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Space Engineers >  Workshop > 2cm's Workshop > 2cm Beam System > Discussions
2cm Beam System
Description Discussions15 Comments692 Change Notes
overwerk 26 May, 2019 @ 6:38am
laser and ION cross grid transmission
So i saw a bunch of comments speaking of ways tp transfer laser energy from one grid to another without frying it, and i decided to give my two cents on the matter.

i think the idea of power transfer can be very useful, and could use the framework already existing for the laser antenna to work.

there would be 2 types, an ION or a laser, which would work the same way but change in size and possible transmission angle (with the laser being able to receive just like a laser antenna, and the ION only being granted limited gimbal).

the transmitter would convert the energy received into radio waves and send them to the receptor (that way the beam does not need to be visible which lowers performance cost and script complexity). upon reception the beam is transformed back into either a laser or ion beam with a inefficiency.

the ticker is that the inefficiency is constant, and not a percentage of the energy transmitted. this means that it is much more effective to transmit a powerful beam than to transmit a weak one. for lasers it just means that you got to have a bunch of generators to make sure the beam is reasonably strong, but for IONS it means you have to use a charge loop much the way you would use a regular lON weapon, and beam the energy in burst to whatever weapon you want to power up.

on the positive side it allows ships and stations to use relatively large laser-based weapons without suffering the size and power consumption required for the grid to charge it. but it means the grid is limited in its movement and is utterly dependent on another ship or installation for its ability to fire the weapon.

for laser, I reckon it will probably be more useful to supercharge the laser weapons of a relatively small craft like a corvette or a gunship, using laser power from a mothership to fire an output of energy to conceivable for a ship of this size, while ION beams would work better for artillery ships drawing power from a much larger fleet carrier, or orbital defense fleets drawing power from a planetary installation.
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Showing 1-15 of 21 comments
skrungl 26 May, 2019 @ 8:57am 
I agree, having a way to transfer power between grids without a block connection would be cool. It'd be neat to just shoot a laser into a block that would charge your ships batteries from a long range.
#1
overwerk 26 May, 2019 @ 12:29pm 
yeah i guess that could be made with another receiver type, which would make it 3. 2 output arrays, for laser or ION, and 3 input arrays, being one for generating a laser, one for generating an ION beam, and one for transforming the microwaves into raw power, or that could be done by using another block to transform laser or ION beams back power.
#2
Soren MC 26 May, 2019 @ 1:35pm 
I think he could achieve this by simply increasing the range at wich the ion beam or laser will use a combiner instead of destroying it
#3
Master engineer 26 May, 2019 @ 5:05pm 
btw I was one of the first people who suggested the energy transfer , I commented with a sibling account , anyway I do agree with the system of antenna type of transfer for a more stable use in multiplayer so you don’t accidentally cut friendly ships in half , but I also have an alternative idea or another system that can be used. So my idea is a laser focuser and unfocuser (bad English) so how it would work is you have a beam going into a laser unfocusing machine and the beam would be a slower wider beam , not as focused so you could see through the beam somewhat. And this beam would emit like normal except it would not do damage as it’s sole purpose would be to shoot beams to other grids / same grid over longer distances. And when it would come into contact with a beam focuser it converts this slow , fat and unfocused beam into a usable beam that does damage and can be used as normal
#4
Master engineer 26 May, 2019 @ 5:06pm 
I might make this idea into a post as well
#5
zachiyo123 26 May, 2019 @ 11:15pm 
I also had a very similar idea to use a longer range and safe beam with a "sender" and a "receiver" set of blocks which I think should also be a bit larger than there normal beam counterparts, although there wouldn't really be much of a way to distinguish between the many beams. I also think that a beam would be more interesting with it requiring line of sight and alignment, I also believe it would add a lot both functionally and tactically. It being safe could allow it to be blocked by an enemy if they can intercept the path which may lead to some interesting scenarios among many others that a beam would present.
#6
overwerk 27 May, 2019 @ 12:17am 
the reason why i'm speaking about laser antennas and converting the flux into invisible microwaves is because of render and loading in multiplayer. if the thing rely on a laser then the communication may not be possible until the ship is streamed into local space, and considering streaming distances on servers range from 2 to 8 km, we are here far closer than what ranges the energy transfer could actually be usefull at. i mean, why do an energy transfer when you are litteraly in fire range of the base itself? no need for auxiliaries if that is the case.

