Note: This module would fit in an armour module bay, as described in this other suggestion by me: Move Defensive Modules to Dedicated Slots
As far as we-the-players know, the majority of a ship's thermal characteristics are determines by its "thermal capacity". This determines how quickly a ship heats up, and how quickly the ship can get rid of "thermal units". The rate a ship "cools" (how quickly the percent gauge goes down) appears to be universal across all ships, but since that percentage is referring to different capacities, the rate ships get rid of thermal units varies.
My proposed module would increase the thermal capacity of a ship, but not affect the cooling rates. The idea is that it's giving you more places to store built-up heat, but is still limited by the design of the ship on how quickly it can get rid of said heat. Bigger modules would add more thermal capacity, similar to hull reinforcement packages. The effect of fitting these modules would be your ship's temperature gauge taking longer to go up, but also taking longer to go down. It would allow silent running ships to extend the amount of time they can safely keep their heat vents shut, but at the cost of potentially taking longer to get their heat back down. It would also be very helpful for explorers, as it would give them more time safely "deep scooping" from a star.
As far as we-the-players know, the majority of a ship's thermal characteristics are determines by its "thermal capacity". This determines how quickly a ship heats up, and how quickly the ship can get rid of "thermal units". The rate a ship "cools" (how quickly the percent gauge goes down) appears to be universal across all ships, but since that percentage is referring to different capacities, the rate ships get rid of thermal units varies.
My proposed module would increase the thermal capacity of a ship, but not affect the cooling rates. The idea is that it's giving you more places to store built-up heat, but is still limited by the design of the ship on how quickly it can get rid of said heat. Bigger modules would add more thermal capacity, similar to hull reinforcement packages. The effect of fitting these modules would be your ship's temperature gauge taking longer to go up, but also taking longer to go down. It would allow silent running ships to extend the amount of time they can safely keep their heat vents shut, but at the cost of potentially taking longer to get their heat back down. It would also be very helpful for explorers, as it would give them more time safely "deep scooping" from a star.
