cogblap v0.98 | beta testing will be happening occasionally

[Cogwerks]

Instead of trying to make it feel more like gas research instead of a bomb lab, why make it so there are other uses for it than making bombs? So that actually conducting research could benefit the station. Perhaps it could be made to generate some power for the station if it gets hot enough or enough pressure is built up inside. I kind of have always been disappointed with how toxins was, I mean the station is technically a plasma research station, but the only research with done with plasma is to make bombs. My suggestions are usually awful so I'll leave it at that, but your ideas sound like they will be a good improvement.

The point of this stuff is that plasma can be used to great effect in the new engine, I posted that on the SA thread but I guess I forgot to write that here.

Toxins researchers can research how gases react to eachother, what generates a lot of heat, what generates a lot of pressure, etc and then deliver both information and gas canisters to the engineers. The new engine can generate absolutely ludicrous levels of power if you cooperate with the Toxins staff or apply that knowledge the right way, but the margin of safety is very narrow.
You have to know how your gas mixtures are going to behave and plan around it.

Make Plasma Research integral to getting the best engineering mixes. Give them some basic supplies to get a decent mix going, but if Research doesn't get to work mixing gasses into better and better mixes, the engine won't last too long. Maybe certain mixes give lower but more sustained power, while you can make some that will flash and burn out incredibly quickly but send a massive jolt through the system for emergency situations. This is probably already a thing.

All of this happens already. There are a ton of ways to configure the new engine and your gas mixtures for the combustion chamber and coolant pipes are both super important. Different configurations can have wildly different effects. Really shitty mixes won't make any power, some experimental mixes can generate significant power at room temperature, some will run nice and safely for a long time with no maintenance, and some arrangements are so finicky that the threshold between enormous power output and the destruction of the engineering sector are razor thin.

The engineers have a limited amount of gases to start with. If they want more, they'll have to ask the Toxins lab for prepared combustibles and/or coolant mixtures, or pester the QMs or Miners to get more fuel that way. Or start feeding corpses and junk into the engine.

To really unlock the full potential of the new engine, both as a power source and as a hilariously lethal weapon, you have to be fairly good at bomb science or work with someone who is.