Dave Forsey, on 19 November 2015 - 08:51 AM, said:
Ok... so you all want something more difficult?
I'll give it a whirl. There's still a few parameters to tweak.
BTW: The waves are awesome. Good work, gives the whole academy another level and this is a next step towards AI. Great to see progress on this matter again
Keep up the good work o7
Target acquisition and information gathering is really really slow in onslaught mode. Is this voluntary? It nearly makes targeting to exploit weaknesses of hurt incoming 'mechs useless.
The only complaint I have is that the "smoothness" and linearity of motion counterintuitively makes it more difficult for me to hit. I'm expecting to compensate for evasive maneuvers and such...never had anyone charge me down in a straight line, lol.
If you guys ever get some decent AI in the game, a wave survival mode similar to COD's N4ZI (seriously profanity filter?) Zombies would be incredibly fun as a co-op mini-game. I know a lot of players have been asking for PVE content and I think a lot of players would enjoy something like this.
edit: I have to say I'm incredibly pleased with how well the tutorial / training stuff has been going. NPE is definitely on the right track, even if other parts of the game aren't. Great work!
I could have them veer left and right as they go.... which will result in some keystone cop moments as they crash into each other and other knock-on effects. Torso turning to distribute damage would be faster/easier to implement and would give an added twist (ahem) to the difficulty setting.
Fiona - the ECM settings should be the same as live (at least I'm not changing anything). If you've got any specific details I can have the folks look into it.
'Tis just another dynamic that I would love to see added onto the game, no doubt I wouldn't want them to be a nuclear blast, 2km suddenly obliterated because some light mech got brave (or incredibly stupid), but something a little bigger than an artillery strike, if not the same size, would be a lovely effect to perhaps deter players who like to give hugs from staying close by, or some other tactical use, or just to look cool, heck, make it an achievement to get one kill from the explosion. I shot Cpt. Adams, do something similar to that.
I agree. The area of effect in that example, including the hex the mech was standing on, was 150 meters for its boom. Damages ranged in 1s to 10s on things affected. Mind you an Atlas has 306 armor rather than 612 stock, so in MWO as a 1:1 it'd be 2s to 20s.
Doing kills that don't involve puncturing the engine would be the away to avoid even the possibility, and the chance of it happening by means other than ammo explosion might be some odd 15%? Makes it fun.
Correct, Dave. Tech Manual gives this explanation.
Quote
Fusion engine explosions: an urban legend that won’t die. Let’s see if I can kill it on this planet, at least. Where to start?
All right. First of all, when I said earlier that the magnetic fields of a fusion engine keep the plasma from melting the
engine, I was already anticipating this question. In fact, the issue is actually kind of the opposite and counter-intuitive,
so I didn’t bring it up. The magnetic fields do provide some protection to the reactor walls from the plasma, but primarily
they protect the plasma from the cold, cold walls of the reactor chamber.
The fusion reactions in a BattleMech’s fusion engine occur only under very narrow conditions of temperature and pres-
sure. Generally, the hotter and higher the pressure, the faster the reactions, and below a certain minimum, fusion simply ceases. If you remember your ideal gas laws from chemistry...eh...the condensed version is that when you heat up a gas, it wants to expand. If it can’t expand, its pressure increases. When a gas expands, its temperature drops. Remember those rules of thumb and if you have trouble remembering them, hit the ‘net when this lecture is over.
When a BattleMech’s fusion reactions spike a bit, the plasma gets hotter. More fusion reactions mean more heat means hot-
ter plasma. But the magnetic confinement fields are not rigid. In fact, an ancient fusion engineering description that dates to
the twentieth century says that, “Trying to hold onto plasma with magnetic fields is like trying to contain a roll of jelly with rub-
ber bands.” When the plasma gets hotter, it pushes against the magnetic fields because its pressure is rising, and the magnetic fields give a bit. The expansion cools the plasma, and the reactions drop. There’s some elbow room in the reactor chamber for just this purpose.
Now, I said the fusion reactions drop when they get cooler. There are ways for the plasma to cool other than expansion.
