An open letter to the Space Engineers Devs.

My hangars ache. I can never design them right, in the compact militaristic fashion I so admire and desire. Why is that?
Because apparently you guys have absolutely no freaking idea what Monopropellant is.

Come on. I get needing simple mechanics, but this game is intricate, and you KNOW this. So, do everybody a favor. Let us add monoprop jets to our fighters or even larger craft. I mean why not? I'm sick of thrusters tearing holes into EVERYTHING. We need a monoprop RCS system, and not a damned nuclear fusion powered thermal power sucker RCS system. The latter is great for immediate response and quick maneuvers. Really awful for parking and delicate tasks.
So, come on Devs. Give us something that wont tear apart our beloved stations.

 

Perhaps you could post a suggestion in that subforum for "maneuvering thrusters"... ones that only blast a block or two in distance and dont go to 200% on breaking mode?

 

No kidding. The rate at which they blow things away is stupid.
"Oh sorry I destroyed that wall making a minor adjustment." -The Hulk

 

It really isn't that hard to design militaristic ships that don't burn any thing. All you need to do is place the thrusters deeper in the ship, just remember to add in exhaust ports.

 

Oh I know. I'm talking about making the interior, in which I store fighters and stuff, compact. No space wasted.

I'm aware, and I think it's silly that it's our only option.

 

When in doubt, schematics out.

Have you tried twin counterbalanced grav generators in the floor/ceiling of your hangar, such that mass blocks in a small ship are gently lifted off the hangar "floor" and reach equilibrium at the center of the hangar, a safe distance from anything that might be torched? Or perhaps a crane/piston system that lifts your ship off the hangar floor? Also, aren't large armor blocks supposed to be immune to small ship thrusters? If you're parking Large ships in the hangar, there's a ton of options with Merge Blocks.

Obviously, a gentler form of propulsion/ lifting off hangar bays and such is desired, perhaps as simple as a "low power" mode for thrusters rather than a whole new block, but until it's implemented there are ways around it.

 

No, I haven't tried that. And while that is a great idea, I... really shouldn't -have- to do it.
And no, heavy armor blocks are not immune to small thrusters, like at all. Just slightly moreso than light armor.

 

Other option is what I use for my station ships. I use wheels to take off. I have mass blocks on one group and the up down thrusters to another group. I turn the thrusters off before enter the hanger, use the mass to come down to the floor, and wheel my way to where I park.

Although one suggestion I would make. Make vents immune to thruster damage. As the thrust would pass through to the other side. Act as basic armor and landing pad

 

Heavy armour is immunie to small ship small thrusters. So, use them as "parking thrusters".

Also, inertial mode is of great help for minimising damage.

 

One very simple solution is to turn off your dampeners and lightly tap the upwards thrust button. All your problems have just been solved. If you wish to keep on whining, then there's nothing anyone can do about it. If you can't wait for the game to work out its kinks (you know, alpha and all), then I recommend that you stop playing till full release?

This really isn't worth an open letter. Still way too early to feel offended at what the game forces people to do and not do. It's like you were nagging at an author for not having clear character development in his story when he just asked for your opinion on the first 2 chapters.

 

Small *ship* thrusters, not small thrusters, and only large heavy armor blocks are immune. But they really are immune. If a small ship is causing deformation to heavy armor blocks on a large ship or station, it's because it's damaging a neighboring, not immune block or because you're bumping into it. If you're trying to put a large ship in a hangar, then I agree the thruster damage issue is extremely difficult--altho I think you can probably just do as Eruend suggests if you really want to put a large ship in a hangar for some reason.

Also, suggestions subforum. There really are a lot of these requests already (e.g.), and there isn't much to "discuss" other than to point out that this is probably on the to-do list. The fact is that your hangars are not as important as functional multiplayer, toolbars, merge blocks, programming, conveyors, etc.

 

See my suggestion for an ION Thruster in the suggestion section

 

Another way is to take off horizontally, like a modern fighter from a carrier. That's how I do it and it adds style +100.

No. We already have ion thrusters.

 

It does. +25 more if you have launch tubes like BSG (but -75 if you crash while using them).

Erm. Not entirely sure what the problem that you're having is, Lackwit. As others have stated, heavy armor is, indeed, immune to thruster damage; so either you're damaging a neighboring block, or you're bumping into the hanger without realizing it ... the former unfortunately forces me to ask how long you've been trying to make these hangers, as you haven't discovered the neighbor-block thing yet. Regardless, the bumping possibility brings us to the other point:

If you're having that much difficulty performing docking maneuvers, turn some of your thrusters off. Just set a thruster group up, label it "Main Thrusters," or something, and set it to off when you're taxiing. Trust me, I know the difficulties of docking small craft; one of my fighters has acceleration of about 27 m/sec^2, trying to dock that without turning some of the engines off is ... well, "stupid" if you're feeling kind.

Could you perhaps give us a screenshot of the kind of hanger you're trying to design here?

 

That thruster damage thing came at first place because of prevent the use of internal engines. It's not perfect solution but anyway better than how it was before that. If they'll release a new nodamage engine the whole thing starts from beginning over again. Perhaps we get some more elegant solution later but right now the thruster damage is the less evil.

 

Damage is specifically why I designed one of my latest Large ships with 4 "small" thrusters elevated high into the primary structure.... If I land on the main gear to park at a station, I disengage Main thrusters (all larges) and use only the high mounted smalls to clear whatever structure I park on. Once clear, I can get away from using docking thrusters and go to main thrusters.

 

Big ship heavy armor blocks are imune to small ship thruster damage. However probelm is a silly bug (or feature) with blocks transfering damage to each otherno matter what. If so happen you damage by your thruster any other block next (on right on the) heavy armor block it transfers the damage to heavy armor block aswell. Most pathetic is treansfer from interior light (they don't even have to by on the side blasted by the thruster). Those little bastards make it even possible to destroy 1x1 corridor just with an assault rifle via damage transfering.