Mod Brainstorming

I wanted to make space pirate ships but wood isn't a material choice. I guess you could add that.

I've been toying with the idea of doing a mod based on the Expanse series. Looks a lot more possible now that I discovered the "black box" functionality in the game, since the Epstein drive in that setting is, as I understand it, borderline impossible in real life.

Perhaps an Epstein drive is cheap enough that you can afford to throw one away with every torpedo? I mean if underfunded belters can afford to run one to haul ice from Saturn back to the belt (Remember the Cant!), and the Mormons are building a freaking generation ship to go to another star system (!) then presumably the Martian navy can afford some pretty fancy missiles.

Having wood in the game would be neat and quirky. Also having whatever the main tether of a space elevator is made from as a material would be nice. Fusion drives of every fusion type would be cool. From D-T to D-D to D-He3. With the choice of having them either normal fusion powered plasma drives with something else as propellant or fusion torch drives riding the fusion reaction open to space. I'd love to have D-He3 fusion craft cruising around and/or capable of about 1G of accelaration with a few hundred km/s of delta V, with drones that use fusion plasma drives and zip about at 10G for maneuvers to keep lasers, defensive missiles, and drones off of them, and more expensive warheaded missiles can use the better fusion plasma drive to better deliver that more expensive warhead.

For warheads, X-Ray Laser warheads would be certainly awesome. I am still shocked to find a lack of shaped nukes in game, a very proven tech in real life that would have to be the primary offensive warhead for efficient delivery of the nuclear energies to target. It'd be like flak in the way it dlivers itself, but that's all the nuke energy focused in that cone instead of just some metal bits. And what about thermite flak or plasma flak?

Lasers! For the most part the lasers are fantastic, but it looks like they only ever hit with small spot size regardless of distance and there is no shining the laser to heat a whole area. Lasers would be great at cooking radiators from a distance. Or am I seeing things a bit wrong here? Why do I bring up lasers in the mod section? Because along with the super materials and super engines mentioned earlier, along with the not so super warheads that should already exist, laser dynamics in the game need to be improved followed by mods for better lasers made from their own super materials. They'd still probably not be much better than 25-50% efficient, but 25% of 10 megawatts kept steady on a 10m area of a ship as you close distance would be fantastic. Granted they could do the same to you, but my main ship being a little crispy is alright while the 10G drones rush in to do real damage.

And drones armed with backup warheads makes way too much sense as well. After running out of ammo or becoming disabled just pop the warhead clear, gyro aim, and BAM hit the bastards with a shaped charge for daring to destroy the drone.

I thought that fusion reactors would be nice for power but when I thought about it the main advantage of fusion (for a spacecraft) is that it has an insane energy density. But 1kg of uranium is already so energy rich that the fact that you can carry centuries of fuel vs just a few years of fuel is not that important in the game. A plasma or gas core fission reactor with a magnetohydrodynamic generator will be powerful enough for anything that expects to only run for less than a century.

For thrusters though, a 1,000km/s exhaust velocity will be killer even if the fuel (and also reaction mass) is D-T.
An antimatter thruster with a 100,000km/s exahst velocity would be cool but the antimatter tanks will be kill you on their terrible mass ratio.

In case of antimatter containment breach you eject the antimatter container. Then just avoid the drift of anti-matter in that area until a magnetic scoop can pick it back up or the soft glow of billions of atomic annihilation on the surface of a rock lets you know it settled somewhere and is gone forever.

Hmm i just think about something close to Honor Harrington Universe. Long range fight with missles, close range they use "Grasers", kind of a gamma ray laser. And mostly mounted in broadside configuration. Ok, engines there are working with changing gravity and so they have real high accelleration, but without that it should work.

Warheads used are nukes or laser warheads, using some laser filament and a directed nuke to utilize the x-rays for laser pumping.


Annother universe would be "The lost fleet" by Jack Cambell, Ships there are faster, up to 20% light speed. Weapons are Missles and some kind of particle accelerator. Also they use two kinds of kinetic weapons, one "shotgun style" for space combat and kinetic projectiles for planetary bombardment.