanStrange]

A "picket ship" on sentry duty with long range scanning would work on a smaller ship? That is, it would fit?

[Fishman]

ORIGINAL: Tanaka
How is it that smaller ships are faster if bigger ships hold more engines etc? Are they coded to automatically be faster?

They aren't. If you're willing to put a ludicrous number of engines on a big ship, you can make it travel at decidedly unsafe speeds. A 1500-size behemoth capital shipwith 800 points of engines on it is going to go as fast as a 150-point escort with 80 points of engines on it. Of course, this means you went and stuck like a hundred engines on it.

[PDiFolco]

ORIGINAL: JonathanStrange

A "picket ship" on sentry duty with long range scanning would work on a smaller ship? That is, it would fit?

Yes it does, but due to the scanner size the ship will be >200 size minimum. Don't forget solar panels else the ship will always scream for fuel [:@]!

[Interesting]

In this game, bigger is better.

All you have to do to keep up with the speed, is maintain the same rate of components efficiency per size.

But most of the time we prefer more damage and shield, yeah, just add two more fuel components and boom, teleport to their Capital Colony with your slow juggernauts.

[richieelias]

Earth physics is real physics. Gravity is everywhere in space, otherwise galaxies would just fly apart. You're always being pulled toward something.

Thats besides the point though. A ships mass and the energy required to propel that mass doesnt have much to do with gravity (unless you're close to an object with a strong gravitational pull). Something with a high mass will always require more energy to accelerate than something with less mass. The abstraction here lies more with the speeds at which ships travel and accelerate. But hey, thats a good thing as I dont feel like waiting several months for something to travel between planets at a measly 1-2 G's of acceleration

I think its a safe assumption that "size" in this game is just a generic term for mass.

ORIGINAL: PDiFolco

Well, that's not real physics - rather, it's Earth physics ! In space with no gravity size doesn't slow anything, so we have an unrealistic game convention based on earthling experience [:D]