Post by goduranus on Oct 16, 2016 14:15:00 GMT
Starting a thread to share random design tips I found while playing this game:
Materials:
Boron- A surprisingly good material to build almost everything, cheap, light, strong, blocks radiation, and high melting point
Good for cannon barrels, rocket nozzles, propellant tanks, missile-launcher coolant pumps, power plant coolant pumps, radiation shields that double as armor
Thrusters:
All stock thrusters can be severly downsized to a couple of hundred kgs at most without losing thrust power, doing this on custom ships is a major weight saving
Pyroplytic Carbon is the best neutron reflector for nuclear engines for its good ability to block radiation combined with high melting point
Fluorine-methane is the best chemical thruster, though this is highly unrealistic, hot fluorine probably is gonna eat through the piping in minutes.
Decane is the best propellant for nuclear thruster on an armored ship, it's got a lower Isp than methane but it's more dense, so you need less armor to cover the ship
Hydrogen Deuteride is the best propellant for nuclear thrusters if the ship is unarmored, ideally, you'd have a tanker that burns Hydrogen Deuteride for itself, but carries Decane for your warships. I found the a reasonably good ratio in weight of Hydrogen Deuteride to Decane carried by tankers to be 4:3
Resistojet isn't worth it unless put on a laser ship that already has a lot of power and weight invested in radiators, when used, its best fuel is Decane
Plasma thrusters aren't worth it on any ship
Fuel Tanks:
I never had a fuel tank get hit and not get punctured regardless of thickness, might as well just use the thinnest walls and build them out of Boron
Cannons:
Always put cannons on turrets, having the whole ship turn to aim the gun is a waste of fuel
Because range is based on size and muzzle velocity is a diminishing return, it's better to build smaller cannons and put them on small drones than big cannons on big drones
Because rate of fire is a diminishing return, and faster reload needs more weight, it's better to build slower reload cannons and field more of them than fast reload cannons
Aim for muzzle velocity of 2.3km/s, reload of around 60ms, turret radius of 15cms, and a weight of 30kgs
Railguns:
Zirconium copper is the best material for rails
Coilguns:
Right now these are bugged and are overpowered
Missile and drone launchers:
You can set the engagement range of missile launchers, and this will force a battle when an enemy enters into this range, so you can put a light dummy missile launcher on your missiles/drones/ship if you want battle to start at this range instead of the default range
With an efficient coolant you can save weight by having a smaller coolant pump, the best coolant is Sodium
You can tweak the reload rate of missiles by changing the coolant pump size and RPM, make the pump smaller if you need a longer reload so your missiles don't collide with one another
Decoys:
Iridium is the best slowing compound I've found to extend flare lifetime.
Warheads:
TNT+Pyroplytic Carbon seems to be the best slow explosive in nukes
Powerplants:
You can get equivalent output of stock power generators with about 1/4 the weight
U-233 dioxide is the best fuel for Fission generators
Boron is the best neutron reflector
Ethane seems to be the coolant, with ethane you can save weight by using a smaller pump
Neutron reflectors are heavy, on power generators meant for dronesremove the neutron reflector to save weight
Radiation Shield:
Polyethlene seems to be the best material for stopping radiation
Armor:
According to blothorn and others, Silica Aerogel is the best material for stopping nukes and lasers, need about 3-5cm to last a reasonable amount of time
If you don't like the black look of Silica Aerogel, just add a 0.5mm layer of something else on top, it only weights like 10 kilograms to gild the whole ship
Materials:
Boron- A surprisingly good material to build almost everything, cheap, light, strong, blocks radiation, and high melting point
Good for cannon barrels, rocket nozzles, propellant tanks, missile-launcher coolant pumps, power plant coolant pumps, radiation shields that double as armor
Thrusters:
All stock thrusters can be severly downsized to a couple of hundred kgs at most without losing thrust power, doing this on custom ships is a major weight saving
Pyroplytic Carbon is the best neutron reflector for nuclear engines for its good ability to block radiation combined with high melting point
Fluorine-methane is the best chemical thruster, though this is highly unrealistic, hot fluorine probably is gonna eat through the piping in minutes.
Decane is the best propellant for nuclear thruster on an armored ship, it's got a lower Isp than methane but it's more dense, so you need less armor to cover the ship
Hydrogen Deuteride is the best propellant for nuclear thrusters if the ship is unarmored, ideally, you'd have a tanker that burns Hydrogen Deuteride for itself, but carries Decane for your warships. I found the a reasonably good ratio in weight of Hydrogen Deuteride to Decane carried by tankers to be 4:3
Resistojet isn't worth it unless put on a laser ship that already has a lot of power and weight invested in radiators, when used, its best fuel is Decane
Plasma thrusters aren't worth it on any ship
Fuel Tanks:
I never had a fuel tank get hit and not get punctured regardless of thickness, might as well just use the thinnest walls and build them out of Boron
Cannons:
Always put cannons on turrets, having the whole ship turn to aim the gun is a waste of fuel
Because range is based on size and muzzle velocity is a diminishing return, it's better to build smaller cannons and put them on small drones than big cannons on big drones
Because rate of fire is a diminishing return, and faster reload needs more weight, it's better to build slower reload cannons and field more of them than fast reload cannons
Aim for muzzle velocity of 2.3km/s, reload of around 60ms, turret radius of 15cms, and a weight of 30kgs
Railguns:
Zirconium copper is the best material for rails
Coilguns:
Right now these are bugged and are overpowered
Missile and drone launchers:
You can set the engagement range of missile launchers, and this will force a battle when an enemy enters into this range, so you can put a light dummy missile launcher on your missiles/drones/ship if you want battle to start at this range instead of the default range
With an efficient coolant you can save weight by having a smaller coolant pump, the best coolant is Sodium
You can tweak the reload rate of missiles by changing the coolant pump size and RPM, make the pump smaller if you need a longer reload so your missiles don't collide with one another
Decoys:
Iridium is the best slowing compound I've found to extend flare lifetime.
Warheads:
TNT+Pyroplytic Carbon seems to be the best slow explosive in nukes
Powerplants:
You can get equivalent output of stock power generators with about 1/4 the weight
U-233 dioxide is the best fuel for Fission generators
Boron is the best neutron reflector
Ethane seems to be the coolant, with ethane you can save weight by using a smaller pump
Neutron reflectors are heavy, on power generators meant for dronesremove the neutron reflector to save weight
Radiation Shield:
Polyethlene seems to be the best material for stopping radiation
Armor:
According to blothorn and others, Silica Aerogel is the best material for stopping nukes and lasers, need about 3-5cm to last a reasonable amount of time
If you don't like the black look of Silica Aerogel, just add a 0.5mm layer of something else on top, it only weights like 10 kilograms to gild the whole ship
