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.
I like this feedback
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.
I really like this. It is basically what I was thinking after watching this video, in the part where he talks about heat sensors (basically long range radars but that detect heat). I'll add my take on this, assuming simulating heat on a per-block basis is too expensive, let's say each grid has a temperature (in C / F).
The temperature increases when adding heat to the ship, if a ship has more mass it's temperature will increase less when adding the same amount of heat.
How can heat be added to a ship:
- By using electricity, higher power consumption adds heat equal to the watts of electricity used.
- During reentry or when going fast in atmosphere (if this ever gets added).
- By burning fuel (hydrogen thrusters, or other things like hydrogen engines. Ion thrusters do not use fuel but electricity so they also will increase the temperature).
- When hit by a weapon (each weapon adds a different amount of heat, imagine cooking a ship with a laser).
- After impacts.
- When in line of sight with the sun.
- When touching other hotter ships (depending on the extent of the surface area in contact between the two ships)
- When touching hotter ground / asteroids (depending on surface area)
- Firing weapons
How can heat be dissipated from a ship:
- All ship will naturally cooldown in space depending on surface area
- Passive radiator blocks that add extra surface area to a ship (with different variants / tiers, they add)
- Active radiators / heat pumps that use electricity
- Venting steam
- Touching other colder ships
- When touching colder ground / asteroids
- Faster cooling in atmosphere (depending on atmospheric temperature, if the air is hotter than the ship, you will heat up)
How can temperature affect a ship:
- The ship can be detected from further away using heat signature sensors as suggested by the liked video. I would put detected heat signatures in the HUD of the player
- Thermal camera can see hot ships (the player can look through them, and they can also act as sensors for the HUD, but with a narrower filed of view)
- Each block of the ship has a minimum and maximum operating temperature outside of which it will turn off, some block may also become less effective as a function of temperature.
- Each block has a maximum and minimum temperature after which it will take damage
- Batteries may loose charge in hot environments faster
- Atmosphere inside a ship may heat up and cause damange to players
- Thermal cameras may also be used for heat seeking player made weapons in addition to optical cameras. The thermal cameras can have a higher range than optical cameras depending on the target temperature.
If the VRAGE engine can handle this, the above could be applied on a per block basis, each block will have it's own temperature and thermal mass and will propagate the heat to colder neighboring blocks. This would enable other ways to cool down a ship, like when a hotter piece of the ship detaches from it. It would also enable combining heat pumps with radiators, an heatpump may cool down blocks from the left side (for example) and heat block on the right side, the block on the right side may be a radiator which would enable higher heat dissipation. Or the block on the right side may be a "ball" of armor blocks that can be jettinsoned.
Heat pumps may also be implemented as 2 blocks connected by a pipe to transfer heat like air conditioners do.
I really like this. It is basically what I was thinking after watching this video, in the part where he talks about heat sensors (basically long range radars but that detect heat). I'll add my take on this, assuming simulating heat on a per-block basis is too expensive, let's say each grid has a temperature (in C / F).
The temperature increases when adding heat to the ship, if a ship has more mass it's temperature will increase less when adding the same amount of heat.
How can heat be added to a ship:
- By using electricity, higher power consumption adds heat equal to the watts of electricity used.
- During reentry or when going fast in atmosphere (if this ever gets added).
- By burning fuel (hydrogen thrusters, or other things like hydrogen engines. Ion thrusters do not use fuel but electricity so they also will increase the temperature).
- When hit by a weapon (each weapon adds a different amount of heat, imagine cooking a ship with a laser).
- After impacts.
- When in line of sight with the sun.
- When touching other hotter ships (depending on the extent of the surface area in contact between the two ships)
- When touching hotter ground / asteroids (depending on surface area)
- Firing weapons
How can heat be dissipated from a ship:
- All ship will naturally cooldown in space depending on surface area
- Passive radiator blocks that add extra surface area to a ship (with different variants / tiers, they add)
- Active radiators / heat pumps that use electricity
- Venting steam
- Touching other colder ships
- When touching colder ground / asteroids
- Faster cooling in atmosphere (depending on atmospheric temperature, if the air is hotter than the ship, you will heat up)
How can temperature affect a ship:
- The ship can be detected from further away using heat signature sensors as suggested by the liked video. I would put detected heat signatures in the HUD of the player
- Thermal camera can see hot ships (the player can look through them, and they can also act as sensors for the HUD, but with a narrower filed of view)
- Each block of the ship has a minimum and maximum operating temperature outside of which it will turn off, some block may also become less effective as a function of temperature.
