Inconsistent Internal Narrative
- Thread starter SavingPrincess
- Start date
When flight assist is on, your thrusters fire constantly to maintain velocity, as if your ship is overcoming air resistance. Turn flight assist off, and your thrusters work as they should - only firing to change velocity. I often use FA off for long straight flights because I get tired of hearing my engines (I prefer the quiet of space).
Oh, and turn off thrusters (module panel) with FA on, and your ship slows down after thrusters are disabled. Do this with FA off, and ship continues to coast at speed. Unfortunately this trick doesn't work to maintain boost speed (yet another inconsistency).
Oh, and turn off thrusters (module panel) with FA on, and your ship slows down after thrusters are disabled. Do this with FA off, and ship continues to coast at speed. Unfortunately this trick doesn't work to maintain boost speed (yet another inconsistency).
Just wait until you find out the Anaconda is made of handwavium.
IIRC it used to maintain boost speed but was changed before release because of balancing reasons.
I sometimes wonder about that. With all our advancements in nano-based material sciences (carbon fiber composites, for example), perhaps the Anaconda gets it right and all the rest of the ships are "wrong". Are we really using solid steel plates in 3304 as if these are WWII destroyers in space? I don't know enough about material science (or the official lore) to do anything more than speculate, but I am at peace with my Conda's low mass
I sometimes wonder about that. With all our advancements in nano-based material sciences (carbon fiber composites, for example), perhaps the Anaconda gets it right and all the rest of the ships are "wrong". Are we really using solid steel plates in 3304 as if these are WWII destroyers in space? I don't know enough about material science (or the official lore) to do anything more than speculate, but I am at peace with my Conda's low mass
Such a material is possible... but.. Let's try to calculate the density of it by simply using density=mass/volume and see if Anaconda would have issues on landing on water or riding through a tough windy atmosphere.
Volume of Conda= 155m x 62m x 32m = 307520 m^3 (considering Anaconda is a rectangular prism so should be slightly lower with proper measurement)
Weight of Conda = 400000 kg
Thus
Density of Conda = 1.3 kg/m^3 Whhhaaatttttt!?!?
Density of air is around 1.29kg/m^3 lol. Someone please tell me I messed up big somewhere because Anaconda appears to be nearly as light as air and it should float in our atmosphere!? Made of foam!?
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I think you messed up big
The Anaconda is mostly air (and vacuum). Your calculations are for a solid, as in a giant block of metal. Since we don't know the internal layout, it would be impossible to calculate the density of the walls, but you could get in the ballpark by making some assumptions.
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Your volume is a bit over generous, but the jist is absolutely correct. All the larger ships are impossibly light.
This is why I scoff at the complaints around the Anaconda's mass. Does it really matter if one ship is made of cotton candy when all the others are made of whipped cream?
Likewise, complaints about cargo space are even more asinine. No ship in the game holds too much cargo for it's volume. The python, even if only 10% of it's internal volume could be dedicated to cargo, could still hold four figures of canisters. Mass has always been the only limiting factor in cargo capacity for anything larger than maybe a hauler.
I think you messed up big
Nope. A box that would hold the Anaconda holds a larger mass of air than the mass of the Anaconda's hull. That's accurate.
Even if we conservatively estimate the volume of the whole ship to be one third of the volume of the rectangular prism needed to hold it, a fully loaded Anaconda would blow away in a gentle breeze and doubling the hull mass would barely change that.
A 2000 ton Anaconda (the mass of a reasonable fit if we increase it's hull mass to ~1000 tons) has a density about one-tenth that of a solid block of balsa wood or styrofoam. Entirely unarmored seagoing ships of similar volume are at least five or six times as massive. Modern high-performance airliners made of composite materials are about that density as well.
Big ships in ED are parade floats or blimps.
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I think you messed up big
No no, thats not right. The weight of Anaconda is simply specificed as 400 tons in the stats. Doesn't matter if its a solid block or it's filled with ice cream on the inside as the stats simply say its ultimately 400 tons. I think I got you confused there, my bad on that, I think you might have thought I was trying to calculate the density of the material-handwavium Anaconda is made out of, which in that case, yeah the material anacondaium by itself should be much much heavier exactly as you said, but I calculated the density of Anaconda the ship itself by the volume, all space included just like calculating density of a mug or a cargo ship. The metal a cargo ship is made out of is definately a lot more heavy than air or water but when you calculate the cargo ships whole density it ends up being less than water so it floats. But being less than air!?!? Thats a new record for Anaconda
Morbad said:
Exactly, as I mentioned a couple posts above, cargo ships the size of Anaconda carries around 10000 tons of goods on water. We can only fit Anaconda with 500~ max.
Well perhaps we could explain it lorewise by saying "oh FSD drive techtm can't roll a mass that big so scientists came with the solution to make them out of light milk crea- I mean anacondium" and goods have to be secured with something something to survive space radiation and FSD jump, but ehh.
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Folks, folks, this thread is a whole lot of fun but with all this talk about thrusters and velocities we're in great danger of accidentally typing the right combination of ASCII to invoke Bounder. His shade has already been seen in the hyperspace exit thread but not for long enough to fully manifest. Someone said "Newton" on the first page of this topic but they didn't suffix it with "-ian" so we might have got away with it. Tread carefully...
(Only kidding if you're reading this, B. I do admire your continued passion for what could have been, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't sigh a little every time someone successfully uses one of your summoning spells ;))
(Only kidding if you're reading this, B. I do admire your continued passion for what could have been, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't sigh a little every time someone successfully uses one of your summoning spells ;))
Just for the signature: lmao
When you're leaving a landing pad and you can't see the ship that's just bumped into you from no where beneath you and you get a fine before you've even checked your mirrors.
That does my head in that and I'm not afraid to say it - I'll follow that tramp and blast it to smithereens. Logic: if a big ship is looking to leave, then you the NPC in your ship, look where you're going or there'll be consequences.
V2k.
p.s. If you find my spleen whilst leaving the station, please do let me know. It could mean another 4000ly before I find a replacement.
That does my head in that and I'm not afraid to say it - I'll follow that tramp and blast it to smithereens. Logic: if a big ship is looking to leave, then you the NPC in your ship, look where you're going or there'll be consequences.
V2k.
p.s. If you find my spleen whilst leaving the station, please do let me know. It could mean another 4000ly before I find a replacement.
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No no, thats not right. The weight of Anaconda is simply specificed as 400 tons in the stats. Doesn't matter if its a solid block or it's filled with ice cream on the inside as the stats simply say its ultimately 400 tons. I think I got you confused there, my bad on that, I think you might have thought I was trying to calculate the density of the material-handwavium Anaconda is made out of, which in that case, yeah the material anacondaium by itself should be much much heavier exactly as you said, but I calculated the density of Anaconda the ship itself by the volume, all space included just like calculating density of a mug or a cargo ship. The metal a cargo ship is made out of is definately a lot more heavy than air or water but when you calculate the cargo ships whole density it ends up being less than water so it floats. But being less than air!?!? Thats a new record for Anaconda
Yep, you confused me. You're talking about average density of the entire ship, what we in the Navy call displacement (a word that obviously does not apply in the vacuum of space). It would be interesting to know what the mass numbers are based on. According to coriolis, mass is just the hull, no modules. Is this basically an empty shell? Do modules include their own bulkheads? I think they might, since a passenger cabin is very different than a cargo hold, which is very different than an SRV hangar (where you can see the custom bulkheads). Odds are this mass does not include any atmosphere, since module slots may be pressurized or at vacuum depending on use (and it is labeled as "hull" mass, not "ship" mass). A thin metal shell wrapped around vacuum may indeed have less displacement than the equivalent volume of 14.7 lb/in^2 (American, sorry) atmosphere at sea level on earth. I'm speculating, not crunching numbers.
LOL, not only am I speculating, I'm applying way to much logic to what I'm sure is just a spreadsheet in Frontier's eyes, like a D&D stats chart. I doubt they gave this 1/10 of the thought we are.
So obviously it's all handwavium, and I completely agree with you about the cargo numbers. I've made a similar argument about the Beluga, which is the size of a modern cruise ship, yet it can only carry a couple hundred (maybe less?) passengers vs many thousand that a cruise ship can carry.
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There's a narrative???
Jenner
I wish I was English like my hero Tj.
TJ's drive always sounds that way. Hmmm.
Logically, the space speed limits (in "normal space") could only be enforced by the ships themselves.
Why would anyone spend time or credits (or worse, engineering grind) to "upgrade" perfectly good engine components when the only thing stopping you going faster is your own ship's "flight assist"?
It's the 34th century and, as if the previous games never happened, all "spaceships" are now slower than any actual space craft that ever flew, anywhere, ever?
Yet despite this, nobody's ever thought of simply de-restricting the "flight assist"? Just jamming a spanner in it, or ripping it out completely?
Even though, precisely because of the space speed limits, speed means life or death?
Everyone just changes out their perfectly-good engines and thrusters, spending mega-credits if it'll gain them a few meters / sec advantage, yet no one's thought to just short out or jam the engine cut-out mechanism on their existing kit?
And the "duh, missions!" board... what the hell is a "missions board"? Billions of inhabitants in a system, the only sign of which are a handful of "mission vendors" on a "missions board". It's just so kludgey, gamey, unimaginative, cringeworthy, ham-fisted and.. naff.
Why would anyone spend time or credits (or worse, engineering grind) to "upgrade" perfectly good engine components when the only thing stopping you going faster is your own ship's "flight assist"?
It's the 34th century and, as if the previous games never happened, all "spaceships" are now slower than any actual space craft that ever flew, anywhere, ever?
Yet despite this, nobody's ever thought of simply de-restricting the "flight assist"? Just jamming a spanner in it, or ripping it out completely?
Even though, precisely because of the space speed limits, speed means life or death?
Everyone just changes out their perfectly-good engines and thrusters, spending mega-credits if it'll gain them a few meters / sec advantage, yet no one's thought to just short out or jam the engine cut-out mechanism on their existing kit?
And the "duh, missions!" board... what the hell is a "missions board"? Billions of inhabitants in a system, the only sign of which are a handful of "mission vendors" on a "missions board". It's just so kludgey, gamey, unimaginative, cringeworthy, ham-fisted and.. naff.
[video=youtube;30Ua5JFPdio]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30Ua5JFPdio[/video]
He's not wrong though. ED is a mash-up of Elite elements and FFE elements, and sometimes it feels like it's the worst elements of both. Some of that is driven by technical limitations, but a lot of it is just lazy design. It hasn't helped that much of the new stuff unique to ED seems to have been made up on the fly with little effort to tie it all together in a way that makes sense.
It's fun to play, arguably as much fun to pick apart and try to explain if you're in the mood. But at some point the rationale always has to fall back on "it's just a game." Which is fine, but it's a shame. While limited by the technical restrictions of their day, the Elite games were always more than "just" games. There are far fewer technical restrictions in the late 2010s; many of ED's flaws are just down to poor and/or rushed design.
The Anaconda is made from unicorn farts.
Oh, that reminds me: ships can't maintain boost speed with AF off for balancing reasons.
Engineers are introduced increasing boost speed. Wonder where's balance now.
I guess it sits in the corner, crying.