shield system in VS

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ltercap
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shield system in VS

Post by ltercap »

While I was working on some weapons for vs
I got some general questions and ideas about
the shields on starships in vs:

In the master part list it says
they would be a compound of magnetic and
gravitic protective shields.

Maybe in the time of the vegastrike
universe there may be a way to
give the shields 'antigravitation'
then they would repeel at least incoming
missiles or other ships.
But this antigravitation would't influence
laserbeams, ions, ignited plasma (all the things
that are so popular in scifi games and films)
because the gravitation plays (nearly) no role
at subatomic levels (at which theses weapons act).
To influence a laser beam with (anti-)gravitation
you would need *really* high energies because photons
are much too light to be influenced by gravitation.

Magnetic shielding only would be a better idea
even if they wouldn't reflect lasers either
but could deflect solar radiation, ions, plasma
and particles that are charged equal to your
shields. But magnetic shields have disatvantages too.

-your ship would be very easy to spot by enemies
due to the strong magnetic fields

-and the shields would collect everything that is
magnetic-chargeable like iron containing asteroids
or would stick to other ships

The laser beams could be directly deflected
by the hull of your ship like on a mirror
you would only have to cool your
spacecraft's hull.

So magnetic shielding seems to be a better solution
if you could completely disable your shields by a
keybinding e.g. for docking or while flying through
an asteroid field.
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Post by Silverain »

Now, THAT'S an interesting idea, have to disable your shields while in an asteroid or mine field. It would make them more of a challenge/ a feared location to enter than they generally are now.
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Post by ltercap »

I thought it would be a good idea if you
could switch your shields on and off whenever you want.
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Post by Duality »

Well there could be many more types of shields in vegastrike..

Think of it as a force field.

Though I would like to stick to the tradition shield system to make it more fun like that.

Though if it were to happen, magnetic and antigravity shields would be at a cheaper price. The traditional would be a lot more expansive.
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Post by ltercap »

what do you mean by traditional
the gravitatic or the magnetic
shields?
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Post by mkruer »

Doh! :lol: There goes one more idea out of Rylix LOL. At this rate I will have to open it up before all the idea are gone. Anyway I was think the same thing for shielding, if you can “seeâ€
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Post by ltercap »

The question is how realistic we want the game to become. Of course a game like Vegastrike
should not be a *perfect* space simulator but should be fun to play. I think most people wouldn't like it if their ship's shields
wouldn't protect them in the game just because it is more realistic then.
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Post by mkruer »

Honestly for VegaStrike there is very little if any distinction between energy and projectile weapons, and I think that in the context of VS, it would confuse more people then it would help. Unfortunately most people have the mindset of the miracle shields from Star Trek that can block anything no matter how absurd it is. (48 mega tons for a photon torpedo? Right! But this is another story.) I think that in the context of VS, this is a bad idea, and would require a whole reshift in play balancing the game. I think that most people for a game expect their shields to block anything till it fails and then hit the hull, not it will some things, and leave what the “some thingâ€
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Post by ltercap »

I think you're right. But maybe the power consumption of the shields could be arised though. And maybe there should be a way to switch the shields on and off if you need the
power for other things...
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Post by mkruer »

Something analogous to WCP where you could shift Power between Weapons, Shields and Thrust? If so, I think it is already there for the Wing Commander Mods.
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Post by Shark »

mkruer wrote:Something analogous to WCP where you could shift Power between Weapons, Shields and Thrust? If so, I think it is already there for the Wing Commander Mods.
I think we should also have the ability to set the power draw for each subunit, individually (up to, but not over, its rated maximum draw). This would require that one enter a special "Manifest" UI screen, where one can view and tinker with equipped or stored items, whereas the former could be done via a series of hotkeys while piloting.
What sort of systems should the [edit]energy systems[/edit] be categorized into?
* weapons
* shields
* engines
* jump drive

Also, should capships require seperate shield modules for each side of the ship? And, can shield modules be stacked in order to get even more power? This is a rather cool feature of Space Empires Star Fury.
Last edited by Shark on Sun May 02, 2004 6:16 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by ltercap »

Shark wrote:
Also, should capships require seperate shield modules for each side of the ship? And, can shield modules be stacked in order to get even more power?
Separate shield modules wouldn't be a good
idea because the shields are generated like
a bubble around the ship (what would be quite reasonable if you have electromagnetic shields).
It would be better to have one central shield
projector consisting of several superconductive coils.
on bigger capships such coils could be wired
under the hull though if their flux lines would still form an acceptable shield.
you could stack more coils to project stronger shields but by higher field intensities the coils would deform each other. It would be more reasonable to charge less coils with more power.
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Post by Duality »

As for the triditional ways of shielding, the shield is supposed to protect anything from hitting the ship(laser hits, astroids, etc).

