67 replies to this topic

[Timelordwho]

Davers, on 06 December 2012 - 04:12 PM, said:

How did you get 700 rounds of ammo into the 2 slots in your leg?

AMS ammo.

[FallenFactol]

Looks like others have explained it pretty well. It's mainly a balance thing, since ammo explosions are a big part of Battletech and there is some reasoning behind it with the capacitors.

[TungstenWall]

My understanding is:

Gauss rifles work by collecting a massive amount of kinetic energy, and then releasing it into a tungsten slug with forward momentum.
Some gauss rifles work by making large, powerful magnets slam against one another, theoretically doubling in speed and going up in weight each magnet the gets hit.


Because the magnates are so powerful, the gun itself is very unstable, almost like a Rail/Coil gun at the moment of firing. Anything that might weaken the structure could cause the magnets to prematurly collide, resulting in permanently jamming the gun. After such a jam, it is very possible for a domino effect to take place, causing all the magnates to prematurely collide and cave in on themselves.
Though the Gauss Gun would not explode, the implosion could definitely rip out electrical wiring, or implode some of the immediate structure around with it.

I would imagine the powerful engines that reset the magnates could also explode.

[CPT Hazel Murphy]

Troggy, on 06 December 2012 - 03:58 PM, said:

The best caps would likely be based on superconducting coils (ideally RT superconductors...).

Regardless of type, even current prototype rail guns (gauss rifles) that they are testing (for real) on navel vessels have muzzle energies of >32 megajoules per shot. The capacitor energy has to be higher (this is is where heat generation comes from), which means on the order of about 50 megajoules. TNT holds about 7.5 MJ of energy per kilogram. So, let's say 5-10 Kg of TNT per capacitor charge. You would likely have two (to improve fire rate), one of which is always charged. If it gets wrecked, the energy has to go somewhere.

Here is a video of 5 Kg TNT. It's probably not good for your equipment.



The end of the video even has the modern version of CASE!

--
Troggy

There isn't a single ship in the navy with a gauss rifle on it.

Edited by CPT Hazel Murphy, 06 December 2012 - 08:41 PM.

[Xenophontis]

There's you some real life Rail Gun prototype. Too big and too much power required to fit it onto anything currently.

Edited by Xenophontis, 06 December 2012 - 08:51 PM.

[Bishop Steiner]

Doommetal, on 06 December 2012 - 03:33 PM, said:

UTROLLBRO?

NOIACTUALLYCONTRIBUTEUSEFULTHOUGHTSBRO!WHATYOUREXCUSE!?!?!?

shadowrwolf, on 06 December 2012 - 03:40 PM, said:

transformers are not caps.

small caps might explode when excessive current is applied, but bigger ones just make a lot of smoke and flames , caps are made from different materials for small to big and whos to say current teck will be the same as the future, there could be something more efficient than a cap bank to drive the coils.

As was explained in the video.. that was not the transformer failing, but the capacitor bank. The pretty bang at the end was the transformer, but all the schtuff going haywire before was from the Capacitor overload. If you think having that much raw electricity arcing around the insides of your mech ain't gonna jack up stuff......

Edited by Bishop Steiner, 06 December 2012 - 09:31 PM.

[Kousagi]

CPT Hazel Murphy, on 06 December 2012 - 08:35 PM, said:

There isn't a single ship in the navy with a gauss rifle on it.

Your right, theres No Gauss rifle on a ship, but there is a rail gun on a destroyer. Both styles of gun run off the same basic idea, but different applications of it.

[Quazil]

Gauss rifles explode when firing due to bugs in the firmware running them or due to a break-down in the insulation of the magnetic-field-inducing coils of copper wire... e.g. from damage.
The smallest nick in the insulation would result in an aurora-borealis + lightning explosion.

As the voltage increases it starts to tear the molecules of the air apart, ripping the electrons off and streaming ions along the magnetic-field-lines. Eventually this hits a critical-point, the air starts to glow like a purple neon sign and a few microseconds later all the current running through the coils decides to run through the air and short-circuit. That rapid of a discharge might cause the capacitors to explode and it will cause the copper-wire to plasma and sputter it all over the rest of the components.

I do not believe lasers use [large] inductors, just [large] capacitors, which can be better armored/protected.

- Advanced propulsion engineer.

Edited by Quazil, 06 December 2012 - 11:59 PM.

[HlynkaCG]

CPT Hazel Murphy, on 06 December 2012 - 08:35 PM, said:

There isn't a single ship in the navy with a gauss rifle on it.

He's refering to this...

[Voidsinger]

Somebody once worked out in the GURPS tabletop, that the batteries of high tech didn't work, because they exceeded chemical binding energies on discharge.

We know a Gauss rifle throws a 100kg projectile at 1800 metres per second.

K=1/2MV^2

So Gauss Muzzle energy is 162 Megajoules. That's at 100% efficiency.

