Thermal Mechanics: Reentry, Detection, Heat Management
Thermal mechanics are an important consideration for real-world aerospace applications.
Grids could build up a thermal rating (in other words, heat) based on mass, drag, their power generation and usage, and how they are managing heat. A ship which is moving very quickly in-atmosphere (ie: during reentry) would increase its thermal rating. Aerodynamics or a simplified drag model could limit speed in-atmosphere to prevent ships from burning out except when coming in from space or using very high thrust to push through drag to reach max speed. Power generation and usage obviously create thermal energy and would increase a ship's thermal rating. Heat management could be done passively through contact with the atmosphere (fast) or through radiating heat (slow). Radiation would depend on exterior surface area and/or special Radiator blocks. It could also be done actively through venting. We'll have water eventually- let us dump thermal energy into it and vent steam into space!
Just imagine a player-made railgun turret charging up and firing, then flash venting steam so it has room to fire again. Or shredding enemy radiators to cook their ship.
Too much thermal rating and vulnerable blocks like gas tanks, programmable blocks, or reactors would start taking damage. The atmosphere inside of an airtight grid could also go from warm to HOT and make a player start taking damage.
Combined with a camera in Thermal Mode from my Advanced Sensors idea also on this forum, a grid's thermal rating would cause it to be detected by a camera at shorter or longer distances. Thermal rating could determine how long an enemy has to react. A small low-heat grid could get very close before detection while a huge high-heat grid could be seen from kilometers away.
If missiles are infrared-guided and flares are added, the camera could check the flare against the heat signature of the grid to determine which to track.
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PLEASE! YES! I want radiators on everything! This would add so much to the gameplay, please add this KSH!
PLEASE! YES! I want radiators on everything! This would add so much to the gameplay, please add this KSH!
Another block you could have with this is a heat sink. A block that you can pump a lot of heat into with it taking a lot of time to heat up itself, letting your ship operate in ways that generate more heat than it can handle for a while, but that also takes way longer to cool afterwards compared to other functional blocks! This would be useful for highspeed aerobraking where you're generating a ton of heat but with no way to deal with it at the time, or for allowing you to fire your ship's main weapon a bunch of times in quick succession at the start of combat before needing to settle into a fire then cooldown cycle, or other things like that!
Another block you could have with this is a heat sink. A block that you can pump a lot of heat into with it taking a lot of time to heat up itself, letting your ship operate in ways that generate more heat than it can handle for a while, but that also takes way longer to cool afterwards compared to other functional blocks! This would be useful for highspeed aerobraking where you're generating a ton of heat but with no way to deal with it at the time, or for allowing you to fire your ship's main weapon a bunch of times in quick succession at the start of combat before needing to settle into a fire then cooldown cycle, or other things like that!
Don't mean to take over, but I opted to make my own suggestion regarding aerodynamics as a whole, so that everybody can group their individual takes on how planet-oriented aviation should/could/would work under a single thread. If you'd prefer, you can expand upon my suggestion in the replies regarding thermals!
Don't mean to take over, but I opted to make my own suggestion regarding aerodynamics as a whole, so that everybody can group their individual takes on how planet-oriented aviation should/could/would work under a single thread. If you'd prefer, you can expand upon my suggestion in the replies regarding thermals!
Even if the VRAGE can't handle thermal dynamics from atmospheric entry, an overheating mechanic for engines/systems in general would be a cool idea. Keeping things cool in space is actually incredibly difficult because there is no matter surrounding your ship to absorb your heat. The ISS coolant loop system is a cool deep dive into the issue of trying to dissipate heat in space.
Here is a great video on the topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5fvy1ZcIZk
Even if the VRAGE can't handle thermal dynamics from atmospheric entry, an overheating mechanic for engines/systems in general would be a cool idea. Keeping things cool in space is actually incredibly difficult because there is no matter surrounding your ship to absorb your heat. The ISS coolant loop system is a cool deep dive into the issue of trying to dissipate heat in space.
Here is a great video on the topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5fvy1ZcIZk
That's the thing I dreamed really long time. Heat controlling is one of the most important things in space. Also it gives very interesting new challenge for planning ships and stations. Not just in combat but also everything. All machines produces some heat some more and some less. It don't have to be super realistic but heat could spread from block to block.
There could be many ways to solve the challenge like BestJamie said heat sinks. If you put radiators close to heat sinks that could help cooling. Also isolated walls could slow down the heat spreading to areas you want to protect. Ejecting super heated liquid out of the ship could help a little. Also cooling pipes could take the heat from different areas to the radiators or heat sinks. But if you don't have any radiators eventually the whole ship will be destroyed.
heat could cause many different problems in the ship. Liquid and gas tanks could explode. Same with batteries, reactors, ammo storages etc. Some items could burn if there's oxygen. Etc. It would be so cool to cause horrible overheating in enemy ship :)
edit. if you played Oxygen not included that could give some heat controlling ideas.
That's the thing I dreamed really long time. Heat controlling is one of the most important things in space. Also it gives very interesting new challenge for planning ships and stations. Not just in combat but also everything. All machines produces some heat some more and some less. It don't have to be super realistic but heat could spread from block to block.
There could be many ways to solve the challenge like BestJamie said heat sinks. If you put radiators close to heat sinks that could help cooling. Also isolated walls could slow down the heat spreading to areas you want to protect. Ejecting super heated liquid out of the ship could help a little. Also cooling pipes could take the heat from different areas to the radiators or heat sinks. But if you don't have any radiators eventually the whole ship will be destroyed.
heat could cause many different problems in the ship. Liquid and gas tanks could explode. Same with batteries, reactors, ammo storages etc. Some items could burn if there's oxygen. Etc. It would be so cool to cause horrible overheating in enemy ship :)
edit. if you played Oxygen not included that could give some heat controlling ideas.
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