Sigh. Grinding a battery doesn't give the power cells back.

[JasonB]

Good thing I ground up my only battery to find that out, now I have to start a new game.

[GameGibu]

Welcome to Space Engineers.

[DrEarlInsanity]

is to keep ya from having magic powered ships. If they gave them back ya could just a battery up'n place it again.

[Hominin]

Originally posted by DrEarlInsanity:

is to keep ya from having magic powered ships. If they gave them back ya could just a battery up'n place it again.

if that is the real reason, it is a pretty stupid reason. to capture anything, you need to grind it down to hack level and weld it back up. can't do that with disappearing components. so we basically have a block you can't capture and it is an exception to the rule. any exceptions to rules only create problems so isn't something that should be done for trivial reasons. nothing counts as cheating in a game like this, if you want magic powered ships, you can just use a mod or a script.. or give yourself massive amounts of fuel.. i hope KSH doesn't follow a path of trying to restrict player actions, that is the quickest way to destroy a sandbox game.

[Orthopaktis]

There are mods to remove the restrictions and instead make all new batteries empty in charge.

[Sabre One]

Originally posted by Hominin:

Originally posted by DrEarlInsanity:

is to keep ya from having magic powered ships. If they gave them back ya could just a battery up'n place it again.

if that is the real reason, it is a pretty stupid reason. to capture anything, you need to grind it down to hack level and weld it back up. can't do that with disappearing components. so we basically have a block you can't capture and it is an exception to the rule. any exceptions to rules only create problems so isn't something that should be done for trivial reasons. nothing counts as cheating in a game like this, if you want magic powered ships, you can just use a mod or a script.. or give yourself massive amounts of fuel.. i hope KSH doesn't follow a path of trying to restrict player actions, that is the quickest way to destroy a sandbox game.

You don't need to capture batteries, as they provide power to a grid regardless. As the previous guy said, you can either mod the restrictions away, or you can play in creative. Survival is a specific game mode with specific mechanics and rules.

[lbhgaming]

I know it doesn´t spawn that often , but "The Pilgrim´s Cuiosity" ´s jumpdrive does give back the power cells , so you can build or repair your batteries . And if you have started on an easy map with the large red and blue ship , they too give power cells back from the jumpdrive .

You don´t need any mods for this .

[VanGoghComplex]

This change was made alongside the decision to have batteries start off with a 30% charge. Batteries used to start with no charge at all, though you could get power cells back.

It does make sense though. The exploit is obvious if you can just grind and rebuild your battery to charge it to 30%.

[Metametheus]

If we want to talk realistic then grinding a power cell would probably either electricute and or splash acid in your face...
But there are a lot of people that love to exploit limitless power without a reactor, and this was implemented to reduce that.

[JasonB]

May just be me, but it would make a lot more sense and be a lot less irritating if batteries simply built with no charge. It would be less of an inconvenience to just have to minimally charge the battery before I can roll my creation off the shop floor.

Realizing I needed to move a couple batteries, then finding out it bricks all my battery cells is a huge setback when you're just starting out and all you have is your starter ship, you're set down on a planet already and haven't even begun to find any mining resources.

So yeah, I don't know, the solution seems pretty obvious to me. Make built batteries start with no charge. It's not hard to charge a battery - stick a reactor or solar panel on to get your first charge, then you can do all future charges using a connector.

[VanGoghComplex]

Originally posted by JasonB:

May just be me, but it would make a lot more sense and be a lot less irritating if batteries simply built with no charge. It would be less of an inconvenience to just have to minimally charge the battery before I can roll my creation off the shop floor.

Realizing I needed to move a couple batteries, then finding out it bricks all my battery cells is a huge setback when you're just starting out and all you have is your starter ship, you're set down on a planet already and haven't even begun to find any mining resources.

So yeah, I don't know, the solution seems pretty obvious to me. Make built batteries start with no charge. It's not hard to charge a battery - stick a reactor or solar panel on to get your first charge, then you can do all future charges using a connector.

What if you're just starting out and you don't have the resources for a reactor or solar panel? Same boat, different dock.

I think Keen is working on a revamp of batteries though. The battery blocks will just be housings, and the cells will be inventory items that hold a charge like oxygen bottles. So you build your battery rover, go pick up some cells from the battery block on your station, and pop them into the battery block on your rover... you're good to go.

[dga8705]

That would be a nice change VanGogh.

Also, large ship batteries can be hacked and only lose 3 power cells. Use the base level grinder, and just be careful. It still requires power cells, but not nearly as many compared to grinding down the whole thing. I got very good at this playing Escape From Mars by DuckRoll. I would hack them, then grind the blocks around them, lift them off the ground, put a merge block on, and add them to my rover based ship.

As to the people that said don't bother hacking them, the problem comes with base defenses blasting batteries on your ship everytime you come near.