Iron Fusion Power Plants as Self Destruct

Ok, so I’m working on a new Anvil Lord character, and I’ve been thinking of his potential approach to being in a situation where it’s inevitable that he’ll be captured by the Vaylen.

Now, obviously, an iron fusion plant can burn out… but can it also fail catastrophically? Going by typical “sci-fi logic”, anything fission or fusion ought to be able to go boom - but how to go about it, specifically? Make an instinct (“If capture inevitable, go nova.”), have a hard tech device fitted to the armor, use Iron-Wise or some other, more technical skill to cause it to happen?

There would be failsafes to make sure this sort of thing didn’t happen ordinarily, but I don’t see why you couldn’t have your Stentor build you an over-ride. Of course, make sure you don’t do it in a crowded mid-town street.

If you wanted a simpler solution, you could give him a poison tooth to bite down on. Less collateral damage. Not as exciting perhaps…

Chris

There would be failsafes to make sure this sort of thing didn’t happen ordinarily, but I don’t see why you couldn’t have your Stentor build you an over-ride. Of course, make sure you don’t do it in a crowded mid-town street.

If you wanted a simpler solution, you could give him a poison tooth to bite down on. Less collateral damage. Not as exciting perhaps…

Chris[/quote]

Meh. If things go so far wrong he’s got to self-destruct, he’ll just be saving all those innocent bystanders from being hulled. Besides, his fate is much too glorious for him to go out in anything but a blaze of nuclear fire. :wink:

Aren’t fusion reactors supposed to be immune to this sort of thing? I find it hard to add “in real life,” because no one’s made one capable of producing more energy than it consumes, but as I understand the process is fundamentally unlike nuclear fission. A fission reaction involves a self-perpetuating chain reactor, so much so that a fission actually needs damper rods to keep it from going critical and melting down. But a fusion reaction requires tremendous pressure just to keep going (gravitional pressure, in the case of a sun; magnetic or laser pulse, in the case of most fusion reactor designs I’ve read about), and if that pressure is removed it just fizzles.

See? Go for the poison tooth, Mk.

-Chris

I’ve a few years experience working around fission reactors (and no they don’t go boom – when things go really bad, they typically melt). I believe that the core temperature of a fusion reactor runs many times hotter than the surface of the sun, and that very powerful magnetic flux fields are used to contain the heat. If that is the case, then I would think to just need find away to shut down the field. Fusion reactors actually do exist, at least experimental ones, I think the Japanese have one, but they are unbelievably expensive and quite large. The fusion reactors in iron must be cold-fusion, which I have no understanding of. There were a couple of researchers who said they had developed a cold-fusion process back in the early-'90’s, I think, but it was later determined to be a fraud.

Interesting. So I guess the question is whether, once you dropped the containment field, whether the fusion reaction releases heat faster than it fizzles – (the temperature of the sun’s core) divided by (a nanosecond) is probably still not enough energy to make much of a boom. But that’s all assuming these are miniaturized magnetic containment reactors and not cold fusion weirdness.

Hehe… I was looking for an answer rooted in the Iron Empires fiction, really, rather than a realistic breakdown of what a fusion reactor might do. (though that’s always interesting anyway)

After all, Burning Empires - while not fantasy masquerading as sci-fi like, say, Star Wars - isn’t exactly Transhuman Space either, as far as “realism” goes… So I guess my question is - in Iron Kingdoms, is it acceptable for a fusion reactor to explode? Is that consistent with the design of the world? With the flavor of the game?

just burn up a bomb with the Tech burner

Whether you describe it in game as either an actual bomb or some sort of jury-rigged, self sabotage of your power plant… all that’s just color, so submit it to peer review and be done with it.

I’ve always liked the idea of antimatter-bottle hollow teeth, myself… more bang for your buck, as it were.

Just make sure your dentist knows your teeth are booby-trapped.

“Open wide, my Lord.”

“Mrppph! Mmmph!”

“M’lud, a little wider please – there’s something on this bicuspid I can’t quite…”

“MRRMPPHH!”

“M’lud, hold still, I…”

WHABOOOOOOOM.

Man, that’s just a disaster waiting to explode in your face… literally :twisted:

boo!! go to your room for that bad joke.

I like the self destruct better than the bomb, but I guess really there is no difference other than color.

but is your character doing it just against the worms or against be captured by anyone. after all it is likely that the forces arrayed against you will not be openly controled by the worms!

Man, that’s just a disaster waiting to explode in your face… literally :twisted:[/quote]

well, since the “it is inside my left molar” is color, it isn’t any more or less safe than any other self destruct device…

… unless I decide to save a few points by making it likely to kill me if I get a bump on the noggin. (I think I’ll pass on that, thanks…)

Just to be clear, I’m not really being critical of the idea of any given character using poison/superbomb teeth, rigged power packs, etc.

My last post is just me contemplating the thought of actually having a suicide tooth in my actual, real life mouth and just cringing.

I mean, in your game, your character is going to go out gloriously. We talking the movie Aliens where Lt. Gorman goes back to save Vasquez, they get cut off and are running out of ammo, so he blows himself and Vasquez up rather than getting captured by the Aliens and the fate that that entails. (And in the process, redeems himself)

That’s friggin awesome :!:

Me, in real life? I’d be driving along, hit a bump in the road which would accidently trigger the device and I’d end up just like that dude from Pulp Fiction with my brains splattered all over the back of the car.

So yeah, give the suicide devices to the heroes cause I’m just too accident prone to die a hero’s death. :smiley:

(or in other words, yes, I totally agree with the post directly above this one)

Moved to the Tech Burner