Anybody going to guess at whether a capacitor system that could release that in such a short time is going to be explosive?

Especially given the Gauss Rifle at 15 tons includes loader, connections, barrel and targeting gear.

Interestingly, if the Gauss Rifle charges over 4 seconds, we are talking about sucking 40MW from the reactor for each Gauss Rifle.

A 100 ton battlemech moving at 48.6 kph has a Kinetic energy of just 9.1Megajoules.

Kind of makes you think doesn't it?

Edited by Voidsinger, 07 December 2012 - 12:59 AM.

[Steel Claws]

All this has done is remove a weapon from the game. Few people use them anymore. There was nothing wrong with them before. They were already too fragile but now there is no reason to take one. It was the heaviest weapon in the game. But the nerf herders cried so the weapon must be trashed.

[Terror Teddy]

CPT Hazel Murphy, on 06 December 2012 - 02:55 PM, said:

This may be explained in the lore, but are gauss rifles different in battletech than in real life? what exactly causes them to explode?

The capacitors.

The gun is essentially a huge electromagnet with big *** energy batteries that charge up between shots and store the energy until released.

When the gun is used the energy is discharged to propel the metal slug. A hit on the weapon have a high chance to damage the capacitors and having them discharge their energy throughout the weapon itself and most likely causing damaging feedback all over the place.

Steel Claws, on 07 December 2012 - 01:09 AM, said:

All this has done is remove a weapon from the game. Few people use them anymore. There was nothing wrong with them before. They were already too fragile but now there is no reason to take one. It was the heaviest weapon in the game. But the nerf herders cried so the weapon must be trashed.

I think it was the wrong move.

a 0,5 second firing delay between pressing the fire button and the shot would have given it the disadvantage in close combat it needed but kept it good at range without doing any direct 'harm' to the weapon.

[GODzillaGSPB]

CPT Hazel Murphy, on 06 December 2012 - 02:55 PM, said:

This may be explained in the lore

It's still BattleTech, isn't it? Of course they change it here and there, but the gauss exploding makes sense, to balance it's advantages, which are plenty.

[Squid von Torgar]

Quote

All this has done is remove a weapon from the game. Few people use them anymore. There was nothing wrong with them before. They were already too fragile but now there is no reason to take one. It was the heaviest weapon in the game. But the nerf herders cried so the weapon must be trashed.

Wrong

The Guass Rifle was always meant to explode in MWO. The devs found a bug preventing it from happening and fixed it. The only recent change was to lower the health of the GR and increase the likelyhood of it exploding..

Anyone who thinks the GR wasn't OP prior to this needs their head tested. It delivers 15 damage, for almost no heat, has a fast projectile speed, No minimum range (Which in TT it did have) and can still do damage out to 1980 meters. Prior to this patch the only limiting factor was ammo, but as you save huge amounts of weight not fitting HS that really has never been an issue.

Now you have to weigh up the risk of taking one verses the chance it will explode. Even so its not a hard decision given the above performance.

Edited by Squid von Torgar, 07 December 2012 - 01:48 AM.

[Steel Claws]

Squid von Torgar, on 07 December 2012 - 01:47 AM, said:

Wrong

The Guass Rifle was always meant to explode in MWO. The devs found a bug preventing it from happening and fixed it. The only recent change was to lower the health of the GR and increase the likelyhood of it exploding..

Anyone who thinks the GR wasn't OP prior to this needs their head tested. It delivers 15 damage, for almost no heat, has a fast projectile speed, No minimum range (Which in TT it did have) and can still do damage out to 1980 meters. Prior to this patch the only limiting factor was ammo, but as you save huge amounts of weight not fitting HS that really has never been an issue.

Now you have to weigh up the risk of taking one verses the chance it will explode. Even so its not a hard decision given the above performance.

Pfff. AC 20s weigh a ton less and do 5 more damage - guess it must be OP. Can you SEE a mech a 1920 meters? Engagement ranges are usually far less, usually less than 600 meters. It was already the easiest weapon to damage in the game and then they reduced it's health again to almost nothing. This seems fair to you? Why don't missile packs explode. Why don't auto cannons explode. After all they all have ammo in them. When was the last time you saw ammo explode like it used to. Answer me these. The gauss is a top tier weapon. It is SUPPOSED to be powerful - even by your bloody ever important cannon. If they wanted to give it heat - fine. All that electricity and current would create heat. If they made them explode alone that might be OK, but this is over the top. All because people were complaining about guass cats. Oh lets nerf the weapon instead of the cat. Bunch of nerf herders.

Edited by Steel Claws, 07 December 2012 - 02:18 AM.

[Terror Teddy]

Steel Claws, on 07 December 2012 - 02:17 AM, said:

Why don't auto cannons explode. After all they all have ammo in them. When was the last time you saw ammo explode like it used to.