- Each block has a maximum and minimum temperature after which it will take damage
- Batteries may loose charge in hot environments faster
- Atmosphere inside a ship may heat up and cause damange to players
- Thermal cameras may also be used for heat seeking player made weapons in addition to optical cameras. The thermal cameras can have a higher range than optical cameras depending on the target temperature.
If the VRAGE engine can handle this, the above could be applied on a per block basis, each block will have it's own temperature and thermal mass and will propagate the heat to colder neighboring blocks. This would enable other ways to cool down a ship, like when a hotter piece of the ship detaches from it. It would also enable combining heat pumps with radiators, an heatpump may cool down blocks from the left side (for example) and heat block on the right side, the block on the right side may be a radiator which would enable higher heat dissipation. Or the block on the right side may be a "ball" of armor blocks that can be jettinsoned.
Heat pumps may also be implemented as 2 blocks connected by a pipe to transfer heat like air conditioners do.
I really want to see Heat added so I made a full on video to help push this over the edge before development gets too much farther along. Hopefully it helps!
Heat in SE2: https://youtu.be/2LidPskhUtI
I really want to see Heat added so I made a full on video to help push this over the edge before development gets too much farther along. Hopefully it helps!
Heat in SE2: https://youtu.be/2LidPskhUtI
Beautiful! We need this for sure
Beautiful! We need this for sure
Upvoted, comment for engagement. I've always wanted a waste heat system to balance out reactors and gunbrick designs.
Upvoted, comment for engagement. I've always wanted a waste heat system to balance out reactors and gunbrick designs.
PLEASE
PLEASE
Incredible idea. Anything to add more balance and dissuade creating death cubes with thousands of turrets
Incredible idea. Anything to add more balance and dissuade creating death cubes with thousands of turrets
There's a ton of potential with a heat system in SE2, but it needs to be kept simple and accessible. Complex heat and ambient temperature modeling could lead to issues with players not understanding why certain systems are overheating at particular times. It's easy to take for granted how intuitive heat is in the real world--we can all feel it--but that information has to be communicated to the player somehow. This video has some good ideas in my opinion.
One big opportunity I haven't seen discussed anywhere else is to potential to turn heat into an asset for the player, rather than just a liability. At the end of the day, the game needs to be fun and players want to feel powerful, clever, or something positive like that. If the heat management system is too complicated and it only imposes burdens on the player, it might feel unfun for many even though other players might enjoy the challenges and limitations heat constraints impose. If heat could be used for useful things, I think it would go a long way towards this goal.
Imagine if stored heat could be turned into a weapon. The game Cosmoteer is an example--you can turn your stored heat into missiles or a beam weapon that applies heat to the enemy ship. Another idea is to use your stored heat as a "decoy" that you could launch or drop to fool enemy weapons or tracking systems that rely on heat signatures. It wouldn't even need to be a specific "heat decoy" block in SE2. If the core systems for weapon or enemy ship tracking have some reliance on heat signatures, you could just build a simple deployable module that has a heat sink, a battery, a radiator, and some heat generating component. Just launch it or drop it and enemy sensors will pick up on it before they notice/target something more important.
And once water is in the game there might be uses for heat to melt ice into liquid water. And speaking of liquids and heat, if Keen ever gets ambitious and decides they want to add lava to one or more planets, you could have a block that converts heat into power for bases. You would probably need to dig down to find it, but it could be a viable option for a planet that has little sunlight due to distance from the sun or a semi-opaque atmosphere.
There are a ton of possibilities with heat and Keen has a lot of talented and creative people so I'm sure they could figure out some clever and fun uses for it. But if they add it, I think they should keep it simple and easy to understand, at least at first.
There's a ton of potential with a heat system in SE2, but it needs to be kept simple and accessible. Complex heat and ambient temperature modeling could lead to issues with players not understanding why certain systems are overheating at particular times. It's easy to take for granted how intuitive heat is in the real world--we can all feel it--but that information has to be communicated to the player somehow. This video has some good ideas in my opinion.
One big opportunity I haven't seen discussed anywhere else is to potential to turn heat into an asset for the player, rather than just a liability. At the end of the day, the game needs to be fun and players want to feel powerful, clever, or something positive like that. If the heat management system is too complicated and it only imposes burdens on the player, it might feel unfun for many even though other players might enjoy the challenges and limitations heat constraints impose. If heat could be used for useful things, I think it would go a long way towards this goal.
Imagine if stored heat could be turned into a weapon. The game Cosmoteer is an example--you can turn your stored heat into missiles or a beam weapon that applies heat to the enemy ship. Another idea is to use your stored heat as a "decoy" that you could launch or drop to fool enemy weapons or tracking systems that rely on heat signatures. It wouldn't even need to be a specific "heat decoy" block in SE2. If the core systems for weapon or enemy ship tracking have some reliance on heat signatures, you could just build a simple deployable module that has a heat sink, a battery, a radiator, and some heat generating component. Just launch it or drop it and enemy sensors will pick up on it before they notice/target something more important.