Of course you have to deactivate your shields to jettison or get the cargo.
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Post by ltercap »

That's exactly the feature I miss in vs
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Post by wanderer »

this is a very intresting idea. haveing magneticly charged shields that can attract asteroids and other ships or can reveal your position so have to be deactervated would be a good addition
Something analogous to WCP where you could shift Power between Weapons, Shields and Thrust? If so, I think it is already there for the Wing Commander Mods.
that would be a great addition. i.e reroute power from weapons to engines to escape a powerful enemy (such as an area cap ship) or divert shield power to weapons to fight a well armoured enemy with weak guns. it would add an intresting dimension to the game 8)
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Post by Regan »

How 'bout a Langston Field? Larry Niven and Jerry Pournell's Mote in God's Eye . I've forgotten how it works exactly, but it absorbs radiation. It overloads when it gets too hot, sometimes exploding (taking the ship with it), as it heats up it goes from black to a slight glow, to dark mauve, orange, red, bright red, white, until it overloads. It DOES cool off slowly, but you can't shut it down when it's over a certin level, because the excess radiation just floods in and destroys your ship.

Would certinaly look cool in some aspects, but then again, you're engageing a black spot. An idea none the less.[/i]
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Re: shield system in VS

Post by zeo1234 »

Perhaps these links can help?

Langston Field

Wiki on Energy Shields

Ablative Armor

Magnetosphere

http://www.freemars.org/studies/magshield/index.html

Plasma Window/Shield, related Cold Plasma

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2007/04/a ... plasm.html

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2007/05/p ... eld_m.html

http://meetings.aps.org/Meeting/DPP05/Event/34938

http://www.niac.usra.edu/files/studies/ ... Slough.pdf

http://technology.newscientist.com/article/dn11723

A summary of real vs Sci-fi, http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/Tec ... ature.html

Site on Star Trek Shields, http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Deflector_shield
ltercap wrote:Maybe in the time of the vegastrike
universe there may be a way to
give the shields 'antigravitation'
then they would repeel at least incoming
missiles or other ships.
But this antigravitation would't influence
laserbeams, ions, ignited plasma (all the things
that are so popular in scifi games and films)
because the gravitation plays (nearly) no role
at subatomic levels (at which theses weapons act).
To influence a laser beam with (anti-)gravitation
you would need *really* high energies because photons
are much too light to be influenced by gravitation.
You are correct that normal levels of gravitation would not significantly influence subatomic particles but at high levels gravitation can warp space itself and thus the path of any particle traveling through space can be altered.

This is how Star Trek shields are explained, any object hitting the shields is basically still traveling in a straight line but the graviton based shield warps space enough to deflect the object.

Basically they went with the idea that it would be possible (mind you we haven't even proven the existence of the Graviton yet so this is still all sci-fi) to set up a polarized field of gravitons that when ever something tries to pass through would cause a discharge of gravitons (think static electricity) proportional to the energy needed to warp space enough to redirect the object away.

The shield then is basically a charge of gravitons and so shield strength and efficiency varies according to how large a charge of gravitons the ship can maintain.

Similar to the plasma shield, the field will have a frequency pattern for the gravitons and polarization so they can control what can and can't go through.

Whether Vegastrike follows that type of gravity shielding I haven't a clue but that's one example of a gravity based shield in popular sci-fi.
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Post by Moe479 »

when the engine should cover most common scifi shieldsystems also some things like transferring shieldenergy to front/back,port/starbord, top bottom ... etc is needed.
this would require seperate shield surfaces each covering only a part of the ship ...
the energytranfer for each region have to be adjusteble from offline to maximum

than we have in some scifi universes ships with more than one generator while each generator can be sepratly malfunctioning or offline or destroyed, ships have to lose shield cover in certain areas, a good example is the bridge shieldgenerator of a super star destroyer ... if its gone the vessel is very vunerable at this location.
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