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Post by slayernz on Mar 17, 2011 18:16:47 GMT -5
there could be a ship upgrade: "Ring-Ice Extraction Scoop"
"This upgrade allows you to extract ice crystals when orbiting around ringed planets."
There is a, say, 80% chance of collecting a quantity of fuel-water per turn when in orbit around a ringed planet.
Modifiers should be pilot skill level, hull size, nbr of engines.
There definitely should be increased risk because, let's face it, you're flying close to, or through the rings of a planet, so there's a possibility that the rocks making up the ring could cause some panel damage. Still worth it if you can gain say 2 - 8 units of water fuel per turn (week)
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spike
Exemplar
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Post by spike on Mar 17, 2011 18:31:19 GMT -5
Maybe, but that would then give rise to calls for "Water Extraction Pump" that has the same effect, but you can use it anywhere on Wilds.
In other words, if Water - Fuel is just water, or just refined or purified water... well, it just isn't, or the game does not make much sense. Water - Fuel is (for example) nano-filtered tritium hydroxide in a perfectly aligned 9-dimensional holographic matrix, with the personal autograph of the Grand High Chapeuxlian of Cadar written in strange-quark quantum-ink on the outside shell of every atomic nucleus.
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Post by Cory Trese on Mar 17, 2011 20:04:55 GMT -5
spike -- nano-filtered tritium hydroxide nice =) The concept has been based around the "activated water" concept I remembered from school. Really pure water doesn't collect imaginary ST RPG quantum fizzle sizzle (deadly stuff!) the same way dirty planet water does. I like this upgrade suggestion.
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Post by oldalchemist on Mar 18, 2011 9:14:11 GMT -5
Gas giants also attract aliens and pirates, don't they? Maybe you don't even need an added danger for water harvesting. Being in that space is bad enough.
Water/Fuel....so are we burning it or drinking it? I'd assume that the harvesting process is mostly doing the purification and filtering part of turning it into fuel or potable water, else you could just dip it for free anywhere.
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spike
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Post by spike on Mar 18, 2011 10:42:41 GMT -5
Technically a nano-modified, radioactively stabilised form of tritium oxide (T2O), space crew and Captains alike refer to it simply as "Water-fuel".
Water-fuel is a stable, liquid form of tritium, suitable for easy handling and storage. The tritium is consumed in the ship's reactors and engines through various types of nuclear fusion reaction.
The heavy isotope also makes it highly suitable for use in solar sail applications. Solar sails are deployed by pumping water-fuel into kilometers-long microfilament structures, and retracted by pumping the water-fuel back out of the sails and into the tanks. In a deployed Solar sail, the massive, actively-energised tritium isotope interacts dynamically with the solar radiation, absorbing the energy and then re-radiating the energy in an amplified and directed form, giving greatly increased thrust.
For centuries, spacers from all quadrants have always strongly believed the tradition that drinking water fuel is the only sure way to protect themselves from radiation, space sickness, inertia madness, and other grim hazards of the void. While the medical and scientific grounds for this might be doubted, the firm belief in the tradition amongst spacers is unshakeable. There is no surer way to break the morale of a space crew, than to withdraw their daily rations of water-fuel.
Decades of drinking the slightly corrosive and slightly radioactive liquid is what gives old space hands their characteristic greying skin and reddish eyes, the look of the "space ghoul". The harsh, acid-smelling breath of the old space-dog is a badge of honour among those who ply the darkness between the stars.
While it is possible to collect tritiated water in raw form from certain astronomical objects, such as tritium-oxygen asteroids or gas giant rings, ship's Engineers will avoid putting such unrefined fuel into their engines unless there is no other choice. Spacers too prefer to fuel their bodies with the refined fuel, fearing that dangerous "void spirits" may be present in raw water-fuel.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tritiated_water (aka "super-heavy water")
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Post by jerry on Mar 23, 2011 7:47:17 GMT -5
Awesome work Spike! I wish it was in the game in form of a flavor text rumor (as long as it goes along the line of Creator's thinking). That should change the common knowledge of fuel as a regular water. Or perhaps change the name to Super Heavy Water-Fuel or something like that? There's also nice wiki about tritium, which says that it costs $US30,000 per gram. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tritium |
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spike
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Post by spike on Mar 23, 2011 10:59:09 GMT -5
jerry, thanks. I said to ehkamp she could include it in the manual, if Cory is ok with it. For me this flavour text resolves a lot of questions about water-fuel. It doesn't quite explain how you can pick up water-fuel for free on Wild worlds. But then the flavour text of water-fuel recovery covers that, it is usually referred to as 'abandoned barrels' or similar.
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Post by Cory Trese on Mar 23, 2011 18:50:17 GMT -5
oldalchemist -- this is brilliant. maybe doing a "Patrol" on a dead planet gives you water fuel? Also, that has the "double alien" flag on it ... hehehe ... so I do like the idea of lots of Captains saying "a dead planet ... well, we're low on fuel ... we'll risk it."
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Post by slayernz on Mar 23, 2011 22:48:33 GMT -5
Good thing that the USD is so low in value right now - makes the SHWF more affordable  I like the concept of flying around a dead planet for water and having a higher risk of getting blatted by an alien. |
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Post by oldalchemist on Mar 25, 2011 10:55:01 GMT -5
I'd rather see water/fuel from gas giants.
Dead planets are terrestrial worlds, aren't they?
Question: Are the atmospheres on Wild worlds breathable? I'm assuming worlds with an Urban center are somewhat 'earth normal' and that Dead planets are either without an atmosphere or without a breathable atmosphere.
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