Realism Improvement

Oh, another suggestion how it could be:
IT.
IS.
A.
FLAKKING.
GAME.
We have a stereotypical USA vs Russia fights (which become awkward since 1991), Aliens, infecting human bodies, extraction energy from Black Hole, some bloody insane terrorists (greenworld-obsessed Gaians, feminazi GC, drugbarons Outcasts), even tachyons guns (BTW, Tachyons are FTL particles, and they r still seen). On this background the bigger from inside than the outside cargo bays are just a minor detail

Guys better shhhhhh about realism, otherwise OP can bring back inertia...again

Yes. Realism in games is like alcohol: you like it, but you dont need to use it too much.

Quote from Rexor

Now we can already do laser, even powerful, ..... we got a plasma ray cutting machine, extremely powerful, a ray at 20'000° celsius that cut quickly everything !
( The version with 10'000° is used to cut the hull of the M1A1/A2 USA tank (!) to install upgrades ).

We also have the engines used to do little movements in space at the Space Shuttle, that are, if I remember well, electric-magnetic-plasma based.
They don't use fuel and have a light-blue exhaust. Updated 3 years ago, can have a power of 300 HP. But scientists are sure to rapidly increase this power.
( Probably, 50 years from now, they'll have a power of 30'000 HP, not sufficient for takeoff from Earth, but to move in space ).

Re. Laser Cutting, I think you mean Watts, not Temperature in C (especially when referring to the Abrams, this is a 10kW laser, basically it is an Aluminium cutting laser) ? Also Laser cutting is slow, very slow compared to plasma cutting. It also has depth issues and it's maximum cut depth through thick material is actually quite low compared to, for example again, plasma cutting. Granted it is true that extreme temperatures can be reached but this defeats the point of laser cutting, which is for extreme precision manufacturing.

But yes what you said re. lasers etc is technically feasible except for the plasma actuators. If you can find a 300hp plasma actuator that has been repeated, submitted to a peer review journal and critiqued by peers, then damn I wasted 7 years of work. Otherwise...

Quote from Ajay

(BTW, Tachyons are FTL particles, and they r still seen).

That the particles go faster than light doesn't mean they don't emmit any light/energy so that they aren't visible, with the right devices.

And hmm, this thread is kinda mixing real life with sci fi with the topic of an attempt to improve something.

Oh one other thing re.moving in space, you don;t need much power at all, 30'000hp would be excessive in space. To me the current space propulsion technique that has me really excited is solar sails, they have a very small impulse, but space is large, time frames are long so a little constantly actually means solar sails can achieve the speeds required to overtake the voyager exploration crafts, they just take a long time picking up the pace!

And yeah now We are WAY off topic! Maybe we should start a How awesome is space, what would apply to crossfire thread?

Rexor's right on the HorsePower topic.

Not only conting about moving a brick made out of metal, but also to change it's speed fast enough, and especially entering in Cruise mode/high speed, in just few seconds, it would totally need a lot of power for that. There are cars with a fifth of that power, and they don't even get close to the sound barrer. The special car made to break the sound barrer, and last world record, has more than 30 k HP (50 k I remember? ) and the sound of speed is nothing in space And the mass of that car is nothing either.

there are just 10 people on the world, one who understand binary and one who dont
I want to say: You are going to be offtopic. And dont be so rude Rexor. Also 40 year ol men might be wrong from time to time - just sayin...

So now please repeat with stuff that belongs to the topic.

I have no intention of arguing, but again, that is a plasma cutter regarding the high temperatures, not a laser. The laser used to cut the Abrams is a 10kW laser same as in the aerospace industry, within which I work, as it is required for the ceramic compounds used, lasers are not designated by temperature only power output the temperature is dependent on the emmisivity of the medium used and the material being cut. The reason Laser is used on Abram's specifically is due to the minimal size of the ceramic tiles, so extreme precision well below tolerances of 1/10 of a mm is required.

Plasma actuation is never intended for main propulsion systems, its a solution to control surface problems, not engine performance or thrust generation, I spent my Honours project back in the day surrounded by them every day. This is why I reacted to your first thread when you claimed 300hp and then 30'000hp. I should have left it alone.

And yes you could move a 500 kT battleship with nothing but a solar sail in space, that's the whole point behind them and why they are being developed, large spacecraft propulsion systems that do not require fuel, they are inertia based systems, slow to get moving but with a higher achievable velocity given time.
Horsepower is only required for, as you have all clearly pointed out, acceleration, the RATE of velocity change. Unfortunately acceleration is the most costly factor in regards to space operations. The only current or future systems that provide acceleration in the ranges you are talking all require fuel, which is heavy and takes up a lot of space, (back to the whole realism/pods argument there).

Back to sci fi: Granted, specifically in the case of crossfire and other popular sci fi, space ship worlds, the engines would be fusion based, collecting debris to fuel the reaction, mathematically it is possible, I remember an astrophysics lecturer who couldn't understand why us bloody engineers wouldn't just make one as the maths was there in front of us, but the material science doesn't currently exist (but may one day, here's hoping).

Bringing it all back to my earlier comments, Plasma actuators and the like (even electromagnetic propulsion) will never be capable of providing the accelerations you are imagining, hence my responses regarding horsepower, which should be thrust if we are going to be pedantic.

Huor... YES!

Topic: pod Size, it works, its balanced, maybe change it slightly for a month if people really want it changed. I think it would just increase the rate people fly to alaska/texas e.t.c. might add 20 minutes to each pile of millions and most new players complain earning money at the start can be a grind.

Eh... What relations have Freelancer Crossfire and M1 Abrams?
Yes, we're seriously going off-topic. Just relax and take it as it is.