Ablative Thermodynamics,Thermodynamic Heat Sink and rigs

EVE Technology and Research Center Player Features & Ideas
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I did a quick search and didn’t see anything relevant to my idea but I’ll admit my Search Fu sucks.

Let me be clear before I start,I rarely overload anything. Fleet doctrine rarely calls for local repair anyway. I cannot claim to be a master of it’s use.

I was sitting around thinking about Assault Ships,HAC’s and T3 hulls and builds and the perks those classes are bringing to their pilots. We’ve seen a trend toward ablative or semi ablative or more simply one time use only modules such as the Capital Ship “oh crap” or PANIC button and the new Assault Module which serves as a sort of semi reusable module provided you survive the fight.

This got me thinking about thermal overload and possible options.

First thing that crossed my mind was actually a rig that effects cool down rate for an overloaded rack(s). If there were a rig that increases cool down rate would you sacrifice other rigs to fit them? How do you think this would effect your game play? How would it effect your targets game play?

As I thought about it a bit more I asked myself what about a heat sink module a bonus to both reduced heat buildup and faster cool down and would I fit this module(s)? What do you think? If such a module existed would you sacrifice some tank or damage to fit it/them? How would this effect your game play and that of your targets?

Another there is the ablative or sacrificial module that instantly wicks away thermal over but has to be repaired in station or more likely at a structure after the fact. The idea is simple,it’s a low slot item that can could be either passive like a DCU or active. As a passive it soaks up heat until it’s fried or as an active it wicks away heat instantly on command and after 5-10 seconds is fried and in either case must be repaired if you survive the fight.

I think it is inevitable someone will mention the heat sinks of Elite Dangerous. Would a module that has some limited munitions capacity and an actual cost both in the module and ejectable sinks be a useful option? Would it be over the top? This would in effect make it a high slot item. Would you sacrifice a weapon or cap war module to fit it?
How would this effect your game play? How would this effect your targets game play?

Finally I have to mention that one of the perks to T3 cruisers is the thermal overload reduction. I personally don’t think it will encroach into that territory too much if at all due to the fact they still get a nice reduction to buildup in the first place so in any event they’d have to use the module far less frequently were it an active ablative module or one that uses expendable sinks as a consumable and they’d still outlast others were it a passive.

Useful? Game enhancing?

Useless? Game breaking?

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heat is already pretty damn balanced in eve. I don’t see much of a reason to mess with it.

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I know CCP likes to associate exceedingly higher costs to every additional gain. Over-heating is one of the top-level gains (together with implants and boosters) and as such has a non-trivial cost to it.

Modules, rigs and base skills are on the other end of the available options. They are easy to get, with not much cost to it.

So when I keep this in mind, then how does it make sense to use a rig or a module to push over-heating further? Wouldn’t you just replace one gain for another while also risking to blur the line of cost between the options? You’d lose a dps rig or module for a gain in over-heating, but at the potential risk of making over-heating extremely popular and far more than it already is, when the idea is to have players define themselves over how well they can push their abilities to the edge.

For this to make sense would the gains need to be equal, but it would also have to be significantly different from options such as dps rigs and modules, or you’d only be getting the same gain as you already can.

It’s not a bad idea, but because it’s a bit vague will you have to be more specific about what exactly you expect to get.

Would players sacrifice a dps or tanking rig for an overheating rig, assuming it was balanced and it adds diversity to the existing landscape of rigs and modules? Sure. I don’t think that’s even a question.

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Or the rig/modual could be a transducer, which converts heat directly into electricity.

They exist IRL.

I’ll let you all have fun with that info and use it however you like. :slight_smile:

Note: The hotter the source of heat, the more efficiently a transducer works.

This could translate to faster cap recharge rate the hotter your moduals get. :slight_smile:

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oh yeah i haven’t already thought of several situations this would be broken

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The laws of physics and the property’s of thermodynamics is a bit** isn’t it? :slight_smile:

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good thing eve is more arcade than simulation so we don’t have to worry about that

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If we where to go off of physics based engine… almost every current ship design would be garbage.

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I would be interesting as a active module that uses cap and charges to negate a certain amount of heat damage from other modules while running. It would allow for some interesting fitting concepts.

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You could even make it physics based, say use hydrogen EVA system to evacuate the heat into space.

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I wouldn’t make it negate the heat damage, but collect it instead. As long as the module is active, it redirects all heat damage to itself, and it should probably have a bit more HP than most modules. Make it a low-slot module with enough cap requirement to not let people use it all the time, and only let them fit one.
Using charges isn’t really necessary, but people in the industry would like it.

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Thermal energy storage is what you are talking about…

Taking a solid and converting it to a liquid through heating is the best solution for storing massive amounts of heat and then slowly dissipating it over time.

