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quote:

Originally posted by Olias7:

My guess is this, though I haven't tested it:

Perhaps when you are getting a high power input from the solar panels, your systems are drawing off of that first, the nuke second, and therefore saving you radine crystals. Perhaps power allocation to the solar reactor affects that somehow.


I had some similar thoughts and tried them out last night.

Just had my ship sit tight for around 15 mins and radine dropped from 1000 to 990.

Turned off solar reactor completly [edit2]and had the ship realigned so the solar input was 0[/edit2], after another 15 mins radine level was 980.

So just to do some kind of confirmation I turned solarpanels up to 10 [edit2]and had the ship realigned so the solar input was 98[/edit2], and waited for yet another 15. Guess what, Radine level 970.

Ok 15 minutes might not be long enough for it to take effect so I'll try again when I have more time on my hands.

[edit]This is harder than an A.Christie novell but my guess is that it has something to do with Resnik and the Nutripak in the Turbolift.

[edit2] See inline text for some minor clarifications.

Other thing to try is to have your ship speed to the max then turning off the engines in ITD and see if radine consumption is the same as if engines are turned on.

Cheers

[ 03-11-2004, 12:42 PM: Message edited by: typhio ]

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One suggestion: (Can't test this myself right now, at work on a slow day).

Rather than turning the solar reactor on/off, turn the ship so that the solar reactor output is zero, see what happens, then turn so its output is 99, see what happens.

The reason I say this is because the solar reactor will provide power even if it has been allocated no power in logistix. Those times I kill the nuke while planetside and power the life support systems solely on s/r output, it powers those systems even while allocated 0 in logistix; for this reason, I don't think turning it on/off is going to produce any difference in your test, at least as far as radine consumption goes.

[ 03-11-2004, 11:47 AM: Message edited by: Olias7 ]

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quote:

Originally posted by Joel Schultz:

quote:

Originally posted by Soul_Apparatus:

It seems to me that if you allocate more power to the solar reactor it creates a lag between the drop in power if you orient yourself away from the systems sun. It's still not very usefull though, execpt in highly specialized situations.

You sure that isn't just the way you turned your ship? The power drops I saw were pretty quick and always to zero after my ship traversed through 90 degrees (I think) of pitch or roll.


Hmmm well now I'm just plain confused. *Shrug* Back to testing.

Edit: I think I may recall having read somewhere that the only things that effect radine consuption are the engine power setting and your engine/reactor combo. Not 100% sure , I'll see if I can find the thread again.

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quote:


Edit: I think I may recall having read somewhere that the only things that effect radine consuption are the engine power setting and your engine/reactor combo. Not 100% sure , I'll see if I can find the thread again.

I think you're right. I could've sworn that was in one of the appendices at one time, in some Battlecruiser version, but can't seem to find it in the UC one.

I'll probably do some more solar reactor poking tonight...

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quote:


I had some similar thoughts and tried them out last night.

Just had my ship sit tight for around 15 mins and radine dropped from 1000 to 990.

Turned off solar reactor completly and had the ship realigned so the solar input was 0, after another 15 mins radine level was 980.

So just to do some kind of confirmation I turned solarpanels up to 10 and had the ship realigned so the solar input was 98, and waited for yet another 15. Guess what, Radine level 970.


I just ran a similar experiment tonight. I ramped up the solar reactor to full 10 units of power. Over a 16 minute period I burned through 10 units radine. Set to 0 power, over 13 minutes I burned through 9 units radine. Roughly, thats about .69 - .75 radine units per minute. That range is OK for the amount of error in my measurements. Still -- I probably should do the runs over a longer time period (30 minutes, perhaps) -- and with engines turned off (see below) -- to tighten up those numbers and ensure that the range is just my experimental error.

I also tried a control step: running up the solar reactor to full 10, but taking away 10 units of power elsewhere. In doing so, I discovered the source of the radine drain. The 10 units of power I took from elsewhere were the launch control -- and main engine.

With the main engine off, radine consumption was zero after 10 minutes.

