Rad shielding vs. fusion damage

[apoc527]

Cross-posted from the Billion Credit Squadron II game since I'm not sure everyone is looking there.

It just occurred to me that a mistake may have been made in the fight. Every time the Yamato has been hit by fusion bays, the Ref has been adding 6 points to its armor rating. I think that's incorrect. The radiation shielding entry in HG states that armor rating is increased by 6 against radiation damage from particle beams, nukes, and fusion guns. Thus, I believe that the Yamoto should only get 10 points of actual armor against the standard "fusing blast of hydrogen burning the hull" as opposed to 16. This would mean that the Yamato is significantly more damaged than it has been.

Thoughts?

 

[rust]

Fusion guns cause two types of damage, "normal" damage and additional
radiation damage. Radiation shielding could perhaps reduce the radiation
damage, although I doubt this, because the radiation damage is caused
inside the ship by the plasma which penetrated the armour, but radiation
shielding should not have any influence on the "normal" part of the dama-
ge.

 

[DFW]

Only apply to rad damage. The actual fusion blast doesn't have to penetrate the hull in order to get rad exposure inside. Ionizing radiation can go through objects that aren't breached. Think X-rays, gamma, etc.

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

I'm going to argue the other side...

I think Rad Shielding protects against both damage and radiation in the case of Fusion Guns.

What is the material being shot at the ship? It is fusing Hydrogen. Fusing hydrogen is Electrons (Beta Radiation), Protons and Neutrons (Neutron Radiation) and Energy (Gamma Radiation) and finally some Helium (Alpha Radiation). SO a Radiation shield should be able to stop every kind of particle/energy being thrown at it by a Fusion Gun.

Same for a Particle Beam - The weapon uses either Protons, Electrons or Neutrons as its "bullet" and all of these are forms or radiation.

Same for a Nuke - The VAST majority of the damage comes from the high energy radiation (mostly Gamma Rays). Again Radiation Shielding should protect a ship here.

Now, you may ask why Radiation Shielding doesn't help against Lasers? Simple, the wavelength of lasers is typically much lower than Gamma Rays (Visible Light, maybe X-Rays in a laser), and the attack lasts for a longer time, making the rad shielding less effective (or not effective at all).

YMMV

 

[DFW]

What is the material being shot at the ship? It is fusing Hydrogen. Fusing hydrogen is Electrons (Beta Radiation), Protons and Neutrons (Neutron Radiation) and Energy (Gamma Radiation) and finally some Helium (Alpha Radiation). SO a Radiation shield should be able to stop every kind of particle/energy being thrown at it by a Fusion Gun.

You forgot about the energy that is the most damaging to material. Heat.

 

[Captain Jonah]

Well then I'll argue the other other side :wink:

Why do plasma and fusion weapons cause radiation hits? What you get hit with is a ball of super heated gas/Liquid called plasma which is the end result of the actual reaction that took place in the weapon. A laser and/or gravity compresion system super heats the hydrogen pellets to a point where they enter the interim gas/liguid state of plasma. Then the Electromagnetic field that contains the plasma is shunted towards the enemy and opened at the front end.

You get hit by a tiny ball of star mass. expanding and rapidly cooling hence its limited range. The actual reaction which puts out the radiation took place on the ship that fired the shot. Its not radiation that melts a hole in your hull

 

[dalamar981]

I will copy my post from the other thread.

I was in the middle of writing how i disagree, and that Radiation shielding does add 6 to the armor against particle, fusion, nuclear weapons.

In doing so I think I discovered the reason why it doesn't. The whole sticking point of the rule is "radiation damage". in standard space combat there is no such thing as radiation damage. So I did a search in the highguard PDF. I found page 79. There is a section about Radiation attacks, and a Radiation Damage table. These to sections explain why Meson weapons are not included in the armor and radiation damage sentence.