Paraffin wax was used on the Apollo missions for heat storage.
So… If you had a layer of the hull that was filled with wax and it was hit with thermal energy, it would transfer the heat through the metal hull into the wax which would then disperse the heat through out the hull or just have a holding tank connected via small transfer pipes to a central holding tank and store massive quantity’s of BTU’s, enough that if you somehow lasted long enough to overload the thermal energy storage tank, you are probobly in a REALLY big fight and are going to die regardless.

More realistically you would have hydrogen filled heat pipes passing through the outer layers of the hull and weapons systems transferring the heat to a central thermal storage tank surrounded and filled with transducers converting the heat into energy.

Making the ship virtually immune to thermal damage and cause it to be cranking out some serious firepower from an inflated cap recharge rate the more thermal overloading is applied, until you exceed the thermal dissipation and conversion capacity.

… At which point, you blow up.

Or more accurately, your systems overload, become exponentially less efficient as they are damaged… until you reach the point of where, you blow up.

Unless you jettison the overloaded thermal storage unit and replace it with a fresh one… But in that case why not have another one linked up in parallel in the first place?

I mean, we can deal with heat throe
#1 Conversion
#2 Dissipation
#3 Storage
#4 Relocation

Feel free to let me know if I missed any methods. (I probobly have)

(Just though of a more optimal heat scavenging, recycling, dissipating and EVA system)

Pump hydrogen though pipes in the outer hull plates, back to a central bank of thermal storage medium through the use of thermal heat pumps into the first bank of thermal storage medium, surrounded my transducers, allowing the first bank to reach optimal heat levels, then opening the second bank to relive the heat from the first storage bank and begin second stage collection though optimal heating while keeping the first stage from overheating and so on and so forth until all banks have become saturated, at which point the ship could intentionally overload the system and form a plasma ball and launch it as a plasma bomb as a last ditch effort to destroy it’s target.

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This gives me an idea … a rig to give higher gains to over-heating, but at the risk of a module exploding from over-heating.

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… I think if the ships reactor or ammo does not explode, you would be more likely to…Melt? :smiley:

Which brings up the question, why can’t I jettison my reactor after overloading it as a bomb and a last ditch effort to keep my ship from exploding?

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Stuff is more and more made out of composites and components. They often no longer melt as a whole. Parts remain solid, some melt and some turn into gas. It’s usually the gasses and their kinetic energy that turns the rest into projectiles.

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So what happens it you build the ship out of Titanium instead if Tritanium?

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Depends … If everything is made out of titanium then you really only have a 1:1 titanium model of a spaceship. It wouldn’t even matter if it was a solid or a hollow model.

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Tritanium is a primary construction material in most structures and ships in New Eden. It is found in most ores, however is extremely abundant in Veldspar. Tritanium is an extremely durable material, and is also highly flexible. Unfortunately the material is very corrosive and as such cannot be used in a raw form within most atmospheres. Certain alloys and compounds are not nearly as unstable. Due to its high availability it is a cheap and accessible material for space-based construction.

Titanium is a chemical element with symbol Ti and atomic number 22. It is a lustrous transition metal with a silver color, low density, and high strength. Titanium is resistant to corrosion in sea water, aqua regia, and chlorine.
Titanium can be alloyed with iron, aluminium, vanadium, and molybdenum, among other elements, to produce strong, lightweight alloys for aerospace (jet engines, missiles, and spacecraft), military, industrial processes (chemicals and petrochemicals, desalination plants, pulp, and paper), automotive, agri-food, medical prostheses, orthopedic implants, dental and endodontic instruments and files, dental implants, sporting goods, jewelry, mobile phones, and other applications.[5]

The two most useful properties of the metal are corrosion resistance and strength-to-density ratio, the highest of any metallic element.

In its unalloyed condition, titanium is as strong as some steels, but less dense.

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I’ll hop back onto the topic.

I’m starting to like my idea of exploding modules. An exploded module would be one, which cannot be repaired once it’s burned out. It is simply destroyed. This would make one think twice before over-heating a faction module with the rig installed, but not so much when a T1/T2 module is being over-heated.

On the other hand could it be used to deny a module from dropping as loot.

Perhaps instead of destroying the module could it apply hull damage to the ship or briefly short-circuit the capacitor setting it to 0. Although loss of cap isn’t much of an issue when you’re in a fleet as someone else could boost you up again.

Loss of hull hit points could be quite funny. You’d see it happening on the target lock or even on the watch list when someone burns out a module with the rig installed. You’d see a spontaneous loss of hull hit points during a fight. No need to guess what happened …

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I think you are trying to apply too much science here.
I wasn’t talking about redirecting the heat and converting it back to energy.
I was talking about a module that you can sacrifice to heat damage, so you can overheat your systems longer.