Rechent Developments.

[RoyalWolfe]

It's been a bit of a low period of late, so maybe its about time we start discussing some of the recent developments.

for those that aren't versed upon the latest news of starmade, Shceema has revealed quite a lot on what hes working on. one of those things is what he called the rail system. and hinted on this system being related to and involving docking. well in the sites chat I've personally asked him about this a long time back. about right after the new one accessible now at the bottom of the screen, which you are in fact, no doubt staring at right now.

He revealed that there was to be some revolutionary new changes to how docking types will work. This involved something else that will allow for moving parts on ships, he at the time called these joint blocks. in basic explanations these worked like turrets, however they did not ignore collisions as the turrets currently do. they also only moved in one axis at a time, so networked one could in theory build a skeleton framework with these joints to create basically a skeleton that could articulate. also with these one could build a real walking vehicle such as a giant robot. so if this all happens what would be the implications for starmade? well quite a lot really.

I think its time we start talking about it now so we can address likely issues which this change mite bring.

 

[Snk]

Mechs! All the mechs

 

[Viridis00]

Stop OP, you're getting me really hyped up. I want to believe, but I won't believe it until I see it.

In theory yes with moving parts we can make something with a movable frame, but how would the movements be controlled relative to the pilot? How would they differentiate when to move in gravity or zero-G? Imagine an AT-AT flailing around its legs in zero-G. That's just silly. We'd need programmable controls for the joints. Maybe that's where Lua would come in at some point in time? I love mecha and walkers, but I just don't want to get my hopes up, sorry for raining on the parade.

 

[jayman38]

Anybody have a degree in inverse kinematics? Anyone? Anyone? Beuller?

 

[DivineEvil]

Stop OP, you're getting me really hyped up. I want to believe, but I won't believe it until I see it.

In theory yes with moving parts we can make something with a movable frame, but how would the movements be controlled relative to the pilot? How would they differentiate when to move in gravity or zero-G? Imagine an AT-AT flailing around its legs in zero-G. That's just silly. We'd need programmable controls for the joints. Maybe that's where Lua would come in at some point in time? I love mecha and walkers, but I just don't want to get my hopes up, sorry for raining on the parade.

To be really honest I'm hyped up for the different vision. Imagine ships of different sizes with the "mode switch", that changes the shape of the ship and repositing turrets around. What if these will affect ship's physical properties like turning rate? Then if you can place your capital weapons on those movable parts, then you can turn your main guns to fire broadside or behind. What about stations? You can make all kinds of moveable stuff like shipyard robo-arms or construction cranes near a WIP module. And how much more life to stations and ships all this will give?

These thoughts hype me much more than mechs. There's not much space to walk on, unless you'd make a tournament for mech builders, and construct an arena for it, then it might be insteresting. But ships and stations... a whole new level of building tricks.

 

[Colt556]

I don't know much about rails but from what I've heard the only aspect I care about is hangar storage. You could keep drones on racks like those battledroids in Episode 1 and then move them out of their storage units into launch position. This would give ships the ability to carry a LOT of extra drones internally since they don't have to worry about ensuring the drones can launch into space from where they're held. Other than that I don't see any real game changing implications of rails, at least not based on what I've heard.

 

[Lecic]

Mechs would be cool, but I'm mainly excited by the on-ship elevators and moving doors I'll be able to make. Crusade made some great ones that work for STATIONS, but if that kind of stuff could work on ships...

 

[Deleted member 433088]

And here I was experimenting with push/pull beams on doorships to give my stations actually moving doors. Guess I'll just wait for the rail system now hahaha.

 

[El_Poulpy]

Anybody have a degree in inverse kinematics? Anyone? Anyone? Beuller?

I do, not exactly it's in robotics but i learned kinematics models, that's why i am skeptical with the possibility to use joints to make mechas. It becomes rapidly complex equations with singularity positions problems, it would be a pain to make a single leg and would be costly in CPU.

I made a suggestion some months ago on a possible solution to avoid this complexity

http://starmadedock.net/threads/a-suggestion-about-mechas-land-vehicles-robots-and-armor.889/