314 replies to this topic

[Dredrik Salkon Kerensky]

Because they are combat hardened, reactors will almost NEVER explode like they do in almost every other mech game.

Now ammo on the other hand, when 5 tons of MG ammo explodes, it would blow apart your entire mech and more (by rules of the Table Top Game).

So reactor going critical and damaging nearby mechs? NO
Ammo explosions damaging nearby mechs? HELL YES

[Graham Wallace]

I believe we all agree that we don't want 'Mechs to be walking nuclear grenades. What we do need is some more spectacular ammunition explosion graphics. If I nail a Catapult juuust right, I want to be rewarded with a hundred little flashbulbs of light, fire, and a great big gout of smoke. I also think it should knock the poor victim over. In fact, we could use more knockdown physics on autocannons and gauss rifles.

[Thorgar Wulfson]

however in the earliest of lore it was possible to have a mech's reactor detonate. it was considered very rare but did happen. whether they checked their science or just wanted more -boom- for their fictional buck, who knows.? It is in cannon that reactors can be detonated, but the were very short ranged but high damage effects. I believe the best description was the reactor going critical and consuming its self, the mech and the surrounding environment. even in teh optional rules it took a extra crit hits against an engine on the same turn as the last engine crit box was filled to cause it. even then it was a roll to see if it happened. and 4 to 6 hexes of damage was the max range.

[JarheadEd]

Fusion reactors going nova? No.

Maybe once in great while, like a 1 in 10,000 chance of a perfect "Stackpole Roll" when hit with the golden BB down the reactor vent.

Ammo explosions should be there,....like this test footage of ammo cooking off in a centurion.

[The Boneshaman]

It has also been said in the Total Warfare rule book that they do not explode, but they have rulers for people that want a real big explosion

Edited by The Boneshaman, 22 June 2012 - 08:16 PM.

[Voss Korgan]

They should explode and cause damage consistent with TT rules. Don't really care what that explosion looks like so long as it is cool.

[shadows96]

Well talking realistically it would be near impossible for even a nuclear reactor to result in a explosion, but in the end I was just talking about in game when you know there is no logic

Edited by shadows96, 22 June 2012 - 08:25 PM.

[Vyviel]

http://www.sarna.net...i/Fusion_Engine

Fusion engines usually will only shut down if damaged, and they are absolutely no risk of being a fusion bomb. ^[2] There have been a number of cases of fusion engines being "over revved" and exploding with devestating force, but this is more akin to a boiler explosion than a true nuclear explosion. More often a destroyed engine will be punctured by weapons fire. Because the plasma is held in a vacuum chamber (to isolate the superheated plasma from the cold walls of the reactor; contact with the walls would super-chill the plasma below fusion temperatures), a punctured reactor can suck in air where the air is superheated. Normal thermal expansion of the air causes the air to burst out in a brilliant lightshow often mistaken for a "nuclear explosion". The Thermal Expansion damages anything within 90 meters of the destroyed 'Mech.
Such dramatic failures are rare, though. It is difficult to sustain the fusion reaction and very easy to shutdown. Safety systems or damage to containment coils will almost always shut down the engine before such an explosion occurs. The massive shielding of the engine (in the case of standard fusion engines, this is a tungsten carbide shell that accounts for over 2/3 of the weight of the engine) usually buys the safety systems the milliseconds needed to shutdown the engine when severe damaged is inflicted.

http://www.sarna.net...h_Self_Destruct

Edited by Vyviel, 22 June 2012 - 08:28 PM.

[sgt coloncrunch]

http://www.sarna.net...i/Fusion_Engine


Fusion engines usually will only shut down if damaged, and they are absolutely no risk of being a fusion bomb. ^[2] There have been a number of cases of fusion engines being "over revved" and exploding with devestating force, but this is more akin to a boiler explosion than a true nuclear explosion. More often a destroyed engine will be punctured by weapons fire. Because the plasma is held in a vacuum chamber (to isolate the superheated plasma from the cold walls of the reactor; contact with the walls would super-chill the plasma below fusion temperatures), a punctured reactor can suck in air where the air is superheated. Normal thermal expansion of the air causes the air to burst out in a brilliant lightshow often mistaken for a "nuclear explosion". The Thermal Expansion damages anything within 90 meters of the destroyed 'Mech.

IMO I think there should be some form of catastrophic failure factor in a mechs destruction that runs the risk of damaging other nearby mechs.

It just makes sense to me, I don't believe any war machine of any type could suffer a critical failure, and not on a given chance have some sort of secondary effect that damages surrouding objects.

[FLAKPANZER]

I would really like it if there was a random chance the reactor would go critical when it received a hit, or the mech was destroyed.
I think this is one of the coolest features of Mechwarrior Living Legends.

[Slepnir]

No....

mech reactors even when you over-ride shutdown have failsafes in them that prevent them from going nuclear.....ammo explosions however are an entirely different animal(and much more devestating in some cases than a reactor meltdown).