One way is when the plasma touches the relatively frigid walls of the reaction chamber. If they do, the plasma will chill so rapidly that fusion ceases instantly. That only leaves you with a puff of hot gas, with no continuing source to damage the reactor walls. When confinement fails so badly that the plasma hits the walls, The walls are usually only scuffed. Surprising, isn’t it? But remember, all the heat energy comes from the fusion reactions. It’s not stored as latent heat in the plasma. In fact, there’s so little plasma mass to store heat that the “dead” plasma is barely able to warm up a multi-ton reactor—even if the cooling system completely fails. You might scorch your hand if you touched the outer casing, but it’s not enough to melt
the shielding or damage critical components. And, no, you can’t just keep powering the fusion reaction while it gnaws through the reactor walls. Evaporating the lining of the reactor will mix kilograms of cold, heavy, non-fusible elements into the plasma, which is much lighter. The effect would be like dumping a ton of wet sand on a welding torch. So, the short version of all that is that when a fusion reactor gets out of hand, it usually shuts itself down and is unable to do more than warm up the reactor a bit.
And you protest, “But I saw a ’Mech explode on the news in a blinding flash of light! It had to be a nuke!” Or is it, “Well, what
about that MechWarrior that buried a bunch of Clanners in a canyon with his exploding reactor?” Or would you ask, “Well, what about Tharkad City?” Okay... Fusion reactors do occasionally die in spectacular manners. But most of the time, the fireworks are not actually from an exploding reactor. What typically happens is that some heavy weapon manages to puncture the reactor itself. Since the reactor interior is a vacuum, air would get sucked in and mix with the plasma, stopping the fusion reaction. Kilograms of cold air mixing with a tiny mass of plasma...well, that’s the wet-sand-and-torch analogy again. And, no, there’s not enough hydrogen in the reactor to really explode with the oxygen.
The explanation however was produced by the same company that...thought this was a feasible weapon design.
Other versions mention that in the event of an engine containment failure (a critical in which "safety systems fail"), either the containment unit could be punctured venting plasma for a fun light show or alternatively the fuel rods (of Hydrogen) could be punctured during incoming fire, creating a hydrogen explosion. Described as 'definitely less-than-nuclear' with very limited fuel. A noteworthy description includes a brilliant bluish-white effect. Though Hydrogen is usually clear burning and in the case of balloons reddish.
Elsewhere, in terms of describing the slim chance of a fusion-based reactor explosion of a full scale Fusion Reactor building and the likely results, I found this from a scientist who apparently has too much time on his hands.
Quote
A fusion reactor contains only about a second's worth of fuel at any time, in contrast to a fission reactor which contains about ten year's worth (and even then the fuel is only partly consumed). So the total amount of energy that can be released is only a second's worth of the output of the power station. This is probably of the same order as the energy held in the heat exchangers, steam pipes, and spinning turbines of the generating system, the worst credible accident is of the same order as the worst credible accident in a fossil fuel powered generating system of the same power.
Furthermore, since fusion stops as soon as the containment vessel or its magnetic coils are disrupted, it is unlikely that all of that energy would be released. And the "unburned" fuel reverts to ordinary hydrogen - effectively harmless in this case.
Of course, the explosion would almost certainly blast the reactor vessel to pieces, and the reactor walls are probably pretty radioactive. So the power station site might have some pretty noxious radioactive debris thrown around. This would be pretty bad for the staff on duty - as would be a worst-case explosion in a conventional power station. But most of the isotopes involved are likely to be pretty short lives, so radiation levels would die down over a few years and the site would probably be safe with a small amount of radiation cleanup within a decade or so.
So it would be no more dangerous, and probably considerably less dangerous, than any large industrial manufacturing plant, such as a chemical plant or refinery.
Thus according to the above it would be something like this...
or between these...
to a less significant version of this (nothing bigger than the first boom and probably not even that big)
for a full 21st century Fusion reactor explosion.
Containment failure on its own is basically a statement that the mech is dead in the water, it can't function anymore even if it's just been the first engine crit. (Why no engine crits in MWO? It'd really do wonders in the IS/Clan XL engine issue.) An extreme case is either an impact on the hydrogen fuel rods or some sort of poorly explained feedback into said rods.
