nop Explain why crew can survive in the vacuum without suits in Cosmoteer.
Cosmoteer Release Candidate 0.14.0_rc1
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SpaceCat Gravitation exists everywhere, but weight does not. Weight requires both an attractive and repulsive force. For example, passengers on an airplane in free fall experience "weightlessness" even though they're very near earth. The passengers are pulled down by gravity, but nothing pushes them up, so they don't feel weight.
This is using a specific definition of weight. "Weight" is not a precise term and has several disputed definitions among the scientific community
nop Probably something to do with time dialation 
ClassicJam Who says it's vacuum? Maybe that's why ships have "drag" - it's actually air. ***illuminati music***
SpaceCat Well, at least we had a fun debate.
Dalas120 Well, you never know with Cosmoteer logic.
SpaceCat Well I stick with the one I was taught.
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ClassicJam Yeah be happy with it! 
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Let's take the "definition of gravity" discussion to Off-Topic and leave this thread for 0.14.0 feedback, thanks!
Dalas120 How are you testing power usage? That power usage for the small thruster should not be that low. I'm curious if there's a bug.
When I originally made the 3 original thrusters, cost and size were really the only way I could create tradeoffs between the different thruster sizes, which is why larger thrusters are less cost-efficient but more space-efficient than smaller thrusters. But now we have the ramp-up time, which creates a much more interesting trade-off. I'm thinking that maybe, at the very least, thruster cost should be directly proportional to thrust, making the tradeoff between surface area and ramp-up time? (Or if that's not enough, making larger thrusters more cost efficient.)
Which begs the question: Are small thrusters too cheap, or are standard-and-larger thrusters too expensive?
Another tradeoff I can make is in power consumption, making larger thrusters more power-efficient than smaller thrusters. (Right now power usage is supposed to be directly proportional to thrust, though @Dalas120's testing seems to indicate there might be a problem with the small thruster in that regard.)
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Thrusters used to have a balance of:
- Surface area
- Cost
- Thrust
Where higher thrust:surface came at higher cost:thrust and thrust:power was 1:1.
Now ramp-up time is a fourth attribute. The existing balance of thrust:surface:cost still exists but ramp-up time just cripples the larger thrusters.
You're suggesting making a 1:1 relationship between thrust and cost, effectively factoring them out, such that the only balance is between surface:ramp-up. On paper that's fine, but currently ramp-up scaling is more exponential while surface scaling is more logarithmic.
And those aren't the only four attributes of thrusters. Thrusters also have an exclusion zone behind them, making larger thrusters harder to internalize and protect (especially when paired with engine rooms). Small thrusters have a "grid-ability" advantage that can not be ignored. This attribute can not be factored out -- it wouldn't make sense for all thrusters to have the same exclusion zone. Width is more valuable than height, but height is not free. You save so much height by stacking small thrusters that you can fit an extra row compared to larger thrusters.
Small thrusters still having lateral thrust gives them yet another attribute unaccounted. Normalizing lateral thrust for all thrusters factors that out.
A more complete list of attributes to balance, for reference:
- Cost
- Thrust
- Power
- Width
- Height/Exclusion
- Lateral
- Ramp-up
- Engine Room Potential
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I used this module to calculate small thruster power usage. There are 40 thrusters, and they can stay active forever on only 1 reactor. Since 1 reactor generates 1515 power, each thruster must consume approximately 38 power.
Walt Which begs the question: Are small thrusters too cheap, or are standard-and-larger thrusters too expensive?
Personally, I like seeing fast and maneuverable ships, so I think that standard+ thrusters are too expensive/too weak. Slow, long-range ships will be getting buffs with the addition of new missiles, railguns, and ion prisms, and fighters/swarmers will be nerfed by the tractor beam. Nerfing engines as well could make fast ships unuseable.
Walt Or if that's not enough, making larger thrusters more cost efficient.
I would be in favor of this. It's a realistic change, and would make sense from a balance perspective. IMO doing this by increasing thrust is better than decreasing cost.
I also agree with NOP that lateral thrust should be normalized, either by removing lateral thrust from small thrusters (my personal preference) or adding 10% lateral to all thrusters.
nop Small thrusters have a "grid-ability" advantage that can not be ignored. This attribute can not be factored out -- it wouldn't make sense for all thrusters to have the same exclusion zone. Width is more valuable than height, but height is not free.
I disagree with this. Small thrusters are a lot harder to supply power to because of how sprawling they get when building inward-facing thrust boxes. They are also less space-efficient than all other thrusters (even counting exclusions zones).
I'm not a fan of lateral thrust. I think it's weird and breaks the authenticity of the simulation. I'd love to get rid of it. BUT it does effectively serve as a sort of "training wheels" for new players who haven't figured out the thruster physics yet, and (probably more importantly) it covers for the ship A.I. which, without lateral thrust, has some issues where you'll tell a ship to fly somewhere nearby and it'll just sit there because it doesn't have thrust to get there without turning.
Anyway, I'm currently playing with buffing the larger thruster's force to match their cost so it's proportional to the small thruster, and reducing power usage:
Standard Thruster
Thrust: 200 -> 300
Power: 100 (unchanged)
Large Thruster
Thrust: 500 -> 800
Power: 250 -> 200
Huge Thruster
Thrust: 1000 -> 2000
Power: 500 -> 400
This of course makes ships in general considerably faster, which may or may not be a good thing, plus it does make up for the loss in speed due to loss of lateral thrust and ramp-up time.
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I think those numbers sound very interesting and definitely better than what's on RC right now, though they might make big thrusters too strong. If small thruster power is increased/fixed that will have an impact too. With these numbers, huge thrusters will be nearly twice as cost-efficient as small thrusters (if engine rooms are allowed). The spin-up time might not be enough to make up for that. But I'm not sure, and I don't think anybody will be able to know for sure without lots of testing.
If lateral thrust is staying, can it be applied evenly to all thrusters?
Dalas120 If lateral thrust is staying, can it be applied evenly to all thrusters?
I forgot to mention that the reason I removed lateral thrust from the larger thrusters is that it really doesn't work well with the ramp up times. Ships start moving in weird ways. I'm not exactly sure why yet, but I removed it to fix that problem.
Anyway, I just removed lateral thrust from small thrusters, so let's see how well that works. If it causes issues with the A.I., then the real solution is to fix the A.I.
Dalas120 I also agree with NOP that lateral thrust should be normalized, either by removing lateral thrust from small thrusters (my personal preference) or adding 10% lateral to all thrusters.
I also agree but would prefer all thrusters 10% rather then no lateral-thrust at all.
Thrust: 1000 -> 2000
Power: 500 -> 400This of course makes ships in general considerably faster, which may or may not be a good thing
If we got faster ships we will need a bigger area to maneuver in Multiplayer.
Mp is alread going from free infinite space to fight the ring of death. (including the ROD wining the official tourneys last round.) This might all change with having other game modes where fast & long -distance travel actually matters.
I liked your idea of significanly speeding up (shorten) the ramp-up-time of thrusters & intruduce a ramp-up for all thrusters more then making them hyperfast (dont get me wrong i'm a fan of ludicrous speed. )
Powerslides in space, here we come. I'll probably replace all my large thrusters with standard and huge. When you're always moving forward, huge thrusters are pretty good at staying ramped-up through turns given enough leverage. The ramp-up is most relevant when accelerating from a standstill or changing flight direction.