Mean vs Median in Planet Settings

[Daeridanii]

Hello everyone! Tell me, when you are setting up a new singleplayer (or maybe even multiplayer) universe, have you ever wondered why the planet sizes never deviate very much from the mean size? Well, it's because it's the mean size and everything is more likely to be sized similarly. In fact, if you set the mean size to 300 and the deviation to 250, you'd probably never see a planet with radius 400 or radius 200.
However, if you changed the average (mean) to the average (median,) you'll have an equal chance of getting a planet with r501 or r123.

WHY THIS SHOULD CHANGE TO MEDIAN:

1. More varied and interesting worlds: A planet with radius 50 is actually pretty cool (and a lot easier to build a ring around). But then, a planet with radius 500 is also interesting (and a bit less easy on the computer). Wouldn't it be even better to see them side by side in the same universe?
2. More intuitive: At a glance, setting the average size to 300 and the deviation to 250 seems like you're going to get big and small planets - but probably not.

Of course, there might be a few drawbacks - so make it an optional feature. "Median based planet generation: YES or NO."

So yes? No? Maybe?

 

[nightrune]

Sounds fine to me, the devs should think about this when they redo generation.

 

[Pacific_Jim]

A range should be definable tbh.

 

[KillaKrazy]

I think you are a bit confused on normal distribution and standard deviation.

 

[Jarraff]

You are not describing the median the median is simply the middle value in a list of numbers orderd from highest to lowest or lowest to highest.

You are describing a system where you determine a range of planet sizes then an RNG decides what each planets radius is.

 

[Madman198237]

You seem to want a functional range as opposed to what we have, which (Though I've never messed with it) appears to be a heavily weighted range. As in, the "mean" is really trying hard to be the mode and is therefore not the center of distribution, but rather tries to appear more often than it should.

 

[KillaKrazy]

You seem to want a functional range as opposed to what we have, which (Though I've never messed with it) appears to be a heavily weighted range. As in, the "mean" is really trying hard to be the mode and is therefore not the center of distribution, but rather tries to appear more often than it should.

The way it is set up now is that the planet sizes are based off of normal distribution and standard deviation. I.E. "if you set the mean size to 300 and the deviation to 250" 68.2% of all the planets will fall within 50-550 radius. Unfortunately a single player will most likely not be able to visit a large enough sampling of planets to see the distribution lay out. Therefore, leading them to incorrectly believe that the planet sizes do not vary.