# Tank Explosion Rework

Currently, tanks which exceed some amount of pressure will rupture, react with itself three times (simulating a runaway reaction?) and explode based off how much pressure was built up at the end. There are a few issues with the way this is done that make it a pain to work with.

## 1. Sharp Cutoff threshold

The tank will automatically explode once its pressure exceeds approximately 5066.25 kPa, as predefined. This means that one mix, Oxygen 200K plasma 1275K, will explode as a maxcap. Another mix, Oxygen 200K plasma 1400K, will explode at some rather weak power, a range of maybe 4-6. But Oxygen 200K plasma 1800K will explode strongly, at a range of 10-12. Why?

When the first mix approaches the cutoff threshold and reacts to 5060, it gets to react 4 times before exploding. Meanwhile, the second mix reacts to, say, 5070, and reacts 3 times before exploding. Because the reaction simulation is rather imprecise, this matters significantly to the resultant power of the explosion, which goes against intuition.

You can see this effect in the below chart, which graphs explosion power as a
color. Blue is a dud (0 range, no boom), while the hottest red is a maxcap (12, huge boom). The plasma tanks are always max pressure, and so are the oxygen tanks.
I won't speak on the ideal gas law as I am not well educated on physics regarding gases, but I can certainly say that these sudden changes in explosion power are due to consequences of imprecision in simulation, not real-life gas laws.

## 2. Issues with realism

Up until recently, a pocket oxygen tank (Volume: 3L) would explode from the same gas mix with the same power as a handheld tank (Volume: 70L). Exploding purely based off pressure just doesn't allow for the explosions to quite make sense, explosions *really* should take into account their contents, volume, and temperature - among other factors.

While the explosion obviously does not need to be 'just like real life', following real explosions more closely would make mechanics in game more intuitive and workable for players.

## 3. Lack of gas diversity / depth

There's really about one thing you can do to make a TTV explode. Add cold oxygen, and add hot plasma. Not much wiggle room for anything else, unless you put in a lot of effort. And for that, you have no reward -- it explodes just the same.

I would find it very interesting if fallout gas was obtainable and usable in a TTV to spread radition, for instance -- or if you can make more durable tanks out of bohrum / uqill to reach higher pressures, as you already can with the 1000L variants. (Did *you* know you could do that? Now you do.) And for higher pressures from those tanks, a larger explosion could certainly follow. (Simple change, just requires adjusting burst temperature of single handheld tanks to depend on density/hardness.)

Adding new gases to interact with the reaction between oxygen and plasma would be interesting as well, changing reaction speed / resultant power with their presence. While farts and agent b to this to some extent, it is so ignorable in TTVs that they are hardly worth experimenting with at this stage.

### Mini-problem: Hard to Understand
Just a side note that for players who don't have the time or desire to make spreadsheets, calculators, and graphs for toxins bombs, the whole deal can be very confusing and unintuitive. It should not be necessarily *easy* to make a max-cap bomb, but it should be an engaging puzzle more than a guessing game. One way to make this discovery process easier, I believe, would be to add a printout log from the bomb simulator, detailing the reaction pressure/temp/contents at each step before the explosion. This would allow players to see more in detail how a reaction occurs, without resorting to external resources.

## Summary

Tank explosions are pretty bland and weird right now, and could use with a touching-up to be more fun for the scientists who have a sizable amount of room and equipment to work with them.

Making a tank explosion more understandable and more accurate is a good first two steps, and making it more enjoyable to work with in the results would be all the better. Having toxins have some real depth to it - while it may never compare to chemistry next door - would do a lot to get scientists into that part of the department.