[Chunkymonkey]

Sarna:


Fusion engines usually will only shut down if damaged, and they are absolutely no risk of being a fusion bomb. There have been a number of cases of fusion engines being "over revved" and exploding with devestating force, but this is more akin to a boiler explosion than a true nuclear explosion. More often a destroyed engine will be punctured by weapons fire. Because the plasma is held in a vacuum chamber (to isolate the superheated plasma from the cold walls of the reactor; contact with the walls would super-chill the plasma below fusion temperatures), a punctured reactor can suck in air where the air is superheated. Normal thermal expansion of the air causes the air to burst out in a brilliant lightshow often mistaken for a "nuclear explosion". The Thermal Expansion damages anything within 90 meters of the destroyed 'Mech.
Such dramatic failures are rare, though. It is difficult to sustain the fusion reaction and very easy to shutdown. Safety systems or damage to containment coils will almost always shut down the engine before such an explosion occurs. The massive shielding of the engine (in the case of standard fusion engines, this is a tungsten carbide shell that accounts for over 2/3 of the weight of the engine) usually buys the safety systems the milliseconds needed to shutdown the engine when severe damaged is inflicted


Done.

Edited by Chunkymonkey, 22 June 2012 - 08:29 PM.

[CaveMan]

trycksh0t, on 22 June 2012 - 08:04 PM, said:

(I'm using cold-fusion because, I suspect, 'Mechs wouldn't be able to handle the roughly 8 million kelvin necessary for hot-fusion of hydrogen.)

In fact you'd be wrong. 'Mech reactors don't just use hot-fusion, they use hot fusion of light hydrogen, not deuterium. You've literally got a miniature star burning in there. As soon as the containment vessel is damaged, the incredibly delicate conditions needed to make that happen instantly disappear and you no longer have fusion. 'Mech reactors cannot explode. They just fizzle out like a candle that's been stomped on.

The "vacuum chamber implosion" thing is a really egregiously bad piece of technobabble too. To make a fusion reactor work the way they're supposed to work in BT, you need enormous internal pressures. That's the complete opposite of a vacuum chamber. Not to mention, the whole "vacuum to hold the plasma away from the walls" thing is bunk. Vacuum doesn't work that way.

Edited by CaveMan, 22 June 2012 - 08:35 PM.

[shadows96]

plus part of me wants to be in a Atlas as it's overheating and pulling the manual override saying "It must be done." and soon after a massive explosion. lol

[shadows96]

but you people crush a persons hopes and dreams (tear, tear) lol

[Duke Grimm]

It's funny to me that everyone is speaking as if we've ever tried to detonate a fusion reactor. How do we really know how one will react (if there were any viable reactor types at all?)? Fusion energy is the combining of 2 atoms and harnessing the energy released from that reaction. It is assumed that the sun is a constant fusion reaction, and from here, to me it kinda looks like someone cored THAT mech and it is still burning...

So I am supposed to believe that if I were to interrupt a nuclear reaction by, say, placing a spent uranium shell into the middle of it I wouldn't be releasing said copious amounts of energy into the wild? It simply would fizzle out like a big fart? I find that hard to believe.

[shadows96]

but in the end the science does not support such a thing happening ^%!& you science.

F.Y.I. I'm very interested in science mainly quantum mechanics

so science please forgive me yelling at you

[Duke Grimm]

shadows96, on 22 June 2012 - 08:42 PM, said:

but in the end the science does not support such a thing happening ^%!& you science.

F.Y.I. I'm very interested in science mainly quantum mechanics

so science please forgive me yelling at you

Science won't stay mad at you as long as you keep doing experiments... For Science!! I want my 100 ton cake now thanks.

[Zakatak]

FactorlanP, on 22 June 2012 - 06:13 PM, said:

Fusion reactors don't go out of control like fission reactors, quite the opposite. The process is delicate and finely tuned. Messing with that balance should cause the reaction to stop, not go out of control.

Although if you pierce the walls of a fusion reactor, plasma heated to over 10 million degrees WILL cause a very strong boiler explosion. A mech can generate between 1-5 gigawatts of power, so if you punched a hole through it, it would be the energy equivelant of a Mk84 bomb.

[FactorlanP]

CaveMan, on 22 June 2012 - 08:28 PM, said:

In fact you'd be wrong. 'Mech reactors don't just use hot-fusion, they use hot fusion of light hydrogen, not deuterium. You've literally got a miniature star burning in there. As soon as the containment vessel is damaged, the incredibly delicate conditions needed to make that happen instantly disappear and you no longer have fusion. 'Mech reactors cannot explode. They just fizzle out like a candle that's been stomped on.

The "vacuum chamber implosion" thing is a really egregiously bad piece of technobabble too. To make a fusion reactor work the way they're supposed to work in BT, you need enormous internal pressures. That's the complete opposite of a vacuum chamber. Not to mention, the whole "vacuum to hold the plasma away from the walls" thing is bunk. Vacuum doesn't work that way.

^Precisely