And once water is in the game there might be uses for heat to melt ice into liquid water. And speaking of liquids and heat, if Keen ever gets ambitious and decides they want to add lava to one or more planets, you could have a block that converts heat into power for bases. You would probably need to dig down to find it, but it could be a viable option for a planet that has little sunlight due to distance from the sun or a semi-opaque atmosphere.
There are a ton of possibilities with heat and Keen has a lot of talented and creative people so I'm sure they could figure out some clever and fun uses for it. But if they add it, I think they should keep it simple and easy to understand, at least at first.
Yes! This would both create natural restrictions on building (that would be a fun challenge to engineer around), and open the door to creative things like player-built reactors from boiling water.
Yes! This would both create natural restrictions on building (that would be a fun challenge to engineer around), and open the door to creative things like player-built reactors from boiling water.
Heat could be a percentage of the energy something produces/uses, and a heatsink could be working exactly like a batter and radiators would have a set dissipation speed based on atmospheric conditions, would be really easy to balance prevent deathcubes as someone else mentioned and it would be an engineering challenge, perfect for SE2
Heat could be a percentage of the energy something produces/uses, and a heatsink could be working exactly like a batter and radiators would have a set dissipation speed based on atmospheric conditions, would be really easy to balance prevent deathcubes as someone else mentioned and it would be an engineering challenge, perfect for SE2
Thermal camera idea would be amazing to see stuff in the darkness of space and add a huge extra layer for combat or exploration
and would look cool as heck in combat vids or them intro vids keen love to do
Just adding in a simple toggle like SE1 did for airtightness could turn this feature off for those who enjoy a more classic SE1 feel, but honestly this does add a whole new element of construction to SE2 that I would love to explore.
Thermal camera idea would be amazing to see stuff in the darkness of space and add a huge extra layer for combat or exploration
and would look cool as heck in combat vids or them intro vids keen love to do
Just adding in a simple toggle like SE1 did for airtightness could turn this feature off for those who enjoy a more classic SE1 feel, but honestly this does add a whole new element of construction to SE2 that I would love to explore.
I'm envisioning thermal sinks that could be disposable in combat. Your ship is overheating because thruster use, weapons, damage to armor plating, etc. and a thermal sink could be dumped and a new one welded in to keep the heat dumping going at the expense of components. Similar to how Elite Dangerous manages heat.
I'm envisioning thermal sinks that could be disposable in combat. Your ship is overheating because thruster use, weapons, damage to armor plating, etc. and a thermal sink could be dumped and a new one welded in to keep the heat dumping going at the expense of components. Similar to how Elite Dangerous manages heat.
Finally! Proper engineering in our engineering game!
I found this forum via: https://youtu.be/2LidPskhUtI?si=HFj_Axhz71Dn_GHo
and had to make an account to add weight as i'm a long time fan of space engineers
Finally! Proper engineering in our engineering game!
I found this forum via: https://youtu.be/2LidPskhUtI?si=HFj_Axhz71Dn_GHo
and had to make an account to add weight as i'm a long time fan of space engineers
A heat recycler could be good for the early game or for production grids. Perhaps they would radiate heat too, just like the radiator, but they would be a larger block, and they would radiate more slowly for their area than a radiator, so it's a trade-off. Maybe the early game version would be a peltier requiring silicon, nickel, and iron, and it would be really inefficient, like 5% or 10% and dimensioned like a small grid block. Then, as you get more exotic materials to end game, you would unlock the sterling engine, which would require cobalt, iron, nickel, and gold(for thermal conductivity), and the more advanced production blocks to machine its components, which could be shared with he hydrogen engine, and would have 30% to 40% efficiency but also require a minimum heat level to operate so if your grid is too cool it won't generate power at all. It could have a smaller and larger version, with the small being 30% efficient and a 1x1x2, and the large 3x3x,4 40% efficient, and possibly have a cool sound effect and piston animations like the hydrogen engine. So, if you had a large reactor and a large sterling engine, you would have 1.4x the power production of the reactor by itself, and you would have cooling for the grid, which would mean your reactor could operate consuming less uranium to power the grid. On a production grid, it could supply extra power as your production equipment generated heat. It would still require a primary power source, as it would not generate enough power to cause an infinite loop due to inefficiency. Still, it might keep your grid powered for a little bit of time if you have stored heat, comparable to a battery, until you can repair your reactor if your reactor breaks for some reason. it would also be bad for a combat grid because you need all the cooling you can get for a combat ship, and the reduced cooling for power generation would be a bad trade-off for combat so pure radiators would be king on combat ships.
