Rework missiles?

[Millitron (OP)]

I have been thinking about how odd missiles function in Aurora.   They are nuclear-tipped, and yet have no blast radius.   Also, they are not a 1-hit kill on pretty much any ships, unless you're extremely lucky and nail a magazine, which is strange because ships aren't that huge.   How strong must Duranium be if it can survive anti-matter hits?

My suggestion is to have two kinds of missiles for anti-shipping.   The nukes we have now would be for area-of-effect damage (I remember Steve saying Newtonian Aurora will have AoE).   But the new kind would have shaped charges, or a TN equivalent for punching through armor.

This could be really cool too, because you could have large AMM's to try to swat multiple ASM's with a single blast, or use more conventional AMM's and just try to slam into

[dgibso29]

I veto on the grounds that Aurora is not supposed to be so easy as to allow "one hit kills."

In regard to shaped charges, there is the option to use laser warheads. I have never used them, personally, but my understanding is that they work to the same end that a shaped charge would against armour. Aurora is complex enough without requiring me to micro between various different types of missiles as you suggest.

Also.. Your idea of the Aurora nuke seems to be something like this, whereas I think the usual strength 6 or 9 or 12 warheads are only a fraction of the size of that. Now, if you create a size 100 missile with 99 points in warhead... Okay, then we're talking a big nuke.

[TallTroll]

Nuclear missiles would be a lot less effective than you'd think in space. In atmosphere, most of the damage is actually done by compressed air moving at very high velocities. In vacuum, most of the energy of a nuclear explosion will just radiate harmlessly into space. You need nearly a skin-skin contact to make a nuke work at all in space.

If it bothers you, imagine that the missiles are actually detonating a short distance (like a few hundred metres) from their target to ensure some damage, rather than relying on one-shot-kills from skin-skin contacts, which would be astonishingly difficult to arrange, as the combined closing speed of some objects might be a respectable fraction of c

>>  How strong must Duranium be if it can survive anti-matter hits?

Nuclear devices != anti-matter. That's something altogether different

[Erik L]

Also need to recall that space is big. Ships in formation might not necessarily be in the blast radius of a missile that hits one. If I were responsible for squadron tactics and formations, I'd specify a minimum of 50-100 miles between ships. No lag for commo at that range, and should be out of any blast radii of missiles that hit one ship of the squad.

[dgibso29]

And yes, technobabble because technobabble means that technobabble and technobabble.

[TallTroll]

>> And yes, technobabble because technobabble means that technobabble and technobabble.

Lol, actual physics != technobabble. Look up the inverse square law

[dgibso29]

No no no, I fully understand and agree. I was just saying

I was trying to give him more game related answers, while you gave him the science answers haha.

(Besides, I'm a history guy, it's all somewhat technobabble to me )

[Millitron (OP)]

I veto on the grounds that Aurora is not supposed to be so easy as to allow "one hit kills. "

In regard to shaped charges, there is the option to use laser warheads.  I have never used them, personally, but my understanding is that they work to the same end that a shaped charge would against armour.  Aurora is complex enough without requiring me to micro between various different types of missiles as you suggest. 

Also. .  Your idea of the Aurora nuke seems to be something like this, whereas I think the usual strength 6 or 9 or 12 warheads are only a fraction of the size of that.  Now, if you create a size 100 missile with 99 points in warhead. . .  Okay, then we're talking a big nuke.

I read up on Laser Warheads, and the damage template seems to be the same as a normal missile hit.   Whether or not that was intended is another matter.   I know Steve was meaning to look into improving how laser warheads work.   I would still value the different types of missiles however, so you could have dedicated bombardment ships, for softening up big fleets, and then have dedicated single-combat ships that pretty much go one-on-one with their TN shaped charges.   I just don't think variety can hurt really.

Nuclear missiles would be a lot less effective than you'd think in space.  In atmosphere, most of the damage is actually done by compressed air moving at very high velocities.  In vacuum, most of the energy of a nuclear explosion will just radiate harmlessly into space.  You need nearly a skin-skin contact to make a nuke work at all in space.