The only lessons that can be taken away from this are (a) the engine/reactor combo is a radine hog and (B) the solar reactor does not seem to have any bearing at all on radine consumption.

Which, if memory serves, is what some manual or appendix said regarding (a) somewhere, sometime...

Drat. Back to square one again.

You know, I'm going to cry if I find out that this is some inside joke of SC's -- a feature that was meant to be, but never was, implemented...since BC3K...even though he's had years to put it in... I guess that sounds kind of ludicrous, huh? I must be getting tired.

Let's try this. Here's a list of all the facts I know about the solar reactor.

1. Solar reactor provides power, regardless of power setting in Logistix.

2. Solar reactor power seems to follow ship orientation to solar source.

3. Logistix displays "reactor power" and "reactor output" for both solar and nuclear reactors.

Hm. Now there's an interesting implication. That it separates "power" from "output" would imply that the two quantities could differ. I never really paid attention to that detail before -- only the min/max/current/available numbers at the end.

I suppose this means we need to define what those two guys mean. Since "output" is used also in "current power output" I would take that to be what power is actually dumping onto the electric grid. So that leaves "power".

I'm getting tired, so I'll have to wait for tomorrow (wait, it is tomorrow) to test this out. But maybe "power" refers to maximum available power that the reactor could produce. "Output" could theoretically be less due to damage. Easily testable -- I just joyride a fire and shoot up my ship some around the engines -- that ought to do some reactor damage. That or wander into a firefight shields down for a minute before getting out of there.

Of course, if that's the difference between them, it still doesn't answer the question of what the power setting for the solar reactor in Logistix is.

Drat it. I can probably cook up experiments all night -- and none of them will answer that question. If there's an answer to this question, there's got to be an experiment that would reveal it. I just can't think of one right now.

Anyone else have anything to report? I hope we figure this one out soon; I swear my profile will get promoted to the next rank from the number of posts I'm putting in this thread if we don't catch a break...

[ 03-12-2004, 01:47 AM: Message edited by: Joel Schultz ]

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Well I looked in the manual page 40 - last sentence and that implies something about distance to solar source, as in my view of it not the same as alignement towards the same source.

Guess this time that'll be poked around with later is something like.

Sol <--> Ship * logistix setting = extracted power.

In words:

Take the distance between the ship and the source. Put it in some mathematical algoritm with the logistix settings and that equels how much power is extracted.

Could be alot more factors involved but I'll play around in that direction until SC points us towards the obvious direction

[edit] LOL

Found myself in space and can't for the life of it locate the source (other than a very bright nebula) in any other means than alignment. My whole theory went down the drain in less than a minute. Well i'm a beginner and I can make mistakes like that!

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quote:


Found myself in space and can't for the life of it locate the source (other than a very bright nebula) in any other means than alignment.

Actually, if you get to 99% output, then pitch 90 degrees up, notice the lens flare. Eventually, it centers and the screen whites out a bit. Presumably that's a star, and the source.

Yeah I'm with you on waiting for a hint from SC. I'm so clueless on this one some of my theories are starting to border on halucinogenic.

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Just ran my own dangerous test

I wanted to see if you can run the ship ENTIRELY without the reactor.

It is possible to run the ship entirely with the solar panals running. However you still need the reactor in order to jump anywhere.

2nd However is that without the reactor, and with about 70% in Solar Panal's you can basicly run the ship without it. Weapons, Tactical and such STILL work but once you move out of 70% then systems start shutting down by priorty (which is reverse from the repair priorty, meaning all lesser systems shut down first before important systems)

Try it if you'd like

Personaly the only time I use the solar panals is when I arrive in a system and an going to ambush a fleet, since I'll be there for awhile I was would rather conserve Radine

The engine is the main radine guzzler, the reactor just transforms that Radine into fuel FOR the engine. Without the reactor you can't jump, without the engine you can't jump.. Thats why if you have the engines off no Radine is spent (for me anyway), but if its on then its spent

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"E6"

"You sank my Battlecruiser!"

.

.

.