A heat recycler could be good for the early game or for production grids. Perhaps they would radiate heat too, just like the radiator, but they would be a larger block, and they would radiate more slowly for their area than a radiator, so it's a trade-off. Maybe the early game version would be a peltier requiring silicon, nickel, and iron, and it would be really inefficient, like 5% or 10% and dimensioned like a small grid block. Then, as you get more exotic materials to end game, you would unlock the sterling engine, which would require cobalt, iron, nickel, and gold(for thermal conductivity), and the more advanced production blocks to machine its components, which could be shared with he hydrogen engine, and would have 30% to 40% efficiency but also require a minimum heat level to operate so if your grid is too cool it won't generate power at all. It could have a smaller and larger version, with the small being 30% efficient and a 1x1x2, and the large 3x3x,4 40% efficient, and possibly have a cool sound effect and piston animations like the hydrogen engine. So, if you had a large reactor and a large sterling engine, you would have 1.4x the power production of the reactor by itself, and you would have cooling for the grid, which would mean your reactor could operate consuming less uranium to power the grid. On a production grid, it could supply extra power as your production equipment generated heat. It would still require a primary power source, as it would not generate enough power to cause an infinite loop due to inefficiency. Still, it might keep your grid powered for a little bit of time if you have stored heat, comparable to a battery, until you can repair your reactor if your reactor breaks for some reason. it would also be bad for a combat grid because you need all the cooling you can get for a combat ship, and the reduced cooling for power generation would be a bad trade-off for combat so pure radiators would be king on combat ships.
I found this via this YT video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LidPskhUtI
This feature as described in depth in the video sounds quite interesting! If togglable in world settings i think its a great idea!
I found this via this YT video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LidPskhUtI
This feature as described in depth in the video sounds quite interesting! If togglable in world settings i think its a great idea!
I am in favor of thermodynamics being added BUT only under the following condition:
What i recommend is that they add thermodynamics and aerodynamics as expansions after the game has released. They need to be fully isolated systems that can be disabled or overridden by mods. Both systems dramatically change how grids should be designed and no matter how its implemented, someone is going to be unhappy. If the math doesn't work the realism crew is going to be pissed. If it isn't intuitive and easy to build around normies are going to get frustrated. I have this same concern about water. I fear that it will be a big black box, players wont have any control over, sucking ridiculous amounts of performance or sacrificing so much realism, that players can abuse the simplified mechanics. The best thing to do is make the game as modular as possible and provide as many configuration options as possible to the user.
I am in favor of thermodynamics being added BUT only under the following condition:
What i recommend is that they add thermodynamics and aerodynamics as expansions after the game has released. They need to be fully isolated systems that can be disabled or overridden by mods. Both systems dramatically change how grids should be designed and no matter how its implemented, someone is going to be unhappy. If the math doesn't work the realism crew is going to be pissed. If it isn't intuitive and easy to build around normies are going to get frustrated. I have this same concern about water. I fear that it will be a big black box, players wont have any control over, sucking ridiculous amounts of performance or sacrificing so much realism, that players can abuse the simplified mechanics. The best thing to do is make the game as modular as possible and provide as many configuration options as possible to the user.
Adding things like fire as well, it could spread arround your ship and even if it dosnt destroy anything it would be a hazard for you and it would scorch your components and that will make them inoperable until they get repaired, that way your ship will not explode because of fire, but it will shut down if enough fire spreads (obviously re-entry is an exception) another cool thing would be the ability to overclock certain parts to be more powerful, at the cost at generating a whole lot of heat that needs to be radiated. It also poses the threat that if your blocks that radiate or transport heat get damaged or destroyed, those overclocked parts will immediately either explode from the heat or engulf in flames, so you are trading more power for more danger.
Adding things like fire as well, it could spread arround your ship and even if it dosnt destroy anything it would be a hazard for you and it would scorch your components and that will make them inoperable until they get repaired, that way your ship will not explode because of fire, but it will shut down if enough fire spreads (obviously re-entry is an exception) another cool thing would be the ability to overclock certain parts to be more powerful, at the cost at generating a whole lot of heat that needs to be radiated. It also poses the threat that if your blocks that radiate or transport heat get damaged or destroyed, those overclocked parts will immediately either explode from the heat or engulf in flames, so you are trading more power for more danger.
+1 for Thermal Mechanics.
+1 for Thermal Mechanics.
While it would be important that this feature could be turned off, and I would expect it mostly implemented in a later update, I think heat management would be just the right amount of complexity to make building functionally interesting forever.
While it would be important that this feature could be turned off, and I would expect it mostly implemented in a later update, I think heat management would be just the right amount of complexity to make building functionally interesting forever.
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