Oolite Bulletins

There has been a lot of debate about the energy bomb. To some, it's too powerful, others don't like that it destroys both hostile and friendly ships.

Is it possible to do a non-lethal variant of the energy bomb, namely an EMP blast of some kind? It would temporarily disable all nearby ships, missiles and Q-mines, randomly even including you. It's intended to be a defensive weapon, giving you time to escape combat, but it could be used offensively as well. I'd give it slightly higher price tag than the energy bomb and it would take up the energy bomb slot.

Edit: fixed some typos

It's a good idea - similar I guess to those used in "The Matrix" movies? Don't think it should disable your own ship, but I do think it should take 3s to detonate and over the 3s all your systems shut down (including shields)leaving you dead in the water but EMP proof - once the EMP bomb has gone off your ship powers back up and you can do what you want - run away or pick off the dead ships one by one (random "off time" calc'd for each ship?)

The weapon should be available to NPCs too and there should be another piece of equipment available called the "EMP bomb detector" - it warns you that a 3s timer has been detected and you have to hit a key to kill all your own systems in that time...

DaddyHoggy wrote:

The weapon should be available to NPCs too and there should be another piece of equipment available called the "EMP bomb detector" - it warns you that a 3s timer has been detected and you have to hit a key to kill all your own systems in that time...

...or EMP shielding. You can't use the bomb unless you have this fitted. It also protects you from other ships' EMP blasts. High tech NPC ships can have it too. It shouldn't be too expensive, but only available at very high tech shipyards.

GalCop vipers should also be carrying one EMP bomb at all times. Maybe the EMP shield and the bomb itself were available only on anarchistic systems. It's illegal and probably stolen tech anyway.

It should also raise your criminal status if you attack the disabled ships even if they're law offenders too. The stations have long range radars, they can detect the detonation and track all activities and immediately add it to your criminal record.

jarnoid wrote:

...or EMP shielding. You can't use the bomb unless you have this fitted. It also protects you from other ships' EMP blasts. High tech NPC ships can have it too. It shouldn't be too expensive, but only available at very high tech shipyards.

I wouldn't have total immunity, just a higher chance of preventing total system outages. Like heat shielding for sun-skimmers.

It should also raise your criminal status if you attack the disabled ships even if they're law offenders too. The stations have long range radars, they can detect the detonation and track all activities and immediately add it to your criminal record.

I doubt having kills added to legal status would greatly worry them, or indeed me....
You could have the scanner go dead while the EMP is in effect, the broad-spectrum interference would muck up any active or passive scanning. It could even damage your Multi-Tracking System or your Target System Memory Upgrade if you have any active target locks as the systems are overloaded by the pulse.

Captain Hesperus
"I'd buy a bomb that made ships automatically dump their cargo in front of me..."

Captain Hesperus wrote:

jarnoid wrote:

...or EMP shielding. You can't use the bomb unless you have this fitted. It also protects you from other ships' EMP blasts. High tech NPC ships can have it too. It shouldn't be too expensive, but only available at very high tech shipyards.

I wouldn't have total immunity, just a higher chance of preventing total system outages. Like heat shielding for sun-skimmers.

It should also raise your criminal status if you attack the disabled ships even if they're law offenders too. The stations have long range radars, they can detect the detonation and track all activities and immediately add it to your criminal record.

I doubt having kills added to legal status would greatly worry them, or indeed me....
You could have the scanner go dead while the EMP is in effect, the broad-spectrum interference would muck up any active or passive scanning. It could even damage your Multi-Tracking System or your Target System Memory Upgrade if you have any active target locks as the systems are overloaded by the pulse.

Captain Hesperus
"I'd buy a bomb that made ships automatically dump their cargo in front of me..."

This is a pretty cool idea, but I agree that an EMP bomb should come with some kind of costs. Requiring EMP shielding is good (although I think it would be more fun to let someone purchase an EMP bomb without the shielding, and of course they would be disabled if they used the bomb);

Also any kills you make on disabled ships would not gain you any bounty nor count towards your total kills, and to really make it purely defensive you could have all the cargo get blown up with any ships destroyed while disabled via EMP. Also make it only a 10- or 15-second period before disabled ships are able to move again.