So, this clarification and revision is focused on shrouds and is actually going to walk back a couple things I've said casually in Discord. Short version of the major change: shrouds no longer exert physical force under any circumstance, and their interactions with one another have been altered to reflect that. So, without further ado, I bring you the
First United Shroud Clarification Update
Open Throttle. Open Shrouds. Open Fire.
What happens when you open a shroud inside a pre-existing shroud?First, a couple points of clarity. As mentioned in a separate entry, shrouds are centered on the core. A shroud is only counted as opening
inside another shroud if the center of the core crystal is within already extant shroud. Also for clarity, we'll refer to the pre-existing shroud as the 'defending' shroud hereafter, and any and all core crystals trying to open shrouds inside of the defender will be 'attacking' shrouds. References to a shroud's strength are in reference to its current condition, not it's theoretical optimum. Thus, damaging a shroud can and will influence the outcomes below.
When the defending shroud is at least as strong or stronger than the attacking core(s), nothing appears to happen. The attacking cores will draw power as though they have open shrouds, but will generate no protective field, nor interfere with the already existing shroud of the defending core. There is a little bit of leeway for the defender in terms of its strength, that is, it's easier to defend than attack. More simply, if the defending shroud is within 20% of the attacker's power, it will still be able to suppress the attack shrouds.
If the attacking shrouds are sufficiently strong, they will destructively destabilize the defending shroud. The defending shroud will buckle and the defending core will overload. The engineers will have seconds to drop shroud and power down the core before it explodes violently. The attacking cores are not unscathed, and their shrouds will be damaged relative to the strength of the defending core when it was overwhelmed. This damage is divided evenly between attacking cores, and will also cause chain overloads if it is sufficient to break the shroud on an attacking crystal. Importantly, the attacking crystals do not immediately raise shrouds. There is a period of time, related to power of the overloaded defending core, that the attacking cores remain unable to generate shroud.
What happens if two shrouds run into each other?Again, a couple points of clarity. Core strength refers to the strength of the core, and is unchanging, shroud strength as before refers to the strength of the shroud at the current moment of time- and thus can be expected to vary during combat. All shrouds are highly elastic, that is they will attempt to spring back to their original shape whenever possible, but we'll be talking a bit about their resistance to deformation here (how easy it is to alter their shape) and we'll just refer to this property as resistance. This has nothing to do with electric resistance, and is just short for resistance to deformation.
The collision between two shrouds can be visualized as water balloons pressing into one another. The velocity of the cores generating the shroud is an irrelevant property, as the shrouds transmit no physical force. However, the distance between the cores, and thus how 'firmly' the two shrouds are pressed together is the relevant component that determines the power of the interactions between the two shrouds.
First, it's important to note that not all shrouds are equal in terms of their resistance to deformation. In general, as core power increases, so does its shroud's resistance to deformation. Thus, while two skiffs with basic VS cores brought very close will deform their shrouds symmetrically, a skiff with a VS core would hardly dimple the surface of a Terren Nautica dreadnought with a Leviathan core. This is important, since highly deformed shrouds begin to behave very unusually.
When two shrouds press into each other, there is, by necessity, an interface between the two. This interface, depending on how tightly the shrouds are pressed together, generates a considerable amount of light and heat. It's not a steady heat or light, but a stochastic series of chaotic discharges. Even for a VS core, if this interface crosses over the deck it's more than sufficient to ignite wood and scorch flesh. This interface is bad for both shrouds, and deals damage to both relative to how tightly they're being pressed together. This damage is evenly distributed across a shroud. When shroud deformation reaches a certain point, the interface not only damages a shroud, it also causes it to lose it's typical 1-way property, meaning that cannons may impact the
inside of a heavily deformed shroud.
If a shroud is ever pressed back onto its own core crystal, the the core will immediately begin to overload, detonating if not correctly disabled in time.
Holes in the shroud, while they fail to stop cannon shots, do not change the way shrouds push against one another.
Short version, shrouds that press up against one another will damage on another. And weaker cores come out very much on the short end of the stick when pressing against stronger cores.
Where is the core in relation to the shroud?with baseline tech, the core is dead center in the shroud.
What shape control is there over the shroud?At baseline tech, there is no real control over the shape of a shroud. The shroud takes form of an expanded and smooth version of the core crystal, with its size (currently) dependent on the power of the shroud and the size of the crystal.
How do we shoot through our shrouds?A healthy shroud is one way, due to some sort of field orientation gibberish. However, there is no IFF to this. It doesn't know the difference between a friendly aether blast and an enemy aether blast, it's solely based on direction. A shroud can lose its directionality of the core becomes cracked, the shroud itself becomes sufficiently deformed, or there is significant high energy interference on the shroud itself (an aetheric surge from the Everstorm could cause this).
What do shrouds do to the air around them?Not much. They're visible, so they warp light slightly and likely shift its color so that you can see the shroud bubble.
What about running shrouds in series?While core crystals on the same network don't play well together, one can imagine a system where cores are brought online sequentially as the last core's shroud fails. While there is no significant delay between turning one shroud off and flicking another on, this changes if a shroud is buckled. If a shroud buckles, you can't raise another one in the same area for a certain amount of time, dependent on the strength of the core that just buckled.
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Topic: Arms Race: War of the Cinder Spires (Read 26032 times)