In short Radiation shielding is for capital ship combat and has no use in the standard Space combat rules except if you want to harden your entire crew and not just your bridge with 1000 rad absorption.

There is no Radiation damage in Standard space combat.

 

[phavoc]

My view on shielding is that it should come two ways - shielding for ships that need protection from the elements, and shielding that is built into the armor to protect against weapons damage.

So a ship that had rad shielding because it operated in a high-radiation environment wouldn't be able to use the DM to protect against radiation delivered via weapons fire. The attack itself would damage the shielding and bypass it.

A warship (or civilian ship with military-grade shielding) would get the benefits of the armor until it was too damaged to provide much protection.

Which brings up another point.... radiation shielding is great, but if you have gaping holes in your shielding that radiation is going to get back into your ship. So I'm wondering at what point would you declare the shielding to no longer be effective?

 

[DFW]

.

Which brings up another point.... radiation shielding is great, but if you have gaping holes in your shielding that radiation is going to get back into your ship. So I'm wondering at what point would you declare the shielding to no longer be effective?

Well, most construction would place at the innermost layer of the hull. So, if your hull is punched clean through... 8)

 

[TC]

The description of the hull option says it protects each and every compartment, including the hull. If the comparment you are in get puncured badly enough by a radiaiton dealing weapon, I posit that the point is moot, your toast already.

On a side note, traveller rad shielding also protects from EMP. A rad shielded ship does not need a hardened bridge or fib computer, ergo, its EMP hardened too.

I'm tending to fall on the it does protect side of this argument for the moment. Plasma is a high energy state of matter. Weaponized Plasma weapons aren't just heat, the heat comes from the highly energetic I.E. ionized radiaition, interractions as it transfers its energy to other mediums.

Note pugmps are a radiation hazard in ground combat, and fugmps are down right lethal to unshielded troops.

 

[rust]

Plasma is a high energy state of matter.

If you define plasma as matter, it has mass and kinetic energy, against
which a radiation shielding alone cannot protect. :wink:

 

[TC]

The issue at question was whether or not the +6 armour add from rad shielding applied. Not whether it stopped it altogether, which I cannot see in any case being the point.

 

[Emperor Herdan]

Radiation shielding is something I have a bit of knowledge on.

<Removal of large rambling post>

Short answer... Yes I think it should be added.

Longish reasoning
Basically its the Type of radiation (Gamma/X-Ray, Particles (Alpha, Beta, sub-atomic) and its interaction with the various protection modes we have.

2 basic barriers are Lead (or any dense material) and Plastic (Lucite).

Alpha Particles and Gamma rays (of which X-Rays are part of its spectrum) are best dealt with by dense materials. Beta emitters are best dealt with a primary barrier of Lucite, with a secondary thin barrier of lead. The basis is that as the beta particles are slowed/attenuated by the plastic, they give off weak "delta" (gamma) rays which are attenuated by the lead.

Magnetic fields can also play a part in attenuation of highly charged particles (but we're not quite there yet).

Take care (Have to run)

E. Herdan

 

[DFW]

Alpha Particles and Gamma rays (of which X-Rays are part of its spectrum) are best dealt with by dense materials. Beta emitters are best dealt with a primary barrier of Lucite, with a secondary thin barrier of lead.
E. Herdan

Alpha particles can be effectively shielded against by a single piece of paper, or a thin layer of skin cells. In other words, the hull handles alpha by itself.Gamma would be handled by a Super Dense hull.

 

[Emperor Herdan]

Alpha particles can be effectively shielded against by a single piece of paper, or a thin layer of skin cells. In other words, the hull handles alpha by itself.Gamma would be handled by a Super Dense hull.

Correct. A super dense hull not only should act as a radiation barrier, but also should act as a barrier to all scanning equipment. High energy beta (electron beams) should be attenuated by a lighter thicker material but if the hull is dense and thick enough, a plastic barrier isn't required.

Neutron beams cause greater problems.

Take care

E. Herdan