05-18-2019, 02:00 AM
I'd need to see which ships are specifically being referred to, but as a first approximation:
a) OA uses droplet radiator systems a good bit, so the radiators may be folded away when the ship is not under power and so not visible.
b) A sufficiently advanced drive in OA may use magmatter components which are effectively immune to any amount of waste heat the drive can produce, making radiators either much smaller or not needed. There is also an ongoing and occasional mention of neutrino cooling in the setting, although the canonicity and details of that is often debated.
c) OA is a project that is largely built on the evolution of ideas, including in its artwork. As such, earlier items may not include things because they weren't thought of at the time or because our conception of things has shifted and/or matured over time. Almost nothing in the setting has sprung into existence fully formed and then never had a need to be updated (those bits that appear to date from the start of the project without updating probably need it but have either been overlooked or we haven't gotten around to them yet - letting us know about an issue is usually the quickest way to resolve such a thing).
Todd
a) OA uses droplet radiator systems a good bit, so the radiators may be folded away when the ship is not under power and so not visible.
b) A sufficiently advanced drive in OA may use magmatter components which are effectively immune to any amount of waste heat the drive can produce, making radiators either much smaller or not needed. There is also an ongoing and occasional mention of neutrino cooling in the setting, although the canonicity and details of that is often debated.
c) OA is a project that is largely built on the evolution of ideas, including in its artwork. As such, earlier items may not include things because they weren't thought of at the time or because our conception of things has shifted and/or matured over time. Almost nothing in the setting has sprung into existence fully formed and then never had a need to be updated (those bits that appear to date from the start of the project without updating probably need it but have either been overlooked or we haven't gotten around to them yet - letting us know about an issue is usually the quickest way to resolve such a thing).
Todd