If it bothers you, imagine that the missiles are actually detonating a short distance (like a few hundred metres) from their target to ensure some damage, rather than relying on one-shot-kills from skin-skin contacts, which would be astonishingly difficult to arrange, as the combined closing speed of some objects might be a respectable fraction of c

>>  How strong must Duranium be if it can survive anti-matter hits?

Nuclear devices != anti-matter.  That's something altogether different

The thing about the atmosphere is a fair point, and it dawned on me right after I hit post.   A little off-topic, but doesnt that also mean nukes wouldn't even be bright in space?  Since most of the light we see from them is actually ionized air?

The end-game warheads are antimatter aren't they?  I'm aware nukes aren't antimatter, but warheads are warheads as far as Aurora is concerned.

[dgibso29]

In this case, I read "more variety" to mean "more complexity." Because, how would you differentiate the various missiles? It wouldn't simply be about warhead strength anymore. You'd need separate tech trees for the various missile/warhead types, etc, etc.

[TallTroll]

A nuclear detonation would give off energy in a very wide range of wavelengths, so some of it would inevitably be in the (really very narrow) human visible range, and therefore probably pretty bright. If you could see in higher frequencies, say gamma rays, it would be really very bright indeed

>> The end-game warheads are antimatter aren't they?

I haven't got that far down that tech line yet, so I dunno. That would be a pretty big bang though. Total mass-energy conversion in a nuclear explosion is only of the order of grams, from a multi-ton device. Anti-matter / matter would totally annihilate, so a kilo of anti-matter would likely have more destructive power than any given countries total nuclear arsenal

[Tarran]

Yes, the end-game warheads (x20 MSP and x24 MSP) are Anti-matter. Use the All Projects filter.

[Hawkeye]

According to Atomic Rocket, 1 kg of antimatter + 1 kg of matter equals 43 megatons

Here is a link to the page which lists energy equivalents:  http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/spacegunconvent.php

[Steve Walmsley]

Here is a link to the Newtonian Aurora section on missiles - there is a section included about nuclear detonations.

http://aurora2.pentarch.org/index.php/topic,4329.msg43459.html#msg43459

The main result of area effect weapons is going to be that the ships in a task groups would have to spread out a little to avoid all being taken out by the same warhead. This could lead to micromanagement hell every time you want to go through a jump point. NA doesn't have that problem because it doesn't have jump points. You are going to have to spread out every missile in a salvo so each one requires a separate kill from an area effect AMM. Also, standard Aurora missiles can change direction instantly, which makes them rather more effective in an area effect role (and anti-missile role) than the heavily constrained movement of NA missiles.

It is possible but would change the game radically. Given the current missile combat system works well, I would be very reluctant to mess around with it too much.

Steve

[Millitron (OP)]

Here is a link to the Newtonian Aurora section on missiles - there is a section included about nuclear detonations.

hxxp: aurora2. pentarch. org/index. php/topic,4329. msg43459. html#msg43459

The main result of area effect weapons is going to be that the ships in a task groups would have to spread out a little to avoid all being taken out by the same warhead.  This could lead to micromanagement hell every time you want to go through a jump point.  NA doesn't have that problem because it doesn't have jump points.  You are going to have to spread out every missile in a salvo so each one requires a separate kill from an area effect AMM.  Also, standard Aurora missiles can change direction instantly, which makes them rather more effective in an area effect role (and anti-missile role) than the heavily constrained movement of NA missiles. 

It is possible but would change the game radically.  Given the current missile combat system works well, I would be very reluctant to mess around with it too much.

Steve

Steve, this is all really cool.   Can't wait to hear about shrapnel missiles.

[TallTroll]

>> According to Atomic Rocket, 1 kg of antimatter + 1 kg of matter equals 43 megatons

Those are milligrams, not kilograms... AM is stupendously powerful stuff. To fit in with the scale of missile warheads, AM warheads would actually be a very small (milligram scale) amount of AM, wrapped in tons of containment gear