Sol System EXPANDED

[AdmiralTigerclaw]

Hey, who's our in house mapper?

I have a mission for him.

A complete Sol System, with as many objects as can be found, for the future of the Stellar Frontier project.

What I would like to see, is, using this.  Create a semi-realistic map of the sol system (I say SEMI because it won't be to scale.)

Terrestrial planets and moons would be habitable, asteroids would not.  This way, we have a template map for when the project advances a little.

Here's where to get the LIST. 

Main list of solar system objects.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Solar_System_objects

List of noteworthy asteroids
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_noteworthy_asteroids

Don't forget to also look at the Kuiper belt, and Scattered disk objects. 

It would be cool to have a nice wide map of the Sol System in which you have all sorts of out-of-the-way objects to check out.

Especially in the future game version where minors such as these would be excelent places to build 'asteroid mines' and gates and stations.

[Mobious]

So like, how many objects? Yikes - I suppose you would want it a moving map to make it more interesting too.

[NiteHawk]

A moving map would be interesting if it wasn't super quick as it currently is kinda insanely silly and AI get annoyed by it specially when trying to chase an asteriod..

I may try to add reverse rotations too, which would be cool for now someone can just mark it as "REVERSE" in a text, then I can have it reveresed later.. :p

I'd like to see a super slow map, something that is noticable.. For example, 1 hour = a full rotation.. or 2 hours.

Right now its like.. What? 10 minutes?.. I'd say 2 hours would be a nice one.. even more if needed.

[AdmiralTigerclaw]

I'm thinking, all propperly named objects.   The serial numbered objects can be ignored.

There are several THOUSAND charted objects in the Solar System... but only the larger ones are really named.

However it'll be nice to see Saturn with it's sixteen plus moons, and trans neptunian objects...  All placed according to my new mapping rules.

And yes, set to moving orbits.  But I would make sure the orbit speed is something like   1/20 of what it is now, so that things only really seem to move anywhere over the course of an hour.

This map would eventually replace Sol System as the main sol system map in later builds when asteroids are treated as supply points rather than colony points.

[ChillFactor]

hoy about this: scale the speed so Earth finished an orbit in 365 minutes... with that the entire system will look more realistic, since merc and venus will finish orbit first.. no?

[AdmiralTigerclaw]

Six hour earth loop eh?  A bit long if you ask me... I don't think actual active games last that long.


Well first we need to understand what the 'rad' distance value is.
                                 
Planet      Earth          0.2       *       1.0    1.0  Earth          300   70   1.0    100  100
Moon       Luna           250       *       1.0    0.0  Luna           300    0   .15    100  100

The distance 0.2 and 250 here.   I'm not sure what units they use for each, but one is for planets (and everything else) and the other is for moons. 

That being said, if we don't know what units it outputs in, we can't math out times.

If we know the units (prefferably in PIXELS), we can then calc the circumference and figure out what the speed of revolution is and be able to slap down the math for it.

[Staker]

Some games last that long if there is a challenge in the game instead of hearing everyone cry that they are there for kills and nothing more...

Anaxis Main Rule:
Keep Moving.

[NiteHawk]

Some games last that long if there is a challenge in the game instead of hearing everyone cry that they are there for kills and nothing more...

Anaxis Main Rule:
Keep Moving.

True, a proper game should last at least a couple hours if theres a acceptable amount of AI as well.

365 sounds like alot still however. I'd say instead of 6 hours, make it 2-3 hours for general stuff. However the player can see and change as they see fit, not like we limit them for that case.

However, if there is a challange, normally its very tough to win, and yes, it can last very long. But a good 3 hour rotation seems more fitting. I believe planets will also reset so we'd want them at least to go 'almost' once.

AI cannot really handle fast rotations either, they have a horrible time trying to drop colonies on small asteroids atm, and it's not worth fixing just yet until some other things are worked on.

[Sandtrooper]

Hey, who's our in house mapper?

I have a mission for him.

A complete Sol System, with as many objects as can be found, for the future of the Stellar Frontier project.

I am.
I will tackle this challenge.

Heres my progress so far:


Positions of planets (currently in a "test" position placement). It takes at least 1 minute to get to the Trans-Neptunian Objects from Saturn.
 

Jupiter, enlarged (a step above 256x, its now 512x (for this mod) to make it look "big" as it should be)

Saturn & it's Moons
^{(Currently 15 moons, 4 uninhabitable. They are all lined up like that because for testing, and it would look odd if they were further apart. Saturn is larger as well (a 768x768 bitmap, stock was 480x480. Titan is still the biggest populated object)}


Uranus with rings (They're supposed to be fainter but I can't really get that to work. Uranus retains it's size, 208x208, same size as Neptune)


Trans-Neptunian Objects
Eris (62x62)
Makemake (42x42)
Haumea (48x48)

The thing thats gunna kill me is the Asteroids.

[AdmiralTigerclaw]

Once you got the tests worked out, don't forget to apply the System Swaths model key.  This will ensure a nice open feel.

I have one addendum to make to the Model key, and that's about distance between planet swaths.  When setting the distance between two planet swaths, the larger of the two bordering ones should be used.  As in the case with jupiter and mars.  If you used Mars' swath to set distance, you'd probably end up with Jupiter's swath overlapping it anyway because of it's extreme size.


Anyway, some things to note.

As far as any unnamed asteroids go, just name them 'rock' .  Because that's about all they are.

Of note, the asteroids for the future game features will be used for asteroid mines, not colonies, so if you just want to copy-pasta a bunch of blank 'no-life' stats all over the board, go ahead.

Some object notes I must cite though, are the Jupiter trojans, one set at each of Jupiter's orbital lagrange points sixty degrees up and down orbit from jupiter proper.  I'm not sure how much you went through, but I kind of randomly started wiki surfing the sol system after I finished posting, found some really neat setups.   

I don't think the Jup Trojans will really work in SF's orbital system though.  Any asteroid on a different orbital radius from jupiter will go slower or faster.

Really, I could be stating stuff I don't need to because you know what I had in mind.  But I must emphasize that once done with the test system, the System Model Key I developed be implemented.  (Though, I think you understand that too...)

EDIT: What you've got done looks REALLY good by the way.  Keep it up.  Soon we'll have a new SOL SYSTEM to be the REAL Sol System of this game.

EDIT 2: Waituminute!

If we're in control of the code, maybe I should just suggest we have a new object locked into place.  'Lagrange points'.   A step out from moons.  OBjects will follow a planet around in it's orbit and have a position based on where the planet is.  I'll have to think about.

[NiteHawk]

So far all I can say is good work, it looks good Sandtrooper. The next patch solving a few things (Including docking) should be out soon too. Hopefully if we sync it up we can throw it all out together

[Sandtrooper]

Jupiter with all 62(!) moons:



SF controls the placement of all but the Galilean moons. "SJ-2" is the most distant moon.
All moons (not the Galilean group) are under 12 pixels in size, I'll make a 4x4 pixel asteroid bitmap to make them smaller (due to their size ranging from 80 to 2 KM in size).

[Mobious]

lol... interesting point - might need to make an outpost type colony.... =P

[Sandtrooper]

Saturn with all 60 moons



Saturn didn't render as I wanted to...     (a 768x768 sized bitmap)
SF controls almost all placement except for Dione & Tethys, due to the asteroids that follow and lead past the two moons.
Unnamed moons are slapped with "SS-#"
The rest of the moons after Phoebe are 4x4 pixels as they're below 30 KM in size.

[Sandtrooper]

Something that works:

Asteroid Moons



Both tiny rocks orbit Aster 87.