Actually, that's what I just tried. Thinking that maybe involuntary shutdown of the reactor would have an effect on solar reactor behavior, I plopped my cruiser down in the middle of the ocean. After about two minutes, it started to pitch wildly, then kind of pointed nose up and sank below the waters. While it was undergoing these radical orientation changes, the solar reactor meter varied wildly. But once it settled to the sea floor (beached) the output stabilized at about 78 -- again due to its orientation. Messing with the Logistix power setting had no discernable effect.

After about a half hour my ship blew up. Shuttles seem to have limited underwater maneuvering capabilities, but it's hard to get them not to go into "float" mode. That makes it hard to rescue a ship sunk in, say, 7000 ft of water. Next time I try this I'll have to do it closer to the coast in shallower water (it took my AE 8 minutes or so to swim to the surface where I had commanded a shuttle to put down -- the AI didn't seem to be able to figure out that it needed to go underwater to tow my ship).

Another aside: ocean water must be ridiculously clean in 3030AD, since the solar reactor got that much sunlight in 7000 ft of water

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Well, there -is- light that gets down that deep in the ocean...it's just not in the visable spectrum. I think evertything on the UV side down disperses the farther you go (hense the water being blue in appearance), with only light on the IR side surviving down there.

So, maybe solar reactors in UC can use more than just visable spectrum light...or maybe I need to stop drinking the water on base.

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quote:


Originally posted by Joel Schultz:

the AI didn't seem to be able to figure out that it needed to go underwater to tow my ship).


Shuttles float above water - they don't travel under water. So you should tow your CC before it sinks below the water level.

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quote:


Originally posted by Supreme Cmdr:

quote:

Originally posted by Joel Schultz:

the AI didn't seem to be able to figure out that it needed to go underwater to tow my ship).


Shuttles float above water - they don't travel under water. So you should tow your CC before it sinks below the water level.


.....still no hints or tips...?
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quote:


Originally posted by Supreme Cmdr:

quote:

Originally posted by Joel Schultz:

the AI didn't seem to be able to figure out that it needed to go underwater to tow my ship).


Shuttles float above water - they don't travel under water.


True, true... Except when you use the invincibility cheat Using that you can get an afterburner-powered power-dive into the ocean with enough velocity to crack you into the sea-floor, at which point your shuttle taxis and can be driven around until you use VTOL to take off and it begins a slow, boring float the surface. Normally, that kind of power dive will kill you.


Back on topic, I'm still no further ahead on the solar reactor project.

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Have you tried it in space yet? Cause that's where I do all my experiment,

only a fool would do his experiments on earth, and put his crew in such danger

Yes, as you can see I value my crew more than anything else.. Hey what do you expect, after a week on this profile you get attached to you're crew

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quote:

Originally posted by Supreme Cmdr:

quote:

Originally posted by Joel Schultz:

the AI didn't seem to be able to figure out that it needed to go underwater to tow my ship).


Shuttles float above water - they don't travel under water. So you should tow your CC before it sinks below the water level.


BRILLIANT!!
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I've stopped trying due to a problem with the game launch and mainly because I cannot figure anything else to try.....

Any helps from the higher ranks...?

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I'm still stuck. The only thing I can think of at this point is waiting around to upgrade the main reactor. The thing is, that's a nuclear upgrade that wouldn't seem to have anything to do with solar power.

One interesting thing about the solar reactor is that none of the main comp systems work when it is on -- apparently, their power grid is tied exclusively to the NRE. Kind of stinks if you are in a pinch and radar is out. But that may not have anything to do with anything.

The problem with this issue is that in a simulation as in-depth as UC, sometimes trying to figure out what effect one input has is difficult because there's just too many outputs that can distract or mislead. A "needle in the haystack".

Of course, I'm not saying it's not possible that I'm being completely boneheaded and am overlooking an Insurgent EFM sitting on the haystack chuckling with a sticky note with the answer pasted on his forehead while I'm searching the haystack...

Help?

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My new video card just got in today so once I log into the game for the first time here in about 30 mins, I won't be comming back out for a few eons. But....damn, this is interesting...

How about some insight, SC? The book that came with the game seems alittle skimpy (compared to actually playing the game). Drop us a cookie!

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