The damage caused in a Battletech stackpole explosion is stated to be mostly caused by the mech's parts being launched into the air and colliding into things. Engine safety failure which are compiled with ammo explosions and ammo explosions themselves are quite a bit more devastating as area-of-effect.
(In game ammo explosions could really use a nice effect. And in general the ammo explosions are almost impossible to get with player-driven excessive crit padding; internal component destruction and meaning behind it would also be awesome to see more of.)
Mkay, that's my rant for now.
(Side note: I found this, which looks a lot like how I would imagine vented plasma might look like. Also lots of electrical explosions, the likes of which clearly inspired descriptions of failing BT engines in the novels).
Ammo explosions being dangerous to mechs near it with random projectiles and missiles taking off would be fun. Don't thing Fusion engines explode very big though, if they do it's probably just a heat\pressure thing.
Evilwallofdeath, on 10 December 2015 - 05:27 PM, said:
Ammo explosions being dangerous to mechs near it with random projectiles and missiles taking off would be fun. Don't thing Fusion engines explode very big though, if they do it's probably just a heat\pressure thing.
Well in the trailer released on steam, something exploded rather violently... devs? what are you doing?
Correct, Dave. Tech Manual gives this explanation.
Containment failure on its own is basically a statement that the mech is dead in the water, it can't function anymore even if it's just been the first engine crit. (Why no engine crits in MWO? It'd really do wonders in the IS/Clan XL engine issue.) An extreme case is either an impact on the hydrogen fuel rods or some sort of poorly explained feedback into said rods.
The damage caused in a Battletech stackpole explosion is stated to be mostly caused by the mech's parts being launched into the air and colliding into things. Engine safety failure which are compiled with ammo explosions and ammo explosions themselves are quite a bit more devastating as area-of-effect.
(In game ammo explosions could really use a nice effect. And in general the ammo explosions are almost impossible to get with player-driven excessive crit padding; internal component destruction and meaning behind it would also be awesome to see more of.)
Mkay, that's my rant for now.
(Side note: I found this, which looks a lot like how I would imagine vented plasma might look like. Also lots of electrical explosions, the likes of which clearly inspired descriptions of failing BT engines in the novels).
A fusion reactor's containment failing catastrophically could indeed release a lot of energy in a very short amount of time (a.k.a. a 'splosion), although as folks have noted that the fusion reaction itself would not likely be the source. Instead, it would be the almost instantaneous release of all the energy contained in the magnetic fields of the containment vessel that would cause the most damage. Multi-Tesla strength magnetic fields collapsing abruptly is also how you could describe the process by which a stellar flare occurs, so yeah plenty of energy to fuel an explosion without invoking the Nuclear Option
Don't forget secondary effects from that and other means - there'll be plenty of x-rays emitted via bremsstrahlung, for instance. Depending on the magnetic field lines' configuration prior to collapse, it would also be possible for streams (more like jets) of plasma that gain some collimation and are "fired" perpendicular to a field line (which can now escape from the shattered reactor vessel). It's a poor man's PPC by any other name
It's more likely to have a catastrophic release of energy from the ultra-capacitors. A more realistic set-up would require a device to store the relatively small flow of energy from the reactor (does lore say these are direct conversion units or is there a steam turbine involved! :-) ) and deliver it to the weapons in fractions of a second. Short these out and you release megajoules of energy instantly - providing that spectacular explosion folk crave. (And, dare I say it, anyone who has tried to put more current through a cable (or out of a capacitor) than it's rated for should have no problem with the concept of extra heat)
Why? We are super friendly and have great ideas. Have you looked into fixing the core mechanics of the heat system recently? Please.
But yeah, there are a lot of ways for something as complicated and energetic as a 'Mech to fail spectacularly enough that the results could be called explosive. Ammo explosions are probably the only thing that could potentially damage a nearby 'Mech, but imagine what happens when a gyro tasked with keeping 100 tons of ambulatory metal upright suddenly has to compensate for a missing 20 tons of limb. Now imagine that over-speed gyro taking an ac/2 round. Picking bits of gyro out of a 'Mech's cockpit after something like that has to be a fun job.
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Dave Forsey, on 19 November 2015 - 08:51 AM, said:
