Life Support works while module is turned off?

Sair Aerwyn · Apr 21, 2015

Hi All,

As per the subject of this post, I am somewhat annoyed at this. Life Support systems (as we buy them now) are generally thought of being the system you install into your ship to provide breathable atmosphere inside the cabin. I think if the system is off, you should be subject to the heat / cold of space (or your engines) and perish if you do not take action. Currently the system treats your life support as an "upgradable" air tank and the descriptions speak nothing of this air tank, and when you turn off the system, nothing happens. If you just so happen to have broken your cockpit and have a breach, you better not turn life support off... OR NO. IT DOESN'T MATTER.

Yes - that's right. Test it yourself. Turn life support off and break your glass, the air will vent and you will get a timer. BECAUSE LIFE SUPPORT IS A BOTTLE. That takes about 4% power. And does nothing if you turn it off. So just save the power, who cares. (sorry - part of me is angry and part of me thinks it's so illogical to buy a system just for a tank, or spend that much on a bottle in first place.)

The systems (which can cost as low as a few thousand all the way to 1.2mil) are misleading into thinking that we are upgrading more than the bottle, but we are not. How does paying 1.2 million for an OXYGEN BOTTLE make sense?

This all came from a heated discussion with a buddy and after proving it, I feel like it's a bug and should be looked at. If I turned off the life support systems, the ship should stop heating/cooling the air, and should stop circulating it. It should grow stale, and also start to be uncomfortable.

I am fine with having the emergency time limit, and by functionalities sake - "A bottle of air by your chair" but let's see some info IN-GAME on the freaking LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEMS that talk about this.

Am I the only one who is ranting like this in my head?

PhazonAran · Apr 21, 2015

What you are talking about is emergency oxygen. The life support system is actually the recycling air thingy, giving you unlimited oxygen while it works right. You have a point, though, when you say that upgrading your life support only increases the amout of emergency oxygen you get. But honestly, what would you want to improve if not that ?

And don't forget you're constantly wearing a space suit !

Also, did you kow that the fact that you can see your helmet better when switching on emergency oxygen is because the air is freezing ? You always have the helmet on, but you can barely see it in normal conditions.

SteveLaw · Apr 21, 2015

The bottle of oxygen comes with the life support but life support IS the thing that provides a breathable atmosphere in the cabin. If you turn it off you switch to your air tank because you've turned off the air in the cabin.

Soda Popinski · Apr 21, 2015

What you don't get is the A grade life support system also makes the air smell like roses, in addition to having a bigger oxygen bottle. Packed deal.

You don't want to know what the stock E grade smells like.

bendover · Apr 21, 2015

Life support as it works at the Moment i think is Just a place holder,Later i belive there plans for carrying paying passengers or perhapse troops this is where a higher grade of of life support comes into play,The higher the grade the more people can be supported well this is how it should

Sair Aerwyn · Apr 21, 2015

bendover said:
Life support as it works at the Moment i think is Just a place holder,Later i belive there plans for carrying paying passengers or perhapse troops this is where a higher grade of of life support comes into play,The higher the grade the more people can be supported well this is how it should

And I am quite alright with this! In fact, I am hoping this is the case.

PhazonAran said:
What you are talking about is emergency oxygen. The life support system is actually the recycling air thingy, giving you unlimited oxygen while it works right. You have a point, though, when you say that upgrading your life support only increases the amout of emergency oxygen you get. But honestly, what would you want to improve if not that ?

And don't forget you're constantly wearing a space suit !

Also, did you kow that the fact that you can see your helmet better when switching on emergency oxygen is because the air is freezing ? You always have the helmet on, but you can barely see it in normal conditions.

And I mean, I DO understand how life support currently operates, I just feel like if you turn the life support off, the ship should be affected in SOME way. In my mind, if you turn off Life Support you should be forced (in some amount of time) to use your emergency supply since the main system is off and no longer moving air (and heating / cooling it) and with it on, hey - it's working. I find some level of my immersion is broke down when I can just turn off life support, have no impact on my ship or well-being, and save that 4% power for other systems.

Half of me is venting, the other half is trying to say that this is a bug, and life support should turn off when it's off.

SteveLaw · Apr 21, 2015

Sair Aerwyn said:
And I mean, I DO understand how life support currently operates, I just feel like if you turn the life support off, the ship should be affected in SOME way. In my mind, if you turn off Life Support you should be forced (in some amount of time) to use your emergency supply since the main system is off and no longer moving air (and heating / cooling it) and with it on, hey - it's working. I find some level of my immersion is broke down when I can just turn off life support, have no impact on my ship or well-being, and save that 4% power for other systems.

But that's how mine works. If I turn off the Life Support module I switch to emergency oxygen.

Mltdwn · Apr 21, 2015

Ditto here, found that out the hard way when I overloaded my power module.

CMDRJob' · Apr 21, 2015

Same here, tried turning off life support because I wanted to save energy and see what happens, it switches to tank breathing

Sair Aerwyn · Apr 21, 2015

SteveLaw said:
But that's how mine works. If I turn off the Life Support module I switch to emergency oxygen.

Mltdwn said:
Ditto here, found that out the hard way when I overloaded my power module.

HUH. I will have to do more testing. The main test for this argument was me blowing up a friends cockpit and then had hit turn off life support. I feel like that should outright kill you, but only since they don't mention the bottle of air anywhere in the descriptions in the shops for the Life Support.

I will have to check tonight when I go home, but I was pretty sure I turned off my life support while flying in supercruise and never had a timer appear.

PhazonAran · Apr 21, 2015

Sair Aerwyn said:
And I am quite alright with this! In fact, I am hoping this is the case.

And I mean, I DO understand how life support currently operates, I just feel like if you turn the life support off, the ship should be affected in SOME way. In my mind, if you turn off Life Support you should be forced (in some amount of time) to use your emergency supply since the main system is off and no longer moving air (and heating / cooling it) and with it on, hey - it's working. I find some level of my immersion is broke down when I can just turn off life support, have no impact on my ship or well-being, and save that 4% power for other systems.

Half of me is venting, the other half is trying to say that this is a bug, and life support should turn off when it's off.

Weeeeeell... That's exactly how it's working

if you turn off your life support, you DO switch on emergency oxygen.

SteveLaw · Apr 21, 2015

Sair Aerwyn said:
since they don't mention the bottle of air anywhere in the descriptions in the shops for the Life Support.

It doesn't mention "a bottle of air" no...

View attachment 30895

Sair Aerwyn · Apr 21, 2015

And here is where I run into issues with this problem (actually explaining it to people so we are all on the same page - I spent an hour with a friend before he completely understood what I was getting at)

So, what I am getting at is this:

1.) the description of the life support system doesn't talk about an "emergency bottle" and makes it seem like you are upgrading your ships systems (which price reflects and the slot you place the "MODULE") but in actuality you are just buying a bigger "bottle" for emergency reserves.
2.) the bottle works fine with life support off (which is how reality operates) but the ship should also heat up / freeze up without life support. Life support isn't JUST oxygen, it's environment control.
3.) I am fine with being able to have sealed ship and life support off, but like I mentioned, this would cause the air to stale up (faster with more people in the ship or smaller ships) and also to heat up / freeze up. This would require you to turn the Life Support back on to keep yourself alive.

Side Note: I think (agreeing with Garix) that when you have spent some of the bottle for some reason your ships systems should refill. Unless the LIFE SUPPORT IS OFF, which completely backs my argument of the Life Support ON/OFF functions as they are.

My Solution? Keep life support and apply the functions to the heat of the air in the ship, and then make a separate option for the AIR BOTTLE. There will be no confusions about what part is doing what for you, and would make the immersion a bit better. Thoughts?

- - - Updated - - -

SteveLaw said:
It doesn't mention "a bottle of air" no...

View attachment 30895

I'm REALLLLLLLLLY trying hard not to be pedantic about this but "Provides Emergency Resevoir" doesnt translate into "Air Bottle"

Jackie Silver · Apr 21, 2015

SteveLaw said:
It doesn't mention "a bottle of air" no...

View attachment 30895

"For the benefit of the uneducated, I shall translate..."

Remlock is the emergency system. In earlier Elite games it functioned as sedation / suspended animation when you hit the Jump key or used time acceleration.

CMDRJob' · Apr 21, 2015

emergency reservoir would be the bottle wouldnt it?

SteveLaw · Apr 21, 2015

reynols said:
I frequently play around with various life support grades and turning the module on and off. The way I look at it is the life support, the cleaning and circulating of the air in your ship, is the same for all grades of modules. The difference is the reserve air supply.

They also differ in power requirements and mass.

SteveLaw · Apr 21, 2015

Sair Aerwyn said:
1.) the description of the life support system doesn't talk about an "emergency bottle" and makes it seem like you are upgrading your ships systems (which price reflects and the slot you place the "MODULE") but in actuality you are just buying a bigger "bottle" for emergency reserves.
2.) the bottle works fine with life support off (which is how reality operates) but the ship should also heat up / freeze up without life support. Life support isn't JUST oxygen, it's environment control.
3.) I am fine with being able to have sealed ship and life support off, but like I mentioned, this would cause the air to stale up (faster with more people in the ship or smaller ships) and also to heat up / freeze up. This would require you to turn the Life Support back on to keep yourself alive.

I think you are making an issue out of nothing to be honest.

1) We have an emergency reservoir of oxygen. A reservoir would be a bottle or a tank (we can't actually see it so we are extrapolating from the word "reservoir"). Different classes of Life Support have different mass and power requirements. They also come with different sized reservoirs.
2) The description says "habitable ship atmosphere". Heat management is under the control of the power modules and the vents (silent running on/off).
3) How would you demonstrate "stale air" in the game? If you turn off Life Support you switch to a limited emergency supply. This would "require you to turn the Life Support back on to keep yourself alive" (or enter a breathable atmosphere, such as a station or outpost).

Sair Aerwyn · Apr 21, 2015

"I think you are making an issue out of nothing to be honest."

Maybe so.

I just feel like the system could be improved upon and am opening a discussion about it. I see a lot of really great points about how REMLOCK was designed in the ELITE universe and great ways to utilize it, but at the same time I don't want to feel like I am taking advantage of a bug or being unrealistic. If you talk to any of my other gaming friends, Immersion is #1 in my book and I tend to blow gaskets when I feel like something isn't quite right. More often than not I just need to hear some opinions from folks like you all, so thanks!

I personally would like to see a separate module for the air tank, apart from the systems themselves. Costs could be adjusted and this could probably benefit the game in the long term in regards to Multi-Crewed ships and even taking our helmets off (akin to space engineers)

Again, I guess I had a little too 'energy' in my first post, but it's nice to clear cut-straight answers from you all instead of being trashed. See you in space, Commanders!

SteveLaw · Apr 21, 2015

Why would an air tank need a module? It's a small reservoir of oxygen that's inside the cabin. That's like having modules for individual seats and control panels. I understand immersion and I honestly think you are breaking it yourself because you initially misunderstood the way the Life Support and other modules work and that thought is stuck in your mind.

Fly safe commander.

Sair Aerwyn · Apr 21, 2015

When I say module, I mean as in a separate listing in the Internals section of Outfitting for the purpose of upgrading. Sorry for being non-descriptive!