Eerh...they have ammo explosions depending on where it is stored and get damaged.

The gauss cannot get ammo explosions at all since their ammo is solid slugs of metal so they CANNOT get damaged in locations where they store ammo for the Gauss.

You also have no NEED to use CASE for the Gauss ammo either, saving up 0,5 tonnes for the locations you have the ammo in.

Edited by Terror Teddy, 07 December 2012 - 02:23 AM.

[Steel Claws]

Terror Teddy, on 07 December 2012 - 02:22 AM, said:

Eerh...they have ammo explosions depending on where it is stored and get damaged.

The gauss cannot get ammo explosions at all since their ammo is solid slugs of metal so they CANNOT get damaged in locations where they store ammo for the Gauss.

You also have no NEED to use CASE for the Gauss ammo either, saving up 0,5 tonnes for the locations you have the ammo in.

The ammo explodes yes but not the rounds that are in the weapon. An AC 20 round cooking off in your breach should cause more than 20 points of damage (warhead plus powder). A damaged AC that fires should also suffer catastophic failure and explode. When was the last time you ever saw an A1 ear explode because of the muissiles in the launchers (and you can't put case there).

My main point is that there were so many other ways they could have dealt with this (increased recycle time for instance because capacitors need to recharge) but instead they have made it to where no one will pack one - unless it's maybe in an arm mount.

I might also point out that AC 10s, AC 5s and UAC 5s already deal more or equal damage over time than a gauss, weigh several tons less and have more ammo. Heat is neglegible.

Edited by Steel Claws, 07 December 2012 - 02:47 AM.

[Mack1]

CPT Hazel Murphy, on 06 December 2012 - 02:55 PM, said:

This may be explained in the lore, but are gauss rifles different in battletech than in real life? what exactly causes them to explode?

You must be new to community gaming. The answer is forum tears, you see people suck at games, get killed by Gauss sniper, cry rivers on forums, devs then nerf the said weapon and there you go.

[Squid von Torgar]

Quote

Pfff. AC 20s weigh a ton less and do 5 more damage - guess it must be OP.

Actually myself and the devs agree its UP. Note the AC20 has 270 meters range. It also is easy to crit out and its ammo explodes (which even if its just a ton of ammo is enough to kill you outright (7 x 20 =140 damage vs the GR 20)

Quote

Engagement ranges are usually far less, usually less than 600 meters.

Yes, but if you are taking the sniper gun par excellence of the game, it makes sense to use that range advantage? Oh right I see you want to brawl with it. Ok that can be done too, but its not its optimum usage. (**PROTIP** dont just charge mindlessly at the first enemy you see).

Quote

Why don't missile packs explode. Why don't auto cannons explode. After all they all have ammo in them

I am not sure what game you have been playing but Missile, AC, AMS and MG ammo all explodes if hit (Again doing damage = to the amount of rounds left to that location).

Quote

It is SUPPOSED to be powerful

Check its stats again, only a moron would say its not powerful, and also note in Cannon it has a minimum range. But dont worry in MWO they ommited this so you can still derp about with it at point blank range.

Quote

If they made them explode alone that might be OK

Are you on Drugs or have you forgotten to take your medication, thats what it does, it blows up if critted (90% chance)

Quote

All because people were complaining about guass cats

Out of all the mech varients availible the K2 is still by far the best one to mount Gauss. Its side torsos are hard to hit, so the GR is well protected.

Quote

lets nerf the weapon instead of the cat

I think that the K2 should have its ballistic HPs moved to its CT (In case you are wondering that would mean the biggest ballistic weapon it could take would be an MG or AC2).

However something tells me you wouldnt like that either?

[JPsi]

Doommetal, on 06 December 2012 - 03:28 PM, said:

All energy weapons should explode then, period, a guess rifle is an energy weapon, that happens to use ammo, I think the rate of explosions is waaaay overboard.

So instead of doing the right thing, we should make all weapons explode and then we can try to kill each other by ramming and doing leg damage.

Then we can create an all powerful EDM module that can only be mounted by light mechs and atlas, which allows you to drop kick other mechs in the kneecaps. (it also renders them completly invisible, I mean why not!)

It will cost very little and nullify the 15 million creds you spent on upgrades and modules , on top of the exp to mount them.

And for the last time, CASE can only go in the torso, this will not help arm mounted Gauss from taking out the side torso also , and in the case of an XL, the entire mech.

Just to clarify, using capacitor explosions as a reason to justify an energy weapon explosion would be rather illogical. While I can't account for every laser type in existence, the vast majority of lasers don't require large capacitor banks. So in short, A laser won't have any significant capacitors in it to explode.

I can explain in more detail if required, but would prefer not to. Read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser first.
As for balance well, its not like large lasers are OP and need a nerf.

Edited by JPsi, 07 December 2012 - 03:08 AM.