but it needs restrictions, and using an antenna for widespread use would be a little bit too "easy" to pull off. after all this is a mod based on engineering, but since you kind of want the receiver to still be able to move or rotate, you can't use a static receiver, hence why the microwave array. the small one would be the size of a laser antena and work akin to it, while the ION array would be big and have limited depression due to its size, forcing it to be somewhat oriented to the sender while also not preventing minor ajustements
#7
Master engineer 27 May, 2019 @ 3:30am 
Actually what I was thinking was yes implement the antenna for multiplayer , but in reality btw I wouldn’t imagine you needing to beam anything over 4 km without a relay . But I’m into Cinematic shots something that would work well in a single player game and that where my idea comes from the beam unfocuser and focuser you could make this a separate mod for people who do not want to run it in multiplayer and instead they could use the antenna system for multiplayer games. So basically I’m suggesting make 2 new systems one for multiplayer and one for single player , would be the best compromise between the conflicting ideas for people who want to see the beam transfer and people who like the antenna idea
#8
Master engineer 27 May, 2019 @ 3:31am 
Tell me what you think?
#9
overwerk 27 May, 2019 @ 4:48am 
yeah that could work. i'm just never sure with beam rendering properly, mostly considering i did some runs with MP and i noticed that the beams were not showing up for anyone but the host, and i had similar issues with the GSF energy weapons
#10
Soren MC 27 May, 2019 @ 6:30am 
Originally posted by Master engineer:
btw I was one of the first people who suggested the energy transfer , I commented with a sibling account , anyway I do agree with the system of antenna type of transfer for a more stable use in multiplayer so you don’t accidentally cut friendly ships in half , but I also have an alternative idea or another system that can be used. So my idea is a laser focuser and unfocuser (bad English) so how it would work is you have a beam going into a laser unfocusing machine and the beam would be a slower wider beam , not as focused so you could see through the beam somewhat. And this beam would emit like normal except it would not do damage as it’s sole purpose would be to shoot beams to other grids / same grid over longer distances. And when it would come into contact with a beam focuser it converts this slow , fat and unfocused beam into a usable beam that does damage and can be used as normal
I like this idea
#11
Soren MC 27 May, 2019 @ 6:33am 
The antenna and the focuser idea are really cool, but i hope that 2cm keeps, and even increase the range of, the functionality of shooting a laser to another combiner on another grid. It could make some interesting mechanics were ships could combine their lasers into one big like this scene at 0:27 https://youtu.be/V4LR6Ev27FQ?t=27
Last edited by Soren MC; 27 May, 2019 @ 6:35am
#12
UpsideDownAirline 27 May, 2019 @ 11:26am 
I'm kind of torn on this one. It would be cool to be able to power ships from another grid, but I also feel like having to have a large power plant to use these weapons aboard your ship should be part of the challenge.

Think about it: Both the laser and ion beam cannons are immensely powerful and can cut through ship armor like a hot knife through butter. The trade-off is that you need to have hundreds of tons of weapon and reactors aboard your ship to power them, and that creates a large target and cuts heavily into your maneuverability. If I could bypass the mass requirement by putting all of the heavy power blocks onto a heavily armored mothership and release a bunch of drones to fire the actual beam from, I not only have extreme maneuverability on my side but also a weapon that can cut straight through even relatively heavily armored targets. And I honestly wouldn't want to come up against something like that in combat.

I do think it would be cool to be able to have ships combine their beams to fire one mega-beam, but I also believe this should require direct line of sight and deliberate aiming between the two grids. Having a ship just radiate out beam power in all directions would be too easy considering how strong these beam weapons are.

Maybe just tweak the beam combiners to not be destroyed by beams of the correct type regardless of range. That would open up a lot of possibilities in terms of ships collaborating to fire very powerful beams more quickly, while not creating something that is so hilariously overpowered that it's useless in any actual player-to-player combat.
#13
Master engineer 27 May, 2019 @ 4:13pm 
Well the idea is that ideally you could have turret type relay stations and multi mega bases to power such systems with cross grid transfer the kick is that the laser focuser and unfocuser would have to cost a lot of materials and wouldn’t be a small block either and would be more inefficient to use
#14
overwerk 28 May, 2019 @ 9:38am 
well for once the power isn't all, if you chose the method of limited angle, LOS bound power transfer you are trading one advantage for another. for once you HAVE TO not break LOS in order to receive the energy and thust being able to fire. the infrastructure nessesary to route the power to the weapons still need to be in there, as you will have to redirect the power from the relay and into the weapon array. for lasers, you are limited on power since realistically you can only get a maximum of 1 full lenz worh of power (don't get me wrong, its good, but if it is from the mothership you could do more). as for the ION, the angle at which you can receive would be very limited, which would hamper your mobility and angle of fire severely. on top of that ION energy being used in burst, this means that you can't just "plug" yourself into the mothership's main weapons, you have to have a loop of your own, on your ship, to accumulate the nessesary energy to fire, and since there will be a power inefficiency, you may have to wait 1 or 2 additional burst of energy before you can fire a beam similar to what you could have used if you used the mothership directly.

this is what we call compromises
#15
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