Power Transmission Laser Feedback

[Vitatroll]

$100,000 credits per tick almost feels underwhelming for 999 TW of transfer.


Of course we ended up rolling the generator beyond any of the prefixes, so I guess that's to be expected

That does seem a bit underwhelming

I think it's reasonable. I haven't engineered in a while, but getting 999tw before round end is possible with even an unprimed hellburn, given the longer rounds we seem to be having. That's already more money than you can spend unless you're just buying all of the stocks or plan on giving everybody an artypod with limitless ammo.

Grek: What the shit? I can understand holding the station's power for ransom, but to cut the SMES so they can get an extra 750kw of power to the PTL is worthy of having them drug through the station in straightjackets while being ridiculed and pelted with things.

[Zamujasa]

I don't know where you're seeing 1PW coming out of the engine. Every round I've observed so far rarely has an engine make it into the GW range, even with people who know what they're doing setting up the engine.

Seems logical to me cause nowhere on Earth could possibly need that much power. Despite what right-wingers believe, the economy does run off demand and not supply.

Considering what happens when someone happens to walk in front of a fully-powered beam, I would start arguing that the mysterious long-range power receiver probably isn't planning on using it strictly for power. That Syndicate cutting beam comes from somewhere.

[Hortford]

There's recently been a trend of engineers setting up the engine, then cutting power to the SMES so they can make more money with the PTL.

Could we not do that?

I think that was me. I was a miscreant with the mission of going on a strike and not doing my job, but I decided to set up the engine to get money from the PTL. I asked for money and better working conditions and ended up arrested twice or something.

[Nurdock]

I don't know where you're seeing 1PW coming out of the engine. Every round I've observed so far rarely has an engine make it into the GW range, even with people who know what they're doing setting up the engine.

Nah, it'll generally hit about 1TW, a standard hellburn gets to 1GW in roughly 25 mins.

Have to say 100k is more reasonable though, is used to be at a rate of 1 credit per MW which translates to about a billion credits a second at max output, which is way way more than anyone could possibly use.

[mozi]

There's recently been a trend of engineers setting up the engine, then cutting power to the SMES so they can make more money with the PTL.

Could we not do that?

the heads of staff should simply respond by firing them all. Out of a pod bay.

generally I wish there were a mechanic to better track down and allow mob punishment of engineers when they screw up. sadly they usually are off in the depths of space before people wise up

[Zamujasa]

I guess something that would be nice: Add fields on the PTL indicating the current earnings rate and the total earnings of the PTL components. I often get asked as AI to see what the PTL is generating and it can be a bit of a pain to look back and forth, especially when micromanaging it. On that note it was mentioned that the PTL earnings rate wasn't linear. What kind of curve is it? It seems like one that rises steeply and then tops out slowly, since 100 TW seemed to bring in over $10,000 (with multiple engineers) when 999 TW brings in $100,000 flat.


I would also suggest modifying the beam so that it isn't half-transparent until the very highest levels; maybe make it fully opaque after 10 MW and start cycling through the colors at every further power of ten. Up to and including ultraviolet and invisible-to-human-eye

[Vitatroll]

I'd like a color shift too if that were possible. The alpha bit is cool looking, I really appreciate the work on that, but you still can't really tell if the laser will ash you or just give you a mild sunburn for the most part.

Here's a dump of the last three engines I set up on 4, along with some other stuff I didn't mean to add but oh well: http://imgur.com/a/tU489

They should be in order. I hope anyways. Ah, a note on that last setup. I said I screwed up in the can switching, but a solar flare knocked out pump control which meant the engine dropped from around 1.7pw to 150tw before it started to rise again. Boo.

[Midaychi]

See, first you have to take into account the power loss from such a beam, then take into account that with enough energy you can synthesize matter, and you get shy nt might want all this energy. You could use it to print out and synthesize all sorts of exotic matter and antimatter, do all sorts of high energy crazy science experiments and bluespace cracking, and power the ceos planet sized spa and lounge party zone.

[wharrgarbl]

it feels really, really strange to have things built on glitches (hellburn)

[Xeram]

generally I wish there were a mechanic to better track down and allow mob punishment of engineers when they screw up. sadly they usually are off in the depths of space before people wise up

We refer to it as that little warning that appears if the engine isn't running and asking the AI.

Ah. The good ol' days of forming lynch mobs and hunting down the shitty engineers whenever they fail to start the singularity, then tossing them inside the tiny generator room as we turn it on. :freep:

[Sex_Robot]

it feels really, really strange to have things built on glitches (hellburn)

[Vitatroll]

it feels really, really strange to have things built on glitches (hellburn)

Yeah. Like strafe-jumping in Quake, or combos and cancelling is Street Fighter, or the whole GTA series.

[BlackPhoenix]

The Idea was brought up on a round last night, once everybody had infinite money but the station was beginning to lose power, that the station should be able to buy power from other PTLs.

[Lcass123]

Maybe have power outputs for above 999 Tera watts? I almost managed to get to an exowatt and I would hope that the PTL would just sort of go crazy and begin tearing apart space time etc , randomly spawning the time space wormholes , setting people within range of the beam on fire and maybe spawning portals bringing demons and stuff at really high power levels (like exa watt levels). Also what is happening with the lens idea? It would be really cool if they were constructable allowing traitors to tear through station walls with them (if that isn't a feature please add it) and split the beam providing a monster beam of death down a hallway.

[medsal15]

Maybe have power outputs for above 999 Tera watts? I almost managed to get to an exowatt and I would hope that the PTL would just sort of go crazy and begin tearing apart space time etc , randomly spawning the time space wormholes , setting people within range of the beam on fire and maybe spawning portals bringing demons and stuff at really high power levels (like exa watt levels). Also what is happening with the lens idea? It would be really cool if they were constructable allowing traitors to tear through station walls with them (if that isn't a feature please add it) and split the beam providing a monster beam of death down a hallway.

We will need mirors.